Funfact about Pre-history chapter: Pogo yells Bing Bang Boom old name sometimes while doing it(Dodagensen), as does Zaki when he uses Fly Lizard Fly(Barindreen!).
As far as I can tell from my limited understanding of Japanese, most of Pogo’s moves in Japanese seem to be named for their sounds, and Pogo yells out the onomatopoeia relevant to each.
@@joshshackelford889 I think he was pointing to the fact that you mentioned the “Original” had unique fonts for each chapter when in reality that was a fan addition to the game so the developers not adding it in the remake isn’t really an omission or change since the true original didn’t incorporate that type of font display. Sure, unique fonts would be great, especially for the final chapter, but I think it’s incorrect to add the font as a general “change” when in reality having the same font for each character is more true to the original. Just kind of a nit pick to your nit pick lol.
but on the other side having an obvious hint to where to search is just boring and need no thoughts from the player: the game plays you instead of you playing the game. I think you can have something right in the middle.
@@mielthesquid6536 True that. This version of the game just turns the problem in the complete opposite direction. You fixed one problem, but now you have to deal with another.
The original game never had an official localization. The transliteration of Chinese words was done by fan translators, which actually made it hellish to read and recognize Xin Shan Quan's abilities in an RPG game that requires you to remember them. Wuxia novels and TV dramas translate moves and techniques for a reason: to keep the story digestible and make techniques sound snappy to the target-language audiences. "Xuan Ya Lian Shan Quan" may be the protagonist's ultimate technique, but it easily rolls off the tongues and is a lot less memorable than "Heavenly Peaks Descent". Meanwhile, "Earthen Heart Shifu" sounds weird but "Xin Shan Quan Master" sounds perfectly fine for a Chinese character. One of the biggest dilemmas for any professional translation is balancing efficiency and being faithful to the source. Neither full translation nor full transliteration is a good idea.
I agree, and I think the translation for the new Chinese abilities is a good thing. Though, I greatly prefer Xuan Ya Lian Shan Quan to Heavenly Peaks Descent
Just for the record, "kokoro" can be translated as either "mind" or "heart", so either interpretation of Shifu's line towards the thugs harassing Yun are valid.
@@joshshackelford889 That's fair. My read on the embellishment was that it was the official localization's way of emphasizing the setting of the chapter; a lot of the dialogue felt like it was written to evoke other contemporary styles, so the dialogue here feels like something out of a Wuxia tale, to me. Aeon Genesis's patch changing the font for each chapter serves a similar purpose, I'd say.
@@ChaosArgate Interesting perspective, that's especially apparent with the new middle ages script lol. I respect the new approach but I miss a lot of the original text, though if it were switched around I'd probably call this remake out for it lol
@@joshshackelford889 Honestly, "true strength flows from the heart" captures the context best I think. The whole chapter is about the heart being the true strength anyway. About taiyaki thing, I think it was a judicious choice , has less to do with creativity. Not many people outside of Japan know what that culturally means especially for someone like us in the 30s/40s who grew up seeing those vendors. Being a taiyaki guy was nothing extraordinary and rather inconspicuous, all the more sharply contrasting who he is and how he looks (which is nothing short of extraordinary). For that, the new translation is more fitting.
@@joshshackelford889 I played with the chinese subtitles And the fighting style they learned from their master is named something like "flowing heart style". Not sure how the english version named the style
- (POSSIBLE) SPOILERS FOR THE GAME BELOW - A small pet peeve I have about the remake (or at least, the advertising) is that the Middle Ages chapter was advertised for the remake alongside the other chapters. It wasn't at all advertised in the release of the original due to it being an extra secret chapter that is the jumping off point of tying the stories of the first 7 chapters together. It was meant to surprise and intrigue a new player first playing the original and seeing an extra chapter suddenly pop up after completing the first 7, but if a new player plays the remake first, then they will be confused as to why the stereotypical Final Fantasy protagonist on the box art isn't available to play as when first starting the game.
I dislike that as well but it's an unrealistic expectation to hope that any modern video game publisher won't brandish every single asset they have when advertising
Adding quality of life improvements is never a bad thing. I feel like this is really nitpicking from playing the original and this. It makes massive improvements on saving time as many have responsibility’s and not a bunch of extra time to waste.
I think that's a trait of super famicom rpgs, especially compared to newer ones. I was never confused in the original, and chapters typically have just a few key locations so you can just check those if you're stuck. As with the difficulty changes though, I can understand why a person would prefer it
@@joshshackelford889hard agree about not being confusing at all, when l was a kid l played it on emulator in japanese and the only chapters l got stuck was the Akira one (that damn switch!) and the sci-fi one (when you have to say your first name)
So, here’s a few things that might be interesting to some fans of the fan translation. There are a few notable spots in the game where it seems like the English localization has tried to sanitize something that was crude or adult-oriented in the original game. A couple I picked up on are the following. * In the Wild West chapter, the healing items you pick up are herbal liniment, miracle tonic, and beef jerky. In the SNES version, they were tequila, bourbon, and cigars, respectively. * also in the Wild West chapter, Sundown is able to raid Annie’s bedroom while she’s out setting traps, and steal her nightgown. In the remake, this is instead her diary. * And in the Near Future chapter, there’s a running gag where Akira wants Watanabe to steal the orphanage teacher Taeko’s underwear, but Watanabe keeps stealing similar-sounding things instead. In the remake, Akira is instead trying to get Watanabe to steal Taeko’s secret stash of pocket money. So, here’s the unexpected thing. Each of those changes appear to be *fully accurate* to the Japanese script of the remake. I was curious about the booze items (because the healing items no longer debuff you for drinking them), so I swapped the game to Japanese text and compared the letters to lists of katakana, Hiragana, and kanji. Here’s what I discovered. * The Wild West healing items are what the localization says. The herbal liniment is medical herbs (薬草: literally the kanji for “Medicine Grass”). The miracle tonic is general medicine or smelling salts (気付け薬: it’s a term meaning “care medicine”). And the jerky is literally “Dry Meat”. * Annie’s diary is Annie’s “日記” (literally, “Day Record”). So yeah, it’s a diary here as well. * and the Taeko stuff? The last item is Taeko’s “ヘソクリ”. That’s “Hesokuri”, which is a Japanese idiom basically meaning money that a housewife saves for herself in secret. So, even this thing, which I expected to be panties, is actually correctly described as a secret stash of money. So it’s an interesting case. Some of these cruder moments have indeed been revised or sanitized, but *not* by the English localization; it’s this way even in the Japanese script.
That's because the original SNES version came out a few years before CERO was a thing.The Live-a-Live remake is a basically a T rated game, and CERO is real strict when it comes to alcohol, tobacco and sexual content in T rated games. So the remake had to meet CERO's standards. That's why the crowd screaming about 'woke western localization' makes me facepalm so hard. Most of the stuff they're complaining about was removed in Japan to meet the guidelines of the Japanese game equivalent to the ESRB.
@@ateliermink6340 or maybe the Japanese branch of SE is already infiltrated by the woke. Considering all the crap they've been doing with other games for a "global" audience.
@@sweet_sukeban4022 The SNES Live-a-Live came out in 1994. CERO was established in 2001. The changes that were made line up with CERO's guidelines for T rated games. Let go of your conspiracy. It's not 'woke infiltration at SQUARE ENIX, ' it's the Japanese ESRB doing their thing. If SE wanted to release the game it HAD to do so by CERO guidelines like every other game over there. It's simple logic.
@@ateliermink6340 But there are indeed some western woke changes, specifically certain lines of dialogue apparently deemed "not woman friendly", like that Matsu's line where he says that a woman should not get in the way of a man which was completely changed in the English localization and kept as it was in Japanese.
@@alessioscoppa1745The shift from a dying Matsu's macho posturing to focusing on his regrets didn't change the scene at all and in fact it set up the flashback what happened to Akira's father. I played the original, nothing was lost in the line change.
A couple things! Firstly, the different fonts by chapter is a fan translation flourish; it doesn't reflect anything in the original Japanese version, so I'm not surprised it wasn't carried over here. Secondly, Takashi Tokita mentioned in a recent interview that he actually had always had voice acting in mind when writing even the original game's script, and, in fact, the Japanese voice track features many of the VAs he originally had in mind for each role. So the decision to add it wasn't purely cynical profit drive, even if they probably would've requested it be added even if Tokita didn't want to include it.
I quite like the japanese va! My biggest complaint is about the really cheap and unprofessional English voice acting (seriously, what were they thinking). I didn't know that about Tokita, thanks for sharing
yeah really takes away from the game's message and how it subverts RPG cliches. You cna still get the intent but Oersted's final warning about how anyone cna become a demon king is kinda watered down by how extra flowery he makes his dialogue coupled with the change to Lord. Not a deal breaker, but it is irksome
@@sarafontanini7051 That's one of the few things that bugged me about the remake. I mean, 'Anyone can become a demon with enough hatred' stuck with me for years. The remake still gets the point across but 'Lord of Dark' is kind of lame compared to 'demon lord' or even simply 'dark lord.'
Am I the only one that really likes the remaster of the Kiss of Jealousy song, is electric guitar kinda fits as the playable characters are delinquents.
I think it's great, if not better. I prefer the original as a battle theme instead of the more jazzy remake's. It loses a lot of its percussive elements.
@@joshshackelford889 personally I'm not sure that Latin percussion really evokes the stone age any way you arrange it, though percussion would definitely be important and I agree that an electric samba band might not be the best interpretation to befit the scene. My feeling is that the new musical director clearly liked Carlos Santana, because that guitar sound is very clearly referencing the way that he sets his guitars and amps. I also like Santana, so I guess I may have gotten more out of that pastiche than you did. 🙂
Seeing the recent drama of localisers messing with translations of games and anime in whatever way they wanted, made remember this remake, back when it came out people would call you a "chud" for complaining about them changing the source material of already established thing....
the localization blunder with pogo is so, SO severe that i genuinely believe it deserves a patch. especially because MAJOR, SERIOUS SPOILERS UNDER THE CUT - - - - pogo's final chapter protag ending was changed to be even more impactful than it was in the original. in this remake, when oersted asks him the question of what the difference is between him and the heroes, not only does he respond with "love", he walks forward, hugs oersted, and ruffles his hair. pogo isn't capable of understanding any of what oersted says, but he could read his body language to see that he was upset, and instinctively held and comforted him. this emphasizes even more than the original's choice of pogo's first word, that "love" is the very essence of all of humanity, as opposed to odio's embodiment of hate. the fact that there are first-time players being denied scenes with this kind of thematic impact is absolutely egregious to me.
Totally. Though maybe this was intentional, they'd have to get a whole new English voice actor for that one word. They could've just had the japanese voice actor do that even if he doesn't speak English, so I'm less inclined to think this was a conscious choice.
@@joshshackelford889 yeah, im usually forgiving and willing to chalk stuff like this up to creative choices, but the serial butchering of the romanized names in [the chapter we arent supposed to really talk about in front of newbies yet they felt the need to show a bunch of trailers spoiling anyway] makes it obvious to me that a lot of genuine mistakes were made in translating this game. "uranus" was the only name not borked out of that scenario because it's a directly translatable noun. if i had to guess why this happened, there might have been communication issues between the teams where there just weren't any TL notes, and the team wasn't familiar with the source material, resulting in a lot of guesswork.
for any other live a live gamers checking this thread, here's some more for this game's translation being extremely full of errors. the secret boss in cube's final chapter dungeon, "erauqs", gets its unusual name from the fact that it's "square" spelled backwards. just another funny little detail of the game. its new name in the localization is euraokos. spelled forwards, that's "soko-aru-e", a pretty blatant phonic guess at the name instead of understanding that it's supposed to be "square". now, i don't blame the team for this, this is absolutely a squeenix moment i'm sure due to all these oddities. however, i don't really understand the confidence to make such drastic script changes as a team that's working off of so little information about the actual source material, regardless of what you think about it's actual quality.
Newcomer to Live a Live here, I think I disagree about the password part for Oboro's scenario. I got very frustrated by that whole section since I like to do pacifist runs of things if I know they're possible. After all the pausing I had to do to figure out what I was missing and resetting to avoid inescapable battles, it was nice to have the game throw me a bone
Also, if you take a break during the chapter and come back later, you are very likely to forget the password, even if it's a simple rotation and that can be frustrating. Also you can always skip the dialogue so that you don't see it if that tickles your fancy.
I played the SNES version first and i gotta say that i agree with you, in the original it made me believe the bell was actually the passage of time so i spent most of the chapter rushing due to the bell. I would've preferred much more to at least have the "Hayate told me that the password changes" instead than just be thrown in the dark.
The stylized fonts are a byproduct of the Aeon Genesis patch. The old 99% patch did not have stylized fonts at all. Zhi did that himself when he fixed the bugs in the old patch and cleaned up the dialogue for the final remastered version. Also I have one instance where I feel the script was *too* faithful to the original: The wrestling match. In Near Future the orphanage kids are watching a wrestling match on TV. I, being a pro wrestling fan, could pick up it was an All-Japan match between The Great Muta and Mitsuharu Misawa. That is an awesome reference... For 1994. Muta's had a long almost 40 year career in pro wrestling and just retired back in February. Misawa though has been dead since 2009 after a back suplex spot in his last match dislocated a vertebrae in his cervical spine, ultimately killing him. I feel like an updated reference would've been nice since gamers today likely wouldn't know who Muta or Misawa are. Shinsuke Nakamura Vs Kazuchika Okada would've been a more contemporary reference since they're two of the biggest stars in Japanese wrestling right now.
I'll be honest, I think I actually prefer the new translation in virtually every aspect except for the Pogo thing, that one's pretty dumb. Some of the "censorship" actually isn't a localization thing... That was changed in the remake in Japan. Specifically, Annie's Diary and Taeko's Panties. I'm guessing those were changed due to CERO (not a thing at the time), and the localizers just had to work off of that. Beyond that, I feel like overall the changes make the game itself just... More fun. Some stuff could be considered less hard... And also less annoying in some stuff. The tutorials never really felt like "spoilers" to me, it just felt like the original being needlessly vague at times for no real reason. The tutorials just make stuff feel less "how the hell was I supposed to know that", which is something that Tokita himself said he wanted to do for the remake, and I think the Ninja chapter is way, WAY better for it. The radar is also a really damn good addition, specially in the chapters you say it's a negative. For example, Sci-Fi actually DOESN'T show you where to go where it counts: when you're running from the Behemoth throughout the ship. I love the original game, but... I genuinely believe most if not all the changes remake makes are all for the best... Again, except for Pogo, even that was a blunder on the Spanish translation. In addition: the backgrounds DO live on in the remake, take a closer look at each chapter's standard text box for generic dialogue. Each chapter has unique prints around the edge of the text box that calls back to the backgrounds of the original: Caveman has the Swirls in the expression bubbles, Kung Fu has a bamboo print, Ninja has a wave print, Cowboy's looks like worn paper (ala the WANTED poster), Wrestler has a chainlink fence, Mecha has a metallic tone, Sci-Fi has circuitry in the corners. I also think this serves as a good replacement for the fonts, since you gotta remember, this remake is translated to a buncha other languages, and believe me, multi language font support for 1 font alone is hellish, let alone making 8 different ones. I think the text box wallpapers are a more than great compromise. Fair presentation of the changes overall, but I feel like some stuff is made out to be problems when... It isn't necessarily? Stuff like Jackie's Mano Toss line, that didn't feel as much an inconsistency as it did a cute reference to the original name in Japanese. Overall, I think some of the "problems" are... A bit overblown... Yes I think Wrestler was more genuine fun in the remake than in the original, there it felt like vague annoyances more like "challenge".
Also in terms of the voice acting, I've been playing with English voices and... It's been amazing. Like, genuinely great. Most if not ALL the characters match how I imagined them... Except for Sci-Fi's, funnily enough. I dunno, never expected the crew to be British. But outside of that, characters like the Shifu, Akira, Pogo, Oboromaru, Sundown... Everyone, has just sounded spot-on. SPECIALLY the cast in Wrestler, I absolutely love the great personalities they gave all the fighters, Jackie being more playful in a snobby way since he enjoys combat, Aja being a self-confident prick, Namkiat being a dork, and SPECIALLY Odie's voice, genuine fighting game hidden boss. Some delivery can be weak at times, but I can't in good faith say the voice acting in this game is bad at all, it's all pretty brilliantly done.
