SEGA and RGG Studio have released the Stranger Than Heaven Act 2 Kure trailer, and it is the most brutal look at the game yet. The Act 2: Kure Story Trailer follows protagonist Makoto Daito to the port city of Kure, Hiroshima, in 1929, where a single act of violence pulls him into the yakuza underworld — and where he earns the name that will define him: the Red Oni.
STRANGER THAN HEAVEN launches January 15, 2027 on PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S, PC via Steam and the Microsoft Store, and Xbox Cloud, and it will be available on Xbox Game Pass on day one. The game is a 50-year saga told across five cities and five eras, from 1915 to 1965, with each chapter following Daito through a different stage of his life. Kure in 1929 is the second stop.
The new trailer opens on Kure, a naval port city, in 1929. Daito joins the Iwaki family after an attack on its patriarch, Genzo Iwaki, and from there his rise begins. He receives the ceremonial sake cup — the ritual that marks him as a member of the family — and starts climbing the ranks of the organization. But the trailer makes it clear that the climb comes at a cost: Daito becomes known as the “Red Oni,” and as the name sticks, he is forced to wrestle with the life he has chosen and confront the choices he has made.
That tension — between loyalty and regret, ambition and consequence — is the heart of the trailer, and it is exactly the kind of character-driven crime drama RGG Studio has built its reputation on. The studio’s Like a Dragon series has spent two decades turning yakuza stories into sprawling, deeply human epics, and STRANGER THAN HEAVEN looks like its most ambitious swing yet: not one city and one era, but five of each, spanning half a century of Japanese history.
Act 1 took Daito to Kokura, and its story trailer set the tone for the saga. Act 2 moves the story to Kure and turns the screws. SEGA says more trailers are on the way, each one focusing on Daito’s life in a different city — so Kure is only the second chapter of a much longer story. With three cities and three eras still to be revealed, the shape of the full saga is only just coming into focus.
What makes the Kure chapter hit so hard is how grounded it feels. The trailer is packed with period detail — the streets of a 1929 naval port, the rituals of the yakuza family, the weight of the sake cup ceremony — and Daito’s transformation into the Red Oni is presented not as a triumph but as a turning point. He is willing to do whatever it takes for the sake of the organization, and the trailer asks what that willingness will cost him.
For players, the wait is now just two months. STRANGER THAN HEAVEN arrives January 15, 2027, and with Game Pass day one, Xbox players will be able to step into Daito’s story the moment it launches. PlayStation 5 and PC players can pre-order or wishlist now. If the Act 2 trailer is any indication, RGG Studio is building something special — a crime epic that spans fifty years, five cities, and one man’s descent into the underworld.
RGG Studio’s latest is shaping up to be one of the biggest releases of early 2027, and the Act 2 trailer is the clearest sign yet of just how dark Daito’s journey is going to get. Kure, 1929. The Red Oni is born. January 15 cannot come soon enough.
Stay with Proven Gamer for more on STRANGER THAN HEAVEN as the remaining act trailers arrive — including our coverage of Like a Dragon: Pirate Yakuza in Hawaii joining the PlayStation Plus Game Catalog and GTA VI pre-load going live on PS5.
Follow Proven Gamer: X/Twitter | Facebook | Bluesky | Twitch | YouTube | Patreon | TikTok | Instagram | Threads | Discord
