Like A Dragon: Infinite Wealth Dondoko Island guide: How to earn $500,000 and break the economy

GamesActionLike a Dragon: Infinite WealthLike A Dragon: Infinite Wealth Dondoko Island guide: How to earn $500,000 and break the economyWhen you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission.Here’s how it works.

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(Image credit: Sega)

Like a Dragon: Dondoko Island guide

If you’re a normal player who just wants to take the game at your own pace, this is probably not for you. Dondoko Island is best experienced slowly, dipped into occasionally as you work your way through the story. But if you’re trying to speed through the plot and want a massive cash boost (around $500,000 at a point where $10,00 is a major amount) plus Ichiban’s most powerful all-target special attack, Dondoko is where you can get it done, fast.

Here’s everything I learned while racing through the game for review: A loose eight step guide on turning Dondoko Island into a five-star island, even if it looks like hell.

1. How to find Dondoko Island

(Image credit: Sega)

Like a Dragon: Dondoko Island guide

You can’t miss it. Shortly after the start of Chapter 6’s main story, a series of unusual events involving a giant tortoise and a pair ofmuppety B-tier Japanese TV mascotswill play out, leaving Ichiban deep in minigame territory with a new quest to turn a garbage-filled island into a glorious five-star resort.

You’ll have to play through the first couple tutorial days of this to return to the main game, but from there you can come and go as you please via the dolphin found on Dondoko Island’s southern beach. Dondoko remains frozen in time when you’re back in the main game, but you can pick up crafting recipes and guests for it in Honolulu.

When leaving via the dolphin, you can also cash out your Dondoko Bucks (the currency of the island) for USD usable back in the main game, but you probably shouldn’t. You’re honestly not going to make much doing so. Definitely a pittance compared to the combined payouts for all the star upgrades you can put those bucks towards intead.

2. Putting the fun in fundamentals

(Image credit: Sega)

Like a Dragon: Dondoko Island guide

Time flows a lot faster on Dondoko Island than in the main game. You’ve got around 15-20 minutes each in-game day to finish up everything you want to do, and once you have guests on the island, you’ve got three days per set of visitors to make a good impression. You’ll be juggling trash collecting, bug-collecting, fishing, smacking around a gang of litterbug pirates (via a very simple action combat system), crafting new decorations and placing them around the map.

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None of it’s too demanding and the tutorial covers the basics well. But we’re here to move fast, break things and secure Ichiban a very large (yet still finite) source of wealth, and so our goal is just to complete each of the certification board’s checklists for each new star. If you optimize and min-max the process, it should be doable in just under an in-game month, or (in my case) one obsessive eight-hour session.

3. People? No. Garbage? Yes!

(Image credit: Sega)

Like a Dragon: Dondoko Island guide

Ichiban is a people person. Of course he’d want to run the most popular, friendly resort island possible, but that’s not why we’re here. Until you’ve got a five-star resort, the income you’ll make from sending home happy guests is minimal, so instead we’re chasing that coveted five-star certification and the big cash bonus that comes with it—a cumulative half million, if you do all five stars in a row. To do that, we need two things:trashandcash.

Withtrash, you can craft new objects, which raise Ichiban’s builder rank, which in turn lets you build bigger things and eventually start replicating buildings straight from Kamurocho and Yokohama. These buildings are the fastest way to increase your island’s Satisfaction rating, but can also be sold for fat stacks of money, enabling you to unlock more areas of the island quickly. In short, trash is the cornerstone of your economic machine.

(Image credit: Sega)

Like a Dragon: Dondoko Island guide

Once you’ve got your stockpile cleared, head to any of the purple trash pile areas on the map and clear everything that’s there, including enemies. The more times you completely clear an area like this, the lower it’ll push the price to convert it to a buildable area, and redirect all those trash spawns straight into your recycling pile each day. Also make sure you whack a bunch of trees and rocks, as early structures demand a lot of both of these.

4. Ichiban the ascetic

(Image credit: Sega)

Like a Dragon: Dondoko Island guide

The island comes with a home for Ichiban. A spartan little hovel, really, that youcanupgrade into a respectably big house, but probably don’t need to. It’s expensive, and the only mechanical advantage you get from making his house bigger is increasing the space for furniture.

Put enough expensive furniture in there (even if you just pile it in like it’s a long neglected IKEA backroom) and you’ll extend Ichiban’s health bar, but the combat on Dondoko Island is so trivial that you can cruise through it with just the default three hearts, restocked at the start of each day.

