LIVE A LIVE

2026-08-26

I've been playing the Live-A-Live remake, which is a vignette jRPG that features multiple short stories, essentially. The stories do not appear to be connected, and each puts its own twist on combat.

I heard about this game years ago and never got around to playing the translation patch. It's an interesting experience, and that's probably the best mindset to have going into it. The modern storyline was very short and linear, but I appreciated the ending. The Edo chapter was a bit longer and the map is really sprawling, so there are definitely things I missed. I think it ultimately depends on if you enjoy less straightforward jRPGs and are willing to try something different.

2026-09-01

Currently playing through the Wild West chapter of Live-a-Live, which has some unexpectedly colorful dialogue. The game offers a few false dialogue options (the cowboy can say, "..." or whatever the game wants you to say, and it loops until you do the thing) but I get why they offer the option even though it's a kinetic story. It's a Seven Samurai type setup. I've gotten through the prologue, but haven't started prepping the town for the showdown.

2026-09-03

Finished up the Wild West chapter. You have the option of setting traps by giving the townfolk various items. Each person takes a different amount of time to set their trap(s) but this was no issue. After the traps were set there was some downtime before the baddies showed up.

While blowing up the Crazy Gang, quite literally, was entertaining, I found this chapter overall to be kinda meh. The story isn't interesting or novel, the gameplay is a bit tedious (you simply run around to every house, pick up whatever items are there, and run back to assign traps), and the ending is, well. Weird. Watching bandits and their horses get launched across the screen repeatedly was definitely the highlight. I didn't mean to kill Mad Dog (I assumed Sundown would let him, go, just as he did in their first duel) but I'm not sure I want to reload and replay the chapter to change that.