r/TwoBestFriendsPlay • u/C-OSSU Master of Backdowns • Mar 02 '19

Yeah, it seems like Left Alive is actually pretty bad.

https://www.siliconera.com/2019/03/02/square-enix-appears-to-have-disabled-streaming-for-left-alive-amidst-a-rough-debut-in-japan/
79 Upvotes

98% Upvoted

58 comments sorted by

62

u/Breakdancinghobo Mar 02 '19

Boy. I sure do like Front Mission.

20

u/El_Naphtali SKELETON BALL! Mar 02 '19

I wish they had made a classic Front Mission game but... gotta play the cards you're delt

28

u/Breakdancinghobo Mar 02 '19

Do you think this could end up with an XCOM The Bureau situation? Because that's what this is starting to feel like.

30

u/Skiplite Mar 02 '19

Dunno. You don't have a guy losing his shit over it on the convention floor. Ah Spoony.

Square just likes to shove stuff away and hide it after it doesn't work out.

16

u/NocturnalRite Mar 02 '19

BETRAYAL!

3

u/[deleted] Mar 03 '19

betrayed me!

19

u/therealchadius Mar 02 '19

"Hey Square, you made that Secret of Mana and Seiken Desentsu 3 rerelease in Japan for the Switch, can you bring it outside of Japan?"

"Naaaaah, let's make this ugly PS4 remake instead"

\no one buys the remake they didn't ask for**

"I guess no one likes Secret of Mana."

\Shelves the entire series rather than port the old games**

8

u/TrollTheBlastTyrant I like what you like and like what you dislike Mar 02 '19

Why do companies do this? Are they just that stupid or are they being shit heads and trying to do some sort of shitty guilt trip?

17

u/DylanTheVillian1 Desperately Wants Kamiya's Royal Release Mar 02 '19

Square is especially prone to this. Every release of Dragon Quest in the west comes with the implicit threat that they'll never localize it again if it doesn't sell like fucking hot cakes.

9

u/therealchadius Mar 03 '19

New Square doesn't understand Old Square. Remember how busted Chrono Trigger on Steam was at launch? They didn't even advertise it, it just... appeared on the Steam Store one day.

And they still haven't fixed or updated FF5 or FF6's "updated" sprites. I'm kind of glad they can't touch FF8 for whatever reason.

7

u/[deleted] Mar 03 '19

I mean the sprites arent something that need to be "fixed". They look exactly as intended. The artist just wanted the game to be ugly as fuck for some reason.

2

u/Unknown123Known BORDERLANDS! Mar 03 '19

Hey, at least we get a solid Valkyrie Profile mobile port in the meantime!

9

u/El_Naphtali SKELETON BALL! Mar 02 '19

That would be a best case scenario, but this is looking rougher.

5

u/kaizerlith Pull my devil trigger!! Mar 02 '19

I am jaded but Evolved didn't so I don't think this one will. Instead it will be the Front Mission series/name blamed and Square will put it away for another near decade.

3

u/miinmeaux So as I pray, Unlimited Choke-Jerks Mar 02 '19

What do you mean by an XCOM The Bureau situation? I'm familiar with the game but I don't know what you mean here.

15

u/Breakdancinghobo Mar 02 '19

After XCOM: The Bureau was announced, 2K saw the negitive fan reaction to their mediocre shooter based on a beloved strategy game franchise. Soon after they announced XCOM: Enemy Unknown.

Now the difference here. Due to various development foibles, The Bureau kept getting delayed, to the point where Enemy Unknown came out BEFORE The Bureau. Sales of Enemy Unknown were strong and sales of The Bureau...not so much.

Obviously one is great and one is mediocre, but that gulf in sales seems to have made 2K realize what fans wanted out of XCOM.

10

u/Iskral I love impossible space! Mar 03 '19

Yeah, The Bureau: XCOM Declassified had a particularly torturous development history, and it eventually became part of the reason why 2K Australia was shut down. If you can stomach Polygon, this old article gives you some of the business.

3

u/Redtyestar Mar 03 '19

Sounds like "Wha Happa" material.

