Live A Live (1994) — 270,000 copies counted as a failure. 28 years later, 500,000 worldwide

September 2, 1994: seven eras went on sale at once

Hello, this is Toki. Episode 45 of “Today Is Release Day.” Today’s game is a role-playing game with seven protagonists.Screenshot from the Steam store page for the HD-2D remake of LIVE A LIVE (2022) (SQUARE ENIX)

Live A Live. Square released it for the Super Famicom on September 2, 1994, at 9,900 yen before tax, product code SHVC-5V.

Prehistory, the end of the samurai era, the Wild West, kung fu, the present day, the near future and the distant future. Seven stories with seven settings sit on one cartridge. You may start with whichever chapter you like.

Today marks exactly 32 years since that day. And the game now sells better than it did back then. Following those 32 years is what this article is about.

Every chapter swaps out the way you play

The seven chapters differ not only in era but in how you play them. The prehistoric chapter has almost no dialogue at all.

The present-day chapter works like a fighting game: you learn moves by taking them. The Edo-era chapter is an infiltration story, and you can reach the end without cutting down a single person.

Battles play out on a seven-by-seven grid. Where you stand changes how your attacks reach, so it feels less like a brawl and more like a board game.Screenshot from the Steam store page for the HD-2D remake of LIVE A LIVE (2022) (SQUARE ENIX)

Seven manga artists each designed one protagonist. Gosho Aoyama took the Edo chapter, Kazuhiko Shimamoto the near future, Ryōji Minagawa the present day.

Yoshinori Kobayashi drew the prehistoric hero, Osamu Ishiwata the gunslinger, Yoshihide Fujiwara the kung fu master and Yumi Tamura the distant future. Yoko Shimomura wrote the music; Takashi Tokita directed.

Finish all seven and an eighth chapter, set in the Middle Ages, opens up. From there the final chapter ties the scattered eras into a single line. That structure became the game’s calling card.

29 out of 40. And 270,000 copies counted as a failure

At release, the four Famitsu reviewers gave the game a combined 29 out of 40.

Their views did not diverge much. They enjoyed how much was packed in, but found the graphics thin next to other Super Famicom games of the period.

The reason is easy to see. On screen, each character is only one tile tall. At that size, the differences between seven manga artists were almost impossible to tell apart.

The uneven length and difficulty of the chapters drew comment at the time too. One chapter can be done quickly; another stops you cold.

Sales in Japan came to 270,000 copies. On its own that is not a small number.

But the publisher was Square. Final Fantasy sat in the same building, and that was the yardstick people reached for.

So in 1994, those 270,000 copies were counted as a failure.

28 years later, rebuilt from the part people liked least

On July 22, 2022, Live A Live was rebuilt for the Nintendo Switch, in the same HD-2D style as Octopath Traveler.

The one-tile heroes were stood back up inside a screen with light and depth. The very thing people complained about in 1994 became the centre of the remake.Screenshot from the Steam store page for the HD-2D remake of LIVE A LIVE (2022) (SQUARE ENIX)

It sold 500,000 copies worldwide between July and September 2022, with more than 140,000 of those in Japan.

That is not a like-for-like comparison with 270,000 copies sold in Japan in 1994. Even so, a game once counted as a failure became a game that sells half a million.

The critical average rose as well: the Switch version holds 81 on Metacritic. On April 27, 2023 it also reached PlayStation and PC, so a game once sold only in Japan can now be bought anywhere.Screenshot from the Steam store page for the HD-2D remake of LIVE A LIVE (2022) (SQUARE ENIX)

Is there a game whose reputation caught up later?

The bones are almost unchanged. Seven chapters, a seven-by-seven grid, the trick in the final chapter — all as they were in 1994. What changed was the look, and the era doing the looking.

September 2, 1994. Let me write the year down. Today, September 2, 2026, makes it exactly 32 years.

What stood on the shelf that day was one cartridge at 9,900 yen. It stayed at the back of that shelf for a while, alongside the numbers 29 and 270,000.

Is there a game whose reputation caught up with it only later? If you remember its release date too, so much the better.