I noticed those text box differences, but I only noticed them being different for some chapters. I recall not being able to tell a difference between the China and Japan ones as an example, though maybe you're more observant than I. I loved the "what the hell do I do" moments in the original, but I'm generally critical of remakes and remasters. We'll have to agree to disagree on the English va though, especially since you mentioned Namkiat, - he sounds way too white it doesn't sound right to me at all
Pogo's mistranslation really struck me too, but it struck me much harder the next times he says it because it makes much less sense than in the fan translation. I'd personally keep the radar on in the near future. I (and whoisthisgit, lmao) got stuck a bit too much on where to go in that chapter Finally, justice for pissed fist.
i'd actually argue. ( *SPOILERS* *AHEAD* ) i prefer the "aieee" mistranslation because it feels much more believable (to me, at least) that someone that has never done words in his life to simply invent a somewhat complex word such as "love" (again, for someone who has never learned how to word). I actually prefer it in the final chapter because he says love at every opportunity he gets, and while he reminds me a bit about a 3 year old who just learned their own name, so i dont dislike it as much, it still feels more believable that Pogo would say a random grunt or scream, rather than a full fledged word. And it put some great room for improvement in the ( *MAJOR* *SPOILERS* *AHEAD* ) final conversation with oersted at the end. In the original translation, he just says love at oersted, and due to the 3 year old name analogy, it feels like (at least to me) he's just screaming his own name at him. And it just happens to be a word Oersted familiar with and has a positive meaning. In the remake however, Pogo hugs Oersted and it's the cutest thing ever. My favorite change in the remake by far. Also, unrelated, but pogo is probably the only main character in live a live that isn't a virgin.
You do realize that the stylized font was specifically added in the fan translation and that the remake developers had no obligation to include that, right?
Yes! That's why I mentioned that I was comparing to the Aeon Genesis localization at the beginning of the video, keen observation though. I do wonder though if anyone on the team was aware of that fan translation, they could've taken a few ideas from it lol
Honestly, that's for the best. Localization of all kinds, from Working Designs-tier fanfiction, to "stylistic improvements" such as the fonts, has no place in any medium. It's not your game, sod off and keep your fanfiction on whatever special education blogging website "people" use these days.
@@joshshackelford889 I want to say "there's no way they didn't know about the fan translation coming into this", but really, that's the only thing that explains the pogo issue.
These changes don't really seem like a huge deal breaker to me (except for the Pogo stuff, which I genuinely hope they patch), but what worries me is the fact that I see so many people calling the localization changes "Woke garbage" and refuse to buy the game just for it, which I find ridiculous as a fan of the original Yes, the changes are a bit jarring and definitely feel weird, but it isn't such a bad thing either; at least not to the point in which you decide to not buy it
bruh, what is woke anyways these days?..these anti-sjws get angry if there is one female protag onistsor one black dude..people wanna be outraged out of nothing these days, Look at GTA6 ""oooh look a female protag..its woke garbage now" and yet GTA1 and 2 had female characters you could use...I bet if terminator 2 came out today, it would be considered woke garbage.. so sick these stupid outrages..anti-sjws, egdelords and cynics have ruined the enjoyment of films and games these days..
I’m not a fan of the localization changes either, _however_ I know how to mod in unofficial patches on my switch. When it comes to PC tho, the modding _will_ be extensive…
Yeah that description is weird. The only thing I could possibly interest as """woke""" is the Gynophobia boss name change. Not sure why they did that but considering the culture in Japan I doubt it was for the sake of appealing to Western notions
@@joshshackelford889 I mean to be fair, on the LAL discord we're finding out a ton of shit that Aeon Genesis had changed for no particular reason (for example, Odie O'Bright never actually described how he killed the other fighters, that was just added by Aeon Genesis), it's possible Gynophobia was a mistranslation of their own. Edit: Nvm it isn't forget what i said
I don't know if I actually can try the original SFC version at this point. The remake adds one last boss in the final chapter that gives Oersted some closure that is missing from the original. Not to mention ending the original on a boss rush of the previous chapters' bosses is kind of a cop out no matter what the time period or reason in my book.
I usually hate boss rushes (looking at you every Mega Man game in existence) but here it's somewhat appropriate as it's trying to reinforce the point made by the main villain prior to it - which is cleverly alluded to (it was in your face the entire time) given their names.
One thing I love about the remake SPOILERS Was the final battle against Odio, the game just ends after the Odio Boss rush. Here you have one final confrontation against Oestred, not only that but even the characters that aren’t in your party join in on the battle. Even Oestred gets a chance to redeem himself
it hoenstly feels like a proper finale, giving literally EVERY protagonist a chance to end Odio once and for all, way better than just an easy boss rush
Pretty sure the "Aie" mistranslation is a production issue. It is clearly impossible for any translator to not know what it should mean. For some reasons the never get a english voice for Pogo and in english, the texts and voices are the same so they went with the "Ai" phonetic. It is obvious because they translated it by "love" in other languages since the texts and audio doesn't match anyway.
@@WhirlyBeepBoops that makes me want to go back to Pogo’s chapter (or talk to him in the final chapter) with the text changed to other languages, to see.
I played the French version of the game and i think the translation found the right compromise, basically French word for love is "amour" and Pogo at the end says "Ama" which sounds like a child trying to say the word for the first time or a primitive pronounciation of the word .
@@nathangirard2646 omg I was so confused when I read "ama" while he was screaming "AIIIIE" I was wondering why they couldn't keep "aie" since in french we say that too, but with the context of the old game it makes so much sense!
Personally I didn't find any of these changes too bad. The radar can definitely be of good use, specially in the near future chapter. That was my most disliked chapter because you needed to do so many bullshit and was hard to guess where to go next and you had to redo a lot of stuff (they actually changed the puzzle to find the buriki daioh basement, now you don't have to redo everything if you mess the order in which you touch the stuff). I would even say the game plays it too safe by staying to loyal to the original, and I would liked if they changed some of the old bullshit. Maybe it's too personal but I hate how easily you could screw up your pacifist run in edo chapter (in the original I had to restart the chapter three times at the end of chapter because of a small mistake). Another subjective opinion but I quite liked the english voice acting, especially the western chapter. It's also important to know that some lines are the same than the original in the japanese version, it's just that the english translation changed them and took liberties (one that annoys me a bit is Sundown's new line "Yours maybe", it's too uncharacteristic for him to do a your mom joke). Other two small changes I found that you missed: -In the edo chapter Oboro-maru will remember the player what is the current password after the bell sound, making it easier to keep track. -Giving the wrong password will no longer enter you in an unescapable battle. You can now run those fights making them a bit pointless -Spoiler: Once you know that the computer is the one trying to kill everyone, the in game tips will change to the computer talking to you and telling you to give yp Overall I say the changes in this remake are rather minor and most of them are helpful. I rather have them than not. The worst ones are the dificulty which is a bit too easy now, and Pogo horrendous last line. Ps: the cool fonts of each chapter were only a thing in the fan-transalation
Megumi Ogata should've said "RUUUVU" (when I hear Japanese seiyuus speak English, sometimes this is how they say stuff like that) in the English version, honestly if they were going to keep her voice unaltered.
While I enjoyed this video, you got a couple major things COMPLETELY WRONG. For one, the font changes ONLY existed in the fan translation, not in the original Japanese. The devs were probably completely unaware of the English fan translation so they based the remake off only the original Japanese, which didn't have the font changes. Other changes to the script were made in the fan translation such as making the boss of the present day chapter more violent and menacing by having him brutally describe the ways he killed each of his opponents. They also implied that he was a white supremacist to make him "more evil", both of which weren't in the original Japanese. So the fan translation isn't actually 100% accurate and took a lot of liberties with the script. Secondly, saying that quality of life features such as actually telling you where the heck your supposed to go in certain chapters is "bad" is a REALLY hot take. Really, in my mind, if the game does a poor job telling you where to go and what your supposed to do then it's poorly designed in some area. The near future chapter in particular is improved DRAMATICLY with the ability to skip cutscenes (so you can skip the 2 minute crafting animation) and telling you where your supposed to go so you don't get lost for 4+ hours and the chapter overstays it's welcome. And about the "mistranslation" that caused you to completely write off the far superior remake undeservedly, that's actually caused by one simple fact. To save on budget, all the voice acting for the prehistory chapter is done by Japanese VAs due to it just being sound effects and no dialogue until the end. It also helps that japanese VAs are far better at doing groans/moans/whatever that consists of 99% of this chapter's VA work due to anime. This causes some major inconsistencies such as Pogo and Zaki yelling out the untranslated lines of their attacks and and the final line of the chapter being "AIIIIIIIIIIIII" instead of "Love" because the Japanese word for love is "Ai." They didn't bother the get some other person that's fluent in English to scream "LOOOOOOOOOOVVE!" for that one line which is a disappointment but isn't a deal breaker if you actually know what "Ai" in Japanese means. They devs probably caught onto this late in development (they probably developed the chapters in chronological order) so in the ending pogo hugs the big bad instead of saying "love" to him since that would cause the same problem as the ending of prehistory.
Alot of the stuff in the video is nitpicks sure but far "superior" remake is an eh. Beside the new final boss phase and some balance tweaks, I honestly have no reason to replay the remake instead of the og considering that Wild West( my favorite chapter beside Far Future) was dumbed down to hell and I personally don't like HD 2D visuals.
I really don't think any of the changes listed here were a problem to me. I honestly think this was a nearly perfect remake. The only real problem I had was in the localization and writing. The voice acting is a little rough sometimes, and I didn't like that there's so many common NPCs who repeat dialogue that other NPCs say
The localization was fine honestly (most of the "censorship" was warranted minus the lewd jokes in near future that's just lame) and the voice acting was good whenever they didn't try to force an accent like with the Shifu. My favorite voices in the game have to go to Kato and nearly everyone else in far future, (Kato is literally Shulk from Xenoblade) Lei, Mad Dog, Akira, and Dr.Tobei. My least favorite voices go to Matsuru, Od Wan Lee, the Shifu, all three villains in Near Future, the villain from Ancient Japan, and a couple others I can't remember. Overall the voice acting is a mixed bag, but still good overall. You could definitely tell it was done on a budget however. It tended to be worse than Octopath but was definitely better the Triangle Strategy, and MILES better than their other recent remake of an unreleased SNES game Trials of Mana which literally had 90s Capcom tier voice acting (Think Mega Man 8, Mega Man X4, or the first Resident Evil on PS1) for basically everyone that isn't one of the 6 possible playable characters and even then the main characters are super mediocre.
I get the reasoning why they didn’t cast and record extra dub lines for Prehistory, but man, if you’re gonna have unique anime openings depending on language, I feel like you can also do the same for Pogo’s exclamation of “LOOOOVE!” It’s still cute and gets across the message when you know that’s the idea behind the scene and the meaning of “Ai”, but for someone who either doesn’t know Japanese, isn’t aware of the original game, or both, it doesn’t convey that. A dang shame. At least, in my opinion, the voice acting for the Spoiler Final Boss Character is EXCELLENT
I'm still waiting to play the game to avoid major spoilers myself. Honestly some of the things pointed seems to be nitpicky and just wanting it to more like the fan translation from a group that kind of did a shooty job with the original SMT. I bet the quality is fine and I have heard and seen worse.
You didn't even play Yakuza until some sodomite eceleb told you and your fellow cattle to play it. Rope. Your neck. A sturdy tree. A stool. Make it happen.
The AG script is far less faithful than the official translation if you compare it as a whole. It's similar to the SMT1 situation: the format of dialogue is changed constantly, sometimes it just creates new plot points for no reason, and certain VERY IMPORTANT nuances in dialogue for pivotal scenes are glossed over. The new translation has a fair few changes and I dislike most of them, but there's far fewer issues with the script than the AG version. Both are serviceable. New one's better overall. Sucks that both of them could be better. I'm very particular about changes in re-releases, but HD LAL is a good remake. At worst you'll be spoiled on some nice little touches from the original, but in exchange you get new nice little touches. The core is preserved and many aspects are conveyed better. Game's short, no good reason not to play both versions.
@@Healnavi Lemme retort all that by using a favorite modern tactic of you lolcalization apologists. Ahem: AG script has SOVL, "accurate" translation doesn't, take your meds and touch grass, sneed incel. Yeah, I think I nailed it.
I love the original promotional art of pogo for the super famicom that was like the first thing I ever knew about live a live. Yet another banger video for the ages
Thank you! I do too, I considered discussing the new official art for the characters but I figured it wasn't notable enough. I dislike how they made his body more proportionate to his head, he looks far too civil now for my tastes.
First of all, NO. If you even THINK about turning off the radar for the Near Future, prepare to go in circles not knowing what to do for a literal fucking hour.
You also have to talk or read specific people's mind in the Near Future in order to advance the plot. It can be very frustrating not knowing where/who to go to so I'm glad the radar was implemented.
Great video. 21:33 From what I've seen (don't have a switch) Bel has a different reaction if you give her the wild dress, she takes pogo into the haystack and they start giggling, not as explicit but still quite suggestive. But the really weird thing for me is that there is a spritesheet of Pogo having a nosebleed within the game, but it's just never used I guess. Maybe I just haven't seen it since I can't play the game myself to find where it is, but in the original game that animation only existed for that one scene. SPOILERS FOR THE END OF THE GAME The "love" mistranslation is horrible, I really hope they patch it. But another change that pissed me off was that they changed ginophobia(fear of women) to hygrophobia(fear of wetness). By that point in the middle ages chapter, oersted is at his lowest point so far, he's alone, persecuted and all the people he cares about are dead save for one. While venturing the dungeon to save her, he starts being attacked by what are pressumed to be his own phobias, or he starts projecting his fears onto the enemies he fights. Some, like claustrophobia or scotophobia(dark), are related to ideas of isolation or loneliness, which would become his reality if he can't clear his name. But the last and strongest one he fights is gynophobia. Throught the entire chapter Oersted has been told that he needs to rescue the princess, that as bad things get, he needs to keep going because she needs him and she believes in him. And all of this is taking a huge mental toll on oersted even before the events at the end take place. And having gynophobia as the last, strongest miniboss puts into perspective the state of his mental health in a subtle but brilliant way. It's not that he's starting to hate women, it's that the situation is getting to him to the point that he's developing genuine aversion to the one he's supposed to protect and love. Of course, it's not like the story becomes incomprehensible like with the "love" change, and I get that the incely misogynistic implications can be uncomfortable, but it was such a smart and subtle piece of storytelling that left me amazed when I first got it. I find it a real shame that it was left out in the localization. I wish you would've adressed the final chapters, i'd love to hear your take on them. I have a lot of mixed feelings myself and are the main reason I still prefer the sfc version, which is a shame because I genuinely love the new things they added.
Thanks! I gave Bel the dress and only got a kiss, not sure what's up with that discrepancy. I agree regarding the gynophobia censorship, no clue why that needed to be changed - though I could (and did) say that about a lot of the changes. The only notable thing I have to say about the middle ages is that Hasshe's voice acting is incredible, doubtlessly the best in the game, though Uranus is a runner-up. I also dislike the new dungeon theme for that chapter, my least favorite remix by far. I also didn't like how Oersted has voice lines for battle, his silence until the end was so climactic before. Regarding Oersted, his monologue at the end also has an inferior translation to me. I still remember reading the line that says something like "There's nothing left for me.... *except demons.*" and seeing the font change. Amazing.
@@joshshackelford889 Yes, yes. I had that exact same thought when I heard Oersted speak. His overly verbose speech makes it hard to follow where's he's going with it and there's no clear sudden shift where he goes from depressed to malicious. And the VA doesn't manage convice me that his soul was broken. Regarding the bel thing, I only saw it on a livestream that's now deleted but if I manage to find another clip of it, I'll post the link. I could be wrong about the item but I'm sure the animation was different from the usual.
"I get that the incely misogynistic implications can be uncomfortable" The proper response to such sentiments would be "well cry me a river and drown yourself in it." They can stick to the rest of the pozzed game industry instead of worming their way into our territory even further. Christ, give a mouse a cookie, and he'll demand a tanker of soy milk.
Now, I’m usually not the type of person that outright says, “new thing good because it’s more shiny.” But honestly 90% of these changes don’t really bother me. I might just have shit taste but I love most of the voice acting. I don’t mind deviations from the original text as long as the story remains the same. The gameplay is easy but from what I’ve seen it wasn’t really that difficult to begin with. I think the new menus, while they don’t have that snes charm, they look great in their own right. The only thing that I can agree on that’s kinda dumb is that mistake with Pogo saying Aiiiii Instead of love, but that’s something that’ll hopefully be patched eventually. The sparkles, while they do make Sundowns chapter less frantic, I can 100% see a modern audience disliking this chapter if it didn’t have those. Like, some people might be into the original way it was, but I can see that being way more frustrating than fun for me personally. Yes there’s more of a challenge to it, but honesty I feel like that would just make the chapter more tedious than tense. I can see why people would be upset about these changes, but I dunno, I feel like even if I played the original, I’d still enjoy this remake because I like most of the new additions. I do think people should be made aware of the changes though. While I’m not a stickler for purity when it comes to these things, I know some people do care. If you want a more modern experience and a few localization changes don’t bother you play the remake, if you want the pure experience, play the original.
