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The Remake announcement came out of left field for me - glad to say the game is still great after however many years it's been since I played the SNES version. Also happy with my collector's edition purchase. The CE for LAL has a fairly unique product spread compared to other S-E CEs. Spoilers all around: The ending: Even now that the "villain protagonist" thing is way more common in fiction, Oersted being a silent protag who begins speaking when he snaps still feels really unique. It is funny/amusing to see streamers and others react to the end of his chapter, as is the way they open the final chapter, see Oersted, and pick him immediately. When I saw Zulily's post about chapter 8, I immediately began speed reading the thread to see if they made a follow-up post.  The new final boss didn't seem out of place compared to the old game at all. It feels like there's a trend with media that has a sequel or remake or whatever after 20+ years, where it looks back at itself and picks some kind of healing or closure option. Oersted still dies, but following this trend, he gets to die as himself, after getting in the last hit. Made me wish I had bothered to level him up to 16 in his chapter. The protagonists giving him a little chat afterwards was a nice touch - I picked my precious robot child Cube as my protag. Oersted remarks that Cube is merely a robot, lacking a human heart, what does it know? Cube beep boops and gives Oersted a little yellow flower. Oersted audibly gasps. It's just a flower, one of many. It's not that this exact specific flower itself is important, perhaps, but that we assign importance to things that are meaningful to us. But what is important to Oersted? Shout out to Masaru's ending too, cause it's just so unapologetically Masaru. Only Masaru could stand there after the boss fight and say - without a trace of irony in his voice - that he isn't just trying to be the strongest guy or have the swolest muscles, but he also wants the biggest heart. The localization: I thought the English localization was great. "Your mother." Tho admittedly during the Middle Ages, when I realized everyone was talking in iambic pentameter my eyes kinda glazed over and I just started listening to the Japanese audio. I noticed that Streibough/Straybow saying "I begged you to lose to me in the tournament for love but you were too greedy" wasn't in the Japanese audio. I guess that changes how you perceive Oersted? I feel it's a weird rewrite after how Oersted criticizes himself in the various protagonist endings that I've seen so far, but I'm not really that fussed about it. One of the things I noticed on other parts of the internet is people saying S-E's localization was wrong because Aeon's fan tl said something else, which is hilarious. The music: Megalomania still slaps. I saw the track listing before my game came in, saw Gigalomania, and felt like I had been spoiled about something, I just didn't know what. Was not expecting it to be a final boss style orchestration of the middle ages theme.
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Aug 9, 2022 17:10
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| # ¿ May 21, 2024 10:28 |
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Last Celebration posted:Endgame: was the part where the gold fish tells you “if you really can’t figure it out try a strategy guide, but just experiment first cause you’ll feel more accomplished if you figure it out yourself” in the original? Yup. Except the old 94 version actually did have a strategy guide book published for it.
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Aug 9, 2022 17:49
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Unlucky7 posted:The line you mention was during what is basically a villainous rant, so in context at the time the player would view it either as a lie or a half truth at best (though ultimately, given what happens afterward, there may be something to it). As mentioned upthread before, it is hard to tell how much Oersted knew about Streibough and the Princess, and it ultimately doesn't matter because he did not care. When I saw people talking about this line, I had a similar train of thought about Streibough saying nonsense until I went back and watched some other cutscenes in English. Early in the chapter before Streibough and Oersted fight, Streibough tells Oersted not to go easy on him. Later, when Streibough goes villain mode, he complains that no matter how hard he tried, Oersted was always better. I get the impression that this is why he was telling Oersted not to hold back during the tournament - Streibough wants to prove he is better than Oersted, but if Oersted is holding back, then what's the point? The English version rewrites this so that Streibough is saying that he won't go easy on Oersted, and later he says he begged Oersted to let him win for the sake of love some time before the competition. Maybe it's just me, but I'm not sure there's much of a point in rewriting Streibough's line to that specific thing before the competition unless what Streibough says is true, if that makes sense. For example, it could have been rewritten so the player couldn't go back and go "that line sounds contradictory if you were expecting me to let you win", or perhaps you were supposed to see it as Streibough announcing that for the audience so they wouldn't be suspicious when Oersted lost on purpose.