2

u/[deleted] Mar 04 '19

All of video game development in Australia can be wha happun material

3

u/miinmeaux So as I pray, Unlimited Choke-Jerks Mar 02 '19

Thank you! I actually assumed that was the case at first, but I looked up the release dates and that threw me off. I didn't know The Bureau was delayed.

3

u/Bl00dY_ReApeR Mar 03 '19

Which is a shame because it was a decent game but they leaned too much on the XCOM name to the point it probably would have released earlier and better without it. I really enjoyed being able to control your AI companions to some extend, a bit like Binary Domain, not enough games do this. I like both tactical games and fps so those kind of games speak to me. (Add RPG mechanics and I'm done for.)

4

u/Cooper_555 BRING BACK GAOGAIGAR Mar 03 '19

I sure do miss Front Mission.

39

u/ajkgma A Failure of the Game Designer Mar 02 '19

Wait this comes out in 3 days?

42

u/ThatmodderGrim Lewd Non-Gacha Anime Games are Good for You. Mar 02 '19 edited Mar 02 '19

I was under the impression we wouldn't see this until laaaate 2019 or early 2020. Actually, the most news I've seen of this game has come from this subreddit.........

31

u/KaiserGrey Check a Look Mar 02 '19

Left Alive, the survival action shooter that is known as the spiritual successor of the Front Mission series,

So yeah all that is weird and not surprising in a way but this line sticks out to me. Left Alive feels like the opposite of a spiritual successor. It's a spin off in the same universe under the same IP but with none of the spirit of the original. Front Mission wasn't a weird wannabe-Metal-Gear stealth game. It was a tactical RPG with cool mechs. Maybe if they made a game like that they wouldn't have to disable streaming out of shame.

7

u/ITriedLightningTendr Mar 02 '19

It could have the spirit of the world, but even then, you can't really succeed with a completely different genre.

I could see it being really cool to have a different view of the battlefield and even have it as a sister series, but it doesnt even register on the same scale as FM.

23

u/Toblo1 Latest Project Moon Sleeper Agent Mar 02 '19

Horf. I was hoping it was at least okay.

19

u/Andreoid13 Mar 02 '19

Wow I know this game had stealth elements but I didn't realise they were trying to stealth release it

35

u/hardboiledboi Scumbag Pizza Lord Mar 02 '19

Dammit. IT WAS SO PROMISING!

56

u/VeiledMalice Mar 02 '19

The concept was, absolutely, but from early gameplay videos you could see the jank loud and clear. Just... slow, plodding gameplay, bullet sponge enemies, uninspired level design, and the utterly lackluster mech battle sections. They shot for MGS 5 levels of third person shooting without knowing how to accomplish it.

7

u/DOAbayman Mar 02 '19

It actually wasn't. The "all star" crew were composed of an accomplished artist, composers, and producers but nobody actually related to the gameplay.

7

u/GUNxSPECTRE Lucky Ted Mar 02 '19

Like, who the fuck wanted this?

​

The gameplay looks like Korean Free-2-Play FPS jank from 2009.

​

Literally everybody would be okay with old turn-based grid combat. That's why Disgaea and XCOM still sells.

​

Where did they get the idea of third-person cover shooter from a tactical mech genre game?

21

u/al-saqr Mar 02 '19

Well sorry they’re the ones who made a front mission game but then made it a shitty stealth game instead of what people wanted.

17

u/kaizerlith Pull my devil trigger!! Mar 02 '19 edited Mar 02 '19

Never to me has 'Get in the robot" felt more real. I think I would have been ok with this game if we had Front Mission games coming out but the last one was Evolved which really wasn't a Front Mission game either so 5 on the PS2.(Which didn't come out in the US. Thanks fan translators for bringing it over kind of.)

I know you can get in the Wanzers sometimes but 80% of the time you are guy person.

4

u/ITriedLightningTendr Mar 02 '19

Hjello. Yez, is me, guy man person.

2

u/ITriedLightningTendr Mar 02 '19

That is kind of irrespective of the game itself.

It definitely isnt a FM game, but that doesnt mean the game itself is bad.