I know you couldn't talk about this because it covers the end of the game but there's one major change that needs to be mentioned. MAJOR ENDGAME SPOILERS AHEAD They added an all new final boss to the remake! After the boss rush against Odio's various incarnations Oersted gathers all the darkness and hatred of the world into himself and transforms into what I assume is Odio's perfect form. The battle can be easy or difficult depending on your preparations beforehand but what really makes this battle stand out is how it ends. As you wittle down the boss's health you start to hear Oersted speak implying that he's beginning to regain his sense of self. And when Odio immobilizes all the party members with a special attack Oersted frees himself from Odio's body and delivers the finishing blow himself! This shows that despite all that happened Oersted still retained at least a fraction of his humanity and conscious thought and was willing to end the mess he started with his own hands. It was awesome to see Oersted go back to his old self at the end even if it was only for a brief moment.
I mean, wasn't Pure Odio already the perfect form? Seems like Square-Enix deciding to swing the "instant redemption" bat yet again. A new fight is neat, but not at the cost of removing all investment(wrong word, probably?) in Oersted/Odio's story arc.
@@HYDEinallcaps Not really. He was always a tragic hero and he being redeemed didn't change his views, as his post-battle dialogue follows the original script and, well, his fate is the same. What that battle implies is that Odio and Oersted are somehow separable, but after "killing Odio", Oersted didn't revert his personality, so it may be fully symbolic.
@@uandresbrito5685 Well, if the dialogue isn't changed, then that passes on paper. Still, why not a separate, optional boss fight if it's that irrelevant in terms of plot? It's not retconning, but it's still confusing.
@@HYDEinallcaps It being symbollic makes it not irrelevant. Just because it doesn't change the outcome, does 't mean they can't add nuance to it. About it being confusing, you're right, but it's probably one of those intentionally ambiguous endings
The only think I really feel should have been kept is in regards to pogo. SPOILERS BELOW The love thing is one thing I miss but given in the final chapter, pogo gives oersted a hug is a really adorable decision and changes Pogo in my eyes from a horny bastard, to a very sentimental and empathetic character who despite not knowing the language (even cube can but hs just can't communicate) can read the emotions of oersted and recontextualises his character. So it's both a mildly annoying change but ads things too.
I turned that Radar off first thing after the demo. Spent more time looking at that thing than the actual game and it totally trivialized some of the puzzles. I'm on the last chapter and loving this game. I fully intend to check out the original after I finish this up. It's been such a cool game and I can't believe I've gone all these years without it. Thanks for the awesome video!
18:00 I'm a bit annoyed that the portraits aren't arranged like a Mega Man stage select screen anymore! It was a cute reference since the chapter is basically a Mega Man game as an RPG
@@joshshackelford889 The new format is closer to Street Fighter 2 Turbo (the last entry Shimomura worked on) than the original was to SF2 in general. Where the original just has two rows (with the wrong number per row), the new version has a six character row (same as Champ Edition/Turbo), 1p displayed to the left and 2p displayed to the right, and Earth in the background. I know nostalgia is strong, but "the presentation is different" =/= "the reference is spoiled."
17:56 All the Pretty Horses, Cormac McCarthy: Translation: I am commander of the mares, I would say, I and I alone. Without charity of these hands have nothing. No food or water or children. I bring the mares that mountain, young mares, wild mares and burning.
I'm playing through it right now. Do you have any thoughts about character balance in the post game? I heard Akira was buffed and Sundown was nerfed, but everything is currently a bit vague.
I honestly didn't notice, but now that you mention it Akira did seem stronger. I'll be curious to see if anyone comes out with specific data regarding these new stat changes
There is no postgame lol. Do you mean the final chapter? And yes, Akira was buffed. All his moves no longer have charge up, have longer range, and hit for a tiny bit more damage. His stats have also been raised by around 12% across the board. Still the worst MC tho lol. And no, Sundown didn't get nerfed, he's still just as OP as ever, though the final bosses are immune to moan bullet (guaranteed max damage with infinite range) so you can't two or three shot them. Matsuru actually got the biggest buff IMO. His charge skill now heals him for around 35% HP (in the original it just removed negative statuses) which makes the modern day chapter SIGNIFICANTLY less frustrating, all of Matsuru's moves are now insanely strong and deal way more damage, and he gains stats every time he learns a new skill in his story so even at Lv1 (which he's locked at) he can have the stats of a Lv10+ character if you learned most of all of the skills. Then in final chapter once he can level up his stats quickly spiral out of control, only beat by sundown and rivaled by Cube. Also I'm pretty sure Pogo was nerfed but IDK. Oboro and Cube are exactly the same and all of the side characters also stayed the same minus Beru who got nerfed. (still very OP tho, you just can't OKO the Odo anymore with her)
@@krimsonkatt Pogo has the highest HP out of the cast and has some pretty good high damage dealing attacks (Bang Boom Bang and Whee Jump) Masaru and the Shifu prodigy are absurdly strong. If you’re able to have him learn all the techniques before the final chapter he’s your ace (once you level him up cause his chapter locks him at level 2) Akira has been buffed and his psychic skills can cause tons of debuffs. His final learned skill Judgement Day has a long charge but has a lot of range.
O'Dio got buffed. It used to be that Gatling shot could only be used diagonally. In dominion of hate, they changed it so ODio can use Gatling gun horizontally, entirely ruining the top row meta for the fight.
Akira got buffed for sure, but if Sundown got nerfed I didn't notice. His Hurricane shot still does 500-999 most of the time. You can totally cheese every domain of hate boss with Hurricane and the cola bottle.
You're absolutely right. i was comparing Aeon Genesis's fan translation with this remake. A few other people mentioned this in the comments, I suppose I worded my statement about the font poorly, whoops lol
I know the Prehistory chapter was only done with Japanese voices, but I do at the very least wish they had Pogo's VA record that one word a few times for a few different languages. Hell, they don't even have to know how to pronounce it properly; since it's Pogo's very first word. I do like a lot of the remake's changes though -- just not how they made Streibough and Alethea into a Romeo and Juliet couple, or giving Oersted that "fair and just reward?!" line. Oersted is supposed to be an example on how even the best people can become a "King of Demons" should they give in to their hatred.
Not gonna lie to you, Pogo exclaiming Aie, I didn't know it meant Love in Japanese... I just honestly figured with the 'pink hue' settling in, showing us nothing of what's happening and a lot of context clues... He uh... Had his first... Pleasing experience with a woman... Which seems completely confirmed in the true end credits to the game.
As someone who played the remake first and absolutely adored it I found this video very interesting. I think you make a really good point about the tutorials and mini-map. The one good thing about them though from a gameplay perspective is that they made sure that even the most novice player wouldn't get stuck. I do wish they had made the option selectable at the beginning of the game instead of forcing them on you. In all honesty a difficulty select would have been a great option for the remake to include. Something you didn't mention about the game which I wouldn't blame you for missing is that some of the loading screens have special flavour text depending on the chapter. Spoilers: In the Distant Future when the ship's AI starts acting up the loading screen becomes a message from the ship like the game is talking to the player, and in the final chapter the loading screens are all blank adding to the feeling of exploring a world devoid of life. My best guess as to why the Pogo change was made was due to Square Enix wanting to save money and not hire an English voice actor for a character who doesn't have any lines and not having the foresight to have the voice actor do the English version of the line. It's a sucky situation to be sure. I actually really liked the voice acting in this game. While there were a few meh performances the highs were really high for me especially in the late-game chapters. My personal favourite was probably O. Dio. His line "I will repay you in our common currency, in blood, and lead, and death!" gave me chills the first time I heard it. I'm curious what you thought about the changes to the final boss since I know some people who really liked it and some who didn't. Personally I loved it and was absolutely shocked when I found out what parts of it weren't from the original game since they felt so natural.
Distant Future spoilers: Though I didn’t see it here, I liked the new Behemoth in the Distant Future. The size increase and sound effects of it charging at me (especially when off screen) made for some great panic moments when I played as little Cube. The change also enhances Darthe’s accomplishment at the end since he managed to take it down.
Agreed. I didn't mention it as I consider that a spoiler for the chapter (thought square had no issue showing that and other spoilers in their trailers :P)
There is another minor detail lost in Odie O'bright's sprite from the original to the remake. In the original he held a set of prayer beads in one of his hands, nowhere to be seen in the remake. Not a big loss since i don't think even in the original japanese text it is implied he is a religious man?
@@kanagawa85 Too cool. Never owned one, just emulated. Buying all those old cartridges would be sooo expensive, especially for stuff like Chrono Trigger which still goes for near full price today
@@joshshackelford889 if u ever go to Japan. You can always buy a game from stores called Tsukiji and traders. That's my go two spot to buy a retro games
You mention that the chapters used to have specific fonts which were removed in the remake. However, I believe these specific fonts were added by the fan localisation. If you look up the original Japanese release, every chapter uses the same font (a straight forward clear readable font). AFAIK the game has never been officially localised into English before now.
I played an early Aeon Genesis translation, so while some of you are complaining that 'Love!' wasn't what was said, I'm sat here frustrated that he didn't instead say 'Sweet!'
I‘m very happy about the difficulty being easier. I never played the Original so I didn‘t really know how the Combat worked. Didn‘t help that my first Chapter was Near Future which is really difficult and annoying imo. Also I absolutely love the minimap. I think the Game sometimes sucks at giving you directions on where to go. I think most of the changes are great especially since Live a Live is a very experimental RPG with some rough edges Edit: Also, I kind of wished you talked about the voice acting in the Medieval Chapter because I found that one to be so good
I'm saddened by the difficulty drop. My FAVORITE part of the original was hunting down and fighting the secret bosses. Though they may be easier, I'm just hapoy they still exist. That's really all I needed to know.
Thank you so much for making this! You sum up my thoughts on the translation and voice acting perfectly, and I really appreciate it. (I changed the voices to Japanese as soon as I realised I could, and spent several parts of the game going “Wait… I don’t have the best understanding of Japanese but I know that’s not what they said…” It was… an experience.)
Apparently the japanese script is mostly the same as the original SNES one, so all the fruity dialogue in the old-age chapters is exclusive to the english script
@@uandresbrito5685 …Disappointed and feeling robbed by the localisation team, but somehow not surprised… I have to ask though, was Straybow’s character a lot more like the original n the Japanese version? Because is that’s… quite a shift.
@@AnnMari871 Pretty much the same script, but there are added scenes, so obviously new lines. Tbh it's explained much better in english imo, even if the japanese lines are stronger
@@uandresbrito5685 Fair- I was just wondering since the English Streibough feels like he’s more open about his feelings from the start (given the lines before the tournament) and that he’s more upset over losing the chance to be with Alethea then losing to Oersted again (given his speech at the end). Thanks for telling me!
The issue with using characters to indicate which chapters have been completed is that the characters are used on save files to show who is in your party and therefore already being used.
When confronted by the Colonel, you're given the option to review your memory banks before you answer what your original name was, giving you the answer to the puzzle in no uncertain terms and breaking the tension of the situation even if you select "no".
As someone prone to accidently taking months-long breaks, while I understand the Colonel's 'puzzle' losing most of its punch simply by letting you flashback, a) Cube's a hyper-intelligent robot, the flashing back could have been fractions of a second of actual time, and played "slow" for the player's benefit, and b) some of us can't remember what we did a few days prior in much detail, let alone some seeming-flavor dialogue from half an hour or more ago (especially if you grinded Captain Square for a while to beat it while Kent's still there to snark at your failures/be surprised at your success), so the ability to flashback is useful.
I’m surprised you didn’t cover the new mini game that grants crafting materials in the prehistoric chapter. It’s less annoying than the original one (and fits the chapter’s humor), but it gives you the same rewards meaning you can craft whatever you want quicker, which I don’t know how I feel about. I wish they could have at least spread out the materials across a few different games if the one they did make was going to be so easy.
the different fonts were added in the fan translation and wasn't in the original game, though it still would've been cool if they added it in the remake
Well yeah this was a video involving my opinions on the changes lol. I understand that some of these changes are very polarizing and some may enjoy even some of my grievous complaints.
I honestly would prefer if they went for the PSP remake style of FF1 and FF2 instead of HD 2D, but then again that is more my preference since I not a fan of HD2D at all.
in fairness i think the instrument used for the caveman battle theme in the SFC version was supposed to be a distorted electric guitar. its a sound the hardware always kind of struggled with
+ ive thought about the ai/love thing a bit since i saw it.. im not sure its an error so much as a compromise, specifically related to the voice acting. they didnt record an english dub for the caveman chapter since they didnt really need to.. or they wouldnt have to if they kept that one word the way it was. maybe its cheap and lazy but thats how localization is sometimes
I personally don't mind the changes to the script that you mentioned. For example in the case of Matsu's "Teriyaki Guy" line, while line is iconic to those who played the original the intent is completely preserved. The intent of the line is for Matsu to answer "who are you?" with something silly that means he's a nobody who's butting in. After all most people have no idea what "Teriyaki" even is nor that it's a type of street food, as the minigame is completely optional. In the case of the Shifu it's actually interesting because he says "Kokoro Jiayou" in which Konoro means what we understand philosophically as "heart" and "Jiayou" which means "fueled by" (you'd use it for a car being fueled by gas). In essence Kokoro Jiayou means "[Strength] is fueled by the heart" and the english localization line stays true to the actual meaning behind the sentence in the original script as opposed to the form. I feel that a lot of these lines that may seem like liberties taken by the English team actually have a lot more thought than it seems, by letting the players understand what characters are trying to say better. People tend to miss the forest for the trees in these kind of arguments, and at the end of the day the point is that more people can enjoy the game in the first place.
One of the things I'll back you up on is the major translation issue you brought up near the end of the video. It really ruined the point of the pre-historic chapter
On voice acting, I think you're off the mark here. VO are great here. Did you play trials of mana remake? This is leaps and bounds better. I happen to be playing them both right now, why I mention
No, I didn't, though I think someone else commented about that. I was holding it to the standard that the voice acting should improve the original game that didn't have it, and in most cases I think a lack of a voice is best for most of these stories
Personally, as a fella who typically doesn’t like most RPGs (I’d usually only play them if they have a form of “active command” like Paper Mario or M&L), this was a nice easing back into the genre. The quality-of-life changes are mostly so that new players can get into the game without getting stuck, and I personally think the voice acting is great for both versions. This was honestly the game that made me love RPGs again, and nothing’s taking that away.
Honestly, as someone who had zero frame of reference for the original (Watching playthroughs on YT doesn't really count I feel), I really enjoyed the remake. Sure, the radar can potentially suck the difficulty out of finding your way, but it wasn't a big deal to me. The voice acting was mostly inoffensive to me, given that I've never really cared about super stellar voice acting as long as the gameplay is good. Hell, there was one voice I instantly fell in love with (won't say who it is for spoiler's sake) the moment I heard it. And the newly done music from the original and new music for this remake we got was some top-notch stuff. Still, I can absolutely understand some of the general complaints for people who played the original.
I think that this is a very good analysis/comparison and you make a lot of valid points and connections between the two but I can't help but feel that a lot of your criticism comes from the fact that it's simply different from the original and not because whatever your criticizing is "bad" for a lack of a better word, which is fair because this is more of a comparison than a review, but I really feel that there's a lot of bias here. but at the end of the day I feel that none of it is a deal breaker, I would say it's all personal preference but this is what I thought playing through the remake (not gonna go over every point but just some that stuck out to me) I get where you're coming from with the radar and tutorials thing but personally I feel that a lot of the things that the tutorials tell you aren't puzzles, there really isn't much to figure out, if you didn't figure out the password thing from the superiors demonstration then you probably did need a tutorial to explain it, and the radar is kinda just there, as you said you really don't need it but I wouldn't turn it off, for me personally i liked to have it incase I didn't know what to do. and there are sometimes where it doesn't tell you where to go. I don't think having them on is a problem in terms of difficulty I did feel that some bosses were easier but I really didn't mind, and I still struggled on some bosses and the super bosses still wring me out, but over all I think the difficutly was pretty constant and fare, the fights that needed to be tense were still pretty challenging. but this point is really just opinion so I don't want to spend too much time on it I personally disagree with the voice acting, I thought every voice was superb and I didn't have a problem with any of them, and they made some scenes for me. but hey that's just me. and I really liked the new translation too, I don't have a good reference of the original's writing considering I played it over 4 years ago and i only beat like 3 chapters but I really liked the writing. responding to your examples, the tayaki guy like being changed to "I'm a local businessman" I didn't mind cause I thought the line was fucking cool even if tayaki guy makes more sense, but so does businessman if you think about it for a second, and earthen shifu's line being changed to "true strength flows from the heart" I like more cause it feels more like something he would say now I do completely agree with you on the pogo line, I do wish he said "love" instead of "aieeee" but I think the implication of him feeling such raw emotion that he starts to invent language is good enough, so i do think the moment is lessened but not completely ruined but again I think a lot of this is due to the fact that you've played the game before, you said it yourself that a new player wouldn't mind at all. I can't blame you for feeling that way, it's why I was so hard on the link's Awakening remake was cause I played the original so much so I nitpicked it to death so I want to make it clear that I am not attacking you or saying that you're wrong, but rather that I simply don't see eye to eye on some of your points but that's ok because your conclusion was that "both are great experiences" and I couldn't agree more. it's only natural to prefer one to the other. I personally like the remake more for the simple reason that I like the voices and the game is really pretty, and I like the way this new one feels. it feels like the same game but prettier and I already loved the original despite never beating it so this is just an upgrade for me. but both are great experiences, I'm really glad that square brought this game back and that you made this video to spread the word
I'm certainly biased (how could one not be?), but my hope for this video was to provide an objective comparison accompanied by some of my opinions, so that either could be ignored throughout the video. Thanks for the kind words
@@joshshackelford889 very fair, very fair. Well I think you very much succeeded in your goal, I just thought I'd share my views as well. But regardless its a very well made video! I know you said you probably won't make anymore videos like this but unless you just don't want to I'd say keep going, you're very good at it!