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Aug 9, 2022 19:51
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EclecticTastes posted:Well, I finally finished up the remake, and the new ending was really great. I'll admit, though, the new boss' design seemed a little plain compared to Demon King Odio, and Gigalovania can't really hold a candle to Megalomania. Maybe I'm just partial to 1994's aesthetic sensibilities, but while the fight itself was unbelievably rad, the sound and visuals were kind of upstaged by the rest of the game. I reaaaally don't find Gigalomania and Megalomania comparable pieces of music... Gigalomania is ultimately a song that has been written for Oersted, not anyone else in the cast, and I think it tied in well with the Remake's ending. He is at odds with himself. Meanwhile, Megalomania still sounds like the ancestor of Guile's Theme, and it's still a banger. Wrt monster design, big agree. Sin Odio is ultimately Generic JRPG Boss Lord Zedd with a cozy chest cutout for Oersted to take a nice nap in. Pure Odio is a fairly unique nightmare Mr. Potato Head of sorts in comparison. Why are there grapes? It feels so random. Japanese fans on Twitter still ask about the grapes and end up Googling random meanings / symbolism for grapes. Who knows at this point, but it's an iconic enough design that Oersted and Odio still get associated with grapes in fanart. Item Getter posted:Outside of a bit disappointing design though, nice capstone to the story and it seems like the original ending would have been a little underwhelming without it. I did like the endings in the SFC version, but the Remake ending does feel organic, like it could have been part of the ending all along. In the SFC version: After you do the statue / boss gauntlet, Oersted asks, "Why can't we win?! Is this our fate?! How are we all different from you?!", then there'd be a chat between him & your protag, then he'd send everyone back home. In the Remake: After you do the statue / boss gauntlet, Oersted asks, "Why can't we win?! Is this our fate?! How are we all different from you?!", then you fight Sin Odio, Oersted is free and he immediately voices his regrets over his actions, then there'd be a chat between him & your protag (only Pogo and Cube's are different in Remake), then he sends everyone back home. I think the new order of events with the boss fight and whatnot before the protag pep talk worked pretty well. EclecticTastes posted:Sin of Odio gave Oersted a chance to do something cool before dying and let you really relish in the power of your characters, but didn't really add much, narratively, that wasn't already present. Yea the difference is slight, but still visible. I guess it depends on how much you care about Oersted's character. Personally, I do like him, so I thought it was a nice touch he got to ~symbolically~ free himself from the hatred and die as himself. And as far as the other characters go, would they wanna help some dumb blonde guy they pretty much just met and was connected to the other 7 aggressors who made everything go to poo poo in their own times who just tried to kill them all all like 3 times in a row? Honestly, yeah. They are "heroes" after all, trying to do something that feels right - I say as a I eye my Oboromaru 100 kill run save file. They aren't in this to seek validation, as Oersted seemingly was himself. I guess the Sin boss fight just helps hammer that aspect in.
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Aug 29, 2022 07:36
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Last Celebration posted:honestly if it weren’t for knowing there was a new track called Gigalovania and the part of the fight where your other three party members on the bench jump for a full seven man beatdown (which seems overambitious even for an exceptionally ambitious game) in id have probably assumed it was just the original SFC ending. Partly because it makes more sense for Oerstied to be getting possessed in the actual new final boss if, you know, the original final boss ends with him coming back to normal and asking for you to give him the old coup de grace. But that might be new to the remake… That part was in the original game. What is new is his "very clearly not okay in the head" laugh that he does during the fight, and the red aura that leaves his body after he says Alethea's name then collapses.
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Aug 29, 2022 10:02
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EclecticTastes posted:Anyway, once he was beaten up, he just sort of resigned himself to being defeated, and (so those who haven't played it will know) if you kill him in the original SNES version, your chosen character will get a dark palette swap and it's implied they give in to their own hatred and become the new incarnation of Odio, rather than everyone just walking away, making it a much darker ending. This is also why he comes back for the boss rush, is because at that point he hadn't truly given up on proving that his hatred is correct. It's only after everyone wins and he gets a stern talking-to and/or inarticulate noises made at him that he's forced to accept that he was wrong, repents briefly, warns everyone, then dies. EclecticTastes posted:Like, in the original, Oersted definitively wasn't possessed, he had become Odio.
