Live-a-Live #11 - Mech Suit Mayhem

Our heroes have no choice but to flee from the evil laboratory. They'll be back, though. Watanabe will be avenged, as the second-longest chapter in the game continues.

Live-a-Live #10 - Park Street

Time to start powering through this game to get it done. Next up, Dr. Toei shows Akira the giant mech he unearthed from some ancient excavation site. When did this turn into Xenogears?

Live-a-Live #9 - Akira

Two chapters left... the future chapters. I take on the near-future chapter first, and it turns out to basically be a ripoff of the movie Akira.

Highlander 4x11 - Timeless

 

Very good episode here. It's a tale of two women, one who'd like to be immortal and one who'd like to be mortal. And also Duncan dressed as a woman.

Live-a-Live #8 - Cave-Plundering

That's unfortunate, because no one took baths either.

Live-a-Live #7 - Red Dio Redemption

Following on the heels of the shortest chapter (the wrestler), I go for the second-shortest chapter. This one is nearly all dialogue and story, oddly enough. These chapters are wildly different from one another so far. We had the dungeon crawl, the training minigame-fest, the fighting game, and now a story-heavy scenario. Wonder what the last three will have in store.

Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night - Part Three (End)

 

WHO'S THAT POKEMON?

Live-a-Live #6 - The Masaru Smackdown

 Fast forward to modern-day Japan, as we meet a pro wrestler who is training to be the greatest fighter in the world. So... pro wrestling is a real sport in the world of Live-a-Live? It's still real to Square, dammit!

Live-a-Live #5 - The Highest Monk II: The Next Highest Monk

Roshi and Yun train to battle the Cobra-Kai as Live-a-Live rolls on.

Live-a-Live #4 - The Highest Monk

No one gets higher than Roshi, as he meditates atop a mountain. Really wondering why this game didn't get a U.S. release; it's very playable. Finding it more entertaining than the often-confusing Romancing SaGa III, the closest thing to this that Square put out at the time. It's like one of their other departments thought they could out-SaGa the SaGa department, and made this game.

Live-a-Live #3 - Tiger Style

Level 10 and decked out in Genji equipment, Oboro is very prepared for the final chapter. But first, he's got to finish his own. Too bad I missed out on Muramasa, because Oboro's attack power is on the low side.

Live-a-Live #2 - Oboro Muramasa

LIVE. WIN.

Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night - Part Two

 

Miriam chases the moon.

Live-a-Live (Super Famicom, 1994)

The next Super Famicom RPG that I'm going to cover is the relatively-unknown Live-a-Live. In the vein of the SaGa games, this one has a bunch of characters to choose from. The difference is that rather than each of them playing all the way through the same game with slightly-to-moderately different scenarios, in this game they all have a chapter of their own before converging at the end. It's most comparable to Dragon Warrior 4, but the way you can choose the order of the chapters puts a new spin on things. It's almost episodic. You can't really go wrong with mid-90's Square, so let's get to it.

Originally Posted in 2014