Just watched the video after having played the first 7 chapters in the remake and I am very impressed by how thorough and informative this is great job bro
Looking at the credits of the Pre-history chapter, there is no English VA for all of them. Hence, why they re-use Ai, the word for love. The maps are maybe useless if you know the game already, but I was glad to have it in Cube's chapter. Planning alternate route is what it's about once plot happens. You may have your gripes with the radar, but while it highlights where to go, it also displays the locations nearby you haven't visited. All it does is give you information, it's up to you to act on it. Also, believe it or not, as simple as that game is to understand, I know people who would be lost if the game didn't flat out told them what mechanics there are. Some people will actually long for these tutorials screens.
I've heard people mention that first point, but I find it hard to believe. They could have just had the JP voice actor say "love" and used that. I also think telling you where you have been on a minimap is a disservice. I get why that and the tutorials are in the game though, if the game didn't have them brainlet reviewers couldn't possibly figure out how to beat the game
@@joshshackelford889 Concerning the first half of the response, I agree it would have been nice, but I'm not losing sleep because the other moment that word is important was handled pretty well. I just wanted to state my opinion on that.
Like 90% of the gripes about the remake in this video is over very minor points that I find very hard to care about. The remake looks better in basically every way save the localization of the ending of the prehistoric arc. The remake > original easily regardless, and I've played the original SFC version.
I can see why you would exclude talking about it for spoiler reasons, but I think ... ... ... ... ... I'd love to talk about the final chapters, especially the new boss and ending. I think they're fantastic. It gives Oersted closure without cheapening the message about what hatred can do to people, and re-contextualizes his final words brilliantly from "Odio will return" to "don't become like me."
Pogo and Gori waking up in the remake: The standard scream you'd expect for realizing you thought your best friend was a hot chick in your sleep. Pogo and Gori waking up in the original: *S C R E A M S OF THE UNHOLY!*
A big thanks for putting the time and effort in to make this video, after finishing the remake I wondered what was different in the original, and this video was exactly what I was looking for. As far as not understanding why they went so far to streamline the exploration and combat system while autosaving every 5 seconds, I think they decided to do this because many people like me that are playing this remake are middle-aged adults who have to play the game in short bursts and who do not have the same time we used to have back when we were kids in the 80's and 90's to invest in long bouts of trial and error by clicking on every single tile or trying out every single attack in an RPG. I can see what you mean about this removing some of the feeling of discovery from the game, but I probably would not have had time to play through the game completely if it was constantly stopping me and asking me to invest large amounts of time figuring out what to do to progress the game or beat a boss battle. The lack of time is also the same reason I am watching your 20 minute video to find out what was changed instead of going back and playing through the original for 20 hours, lol. PS. You are totally right about the japanese voice acting features an all star cast. I was shocked to see that the voice actor for shinji ikari in neon genesis evangelion was the voice actor for pogo in this game.
Personally I love how every non-named character in the caveman chapter is Sugita, that it's all one guy making all the noises often talking to himself.
title screen changes, Something spoilery during spoiler. But also why is there so many dislikes? Grinding in near future beyond the level it used to stop you in the original, you used to go to a specific lady in one of the buildings read her mind she brings guards fight them exit the room re-enter repeat. You don't have to do that anymore
I don't mind the title screen change too much, by the time a player would finish the 7th scenario and realize that wasn't in any of those, they'd already be upon it. Regarding the dislikes, it seems a lot of people found me too opinionated lol, probably about the smaller stuff. I'm guessing many of those didn't watch to the end where I said I liked both versions, but I don't mind - didn't say anything I didn't mean, can't please everyone
I watched two let's plays of the game over a decade ago. I actually enjoy the radar telling me what to do. Although, the radar stopped working at the very end of t he distant future chapter. I was so confused that I had to look up what to do. Why does the game even give you empty vents to explore?
In the original, the power goes out in the elevator and you have to use the vents to move to a different floor. That doesn't happen in the remake, but they kept the vents in for whatever reason. Not sure why they changed the elevator dysfunction at all though
I can see why they don't have where you're meant to go appear on the radar at that moment. it's thefinal puzzle of chapter, one you HAVE to genuinely figure out to slve the problem, so I guess they wanted to prserve that puzzle due to its significance.
Felt like coming back to this video since I was reminded of it. Just a few notes. For one, the entirety of Watanabe's quest is not required to continue, and instead you only need to get his Pocket Lint. And secondly, not sure if it was changed or not from the PC port because I could've sworn that Beru just kissed you either way, but when you give her the Dress this time around instead of flashing you she brings Pogo into the haystack to do... something? Still censored but I do get why it was done.
The 'wonderful stylized font' was actually a special feature that was added by Aeon Genesis for the fan re-translation. The original version didn't have that feature either, and in fact, the first attempt to translate Live a livE was pretty... poor, but was a key step to get the game properly localized. Pointing this out, because while I agree Square could've done that, it's not something the original had either. I personally love the remake, in general it was a massive improvement. The weaknesses and elements being added was actually a huge improvement, while those features were in the original... when were you supposed to learn about them? Why use elemental attacks as Oboro, when whipping Shuriken was a better option 100% of the time. In the remake, I found myself experimenting with every ability and even learned that some of them had effects I never knew about, and plenty got buffed to be worth using.
Never played the original, but all the complaints about map and quality of life updates; really helped me out. Would have prob not finished the game without them
Yeah... gonna just say mah to the whole turning off tutorials. With prehistory, imperial China, and distant future especially, they're kinda necessary. The non-verbal presentation of prehistory would easily lead to many people - myself included - just not bothering with the crafting if it weren't explained what the menus were wanting. Likewise, highlighting how moves are taught in China removes guess work that would be frustrating, and I absolutely would've expected to fight the Behemoth in the Distant Future. Did the passwords need to be over explained? Probably not to that extent but having the reminders at each bell really helps keep it in the player's mind when so much of the rest of the chapter is vying for your attention. If you played the original, yeah, nor necessary. New players though will have such a vastly better experience with them on.
The game can say shit but not panties. The censorship is all over the place, I'm playing with Japanese voices and most of the script in Japanese is faithful to the original. One of my biggest issues with the localization is a part where Taeko talks down to Kaori when she offers herself to be used for Bukiri Daioh. The Localization says "Don't be silly, dear!" the Japanese Voice says "Why are you saying such things". The localization accidentally implies Taeko isn't taking Kaori's suggestion seriously. The English Localization is just all over the place.
Personally I enjoyed the voice acting and thought it all fit incredibly well for what I typically see in RPGs. Even non-essential characters had voices that felt committed to the line. In fact one of the examples you use of bad VA happens to be the same VA as one of your examples for good VA, lol. I think they nailed the delivery so well they turns annoying to 11 and great to 11. I also thought the Prehistory end scene was fine; better than the original because unless someone deep dove and read into that line I'd have never thought to consider it some milestone 'first word spoken'. I'm still on the fence as to whether that's adding more nuisance then was actually there. I feel the simplicity of our monkey man getting a harem tumble and our boy getting to smash just feels appropriately over the top comedic; after all Zaki hip-thrusts a lizard into enemy faces for Godsake, lol. My girlfriend's reaction is probably what made the scene so good for me though. She was walking through RIGHT when the scene went off and just stood there with this "What the actual...?" look on her face, lol.
I agree with this. The VA work was fitting for the game, with a lot of the accents not being conventional (much like this gem of a game among its peers). Hell, it's nice to hear an Australian accent for once! Plus I never heard any voices and thought "Oh it's Troy Baker" or "Oh it's Goku", which isn't always a bad thing but in a game like this I feel that would of detracted from the experience. Plus I don't really know if I could imagine the 8th protagonists voice being any different after that true finale...
Predownloaded the game and played it all the way through in about a day or three. I’ve watched plenty of videos on the original (hell whoisthisgit is the only reason I knew the game existed), so I already knew just about everything about the game. Did everything in the remake, apart from the prehistoric superboss- that one was… just annoying. So uh here’s my takes, I guess. -- - The only thing that really bothered me with the translation was the ‘love’ butchering. Others have said this before far better than I could ever hope to, but the symbolism of that being humanity’s first word, cheesy as that is, is very important and very relevant to the overall plot. - I enjoyed most of the game’s music- standouts for me including the near future battle theme and the final boss themes, and ofc megalomania. Kiss of jealously was a bop, but I do agree the original version of the song fitted the time period better. I like them both honestly. But the overworld themes for most of the chapters wore out their welcome pretty quick. I think an additional alternate overworld theme for each would’ve been great for this remake. But the final chapter battle theme is, in my opinion, the worst of them all (and yes I know it’s just the title screen music). I have personally heard that song too many damn times- and it’s the one most players will probably end up hearing the most of. Really should’ve been an option to change it to any of the characters in your party’s battle themes or any of the characters you’ve found. Or to at least keep it the same as in the middle ages chapter. Hell, I’d have liked a toggle to switch to the original ost, or at least to be able to unlock the original songs in the jukebox. Would’ve been a nice touch. - I generally liked the voice acting overall. Liked some of the battle quotes too- namely my favourite protagonist Akira’s (“who’s a badass”)- but they were pretty repetitive. Lei, as much as I love her, started to get grating pretty quickly in the final chapter. Yes, the old man did indeed teach you that move. We know. - As for the gameplay, I never played the original so I don’t really have anything to compare it to. Again, I have seen plenty of videos, but never actually experienced the og gameplay myself. But I quite enjoyed the battle system. Though most of the game was pretty easy (I would have loved a hard mode or new game plus). Like the superbosses in the final chapter- first tried ‘em all (mainly using Akira, Lei, Oboro and Cube). Final boss was a bit difficult- at least in comparison- but my boys Akira and Cube- and best girl Lei don’t @ me- pretty much steamrolled it. Oh and Oboro was there too I guess. Always did find it a bit strange that I could just bail away from an enemy, heal, and kill them without any retaliation. Felt off. I do wish they did chase you down. I do think showing enemy weaknesses and resistances is a good change… but you should’ve had to discover them first. I like the charge gauge and more detailed ability descriptions though. And I honestly don’t have many issues with the radar and the tutorials, but I guess I did already know about most of the mechanics. Looking back on it, some of the tutorials did go a bit… far. But I wouldn’t want them gone completely either. Maybe a compromise of toggling between ‘detailed’ tutorials and ‘minimalistic’ tutorials (which only explain the fundamentals of gameplay) could’ve worked. - I do have two chapter specific gripes that I think ruin some aspects of them; Items being displayed by sparkly spots is something I’m okay with... except in the wild west chapter. It completely trivializes it. I’ve seen gameplay of perfect runs a long while back so I had a general idea of where to look. But even with just that, I first tried set up all the traps perfectly my first run. I found the rope at the last minute though I’ll admit. But what REALLY makes it so simple now is Mad Dog, bless his soul but goddamn it Mad Dog, just tells you what to give people if you have the item on you. And the other gripe is with the password system in the edo Japan chapter. I think Oboro noting to himself the two passwords being used is good- I don’t know if the original even tells you what the other password is. And it makes sense that Hayate gave him this kind of important intel before the mission. But him stopping and saying every time the password changes… uh, what’s even the point anymore? Forget what password it’s on now? Just run around in a circle until Oboro tells you. - Anyways uh that’s it I guess. Overall I did really enjoy this game, and definitely looking forward to replaying it in the future. But it sure ain’t perfect either. But neither was the original. Either way it’s still one hell of a weird and quirky rpg- and that’s one of it’s greatest strengths. Also uh sorry if my little rant here was all over the place. Making long comments on mobile is not fun.
I didn't mind Mad Dog's remarks too much as the only character specific items are the slingshot (obvious) and the frying pan (better as an equipment after the chapter anyway).
The chinese translation of pogo's last word are actually translated correctly to the world "love" instead of the sound aiiiiiieee~ ***spoiler*** And its funny when he yell that word at the final chapter boss. He's not here fighting for justice or the fate of the world. He can't comprehend any of those. He only care to go back to his new found love asap(later to be show are his wife and KID!). He is just fighting for love~
Funfact about Pre-history chapter: Pogo yells Bing Bang Boom old name sometimes while doing it(Dodagensen), as does Zaki when he uses Fly Lizard Fly(Barindreen!).
Too cool! Another thing I love about the remake. I only caught the ogre grip reference but thanks for pointing this out!
As far as I can tell from my limited understanding of Japanese, most of Pogo’s moves in Japanese seem to be named for their sounds, and Pogo yells out the onomatopoeia relevant to each.
That's because the caveman chapter doesn't have an English voice cast.
The font thing was something that was only in the fan translation by Aeon Genesis. It wasn't in the original Japanese version.
You're right, I mentioned I was compared this remake to the Aeon Genesis translation at the beginning. Sharp eye!
@@joshshackelford889 I think he was pointing to the fact that you mentioned the “Original” had unique fonts for each chapter when in reality that was a fan addition to the game so the developers not adding it in the remake isn’t really an omission or change since the true original didn’t incorporate that type of font display. Sure, unique fonts would be great, especially for the final chapter, but I think it’s incorrect to add the font as a general “change” when in reality having the same font for each character is more true to the original. Just kind of a nit pick to your nit pick lol.
@@joshshackelford889 except, it was something else.
I... wouldn't say mindlessly checking walls for an outlet would be a puzzle. That's just an inconvenience.
What can I say I love oddities in my funny little games
but on the other side having an obvious hint to where to search is just boring and need no thoughts from the player: the game plays you instead of you playing the game. I think you can have something right in the middle.
@@mielthesquid6536 True that. This version of the game just turns the problem in the complete opposite direction. You fixed one problem, but now you have to deal with another.
@@Laurmachi its better to be easy than to be tedious
@@arzfan29 I disagree because at least tedium brings a sense of relief.
The original game never had an official localization. The transliteration of Chinese words was done by fan translators, which actually made it hellish to read and recognize Xin Shan Quan's abilities in an RPG game that requires you to remember them. Wuxia novels and TV dramas translate moves and techniques for a reason: to keep the story digestible and make techniques sound snappy to the target-language audiences. "Xuan Ya Lian Shan Quan" may be the protagonist's ultimate technique, but it easily rolls off the tongues and is a lot less memorable than "Heavenly Peaks Descent". Meanwhile, "Earthen Heart Shifu" sounds weird but "Xin Shan Quan Master" sounds perfectly fine for a Chinese character.
One of the biggest dilemmas for any professional translation is balancing efficiency and being faithful to the source. Neither full translation nor full transliteration is a good idea.
I agree, and I think the translation for the new Chinese abilities is a good thing. Though, I greatly prefer Xuan Ya Lian Shan Quan to Heavenly Peaks Descent
Just for the record, "kokoro" can be translated as either "mind" or "heart", so either interpretation of Shifu's line towards the thugs harassing Yun are valid.
You're right, or spirit too. My issue was moreso with that embellishment "true strength flow from the ____".
@@joshshackelford889 That's fair. My read on the embellishment was that it was the official localization's way of emphasizing the setting of the chapter; a lot of the dialogue felt like it was written to evoke other contemporary styles, so the dialogue here feels like something out of a Wuxia tale, to me. Aeon Genesis's patch changing the font for each chapter serves a similar purpose, I'd say.