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Aug 29, 2022 12:54
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EclecticTastes posted:And I suppose it's more Akira's remark in his version that leads one to that implication, and it may be that the reason they all walk away in the new variant is to remove the ambiguity. Hmm. I'm curious - what did Aeon put as the translation for what Akira says there? Cause I can only think of the Japanese line for that, and it doesn't register for me as "implying Akira becomes the next embodiment of hatred and despair".
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Aug 29, 2022 20:27
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EclecticTastes posted:It's the combination of him basically just calling Oersted an idiot and then the yellow filter making his sprite look darker that makes it feel like he's now on a dark path. Also, you know, the phrase "never end" implies that everything is repeating itself, as in, now Akira is the demon king. To make it clear, I don't doubt that someone, your protag, etc becomes the next host for the Spooky Hate Magic or whatever in the Never End. After all, even in the True End, Oersted warns the others that this could happen to anyone. But you claimed that "your chosen character will get a dark palette swap and it's implied they give in to their own hatred and become the new incarnation of Odio, rather than everyone just walking away, making it a much darker ending", and "Akira's remark in his version that leads one to that implication", which is what I was questioning.
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Aug 29, 2022 21:38
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Last night in Japan was the 28th anniversary & rebirth celebratory livestream, which can be viewed on Square Enix's channel: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V_nWg76IatI  
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Sep 3, 2022 08:27
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Last Celebration posted:Question for people who played the SFC version, gameplay spoilers: so from gameplay I’ve seen of the SFC fan translation, the names of the attacks for Imperial China characters are Chinese. I thought it was kinda lame that the remake translation doesn’t retain that since there’s skill descriptions until I realized, “oh, that would make their final chapter dungeon kinda bullshit since the attack names are hints in the context of that section”. As for the dungeon, it's pretty much what the others said. You just had to guess or go down the list and use every single move lol.
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Sep 19, 2022 04:55
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I Lived, Laughed, and Loved at the LAL collab at Square-Enix's Artnia cafe in Japan.  I withdrew a 10k yen bill out at an ATM purely for this photoI'm waiting for some kind of news about the concert in 2023, but I assume it's also gonna be an absolute nightmare for a foreigner to try and get a ticket. Edit: Here's the whole album of food & the OG + remake gallery on display. Unfortunately I didn't realize my photo of the prehistory was busted until I got home. miasmacloud fucked around with this message at 02:42 on Dec 24, 2022 |
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Dec 23, 2022 23:40
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Aw, poo poo, whoops, I thought I linked my whole album originally, but here's more photos with everything I ordered and photos from the displays in the cafe: https://imgur.com/a/L4EtIbs Aoyama's artwork for Oboromaru's chapter is by far the coolest to see in person. I don't think any photo could do it justice, the colors and the texture on the paper are radically different in person.EclecticTastes posted:And the taiyaki in the parfait is a spot-on recreation of the taiyaki used as Akira's menu cursor back on the SNES (I've not see too many taiyaki, myself, so I'm not sure if that's just how they all look or if they specifically put effort into making this one match up). They all look like that! They use a mold specifically for making the fish shape. EclecticTastes posted:EDIT: Also, they apparently slipped in a tiny bit of new lore, as they've actually named the girl from the peach bun gag in the Kung Fu chapter. Her name is Hui Lan, turns out. Ah, I think that webpage isn't as familiar with the game. The name of the Kung Fu dish is the Hoi restaurant's peach buns, and the description is that the Hoi restaurant guy made them in honor of the roshi and the 3 disciples. It's written ホイ飯店 (hoi han ten). I guess they tried to read it as a name? Here are all of the dish descriptions: quote:[Middle Ages] The "Repay my loyalty in death" drink: The famous scene is re-enacted on top of the glass! The cassis and butterfly pea tea represent the gloomy purple atmosphere of Archon's Roost, and the blackberry and raspberry garnish resembles Joshua Tree Fruit. Whose loyalty are you repaying after you drink this? Coincidentally, I went to the Kirby Cafe in the Fukuoka Canal City mall as well.