5. Magpie mindset

(Image credit: Sega)

Like a Dragon: Dondoko Island guide

To reach each new Star goal on Dondoko Island, you primarily need to hitSatisfactionandPopularitytargets.

An Infinite Wealth of guides(Image credit: Sega)-Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth combat tips-Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth money farming guide-Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth vocational school answers-Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth Sujimon guide

An Infinite Wealth of guides

(Image credit: Sega)-Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth combat tips-Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth money farming guide-Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth vocational school answers-Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth Sujimon guide

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Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth review

-Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth combat tips-Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth money farming guide-Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth vocational school answers-Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth Sujimon guide

In short, grab everything that’s not nailed down, and feel free to sell most of it. Only a handful of items such as Red/Green Dondoko bugs (which can be brewed into Sake to give as a gift to boost guest happiness) and Dinosaur/Yeti fossils (same deal, and can also be used to DIY up some high-level decorative items) are really useful to keep around. Fish can all be sold, although waiting until you’ve bumped up their popularity for the cash boost also helps.

6. A little help from my friends

(Image credit: Sega)

Like a Dragon: Dondoko Island guide

Around the mid-point on your way to fame and five-star fortune, you’ll unlock the Dondoko Farm area, accessible via a raft from Dondoko’s western beach. You should check in on it regularly. You can assign your Sujimon from the main game to gather resources or generate Dondoko Bucks in real-time here. Just set them to work on the largest hauls, match the elemental types to the jobs requested and they’ll get it done—it won’t cost you any money or much time.

The farm island also contains an eternally respawning pile of golden trash-bags—one of the few areas to find them even after clearing the island entirely. A good spot for gathering some extra trash, plus a bunch of rare mineral pickups scattered around the trash plateau. A good location to work into your daily trash-harvesting patrol routine.

7. Spend money to make money

(Image credit: Sega)

Like a Dragon: Dondoko Island guide

While any spare Dondoko bucks you’ve got should immediately be invested in unlocking new areas as soon as possible, there are a few other things that are worth spending money on. Getting at least the second tier bat, bug net and fishing spear upgrades (in that order) can greatly speed up resource gathering.

Beyond that, the big investment you’ll want to make is in farming structures, sold in the ‘exclusive Matayoshiya furnishings’ section of the general store. Scroll on over to the’etc' paneland you’ll find structures like Burnable Waste Dumps and Woodworking Areas.

These structures passively generate extra resources in your recycling pile every single day, and I highly recommend buying and placing them ASAP. Just find a corner of your island to designate as your recycling plot and just place them down en-masse, as close to one another as possible. No need to connect them to roads, even. It’s ugly, butveryprofitable.

Another good investment unlocked later in the Dondoko campaign: TV advertisements. Buy one and it’ll immediately increase your Popularity and add a few new potential guests to your visitors list. While not cheap, it’s an easy way to speed yourself towards those last couple stars if you’re having trouble boosting Popularity.

8. Five-star throwdown

(Image credit: Sega)

Like a Dragon: Dondoko Island guide

The final challenge on Dondoko Island comes after you’ve cleared out every region, hit the final Satisfaction and Popularity goals and talked to Matayoshiya. Your final goal is to take down all of the Washbucklers. All of the bosses, all of the grunts and the big bad himself.

With that battle squared away, you’ll be rewarded with your five-star certification, an additional $300,000 in ‘real’ money (which combined with the other star ratings adds up to a half million), and the new Essence Of Dondoko Beam attack for Ichiban, usable in all of his jobs. For a hefty 100 MP, you can blast every enemy on the map with an orbital laser strike filled with tropical vacation vibes. And yes, it’s a shameless reskin of the one you got in Ichiban’s previous game.

(Image credit: Sega)

Like a Dragon: Dondoko Island guide

Is it worth it? Eh, maybe. But now that you’ve maxed out your building level and resort rank, you’re free to either return to Honolulu with more money than you know what to do with, or chill out on Dondoko Island all you please. Maybe you can start running your island paradise like a resort, instead of some kind of freakish get-rich-quick trash disposal scheme. Sounds like something only a villain would do.

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1. How to find Dondoko Island#

2. Putting the fun in fundamentals#

The biggest gaming news, reviews and hardware deals#

3. People? No. Garbage? Yes!#

4. Ichiban the ascetic#

5. Magpie mindset#

6. A little help from my friends#

7. Spend money to make money#

8. Five-star throwdown#

1. How to find Dondoko Island

2. Putting the fun in fundamentals

The biggest gaming news, reviews and hardware deals

3. People? No. Garbage? Yes!

4. Ichiban the ascetic

5. Magpie mindset

6. A little help from my friends

7. Spend money to make money

8. Five-star throwdown