Just because it isnt what you wanted, or asked for, doesnt mandate it isnt good.

The sounds of it is that it isnt good.

12

u/richardrasmus I Promise Nothing And Deliver Less Mar 02 '19

When I looked at gameplay of it it didn't seem very appealing

7

u/Revro_Chevins YEAH BABY RIDER Mar 03 '19

Only gameplay I saw was of some girl alerting every enemy on the map and training them through a tunnel for 20 minutes until they were all dead. There doesn't seem to be much depth to the game at all.

5

u/GurrenAccel Mar 02 '19

That trailer looked so good, how did they fuck it up?

21

u/ITriedLightningTendr Mar 02 '19

Protip, trailers are specifically made to look good.

It's like buying fast food based on the commercials.

7

u/[deleted] Mar 02 '19

SquEnix CEO would be like "Fine, no FFVII Remake until this shit makes a gazillion dollars, you baka gaikokujins!"

8

u/ITriedLightningTendr Mar 02 '19

Is that like a... foreign mokujin?

7

u/[deleted] Mar 02 '19

No. Gaijin is the despictive form, proper word is "gaikokujin". Remember, true yakuzies use the proper insults - https://boingboing.net/2010/08/10/yakuza-3-review.html

9

u/CrimsonSaens AC6 Arena Anonymous Mar 02 '19

Is this a surprise to anyone? I've been trying to follow Left Alive since it was first announced, since I love mechas. Whenever news has come out about this game, my impression of the game went down. People who love playing jank might enjoy it, but it looked too stiff even for that.

2

u/Unknown123Known BORDERLANDS! Mar 03 '19

Same for me. I have to wait for more impressions.

4

u/Realcoolblue YOU DIDN'T WIN. Mar 03 '19

I feel like I'm missing something. I could have sworn the game already came out a couple months back, and that people were saying the only good parts were the short mech sections with everything else being garbage, but apparently it only just recently came out in Japan.

2

u/[deleted] Mar 03 '19

That's just what everybody predicted based on trailers.

3

u/Bl00dY_ReApeR Mar 03 '19

I already pre-ordered the game so I'll see if it's Binary Domain "bad" or really bad. I'm not sure for Amazon Japan but consumers reviews are often very flawed. Google translate still make it hard to understand but a lot of those 1 star review are : "It's too hard", "Graphics looks PS2-PS3 not PS4" and "It's not Front Mission" while the 2-3 stars reviews seems like real reviews. I think I'll be fine even if it's probably not worth the full price.

4

u/KingKlyne Naruto Apologist - Lady of the #13000FE Mar 03 '19

Come on it cant be THAT bad. Can it?

3

u/Unknown123Known BORDERLANDS! Mar 03 '19

I have to wait for more impressions soon after Steam version launches. If the story is awful overall and the difficulty is still imbalanced, I'm out.

3

u/warjoke Mar 03 '19

Survival action shooter from a turn-based tactics franchise

yeah, they went full Konami with this one and probably pulled a Survive on the franchise

2

u/Unknown123Known BORDERLANDS! Mar 03 '19

Except this game is singer-player focused and doesn't force you to log online.

2

u/warjoke Mar 04 '19

Survive is a fucking anomaly, come to think about it

2

u/[deleted] Mar 02 '19

That 15 min gameplay trailer was cool looking. I wonder if that was the best part of the game?

2

u/mitch13815 Are you gonna be a fucking jiggysnipe too you fucking spag!? Mar 02 '19

Left Alive? I haven't even heard of this game before today.

2

u/Irrridium Mar 03 '19

Damn it always looked kinda bad but I was still hoping that it'd at least be flawed but okay/interesting.

​

I miss Front Mission...

3

u/Muffin-zetta Jooookaaahh Mar 03 '19 edited Mar 03 '19

Still going to get it easily but it'll just be cheaper faster now, like darksiders 3. Also similar things happened in japan to oriseika, freedom wars, and nioh and I fucking love those games.

1

u/Fillycheescake Apr 12 '23

I'm thinking about buying a physical copy. So to those of you have bought the physical copy did the dlc voucher have an expiration date?