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Dec 24, 2022 02:37
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Booky posted:yoooo those pics are win!!! The new ones are all of the pencil sketches - those are Naoki Ikushima's sketches for the remake. EclecticTastes posted:You know this has really given me a fresh appreciation for Live A Live, now that I can truly comprehend the depth and intensity of Streibough's envy. Imo, Pogo and Masaru's dishes were the best. With Pogo's, the mustard + worcestershire sauce went pretty well with the chicken. They ran out of the ingredients for Pogo's dish (twice?) and changed it to be easier to make. I didn't order the new version when I went back on the 24th, but it looked like it had been changed to use 2 sausages instead. And Masaru's drink was super flavorful. Was like a mango smoothie garnished with cute star shaped pieces of mango. The middle ages drink was also good cause it was kinda like a blackcurrant soda, but because of the overly dramatic serving glass you took 1-2 sips and were done with it. Oboro dish, mixed opinion. I liked the castella because it's that kind of Eastern Asian dessert that's, you know... "not too sweet (complimentary)", but the tenmusu (rice ball w/shrimp tempura) was ???. I think you can kinda tell from my photo, but it was overly stuffed with rice. Then the nori on the outside and the tempura on the inside were both kinda soft. Idk, I'm used to nori being more pleasantly crunchy (e.g. battle ship-style sushi, or how convenience store onigiri has the wrapper separating the nori from the rice specifically so it doesn't get soggy before someone buys it). I'm not sure if tenmusu is always soft like that or not. The other 3 were all desserts. Akira's parfait was a metric ton of sweet and sugar. I simultaneously loved and hated it because it had stuff I like in it, but it was just... so much. Like there was a piece of matcha cake propping up the taiyaki, and the thing that looks like chocolate in the bottom of the glass was actually a serving of pudding lol. Sundown's milkshake had a banana-ish taste. It was a pretty basic milkshake with a cute hat - liked it, but it had a ton of ice in it. The kung fu dish, I'm not a huge fan of azuki bean, but the fruit sauces that came with the buns helped. The sesame ice cream seemed kind of random, but I also like sesame ice cream, so, no complaints there. When the collab was first announced, I was hoping they would also have some kind of Odio-themed dish with grapes, but alas. Still, I liked the little garnishes the dishes had, like the halved grape on a peach bun for Yun's bandana, the pistachio on the middle ages drink, and Masaru's cup having a hachimaki. Helped made it feel "themed". As far as those themed restaurants go (I've been to like 9 between my 2 visits to Japan  ), I thought this was one of the better ones. Like Japan has a lot of great food in general, so this is more of a question of, "is it fun to sit around listening to video game music while eating themed food for 90 minutes?" And honestly yeah it's kinda nice. Like, The Archon's Roost BGM kicked in when I first stepped into Artnia. Perfect.
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Dec 24, 2022 04:25
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They are also releasing a 2nd Collector's Edition for the ps4/ps5/steam version: https://store.jp.square-enix.com/sp/livealive_ce2/index.html I like all of the standees of the characters.
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Mar 30, 2023 20:32
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    I won a first wave concert ticket for the Live A Live A Live 29th Anniversary Concert, which was this past Sunday in Hachioji. The arrangement of Masaru's bgm went very, very hard. Was not sure how they were going to do the sci fi themes, but the percussion player did work during them. Other highlight for me was the live version of Armageddon. Also, Hironobu Kageyama is a great at live shows. And Yoko Shimomura joined the band on keyboard for the encore (the battle medley). The merch line also had a preview of the new Cube plush that Square is making.
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Aug 17, 2023 11:50
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EclecticTastes posted:I am at once both happy for your good fortune and also just, just absolutely seething with envy, as is the norm with your posts ITT.  EclecticTastes posted:Joking aside, it's great that someone's able to report on all this dope poo poo for us, seeing as we're never going to see anything remotely like it in the US.
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Aug 18, 2023 06:02
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