@@ChaosArgate Interesting perspective, that's especially apparent with the new middle ages script lol. I respect the new approach but I miss a lot of the original text, though if it were switched around I'd probably call this remake out for it lol
@@joshshackelford889 Honestly, "true strength flows from the heart" captures the context best I think. The whole chapter is about the heart being the true strength anyway. About taiyaki thing, I think it was a judicious choice , has less to do with creativity. Not many people outside of Japan know what that culturally means especially for someone like us in the 30s/40s who grew up seeing those vendors. Being a taiyaki guy was nothing extraordinary and rather inconspicuous, all the more sharply contrasting who he is and how he looks (which is nothing short of extraordinary). For that, the new translation is more fitting.
@@joshshackelford889 I played with the chinese subtitles
And the fighting style they learned from their master is named something like "flowing heart style". Not sure how the english version named the style
- (POSSIBLE) SPOILERS FOR THE GAME BELOW -
A small pet peeve I have about the remake (or at least, the advertising) is that the Middle Ages chapter was advertised for the remake alongside the other chapters. It wasn't at all advertised in the release of the original due to it being an extra secret chapter that is the jumping off point of tying the stories of the first 7 chapters together. It was meant to surprise and intrigue a new player first playing the original and seeing an extra chapter suddenly pop up after completing the first 7, but if a new player plays the remake first, then they will be confused as to why the stereotypical Final Fantasy protagonist on the box art isn't available to play as when first starting the game.
I dislike that as well but it's an unrealistic expectation to hope that any modern video game publisher won't brandish every single asset they have when advertising
Adding quality of life improvements is never a bad thing. I feel like this is really nitpicking from playing the original and this. It makes massive improvements on saving time as many have responsibility’s and not a bunch of extra time to waste.
The minimap is VERY debatable, I know plenty of people who grew frustrated on not knowing where to go or what to do.
I think that's a trait of super famicom rpgs, especially compared to newer ones. I was never confused in the original, and chapters typically have just a few key locations so you can just check those if you're stuck. As with the difficulty changes though, I can understand why a person would prefer it
@@joshshackelford889hard agree about not being confusing at all, when l was a kid l played it on emulator in japanese and the only chapters l got stuck was the Akira one (that damn switch!) and the sci-fi one (when you have to say your first name)
So, here’s a few things that might be interesting to some fans of the fan translation. There are a few notable spots in the game where it seems like the English localization has tried to sanitize something that was crude or adult-oriented in the original game. A couple I picked up on are the following.
* In the Wild West chapter, the healing items you pick up are herbal liniment, miracle tonic, and beef jerky. In the SNES version, they were tequila, bourbon, and cigars, respectively.
* also in the Wild West chapter, Sundown is able to raid Annie’s bedroom while she’s out setting traps, and steal her nightgown. In the remake, this is instead her diary.
* And in the Near Future chapter, there’s a running gag where Akira wants Watanabe to steal the orphanage teacher Taeko’s underwear, but Watanabe keeps stealing similar-sounding things instead. In the remake, Akira is instead trying to get Watanabe to steal Taeko’s secret stash of pocket money.
So, here’s the unexpected thing. Each of those changes appear to be *fully accurate* to the Japanese script of the remake. I was curious about the booze items (because the healing items no longer debuff you for drinking them), so I swapped the game to Japanese text and compared the letters to lists of katakana, Hiragana, and kanji. Here’s what I discovered.
* The Wild West healing items are what the localization says. The herbal liniment is medical herbs (薬草: literally the kanji for “Medicine Grass”). The miracle tonic is general medicine or smelling salts (気付け薬: it’s a term meaning “care medicine”). And the jerky is literally “Dry Meat”.
* Annie’s diary is Annie’s “日記” (literally, “Day Record”). So yeah, it’s a diary here as well.
* and the Taeko stuff? The last item is Taeko’s “ヘソクリ”. That’s “Hesokuri”, which is a Japanese idiom basically meaning money that a housewife saves for herself in secret. So, even this thing, which I expected to be panties, is actually correctly described as a secret stash of money.
So it’s an interesting case. Some of these cruder moments have indeed been revised or sanitized, but *not* by the English localization; it’s this way even in the Japanese script.
That's because the original SNES version came out a few years before CERO was a thing.The Live-a-Live remake is a basically a T rated game, and CERO is real strict when it comes to alcohol, tobacco and sexual content in T rated games. So the remake had to meet CERO's standards. That's why the crowd screaming about 'woke western localization' makes me facepalm so hard. Most of the stuff they're complaining about was removed in Japan to meet the guidelines of the Japanese game equivalent to the ESRB.
@@ateliermink6340 or maybe the Japanese branch of SE is already infiltrated by the woke. Considering all the crap they've been doing with other games for a "global" audience.
@@sweet_sukeban4022 The SNES Live-a-Live came out in 1994. CERO was established in 2001. The changes that were made line up with CERO's guidelines for T rated games. Let go of your conspiracy. It's not 'woke infiltration at SQUARE ENIX, ' it's the Japanese ESRB doing their thing. If SE wanted to release the game it HAD to do so by CERO guidelines like every other game over there. It's simple logic.
@@ateliermink6340 But there are indeed some western woke changes, specifically certain lines of dialogue apparently deemed "not woman friendly", like that Matsu's line where he says that a woman should not get in the way of a man which was completely changed in the English localization and kept as it was in Japanese.
@@alessioscoppa1745The shift from a dying Matsu's macho posturing to focusing on his regrets didn't change the scene at all and in fact it set up the flashback what happened to Akira's father. I played the original, nothing was lost in the line change.
I’m glad you agree Mad Dog’s VA did him justice in the remake.
Mostly. Some of his lines come off a tad weird though lol
A couple things!
Firstly, the different fonts by chapter is a fan translation flourish; it doesn't reflect anything in the original Japanese version, so I'm not surprised it wasn't carried over here.
Secondly, Takashi Tokita mentioned in a recent interview that he actually had always had voice acting in mind when writing even the original game's script, and, in fact, the Japanese voice track features many of the VAs he originally had in mind for each role. So the decision to add it wasn't purely cynical profit drive, even if they probably would've requested it be added even if Tokita didn't want to include it.
I quite like the japanese va! My biggest complaint is about the really cheap and unprofessional English voice acting (seriously, what were they thinking). I didn't know that about Tokita, thanks for sharing
I hate that they changed Demon King/ King of Demons to Lord of Dark.
Demon is an offensive word, use "mortally challenged"
@@MrNoot39449 wow you got the whole squad laughing 😐
@@federicomachado811 Twitter is two blocks down
yeah really takes away from the game's message and how it subverts RPG cliches. You cna still get the intent but Oersted's final warning about how anyone cna become a demon king is kinda watered down by how extra flowery he makes his dialogue coupled with the change to Lord.
Not a deal breaker, but it is irksome
@@sarafontanini7051 That's one of the few things that bugged me about the remake. I mean, 'Anyone can become a demon with enough hatred' stuck with me for years. The remake still gets the point across but 'Lord of Dark' is kind of lame compared to 'demon lord' or even simply 'dark lord.'
Am I the only one that really likes the remaster of the Kiss of Jealousy song, is electric guitar kinda fits as the playable characters are delinquents.
Not a bad point of view. In a vacuum, I like the song, but I greatly prefer the original and its more primitive sound
I think it's great, if not better. I prefer the original as a battle theme instead of the more jazzy remake's. It loses a lot of its percussive elements.
@@joshshackelford889 personally I'm not sure that Latin percussion really evokes the stone age any way you arrange it, though percussion would definitely be important and I agree that an electric samba band might not be the best interpretation to befit the scene.
My feeling is that the new musical director clearly liked Carlos Santana, because that guitar sound is very clearly referencing the way that he sets his guitars and amps.
I also like Santana, so I guess I may have gotten more out of that pastiche than you did. 🙂
To me, is better than the original. The whole soundtrack is awesome.
You're not. Is awesome
Seeing the recent drama of localisers messing with translations of games and anime in whatever way they wanted, made remember this remake, back when it came out people would call you a "chud" for complaining about them changing the source material of already established thing....
the localization blunder with pogo is so, SO severe that i genuinely believe it deserves a patch. especially because
MAJOR, SERIOUS SPOILERS UNDER THE CUT
-
-
-
-
pogo's final chapter protag ending was changed to be even more impactful than it was in the original. in this remake, when oersted asks him the question of what the difference is between him and the heroes, not only does he respond with "love", he walks forward, hugs oersted, and ruffles his hair. pogo isn't capable of understanding any of what oersted says, but he could read his body language to see that he was upset, and instinctively held and comforted him. this emphasizes even more than the original's choice of pogo's first word, that "love" is the very essence of all of humanity, as opposed to odio's embodiment of hate. the fact that there are first-time players being denied scenes with this kind of thematic impact is absolutely egregious to me.
Totally. Though maybe this was intentional, they'd have to get a whole new English voice actor for that one word. They could've just had the japanese voice actor do that even if he doesn't speak English, so I'm less inclined to think this was a conscious choice.
@@joshshackelford889 yeah, im usually forgiving and willing to chalk stuff like this up to creative choices, but the serial butchering of the romanized names in [the chapter we arent supposed to really talk about in front of newbies yet they felt the need to show a bunch of trailers spoiling anyway] makes it obvious to me that a lot of genuine mistakes were made in translating this game. "uranus" was the only name not borked out of that scenario because it's a directly translatable noun. if i had to guess why this happened, there might have been communication issues between the teams where there just weren't any TL notes, and the team wasn't familiar with the source material, resulting in a lot of guesswork.
@@IncompleteChimera Regarding the marketing, no idea what they were thinking there. Anything to sell copies I guess
for any other live a live gamers checking this thread, here's some more for this game's translation being extremely full of errors. the secret boss in cube's final chapter dungeon, "erauqs", gets its unusual name from the fact that it's "square" spelled backwards. just another funny little detail of the game. its new name in the localization is euraokos. spelled forwards, that's "soko-aru-e", a pretty blatant phonic guess at the name instead of understanding that it's supposed to be "square". now, i don't blame the team for this, this is absolutely a squeenix moment i'm sure due to all these oddities. however, i don't really understand the confidence to make such drastic script changes as a team that's working off of so little information about the actual source material, regardless of what you think about it's actual quality.
Newcomer to Live a Live here, I think I disagree about the password part for Oboro's scenario. I got very frustrated by that whole section since I like to do pacifist runs of things if I know they're possible. After all the pausing I had to do to figure out what I was missing and resetting to avoid inescapable battles, it was nice to have the game throw me a bone
Also, if you take a break during the chapter and come back later, you are very likely to forget the password, even if it's a simple rotation and that can be frustrating. Also you can always skip the dialogue so that you don't see it if that tickles your fancy.
I played the SNES version first and i gotta say that i agree with you, in the original it made me believe the bell was actually the passage of time so i spent most of the chapter rushing due to the bell. I would've preferred much more to at least have the "Hayate told me that the password changes" instead than just be thrown in the dark.
The stylized fonts are a byproduct of the Aeon Genesis patch. The old 99% patch did not have stylized fonts at all. Zhi did that himself when he fixed the bugs in the old patch and cleaned up the dialogue for the final remastered version.
Also I have one instance where I feel the script was *too* faithful to the original: The wrestling match. In Near Future the orphanage kids are watching a wrestling match on TV. I, being a pro wrestling fan, could pick up it was an All-Japan match between The Great Muta and Mitsuharu Misawa. That is an awesome reference... For 1994. Muta's had a long almost 40 year career in pro wrestling and just retired back in February. Misawa though has been dead since 2009 after a back suplex spot in his last match dislocated a vertebrae in his cervical spine, ultimately killing him. I feel like an updated reference would've been nice since gamers today likely wouldn't know who Muta or Misawa are. Shinsuke Nakamura Vs Kazuchika Okada would've been a more contemporary reference since they're two of the biggest stars in Japanese wrestling right now.
I'll be honest, I think I actually prefer the new translation in virtually every aspect except for the Pogo thing, that one's pretty dumb. Some of the "censorship" actually isn't a localization thing... That was changed in the remake in Japan. Specifically, Annie's Diary and Taeko's Panties. I'm guessing those were changed due to CERO (not a thing at the time), and the localizers just had to work off of that.
Beyond that, I feel like overall the changes make the game itself just... More fun. Some stuff could be considered less hard... And also less annoying in some stuff. The tutorials never really felt like "spoilers" to me, it just felt like the original being needlessly vague at times for no real reason. The tutorials just make stuff feel less "how the hell was I supposed to know that", which is something that Tokita himself said he wanted to do for the remake, and I think the Ninja chapter is way, WAY better for it. The radar is also a really damn good addition, specially in the chapters you say it's a negative. For example, Sci-Fi actually DOESN'T show you where to go where it counts: when you're running from the Behemoth throughout the ship. I love the original game, but... I genuinely believe most if not all the changes remake makes are all for the best... Again, except for Pogo, even that was a blunder on the Spanish translation.
In addition: the backgrounds DO live on in the remake, take a closer look at each chapter's standard text box for generic dialogue. Each chapter has unique prints around the edge of the text box that calls back to the backgrounds of the original: Caveman has the Swirls in the expression bubbles, Kung Fu has a bamboo print, Ninja has a wave print, Cowboy's looks like worn paper (ala the WANTED poster), Wrestler has a chainlink fence, Mecha has a metallic tone, Sci-Fi has circuitry in the corners. I also think this serves as a good replacement for the fonts, since you gotta remember, this remake is translated to a buncha other languages, and believe me, multi language font support for 1 font alone is hellish, let alone making 8 different ones. I think the text box wallpapers are a more than great compromise.
Fair presentation of the changes overall, but I feel like some stuff is made out to be problems when... It isn't necessarily? Stuff like Jackie's Mano Toss line, that didn't feel as much an inconsistency as it did a cute reference to the original name in Japanese. Overall, I think some of the "problems" are... A bit overblown... Yes I think Wrestler was more genuine fun in the remake than in the original, there it felt like vague annoyances more like "challenge".
Also in terms of the voice acting, I've been playing with English voices and... It's been amazing. Like, genuinely great. Most if not ALL the characters match how I imagined them... Except for Sci-Fi's, funnily enough. I dunno, never expected the crew to be British. But outside of that, characters like the Shifu, Akira, Pogo, Oboromaru, Sundown... Everyone, has just sounded spot-on. SPECIALLY the cast in Wrestler, I absolutely love the great personalities they gave all the fighters, Jackie being more playful in a snobby way since he enjoys combat, Aja being a self-confident prick, Namkiat being a dork, and SPECIALLY Odie's voice, genuine fighting game hidden boss. Some delivery can be weak at times, but I can't in good faith say the voice acting in this game is bad at all, it's all pretty brilliantly done.
I noticed those text box differences, but I only noticed them being different for some chapters. I recall not being able to tell a difference between the China and Japan ones as an example, though maybe you're more observant than I. I loved the "what the hell do I do" moments in the original, but I'm generally critical of remakes and remasters. We'll have to agree to disagree on the English va though, especially since you mentioned Namkiat, - he sounds way too white it doesn't sound right to me at all
Oh and the mano toss thing wasn't a complaint at all I just thought it was a cool reference
Pogo's mistranslation really struck me too, but it struck me much harder the next times he says it because it makes much less sense than in the fan translation.
I'd personally keep the radar on in the near future. I (and whoisthisgit, lmao) got stuck a bit too much on where to go in that chapter
Finally, justice for pissed fist.
i'd actually argue. ( *SPOILERS* *AHEAD* )
i prefer the "aieee" mistranslation because it feels much more believable (to me, at least) that someone that has never done words in his life to simply invent a somewhat complex word such as "love" (again, for someone who has never learned how to word). I actually prefer it in the final chapter because he says love at every opportunity he gets, and while he reminds me a bit about a 3 year old who just learned their own name, so i dont dislike it as much, it still feels more believable that Pogo would say a random grunt or scream, rather than a full fledged word. And it put some great room for improvement in the
( *MAJOR* *SPOILERS* *AHEAD* )
final conversation with oersted at the end. In the original translation, he just says love at oersted, and due to the 3 year old name analogy, it feels like (at least to me) he's just screaming his own name at him. And it just happens to be a word Oersted familiar with and has a positive meaning. In the remake however, Pogo hugs Oersted and it's the cutest thing ever. My favorite change in the remake by far. Also, unrelated, but pogo is probably the only main character in live a live that isn't a virgin.
You do realize that the stylized font was specifically added in the fan translation and that the remake developers had no obligation to include that, right?
Yes! That's why I mentioned that I was comparing to the Aeon Genesis localization at the beginning of the video, keen observation though. I do wonder though if anyone on the team was aware of that fan translation, they could've taken a few ideas from it lol
Honestly, that's for the best. Localization of all kinds, from Working Designs-tier fanfiction, to "stylistic improvements" such as the fonts, has no place in any medium. It's not your game, sod off and keep your fanfiction on whatever special education blogging website "people" use these days.
