Live A Live is a 1994 rpg published by Square (currently known as Square Enix) for the Super Famicon. Until 2022, it was never offically released outside of Japan, but the translation group Aeon Genesis made the english translation for this orginal version. In 2022, the game got a remade and an offical translation into English.
A summary to encompass every chapter of the game would be tedious, because of the fact that each chapter is a standalone story (minus for the final one to be unlocked, as that is the connecting thread of them all), and each one I have varying thoughts upon. Instead, I made it so that each chapter has their own page (see below), all with their own designs due to the differences between each scenario; this is so that each page may reflect the scenario they are based after.
THOUGHTS OVERALL
I personally really enjoy LAL, despite all of it's flaws. It's a fun game with stories to tell and a message to send. All the characters are unique, yet the potential of them all having unique interactions throughout the Dominion of Hatred feels squandered (but we have fanfiction for that), and it felt like wasted potential, in my opinion.
I'm aware that some of the chapters are a bit short to get to fully know the characters (mostly the Wild West and Present Day ones), but they're still fun none the less. I liked the time crunch of the Wild West chapter, each replay of it, you can come up with different plans on how to reduce the amount of enemies you have to fight during the final boss. The boss rush aspect of Present Day was quite fun, and you can fight bosses in any order you want (though some are harder for early Masaru than others).
The Odio naming convention is really cool, because if you catch it before the reveal, it probably feels smart to notice the pattern that was planted in every name. I liked how all the bosses were connected by the main villian, because it makes sense to me. Hatred has incarnated in so many ways throughout history, it makes sense to want to personify it as starting at one point, though it doesn't really make sense how Odio incarnations show up in places like the prehistory chapter, as it comes far before when Oersted became Odio.
Overall, I really love the game. It's fun and quite interesting, especially with some of the lore. I'm a massive fan of the game, hell, I put Akira on the index page. It just brings me comfort and joy, because no matter how bad stuff gets, there's always hope.
Please play Live A Live, sorry for spoilers.