Great video! Live A Live is one of my favorite games, but I agree with everything that you said. The ideas are great, but the execution is inconsistent. While I played it, I couldn't shake the feeling that the game felt like a prototype. The systems not important to the overarching story (items, equipment, combat) felt underdeveloped. Also, some stories and characters are more developed than others. It's hard to care about, say, Masaru, when I know nothing about him other than he wants to be the strongest and he fights clean, and that's it. He's a white-meat babyface. Boring. Pogo and Cube show way more character and they're silent. What gives? One way I would solve the problem of "making the battle system more complicated" is to either introduce more elements in each chapter's boss or in the final chapter, in which you'll spend the majority or your play-time anyway. The highlight for me was the end of the Middle Ages chapter and the final chapter. Oersted's twist is so good, it elevates the whole game for me. I like it when my expectations are subverted like that. I guess I'm a story guy. I'd love a sequel where the chapters are a little bit longer and equally developed. Who knows if that'll ever happen.
Thanks for commenting! It would be cool if they made another game like this but developed everything further and more evenly. I think the game is more of a proof of concept than a full blown game in terms of the ideas it develops. In that regard it reminds me of that Atlus game Catherine, but I think Catherine benefitted from just focusing on its aesthetics, branching visual novel plot and puzzle gameplay and thoroughly developing these. I like games that subvert expectations with plots and stuff. I've been meaning to replay KotOR 2 for that reason (I played it as a kid but the weird subversive plot went over my head) and I really respect MGS2 for the same reason. I'm just not as excited by the plot in the Middle Ages because I'm just not that into fantasy tropes.
I love Super Castlevania IV. I got interested in older stuff from watching AVGN and so Castlevania II was my first NES game and Castlevania IV was my first SNES game. Good times!
@@HereComesTheGame Castlevania 2 was your first?? Thank god we live in the Information Age!! Try getting through that thing in the blind. I sure as shit didn’t. And none of my friends could either. Thank god for Nintendo Power
THANK YOU! I see NOTHING but amazing reviews but never get into WHY it's so good. This will help me decide if it's really something I would enjoy. It looks like a precursor to Saga Frontier (and I guess by extension Octopath Traveler) except your characters don't meet each other throughout their own stories AND also don't have their own combat mechanics? Sigh, they were that close.
I'm happy I could help. I haven't seen many reviews of the game but since it is kind of niche I feel like a lot of people just covered it at release to be relevant with a new release. So as a natural consequence reviews tend to be somewhat surface level and may be colored by the hype for a new game unconsciously. People really liked this game at the time, I think. It's all subjective, so I'm happy they had fun but I just didn't dig it. I'm not wrong, and neither are they. Different strokes for different folks, as they say. Seemed like most people who cared enough to review it were really hyped though, so I thought maybe I could offer a different perspective.
I didn't like the idea of short stories to be honest so it wasn't for me either. It means the game feel like 5 short game instead one large game the way other RPGs are going deep into details
I think the short story thing could work but I felt that having so many meant the ideas were spread really thin. This game reminds me of Catherine in that it's really experimental, except Catherine just focuses on three things the whole time (aesthetics/graphics, the story and the puzzle gameplay) so it's able to flesh everything out.
I couldn't get through the demo. I'm blanking on why I felt bored but the big deal breaker was the menu. A slow transition to a gleaming white menu with lighting and some particle effects which made me squint my eyes because the scene was set at night. If someone is gonna make a slow menu that hurts my eyes, I'm done. It's an RPG. I'm probably going to spend a good bit of time on the menu.
Yeah a menu that hurts to look at in a JRPG is a bit of a deal breaker. It didn't really bother me but if it bothers someone like it did bother you, that's pretty much ruined it at that point.
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I’ve only done about three chapters. I’ve got to get back to that game. I have to get back to a lot of games
I felt that in my soul. I've got a couple of games I'm working on recording for reviews so I need to get back to that.
