As we detailed in a previous article, Sega and Yakuza Studio's Project Judge has characters voiced by famous Japanese actors, with some characters directly modeled on the actors. Sega published multiple interviews of these actors, sharing their impressions on the game's recording, face and motion capture.

The first video focuses on ex-SMAP member Takuya Kimura, who plays Project Judge's hero, Takayuki Yagami. We get to see one of Kimura-san's recording session, face-capture session, and a motion-capture session.  Kimura-san really put his soul in the game, so even fans of him who never played games can definitely enjoy Project Judge.

The second interview video is of Shosuke Tanihara, who plays the brilliant but arrogant police detective Mitsuru Kuroiwa. Tanihara-san accepted the role immediately after hearing about it, seeing how enthusiastic the game's staff was, and signed his contract after their second meeting. He was a bit nervous during the face-capture as the data taken would be recreated as is in the game, but everything went well. As for the recording, he says it was really fun and to look forward to the game, as surprising developments will happen between Takayuki and Mitsuru as they investigate the same serial murder case.

The third interview is of Pierre Taki, who plays the yakuza leader Kyohei Hamura. As he turned 51 years old this year, he always felt like he grew-up along with the video games industry, so he's really happy to appear in a Sega game. Kyohei is one of the antagonistic characters in the game, but as the story progresses, you might realize he has his own reasons and sense of justice as well.

The fourth interview is of Kenichi Takito, who plays detective Kazuya Ayabe. Takito-san really got into the role and had a great time working on the game. He adds that Kazuya seems like a useless lazy guy but is in truth extremely competent, and a precious source of information on the underworld society for our hero Takayuki.

The fifth and final interview is of Akira Nakao, who plays Takashi Genda, the father figure of Takayuki and the boss of his old attorney agency. As he turned past 75 years old this year, and as he's never really been into games, when he heard about the job from his manager he was both really interested and slightly nervous about it. Nakao-san says that his character Genda-san is a veteran attorney, so he definitely had to get his hands dirty during his long career. Nakao-san acted in a way that shows that grey area, humanistic part of the character, so you'll definitely enjoy his story.

You can watch all five interviews below. If you want to know more about Project Judge, you can watch our playthrough of the demo currently available on the Japanese PS Store. You can read more about the characters and game systems here. You can also check the game's latest trailers and commercials.

Project Judge is a PS4 exclusive. The game releases on December 13th in Japan and in 2019 in the west.