@@joshshackelford889 I want to say "there's no way they didn't know about the fan translation coming into this", but really, that's the only thing that explains the pogo issue.
@@HYDEinallcaps what the fuck are you talking about
@@HYDEinallcaps Trash take.
These changes don't really seem like a huge deal breaker to me (except for the Pogo stuff, which I genuinely hope they patch), but what worries me is the fact that I see so many people calling the localization changes "Woke garbage" and refuse to buy the game just for it, which I find ridiculous as a fan of the original
Yes, the changes are a bit jarring and definitely feel weird, but it isn't such a bad thing either; at least not to the point in which you decide to not buy it
bruh, what is woke anyways these days?..these anti-sjws get angry if there is one female protag onistsor one black dude..people wanna be outraged out of nothing these days, Look at GTA6 ""oooh look a female protag..its woke garbage now" and yet GTA1 and 2 had female characters you could use...I bet if terminator 2 came out today, it would be considered woke garbage.. so sick these stupid outrages..anti-sjws, egdelords and cynics have ruined the enjoyment of films and games these days..
I’m not a fan of the localization changes either, _however_ I know how to mod in unofficial patches on my switch.
When it comes to PC tho, the modding _will_ be extensive…
Yeah that description is weird. The only thing I could possibly interest as """woke""" is the Gynophobia boss name change. Not sure why they did that but considering the culture in Japan I doubt it was for the sake of appealing to Western notions
@@joshshackelford889 I mean to be fair, on the LAL discord we're finding out a ton of shit that Aeon Genesis had changed for no particular reason (for example, Odie O'Bright never actually described how he killed the other fighters, that was just added by Aeon Genesis), it's possible Gynophobia was a mistranslation of their own.
Edit: Nvm it isn't forget what i said
Don't be overdramatic
Nearly everyone loved the game, there is only a extremely small dozen of ppl online complaining about it
I don't know if I actually can try the original SFC version at this point. The remake adds one last boss in the final chapter that gives Oersted some closure that is missing from the original. Not to mention ending the original on a boss rush of the previous chapters' bosses is kind of a cop out no matter what the time period or reason in my book.
I dunno, i love boss rushes when it is for creating story.
I usually hate boss rushes (looking at you every Mega Man game in existence) but here it's somewhat appropriate as it's trying to reinforce the point made by the main villain prior to it - which is cleverly alluded to (it was in your face the entire time) given their names.
One thing I love about the remake
SPOILERS
Was the final battle against Odio, the game just ends after the Odio Boss rush. Here you have one final confrontation against Oestred, not only that but even the characters that aren’t in your party join in on the battle. Even Oestred gets a chance to redeem himself
it hoenstly feels like a proper finale, giving literally EVERY protagonist a chance to end Odio once and for all, way better than just an easy boss rush
Pretty sure the "Aie" mistranslation is a production issue. It is clearly impossible for any translator to not know what it should mean. For some reasons the never get a english voice for Pogo and in english, the texts and voices are the same so they went with the "Ai" phonetic. It is obvious because they translated it by "love" in other languages since the texts and audio doesn't match anyway.
Oh hold up, the other languages use their word for love? That means English is the odd one out... weird.
@@WhirlyBeepBoops that makes me want to go back to Pogo’s chapter (or talk to him in the final chapter) with the text changed to other languages, to see.
Not to mention that its portrayed very... naughty. Which I'll take that as a plus and a minus due to misconceptions
I played the French version of the game and i think the translation found the right compromise, basically French word for love is "amour" and Pogo at the end says "Ama" which sounds like a child trying to say the word for the first time or a primitive pronounciation of the word .
@@nathangirard2646 omg I was so confused when I read "ama" while he was screaming "AIIIIE" I was wondering why they couldn't keep "aie" since in french we say that too, but with the context of the old game it makes so much sense!
Personally I didn't find any of these changes too bad. The radar can definitely be of good use, specially in the near future chapter. That was my most disliked chapter because you needed to do so many bullshit and was hard to guess where to go next and you had to redo a lot of stuff (they actually changed the puzzle to find the buriki daioh basement, now you don't have to redo everything if you mess the order in which you touch the stuff). I would even say the game plays it too safe by staying to loyal to the original, and I would liked if they changed some of the old bullshit. Maybe it's too personal but I hate how easily you could screw up your pacifist run in edo chapter (in the original I had to restart the chapter three times at the end of chapter because of a small mistake). Another subjective opinion but I quite liked the english voice acting, especially the western chapter. It's also important to know that some lines are the same than the original in the japanese version, it's just that the english translation changed them and took liberties (one that annoys me a bit is Sundown's new line "Yours maybe", it's too uncharacteristic for him to do a your mom joke). Other two small changes I found that you missed:
-In the edo chapter Oboro-maru will remember the player what is the current password after the bell sound, making it easier to keep track.
-Giving the wrong password will no longer enter you in an unescapable battle. You can now run those fights making them a bit pointless
-Spoiler: Once you know that the computer is the one trying to kill everyone, the in game tips will change to the computer talking to you and telling you to give yp
Overall I say the changes in this remake are rather minor and most of them are helpful. I rather have them than not. The worst ones are the dificulty which is a bit too easy now, and Pogo horrendous last line.
Ps: the cool fonts of each chapter were only a thing in the fan-transalation
I thought the caveman screaming aieee was because he finished the horizontal mambo and i thought it was funny.
I'll admit Pogo not saying Love did actually kill me inside out of all your points I'll say I resonated with that the most
Megumi Ogata should've said "RUUUVU" (when I hear Japanese seiyuus speak English, sometimes this is how they say stuff like that) in the English version, honestly if they were going to keep her voice unaltered.
I got this game because it sounded similar to a game called Terranigma. Thanks for this explanation of the changes, it was very helpful.
While I enjoyed this video, you got a couple major things COMPLETELY WRONG. For one, the font changes ONLY existed in the fan translation, not in the original Japanese. The devs were probably completely unaware of the English fan translation so they based the remake off only the original Japanese, which didn't have the font changes. Other changes to the script were made in the fan translation such as making the boss of the present day chapter more violent and menacing by having him brutally describe the ways he killed each of his opponents. They also implied that he was a white supremacist to make him "more evil", both of which weren't in the original Japanese. So the fan translation isn't actually 100% accurate and took a lot of liberties with the script.
Secondly, saying that quality of life features such as actually telling you where the heck your supposed to go in certain chapters is "bad" is a REALLY hot take. Really, in my mind, if the game does a poor job telling you where to go and what your supposed to do then it's poorly designed in some area. The near future chapter in particular is improved DRAMATICLY with the ability to skip cutscenes (so you can skip the 2 minute crafting animation) and telling you where your supposed to go so you don't get lost for 4+ hours and the chapter overstays it's welcome.
And about the "mistranslation" that caused you to completely write off the far superior remake undeservedly, that's actually caused by one simple fact. To save on budget, all the voice acting for the prehistory chapter is done by Japanese VAs due to it just being sound effects and no dialogue until the end. It also helps that japanese VAs are far better at doing groans/moans/whatever that consists of 99% of this chapter's VA work due to anime. This causes some major inconsistencies such as Pogo and Zaki yelling out the untranslated lines of their attacks and and the final line of the chapter being "AIIIIIIIIIIIII" instead of "Love" because the Japanese word for love is "Ai." They didn't bother the get some other person that's fluent in English to scream "LOOOOOOOOOOVVE!" for that one line which is a disappointment but isn't a deal breaker if you actually know what "Ai" in Japanese means. They devs probably caught onto this late in development (they probably developed the chapters in chronological order) so in the ending pogo hugs the big bad instead of saying "love" to him since that would cause the same problem as the ending of prehistory.
Alot of the stuff in the video is nitpicks sure but far "superior" remake is an eh. Beside the new final boss phase and some balance tweaks, I honestly have no reason to replay the remake instead of the og considering that Wild West( my favorite chapter beside Far Future) was dumbed down to hell and I personally don't like HD 2D visuals.
I really don't think any of the changes listed here were a problem to me. I honestly think this was a nearly perfect remake. The only real problem I had was in the localization and writing. The voice acting is a little rough sometimes, and I didn't like that there's so many common NPCs who repeat dialogue that other NPCs say
The localization was fine honestly (most of the "censorship" was warranted minus the lewd jokes in near future that's just lame) and the voice acting was good whenever they didn't try to force an accent like with the Shifu. My favorite voices in the game have to go to Kato and nearly everyone else in far future, (Kato is literally Shulk from Xenoblade) Lei, Mad Dog, Akira, and Dr.Tobei. My least favorite voices go to Matsuru, Od Wan Lee, the Shifu, all three villains in Near Future, the villain from Ancient Japan, and a couple others I can't remember.
Overall the voice acting is a mixed bag, but still good overall. You could definitely tell it was done on a budget however. It tended to be worse than Octopath but was definitely better the Triangle Strategy, and MILES better than their other recent remake of an unreleased SNES game Trials of Mana which literally had 90s Capcom tier voice acting (Think Mega Man 8, Mega Man X4, or the first Resident Evil on PS1) for basically everyone that isn't one of the 6 possible playable characters and even then the main characters are super mediocre.
@@krimsonkatt I don’t see any parts where censorship was justified. Care to list them?
I get the reasoning why they didn’t cast and record extra dub lines for Prehistory, but man, if you’re gonna have unique anime openings depending on language, I feel like you can also do the same for Pogo’s exclamation of “LOOOOVE!”
It’s still cute and gets across the message when you know that’s the idea behind the scene and the meaning of “Ai”, but for someone who either doesn’t know Japanese, isn’t aware of the original game, or both, it doesn’t convey that. A dang shame.
At least, in my opinion, the voice acting for the Spoiler Final Boss Character is EXCELLENT
I'm still waiting to play the game to avoid major spoilers myself. Honestly some of the things pointed seems to be nitpicky and just wanting it to more like the fan translation from a group that kind of did a shooty job with the original SMT. I bet the quality is fine and I have heard and seen worse.
You didn't even play Yakuza until some sodomite eceleb told you and your fellow cattle to play it.
Rope. Your neck. A sturdy tree. A stool. Make it happen.
That's because most of this is nitpicky lmao
@@Lego1upMushroom N
The AG script is far less faithful than the official translation if you compare it as a whole. It's similar to the SMT1 situation: the format of dialogue is changed constantly, sometimes it just creates new plot points for no reason, and certain VERY IMPORTANT nuances in dialogue for pivotal scenes are glossed over. The new translation has a fair few changes and I dislike most of them, but there's far fewer issues with the script than the AG version. Both are serviceable. New one's better overall. Sucks that both of them could be better.
I'm very particular about changes in re-releases, but HD LAL is a good remake. At worst you'll be spoiled on some nice little touches from the original, but in exchange you get new nice little touches. The core is preserved and many aspects are conveyed better. Game's short, no good reason not to play both versions.
@@Healnavi Lemme retort all that by using a favorite modern tactic of you lolcalization apologists. Ahem:
AG script has SOVL, "accurate" translation doesn't, take your meds and touch grass, sneed incel.
Yeah, I think I nailed it.
I love the original promotional art of pogo for the super famicom that was like the first thing I ever knew about live a live. Yet another banger video for the ages
Thank you! I do too, I considered discussing the new official art for the characters but I figured it wasn't notable enough. I dislike how they made his body more proportionate to his head, he looks far too civil now for my tastes.
First of all, NO. If you even THINK about turning off the radar for the Near Future, prepare to go in circles not knowing what to do for a literal fucking hour.
You also have to talk or read specific people's mind in the Near Future in order to advance the plot. It can be very frustrating not knowing where/who to go to so I'm glad the radar was implemented.
Great video. 21:33 From what I've seen (don't have a switch) Bel has a different reaction if you give her the wild dress, she takes pogo into the haystack and they start giggling, not as explicit but still quite suggestive. But the really weird thing for me is that there is a spritesheet of Pogo having a nosebleed within the game, but it's just never used I guess. Maybe I just haven't seen it since I can't play the game myself to find where it is, but in the original game that animation only existed for that one scene.
SPOILERS FOR THE END OF THE GAME
The "love" mistranslation is horrible, I really hope they patch it. But another change that pissed me off was that they changed ginophobia(fear of women) to hygrophobia(fear of wetness).
By that point in the middle ages chapter, oersted is at his lowest point so far, he's alone, persecuted and all the people he cares about are dead save for one. While venturing the dungeon to save her, he starts being attacked by what are pressumed to be his own phobias, or he starts projecting his fears onto the enemies he fights. Some, like claustrophobia or scotophobia(dark), are related to ideas of isolation or loneliness, which would become his reality if he can't clear his name. But the last and strongest one he fights is gynophobia.
Throught the entire chapter Oersted has been told that he needs to rescue the princess, that as bad things get, he needs to keep going because she needs him and she believes in him. And all of this is taking a huge mental toll on oersted even before the events at the end take place. And having gynophobia as the last, strongest miniboss puts into perspective the state of his mental health in a subtle but brilliant way. It's not that he's starting to hate women, it's that the situation is getting to him to the point that he's developing genuine aversion to the one he's supposed to protect and love.
Of course, it's not like the story becomes incomprehensible like with the "love" change, and I get that the incely misogynistic implications can be uncomfortable, but it was such a smart and subtle piece of storytelling that left me amazed when I first got it. I find it a real shame that it was left out in the localization.
I wish you would've adressed the final chapters, i'd love to hear your take on them. I have a lot of mixed feelings myself and are the main reason I still prefer the sfc version, which is a shame because I genuinely love the new things they added.
Thanks! I gave Bel the dress and only got a kiss, not sure what's up with that discrepancy. I agree regarding the gynophobia censorship, no clue why that needed to be changed - though I could (and did) say that about a lot of the changes. The only notable thing I have to say about the middle ages is that Hasshe's voice acting is incredible, doubtlessly the best in the game, though Uranus is a runner-up. I also dislike the new dungeon theme for that chapter, my least favorite remix by far. I also didn't like how Oersted has voice lines for battle, his silence until the end was so climactic before. Regarding Oersted, his monologue at the end also has an inferior translation to me. I still remember reading the line that says something like "There's nothing left for me.... *except demons.*" and seeing the font change. Amazing.
@@joshshackelford889 Yes, yes. I had that exact same thought when I heard Oersted speak. His overly verbose speech makes it hard to follow where's he's going with it and there's no clear sudden shift where he goes from depressed to malicious. And the VA doesn't manage convice me that his soul was broken.
Regarding the bel thing, I only saw it on a livestream that's now deleted but if I manage to find another clip of it, I'll post the link. I could be wrong about the item but I'm
sure the animation was different from the usual.
@@joshshackelford889 /watch?v=MMndakCRKWg&t=2315s best I could find. It shows the animation but doesn't show what item he uses
"I get that the incely misogynistic implications can be uncomfortable"
The proper response to such sentiments would be "well cry me a river and drown yourself in it." They can stick to the rest of the pozzed game industry instead of worming their way into our territory even further. Christ, give a mouse a cookie, and he'll demand a tanker of soy milk.
Now, I’m usually not the type of person that outright says, “new thing good because it’s more shiny.” But honestly 90% of these changes don’t really bother me.
I might just have shit taste but I love most of the voice acting. I don’t mind deviations from the original text as long as the story remains the same. The gameplay is easy but from what I’ve seen it wasn’t really that difficult to begin with. I think the new menus, while they don’t have that snes charm, they look great in their own right.
The only thing that I can agree on that’s kinda dumb is that mistake with Pogo saying Aiiiii Instead of love, but that’s something that’ll hopefully be patched eventually.
The sparkles, while they do make Sundowns chapter less frantic, I can 100% see a modern audience disliking this chapter if it didn’t have those. Like, some people might be into the original way it was, but I can see that being way more frustrating than fun for me personally. Yes there’s more of a challenge to it, but honesty I feel like that would just make the chapter more tedious than tense.
I can see why people would be upset about these changes, but I dunno, I feel like even if I played the original, I’d still enjoy this remake because I like most of the new additions.
I do think people should be made aware of the changes though. While I’m not a stickler for purity when it comes to these things, I know some people do care.
If you want a more modern experience and a few localization changes don’t bother you play the remake, if you want the pure experience, play the original.
As someone who grew up with Resident Evil. I like it a lot when items sparkle at me in games.
I agree with you on some but others i just don't feel are a big deal namely the love part really should be fixed i feel.
I know you couldn't talk about this because it covers the end of the game but there's one major change that needs to be mentioned.