Great video! Live A Live is one of my favorite games, but I agree with everything that you said. The ideas are great, but the execution is inconsistent. While I played it, I couldn't shake the feeling that the game felt like a prototype. The systems not important to the overarching story (items, equipment, combat) felt underdeveloped.
Also, some stories and characters are more developed than others. It's hard to care about, say, Masaru, when I know nothing about him other than he wants to be the strongest and he fights clean, and that's it. He's a white-meat babyface. Boring. Pogo and Cube show way more character and they're silent. What gives?
One way I would solve the problem of "making the battle system more complicated" is to either introduce more elements in each chapter's boss or in the final chapter, in which you'll spend the majority or your play-time anyway.
The highlight for me was the end of the Middle Ages chapter and the final chapter. Oersted's twist is so good, it elevates the whole game for me. I like it when my expectations are subverted like that. I guess I'm a story guy.
I'd love a sequel where the chapters are a little bit longer and equally developed. Who knows if that'll ever happen.
Thanks for commenting! It would be cool if they made another game like this but developed everything further and more evenly. I think the game is more of a proof of concept than a full blown game in terms of the ideas it develops. In that regard it reminds me of that Atlus game Catherine, but I think Catherine benefitted from just focusing on its aesthetics, branching visual novel plot and puzzle gameplay and thoroughly developing these.
I like games that subvert expectations with plots and stuff. I've been meaning to replay KotOR 2 for that reason (I played it as a kid but the weird subversive plot went over my head) and I really respect MGS2 for the same reason. I'm just not as excited by the plot in the Middle Ages because I'm just not that into fantasy tropes.
Love that super Castlevania 4 music towards the end. Miss those days
I love Super Castlevania IV. I got interested in older stuff from watching AVGN and so Castlevania II was my first NES game and Castlevania IV was my first SNES game. Good times!
@@HereComesTheGame Castlevania 2 was your first?? Thank god we live in the Information Age!! Try getting through that thing in the blind. I sure as shit didn’t. And none of my friends could either. Thank god for Nintendo Power
Yeah the Internet helped a lot.
THANK YOU! I see NOTHING but amazing reviews but never get into WHY it's so good. This will help me decide if it's really something I would enjoy. It looks like a precursor to Saga Frontier (and I guess by extension Octopath Traveler) except your characters don't meet each other throughout their own stories AND also don't have their own combat mechanics? Sigh, they were that close.
I'm happy I could help. I haven't seen many reviews of the game but since it is kind of niche I feel like a lot of people just covered it at release to be relevant with a new release. So as a natural consequence reviews tend to be somewhat surface level and may be colored by the hype for a new game unconsciously.
People really liked this game at the time, I think. It's all subjective, so I'm happy they had fun but I just didn't dig it. I'm not wrong, and neither are they. Different strokes for different folks, as they say. Seemed like most people who cared enough to review it were really hyped though, so I thought maybe I could offer a different perspective.
I didn't like the idea of short stories to be honest so it wasn't for me either.
It means the game feel like 5 short game instead one large game the way other RPGs are going deep into details
I think the short story thing could work but I felt that having so many meant the ideas were spread really thin. This game reminds me of Catherine in that it's really experimental, except Catherine just focuses on three things the whole time (aesthetics/graphics, the story and the puzzle gameplay) so it's able to flesh everything out.
I couldn't get through the demo. I'm blanking on why I felt bored but the big deal breaker was the menu. A slow transition to a gleaming white menu with lighting and some particle effects which made me squint my eyes because the scene was set at night. If someone is gonna make a slow menu that hurts my eyes, I'm done. It's an RPG. I'm probably going to spend a good bit of time on the menu.
Yeah a menu that hurts to look at in a JRPG is a bit of a deal breaker. It didn't really bother me but if it bothers someone like it did bother you, that's pretty much ruined it at that point.
@@HereComesTheGame I'm glad you get me. Sometimes I'm convinced I'm an old grump who doesn't know what's good lol.