MAJOR ENDGAME SPOILERS AHEAD
They added an all new final boss to the remake! After the boss rush against Odio's various incarnations Oersted gathers all the darkness and hatred of the world into himself and transforms into what I assume is Odio's perfect form. The battle can be easy or difficult depending on your preparations beforehand but what really makes this battle stand out is how it ends. As you wittle down the boss's health you start to hear Oersted speak implying that he's beginning to regain his sense of self. And when Odio immobilizes all the party members with a special attack Oersted frees himself from Odio's body and delivers the finishing blow himself! This shows that despite all that happened Oersted still retained at least a fraction of his humanity and conscious thought and was willing to end the mess he started with his own hands. It was awesome to see Oersted go back to his old self at the end even if it was only for a brief moment.
For sure, awesome change. Maybe even as good as the Buriki Daioh change
I mean, wasn't Pure Odio already the perfect form? Seems like Square-Enix deciding to swing the "instant redemption" bat yet again. A new fight is neat, but not at the cost of removing all investment(wrong word, probably?) in Oersted/Odio's story arc.
@@HYDEinallcaps Not really. He was always a tragic hero and he being redeemed didn't change his views, as his post-battle dialogue follows the original script and, well, his fate is the same. What that battle implies is that Odio and Oersted are somehow separable, but after "killing Odio", Oersted didn't revert his personality, so it may be fully symbolic.
@@uandresbrito5685 Well, if the dialogue isn't changed, then that passes on paper. Still, why not a separate, optional boss fight if it's that irrelevant in terms of plot? It's not retconning, but it's still confusing.
@@HYDEinallcaps It being symbollic makes it not irrelevant. Just because it doesn't change the outcome, does 't mean they can't add nuance to it. About it being confusing, you're right, but it's probably one of those intentionally ambiguous endings
The only think I really feel should have been kept is in regards to pogo.
SPOILERS BELOW
The love thing is one thing I miss but given in the final chapter, pogo gives oersted a hug is a really adorable decision and changes Pogo in my eyes from a horny bastard, to a very sentimental and empathetic character who despite not knowing the language (even cube can but hs just can't communicate) can read the emotions of oersted and recontextualises his character.
So it's both a mildly annoying change but ads things too.
Interesting perspective!
Pogo's a friendly, kind boy who just so happens to be growing up, with all the issues that come with it, like his fondness for cute women. :p
I turned that Radar off first thing after the demo. Spent more time looking at that thing than the actual game and it totally trivialized some of the puzzles. I'm on the last chapter and loving this game. I fully intend to check out the original after I finish this up. It's been such a cool game and I can't believe I've gone all these years without it. Thanks for the awesome video!
Glad you're enjoying it, what a treat it is!
Not sure I agree with the majority of your gripes but it is helpful to see the comparisons so thanks for that
18:00 I'm a bit annoyed that the portraits aren't arranged like a Mega Man stage select screen anymore! It was a cute reference since the chapter is basically a Mega Man game as an RPG
It also makes it abandon the street fighter 2 parody they were going for, as that character select screen is also two rows
@@joshshackelford889 The new format is closer to Street Fighter 2 Turbo (the last entry Shimomura worked on) than the original was to SF2 in general. Where the original just has two rows (with the wrong number per row), the new version has a six character row (same as Champ Edition/Turbo), 1p displayed to the left and 2p displayed to the right, and Earth in the background.
I know nostalgia is strong, but "the presentation is different" =/= "the reference is spoiled."
People complaining about the english voices in this game.....
Have you heard the Trials of Mana remake one???!!!!
Square Enix needs to up their game clearly lol
17:56 All the Pretty Horses, Cormac McCarthy: Translation: I am commander of the mares, I would say, I and I alone. Without charity of these hands have nothing. No food or water or children. I bring the mares that mountain, young mares, wild mares and burning.
I'm playing through it right now. Do you have any thoughts about character balance in the post game? I heard Akira was buffed and Sundown was nerfed, but everything is currently a bit vague.
I honestly didn't notice, but now that you mention it Akira did seem stronger. I'll be curious to see if anyone comes out with specific data regarding these new stat changes
There is no postgame lol. Do you mean the final chapter? And yes, Akira was buffed. All his moves no longer have charge up, have longer range, and hit for a tiny bit more damage. His stats have also been raised by around 12% across the board. Still the worst MC tho lol. And no, Sundown didn't get nerfed, he's still just as OP as ever, though the final bosses are immune to moan bullet (guaranteed max damage with infinite range) so you can't two or three shot them.
Matsuru actually got the biggest buff IMO. His charge skill now heals him for around 35% HP (in the original it just removed negative statuses) which makes the modern day chapter SIGNIFICANTLY less frustrating, all of Matsuru's moves are now insanely strong and deal way more damage, and he gains stats every time he learns a new skill in his story so even at Lv1 (which he's locked at) he can have the stats of a Lv10+ character if you learned most of all of the skills. Then in final chapter once he can level up his stats quickly spiral out of control, only beat by sundown and rivaled by Cube. Also I'm pretty sure Pogo was nerfed but IDK. Oboro and Cube are exactly the same and all of the side characters also stayed the same minus Beru who got nerfed. (still very OP tho, you just can't OKO the Odo anymore with her)
@@krimsonkatt Pogo has the highest HP out of the cast and has some pretty good high damage dealing attacks (Bang Boom Bang and Whee Jump)
Masaru and the Shifu prodigy are absurdly strong. If you’re able to have him learn all the techniques before the final chapter he’s your ace (once you level him up cause his chapter locks him at level 2)
Akira has been buffed and his psychic skills can cause tons of debuffs. His final learned skill Judgement Day has a long charge but has a lot of range.
O'Dio got buffed. It used to be that Gatling shot could only be used diagonally. In dominion of hate, they changed it so ODio can use Gatling gun horizontally, entirely ruining the top row meta for the fight.
Akira got buffed for sure, but if Sundown got nerfed I didn't notice. His Hurricane shot still does 500-999 most of the time. You can totally cheese every domain of hate boss with Hurricane and the cola bottle.
About the font. It's part of the fan translation. There was another fan translation before that without the different fonts.
You're absolutely right. i was comparing Aeon Genesis's fan translation with this remake. A few other people mentioned this in the comments, I suppose I worded my statement about the font poorly, whoops lol
It wasn't another fan translation; just an earlier patch from the same group.
I know the Prehistory chapter was only done with Japanese voices, but I do at the very least wish they had Pogo's VA record that one word a few times for a few different languages. Hell, they don't even have to know how to pronounce it properly; since it's Pogo's very first word.
I do like a lot of the remake's changes though -- just not how they made Streibough and Alethea into a Romeo and Juliet couple, or giving Oersted that "fair and just reward?!" line. Oersted is supposed to be an example on how even the best people can become a "King of Demons" should they give in to their hatred.
Not gonna lie to you, Pogo exclaiming Aie, I didn't know it meant Love in Japanese... I just honestly figured with the 'pink hue' settling in, showing us nothing of what's happening and a lot of context clues... He uh... Had his first... Pleasing experience with a woman... Which seems completely confirmed in the true end credits to the game.
As someone who played the remake first and absolutely adored it I found this video very interesting. I think you make a really good point about the tutorials and mini-map. The one good thing about them though from a gameplay perspective is that they made sure that even the most novice player wouldn't get stuck. I do wish they had made the option selectable at the beginning of the game instead of forcing them on you. In all honesty a difficulty select would have been a great option for the remake to include.
Something you didn't mention about the game which I wouldn't blame you for missing is that some of the loading screens have special flavour text depending on the chapter. Spoilers: In the Distant Future when the ship's AI starts acting up the loading screen becomes a message from the ship like the game is talking to the player, and in the final chapter the loading screens are all blank adding to the feeling of exploring a world devoid of life.
My best guess as to why the Pogo change was made was due to Square Enix wanting to save money and not hire an English voice actor for a character who doesn't have any lines and not having the foresight to have the voice actor do the English version of the line. It's a sucky situation to be sure.
I actually really liked the voice acting in this game. While there were a few meh performances the highs were really high for me especially in the late-game chapters. My personal favourite was probably O. Dio. His line "I will repay you in our common currency, in blood, and lead, and death!" gave me chills the first time I heard it.
I'm curious what you thought about the changes to the final boss since I know some people who really liked it and some who didn't. Personally I loved it and was absolutely shocked when I found out what parts of it weren't from the original game since they felt so natural.
Distant Future spoilers:
Though I didn’t see it here, I liked the new Behemoth in the Distant Future. The size increase and sound effects of it charging at me (especially when off screen) made for some great panic moments when I played as little Cube. The change also enhances Darthe’s accomplishment at the end since he managed to take it down.
Agreed. I didn't mention it as I consider that a spoiler for the chapter (thought square had no issue showing that and other spoilers in their trailers :P)
There is another minor detail lost in Odie O'bright's sprite from the original to the remake. In the original he held a set of prayer beads in one of his hands, nowhere to be seen in the remake. Not a big loss since i don't think even in the original japanese text it is implied he is a religious man?
Oh man that sucks! Though I didn't notice at all so not that big of a change, another thing small thing I'm not sure needed to be changed at all.
Maybe implies he is eating Akuma for breakfast idk
So the thing about the whole “Love” scene is actually very easy to explain
They didn’t dub pogo’s chapter in English
Ah, the Pogo thing makes more sense now.
Okay.
Either way, the rest is great. Thanks for the info!
I knew Takahara's recovery skill has increased. IThe original live a live,you couldn't recover no more than 40HP+. I thought I was tripping at first
Yeah. Remember when you'd get hunted down like a dog if you tried to run from the bosses? I miss that
@@joshshackelford889 I regret selling my Japanese super Famicon. I had over 30RPG games that include Chrono trigger,Mother 2 and Live A Live smh
@@kanagawa85 Too cool. Never owned one, just emulated. Buying all those old cartridges would be sooo expensive, especially for stuff like Chrono Trigger which still goes for near full price today
@@joshshackelford889 if u ever go to Japan. You can always buy a game from stores called Tsukiji and traders. That's my go two spot to buy a retro games
20:32
Not sure which one you're talking about. Mind elaborating, please?
You mention that the chapters used to have specific fonts which were removed in the remake. However, I believe these specific fonts were added by the fan localisation. If you look up the original Japanese release, every chapter uses the same font (a straight forward clear readable font). AFAIK the game has never been officially localised into English before now.
Yeah but Pogo’s weird screeching is Megumi Ogata, the voice of Shinji Ikari and Nagito Komeada and that is just hilarious
I played an early Aeon Genesis translation, so while some of you are complaining that 'Love!' wasn't what was said, I'm sat here frustrated that he didn't instead say 'Sweet!'
I‘m very happy about the difficulty being easier. I never played the Original so I didn‘t really know how the Combat worked. Didn‘t help that my first Chapter was Near Future which is really difficult and annoying imo.
Also I absolutely love the minimap. I think the Game sometimes sucks at giving you directions on where to go.
I think most of the changes are great especially since Live a Live is a very experimental RPG with some rough edges
Edit: Also, I kind of wished you talked about the voice acting in the Medieval Chapter because I found that one to be so good
The voice acting in the medieval chapter is far and away the best, but I didn't mention that chapter at all in the video to avoid spoilers
I'm saddened by the difficulty drop. My FAVORITE part of the original was hunting down and fighting the secret bosses. Though they may be easier, I'm just hapoy they still exist. That's really all I needed to know.
"I am the Commander of the Mares""
Comes from All Pretty Horses movie(maybe,thats what i found in a PDF).
Thank you so much for making this! You sum up my thoughts on the translation and voice acting perfectly, and I really appreciate it. (I changed the voices to Japanese as soon as I realised I could, and spent several parts of the game going “Wait… I don’t have the best understanding of Japanese but I know that’s not what they said…” It was… an experience.)
Glad you enjoyed!
Apparently the japanese script is mostly the same as the original SNES one, so all the fruity dialogue in the old-age chapters is exclusive to the english script
@@uandresbrito5685 …Disappointed and feeling robbed by the localisation team, but somehow not surprised…
I have to ask though, was Straybow’s character a lot more like the original n the Japanese version? Because is that’s… quite a shift.
@@AnnMari871 Pretty much the same script, but there are added scenes, so obviously new lines. Tbh it's explained much better in english imo, even if the japanese lines are stronger
@@uandresbrito5685 Fair- I was just wondering since the English Streibough feels like he’s more open about his feelings from the start (given the lines before the tournament) and that he’s more upset over losing the chance to be with Alethea then losing to Oersted again (given his speech at the end).
Thanks for telling me!
The issue with using characters to indicate which chapters have been completed is that the characters are used on save files to show who is in your party and therefore already being used.
Possibly, though my main concern there was that the cursor was changed, less so about the save icons
i enjoyed the remake way more than the original
babe wake up new josh video
Just finished the game, could someone explain the Distant Future puzzle he'd mentioned that got completely ruined by the remake?
When confronted by the Colonel, you're given the option to review your memory banks before you answer what your original name was, giving you the answer to the puzzle in no uncertain terms and breaking the tension of the situation even if you select "no".
As someone prone to accidently taking months-long breaks, while I understand the Colonel's 'puzzle' losing most of its punch simply by letting you flashback, a) Cube's a hyper-intelligent robot, the flashing back could have been fractions of a second of actual time, and played "slow" for the player's benefit, and b) some of us can't remember what we did a few days prior in much detail, let alone some seeming-flavor dialogue from half an hour or more ago (especially if you grinded Captain Square for a while to beat it while Kent's still there to snark at your failures/be surprised at your success), so the ability to flashback is useful.
I’m surprised you didn’t cover the new mini game that grants crafting materials in the prehistoric chapter. It’s less annoying than the original one (and fits the chapter’s humor), but it gives you the same rewards meaning you can craft whatever you want quicker, which I don’t know how I feel about. I wish they could have at least spread out the materials across a few different games if the one they did make was going to be so easy.
Crafting is pretty optional in even the original. It is kinda lame, but again you can completely ignore it ESPECIALLY in the remake
the different fonts were added in the fan translation and wasn't in the original game, though it still would've been cool if they added it in the remake
while i like this video all the "problem" you listed are a "you" problem and you assume that everyone share your thought
Well yeah this was a video involving my opinions on the changes lol. I understand that some of these changes are very polarizing and some may enjoy even some of my grievous complaints.
Looking forward to getting to this despite the translation issues. We really need more of these hd2d remakes!
For sure, fingers crossed for a FF4 one (I can never get enough ports of that one). Enjoy!
@@joshshackelford889 I would personally prefer an HD2D remake of FF6 because that one's my most favorite game in the series.
Just emulate it and turn up the brightness of your monitor.
I honestly would prefer if they went for the PSP remake style of FF1 and FF2 instead of HD 2D, but then again that is more my preference since I not a fan of HD2D at all.
in fairness i think the instrument used for the caveman battle theme in the SFC version was supposed to be a distorted electric guitar. its a sound the hardware always kind of struggled with
+ ive thought about the ai/love thing a bit since i saw it.. im not sure its an error so much as a compromise, specifically related to the voice acting. they didnt record an english dub for the caveman chapter since they didnt really need to.. or they wouldnt have to if they kept that one word the way it was. maybe its cheap and lazy but thats how localization is sometimes
I personally don't mind the changes to the script that you mentioned. For example in the case of Matsu's "Teriyaki Guy" line, while line is iconic to those who played the original the intent is completely preserved. The intent of the line is for Matsu to answer "who are you?" with something silly that means he's a nobody who's butting in. After all most people have no idea what "Teriyaki" even is nor that it's a type of street food, as the minigame is completely optional.
In the case of the Shifu it's actually interesting because he says "Kokoro Jiayou" in which Konoro means what we understand philosophically as "heart" and "Jiayou" which means "fueled by" (you'd use it for a car being fueled by gas).
In essence Kokoro Jiayou means "[Strength] is fueled by the heart" and the english localization line stays true to the actual meaning behind the sentence in the original script as opposed to the form.
I feel that a lot of these lines that may seem like liberties taken by the English team actually have a lot more thought than it seems, by letting the players understand what characters are trying to say better. People tend to miss the forest for the trees in these kind of arguments, and at the end of the day the point is that more people can enjoy the game in the first place.
One of the things I'll back you up on is the major translation issue you brought up near the end of the video.
It really ruined the point of the pre-historic chapter
Wonderful and educational video!
Wonderful and flattering comment, fellow shulk fan!
On voice acting, I think you're off the mark here. VO are great here. Did you play trials of mana remake? This is leaps and bounds better. I happen to be playing them both right now, why I mention
No, I didn't, though I think someone else commented about that. I was holding it to the standard that the voice acting should improve the original game that didn't have it, and in most cases I think a lack of a voice is best for most of these stories
Personally, as a fella who typically doesn’t like most RPGs (I’d usually only play them if they have a form of “active command” like Paper Mario or M&L), this was a nice easing back into the genre.
The quality-of-life changes are mostly so that new players can get into the game without getting stuck, and I personally think the voice acting is great for both versions. This was honestly the game that made me love RPGs again, and nothing’s taking that away.
Honestly, as someone who had zero frame of reference for the original (Watching playthroughs on YT doesn't really count I feel), I really enjoyed the remake. Sure, the radar can potentially suck the difficulty out of finding your way, but it wasn't a big deal to me. The voice acting was mostly inoffensive to me, given that I've never really cared about super stellar voice acting as long as the gameplay is good. Hell, there was one voice I instantly fell in love with (won't say who it is for spoiler's sake) the moment I heard it. And the newly done music from the original and new music for this remake we got was some top-notch stuff. Still, I can absolutely understand some of the general complaints for people who played the original.
Dude the new va for Uranus and Hasshe is amazing
I think that this is a very good analysis/comparison and you make a lot of valid points and connections between the two but I can't help but feel that a lot of your criticism comes from the fact that it's simply different from the original and not because whatever your criticizing is "bad" for a lack of a better word, which is fair because this is more of a comparison than a review, but I really feel that there's a lot of bias here. but at the end of the day I feel that none of it is a deal breaker, I would say it's all personal preference but this is what I thought playing through the remake (not gonna go over every point but just some that stuck out to me)
I get where you're coming from with the radar and tutorials thing but personally I feel that a lot of the things that the tutorials tell you aren't puzzles, there really isn't much to figure out, if you didn't figure out the password thing from the superiors demonstration then you probably did need a tutorial to explain it, and the radar is kinda just there, as you said you really don't need it but I wouldn't turn it off, for me personally i liked to have it incase I didn't know what to do. and there are sometimes where it doesn't tell you where to go. I don't think having them on is a problem
in terms of difficulty I did feel that some bosses were easier but I really didn't mind, and I still struggled on some bosses and the super bosses still wring me out, but over all I think the difficutly was pretty constant and fare, the fights that needed to be tense were still pretty challenging. but this point is really just opinion so I don't want to spend too much time on it
I personally disagree with the voice acting, I thought every voice was superb and I didn't have a problem with any of them, and they made some scenes for me. but hey that's just me. and I really liked the new translation too, I don't have a good reference of the original's writing considering I played it over 4 years ago and i only beat like 3 chapters but I really liked the writing. responding to your examples, the tayaki guy like being changed to "I'm a local businessman" I didn't mind cause I thought the line was fucking cool even if tayaki guy makes more sense, but so does businessman if you think about it for a second, and earthen shifu's line being changed to "true strength flows from the heart" I like more cause it feels more like something he would say
now I do completely agree with you on the pogo line, I do wish he said "love" instead of "aieeee" but I think the implication of him feeling such raw emotion that he starts to invent language is good enough, so i do think the moment is lessened but not completely ruined
but again I think a lot of this is due to the fact that you've played the game before, you said it yourself that a new player wouldn't mind at all. I can't blame you for feeling that way, it's why I was so hard on the link's Awakening remake was cause I played the original so much so I nitpicked it to death so I want to make it clear that I am not attacking you or saying that you're wrong, but rather that I simply don't see eye to eye on some of your points but that's ok because your conclusion was that "both are great experiences" and I couldn't agree more. it's only natural to prefer one to the other.
I personally like the remake more for the simple reason that I like the voices and the game is really pretty, and I like the way this new one feels. it feels like the same game but prettier and I already loved the original despite never beating it so this is just an upgrade for me. but both are great experiences, I'm really glad that square brought this game back and that you made this video to spread the word
I'm certainly biased (how could one not be?), but my hope for this video was to provide an objective comparison accompanied by some of my opinions, so that either could be ignored throughout the video. Thanks for the kind words
@@joshshackelford889 very fair, very fair. Well I think you very much succeeded in your goal, I just thought I'd share my views as well. But regardless its a very well made video! I know you said you probably won't make anymore videos like this but unless you just don't want to I'd say keep going, you're very good at it!
@@KyleInman2112 I'm thinking about doing one for Tactics Ogre or the Front Mission Remaster, I'll see if those are fit for a video when they come out
Just watched the video after having played the first 7 chapters in the remake and I am very impressed by how thorough and informative this is great job bro
Thank you!
Looking at the credits of the Pre-history chapter, there is no English VA for all of them.
Hence, why they re-use Ai, the word for love.
The maps are maybe useless if you know the game already, but I was glad to have it in Cube's chapter. Planning alternate route is what it's about once plot happens.
You may have your gripes with the radar, but while it highlights where to go, it also displays the locations nearby you haven't visited. All it does is give you information, it's up to you to act on it.
Also, believe it or not, as simple as that game is to understand, I know people who would be lost if the game didn't flat out told them what mechanics there are. Some people will actually long for these tutorials screens.
I've heard people mention that first point, but I find it hard to believe. They could have just had the JP voice actor say "love" and used that. I also think telling you where you have been on a minimap is a disservice. I get why that and the tutorials are in the game though, if the game didn't have them brainlet reviewers couldn't possibly figure out how to beat the game
@@joshshackelford889 Concerning the first half of the response, I agree it would have been nice, but I'm not losing sleep because the other moment that word is important was handled pretty well. I just wanted to state my opinion on that.
Great thorough video. Having played the original years ago, I'm glad that this remake has done it justice in my opinion. Great work 👍
Thanks!
Can we collab for the dq3 one if you make it
Yes!
Like 90% of the gripes about the remake in this video is over very minor points that I find very hard to care about. The remake looks better in basically every way save the localization of the ending of the prehistoric arc. The remake > original easily regardless, and I've played the original SFC version.
I can see why you would exclude talking about it for spoiler reasons, but I think
...
...
...
...
...
I'd love to talk about the final chapters, especially the new boss and ending. I think they're fantastic. It gives Oersted closure without cheapening the message about what hatred can do to people, and re-contextualizes his final words brilliantly from "Odio will return" to "don't become like me."
Pogo and Gori waking up in the remake: The standard scream you'd expect for realizing you thought your best friend was a hot chick in your sleep.
Pogo and Gori waking up in the original: *S C R E A M S OF THE UNHOLY!*
A big thanks for putting the time and effort in to make this video, after finishing the remake I wondered what was different in the original, and this video was exactly what I was looking for.
As far as not understanding why they went so far to streamline the exploration and combat system while autosaving every 5 seconds, I think they decided to do this because many people like me that are playing this remake are middle-aged adults who have to play the game in short bursts and who do not have the same time we used to have back when we were kids in the 80's and 90's to invest in long bouts of trial and error by clicking on every single tile or trying out every single attack in an RPG.
I can see what you mean about this removing some of the feeling of discovery from the game, but I probably would not have had time to play through the game completely if it was constantly stopping me and asking me to invest large amounts of time figuring out what to do to progress the game or beat a boss battle. The lack of time is also the same reason I am watching your 20 minute video to find out what was changed instead of going back and playing through the original for 20 hours, lol.
PS. You are totally right about the japanese voice acting features an all star cast. I was shocked to see that the voice actor for shinji ikari in neon genesis evangelion was the voice actor for pogo in this game.
That's an interesting perspective, perhaps the target audience was taken into account during development. Glad you enjoyed
Personally I love how every non-named character in the caveman chapter is Sugita, that it's all one guy making all the noises often talking to himself.
I played the first chapters already but will turn off tutorials now. Thank you!
Also great video.
Glad I could help, thanks man
title screen changes, Something spoilery during spoiler.
But also why is there so many dislikes?
Grinding in near future beyond the level it used to stop you in the original, you used to go to a specific lady in one of the buildings read her mind she brings guards fight them exit the room re-enter repeat. You don't have to do that anymore
I don't mind the title screen change too much, by the time a player would finish the 7th scenario and realize that wasn't in any of those, they'd already be upon it. Regarding the dislikes, it seems a lot of people found me too opinionated lol, probably about the smaller stuff. I'm guessing many of those didn't watch to the end where I said I liked both versions, but I don't mind - didn't say anything I didn't mean, can't please everyone
I watched two let's plays of the game over a decade ago. I actually enjoy the radar telling me what to do. Although, the radar stopped working at the very end of t he distant future chapter. I was so confused that I had to look up what to do. Why does the game even give you empty vents to explore?
In the original, the power goes out in the elevator and you have to use the vents to move to a different floor. That doesn't happen in the remake, but they kept the vents in for whatever reason. Not sure why they changed the elevator dysfunction at all though
I can see why they don't have where you're meant to go appear on the radar at that moment. it's thefinal puzzle of chapter, one you HAVE to genuinely figure out to slve the problem, so I guess they wanted to prserve that puzzle due to its significance.
Felt like coming back to this video since I was reminded of it. Just a few notes. For one, the entirety of Watanabe's quest is not required to continue, and instead you only need to get his Pocket Lint. And secondly, not sure if it was changed or not from the PC port because I could've sworn that Beru just kissed you either way, but when you give her the Dress this time around instead of flashing you she brings Pogo into the haystack to do... something? Still censored but I do get why it was done.
The 'wonderful stylized font' was actually a special feature that was added by Aeon Genesis for the fan re-translation. The original version didn't have that feature either, and in fact, the first attempt to translate Live a livE was pretty... poor, but was a key step to get the game properly localized.
Pointing this out, because while I agree Square could've done that, it's not something the original had either. I personally love the remake, in general it was a massive improvement. The weaknesses and elements being added was actually a huge improvement, while those features were in the original... when were you supposed to learn about them? Why use elemental attacks as Oboro, when whipping Shuriken was a better option 100% of the time. In the remake, I found myself experimenting with every ability and even learned that some of them had effects I never knew about, and plenty got buffed to be worth using.
Just imagine that pogo is in prehistoric Japan
Never played the original, but all the complaints about map and quality of life updates; really helped me out. Would have prob not finished the game without them
Glad you enjoyed the game!
Yeah... gonna just say mah to the whole turning off tutorials. With prehistory, imperial China, and distant future especially, they're kinda necessary. The non-verbal presentation of prehistory would easily lead to many people - myself included - just not bothering with the crafting if it weren't explained what the menus were wanting. Likewise, highlighting how moves are taught in China removes guess work that would be frustrating, and I absolutely would've expected to fight the Behemoth in the Distant Future. Did the passwords need to be over explained? Probably not to that extent but having the reminders at each bell really helps keep it in the player's mind when so much of the rest of the chapter is vying for your attention.
If you played the original, yeah, nor necessary. New players though will have such a vastly better experience with them on.
I think you’re just letting nostalgia cloud your judgment.
The game can say shit but not panties. The censorship is all over the place, I'm playing with Japanese voices and most of the script in Japanese is faithful to the original. One of my biggest issues with the localization is a part where Taeko talks down to Kaori when she offers herself to be used for Bukiri Daioh.
The Localization says "Don't be silly, dear!" the Japanese Voice says "Why are you saying such things". The localization accidentally implies Taeko isn't taking Kaori's suggestion seriously. The English Localization is just all over the place.
Personally I enjoyed the voice acting and thought it all fit incredibly well for what I typically see in RPGs. Even non-essential characters had voices that felt committed to the line. In fact one of the examples you use of bad VA happens to be the same VA as one of your examples for good VA, lol. I think they nailed the delivery so well they turns annoying to 11 and great to 11.
I also thought the Prehistory end scene was fine; better than the original because unless someone deep dove and read into that line I'd have never thought to consider it some milestone 'first word spoken'. I'm still on the fence as to whether that's adding more nuisance then was actually there. I feel the simplicity of our monkey man getting a harem tumble and our boy getting to smash just feels appropriately over the top comedic; after all Zaki hip-thrusts a lizard into enemy faces for Godsake, lol.
My girlfriend's reaction is probably what made the scene so good for me though. She was walking through RIGHT when the scene went off and just stood there with this "What the actual...?" look on her face, lol.
I agree with this. The VA work was fitting for the game, with a lot of the accents not being conventional (much like this gem of a game among its peers). Hell, it's nice to hear an Australian accent for once! Plus I never heard any voices and thought "Oh it's Troy Baker" or "Oh it's Goku", which isn't always a bad thing but in a game like this I feel that would of detracted from the experience. Plus I don't really know if I could imagine the 8th protagonists voice being any different after that true finale...
Predownloaded the game and played it all the way through in about a day or three. I’ve watched plenty of videos on the original (hell whoisthisgit is the only reason I knew the game existed), so I already knew just about everything about the game.
Did everything in the remake, apart from the prehistoric superboss- that one was… just annoying.
So uh here’s my takes, I guess.
--
- The only thing that really bothered me with the translation was the ‘love’ butchering. Others have said this before far better than I could ever hope to, but the symbolism of that being humanity’s first word, cheesy as that is, is very important and very relevant to the overall plot.
- I enjoyed most of the game’s music- standouts for me including the near future battle theme and the final boss themes, and ofc megalomania. Kiss of jealously was a bop, but I do agree the original version of the song fitted the time period better. I like them both honestly.
But the overworld themes for most of the chapters wore out their welcome pretty quick. I think an additional alternate overworld theme for each would’ve been great for this remake.
But the final chapter battle theme is, in my opinion, the worst of them all (and yes I know it’s just the title screen music). I have personally heard that song too many damn times- and it’s the one most players will probably end up hearing the most of. Really should’ve been an option to change it to any of the characters in your party’s battle themes or any of the characters you’ve found. Or to at least keep it the same as in the middle ages chapter.
Hell, I’d have liked a toggle to switch to the original ost, or at least to be able to unlock the original songs in the jukebox. Would’ve been a nice touch.
- I generally liked the voice acting overall. Liked some of the battle quotes too- namely my favourite protagonist Akira’s (“who’s a badass”)- but they were pretty repetitive. Lei, as much as I love her, started to get grating pretty quickly in the final chapter. Yes, the old man did indeed teach you that move. We know.
- As for the gameplay, I never played the original so I don’t really have anything to compare it to. Again, I have seen plenty of videos, but never actually experienced the og gameplay myself.
But I quite enjoyed the battle system. Though most of the game was pretty easy (I would have loved a hard mode or new game plus).
Like the superbosses in the final chapter- first tried ‘em all (mainly using Akira, Lei, Oboro and Cube).
Final boss was a bit difficult- at least in comparison- but my boys Akira and Cube- and best girl Lei don’t @ me- pretty much steamrolled it. Oh and Oboro was there too I guess.
Always did find it a bit strange that I could just bail away from an enemy, heal, and kill them without any retaliation. Felt off. I do wish they did chase you down.
I do think showing enemy weaknesses and resistances is a good change… but you should’ve had to discover them first. I like the charge gauge and more detailed ability descriptions though.
And I honestly don’t have many issues with the radar and the tutorials, but I guess I did already know about most of the mechanics. Looking back on it, some of the tutorials did go a bit… far. But I wouldn’t want them gone completely either.
Maybe a compromise of toggling between ‘detailed’ tutorials and ‘minimalistic’ tutorials (which only explain the fundamentals of gameplay) could’ve worked.
- I do have two chapter specific gripes that I think ruin some aspects of them;
Items being displayed by sparkly spots is something I’m okay with... except in the wild west chapter. It completely trivializes it. I’ve seen gameplay of perfect runs a long while back so I had a general idea of where to look. But even with just that, I first tried set up all the traps perfectly my first run. I found the rope at the last minute though I’ll admit.
But what REALLY makes it so simple now is Mad Dog, bless his soul but goddamn it Mad Dog, just tells you what to give people if you have the item on you.
And the other gripe is with the password system in the edo Japan chapter. I think Oboro noting to himself the two passwords being used is good- I don’t know if the original even tells you what the other password is. And it makes sense that Hayate gave him this kind of important intel before the mission.
But him stopping and saying every time the password changes… uh, what’s even the point anymore? Forget what password it’s on now? Just run around in a circle until Oboro tells you.
-
Anyways uh that’s it I guess. Overall I did really enjoy this game, and definitely looking forward to replaying it in the future. But it sure ain’t perfect either. But neither was the original. Either way it’s still one hell of a weird and quirky rpg- and that’s one of it’s greatest strengths.
Also uh sorry if my little rant here was all over the place. Making long comments on mobile is not fun.
I didn't mind Mad Dog's remarks too much as the only character specific items are the slingshot (obvious) and the frying pan (better as an equipment after the chapter anyway).
The chinese translation of pogo's last word are actually translated correctly to the world "love" instead of the sound aiiiiiieee~
***spoiler***
And its funny when he yell that word at the final chapter boss. He's not here fighting for justice or the fate of the world. He can't comprehend any of those. He only care to go back to his new found love asap(later to be show are his wife and KID!). He is just fighting for love~