Left Alive Wiki – Everything You Need To Know About The Game

Left Alive is an action adventure video game developed and published by Square Enix that places focus on third person shooting, tactical espionage, and mech combat. It is set in the Front Mission universe of games.

Development

Left Alive was originally announced by Square Enix at 2017’s Tokyo Game Show. The game’s development team is comprised of various well known developers from across the industry. Toshifumi Nabeshima, the custodian of FromSoftware’s mech combat-focused Armored Core franchise, serves as the game’s director. Yoji Shinkawa, who has been the art director on the majority of Metal Gear Solid games, as well as Zone of the Enders, serves in the same capacity for Left Alive. Meanwhile, longtime Square Enix veteran Shinji Hashimoto, who has been heavily involved in franchises such as Front Mission, Final Fantasy, Kingdom Hearts, and many others, serves as Left Alive’s producer. Takayuki Anase, who has worked on games such as Xenoblade Chronicles X, is also involved with the project.

When Left Alive was originally announced, Square Enix confirmed that it would be launching in Japan in 2018. However, there was no word on the game from the developers or the publisher for a considerable period of time afterward. The game was shown off at Gamescom 2018 once again, where its release date was confirmed for 2019, releasing on February 28 in Japan, and on March 5 in the rest of the world.

The developers have stated that they purposely did not include Front Mission in the game’s title, in spite of it being part of that same universe, because the development team behind the project was different, and because they were taking the series in a new direction with Left Alive.

Though Left Alive was announced as a console exclusive to the PS4 (in addition to a PC launch), Square Enix have mentioned that they would “look into” the possibility of bringing it to other platforms as well, following its initial launch.

Story

Left Alive is a spinoff of the Front Mission series, and is set in the same universe. Its story takes place between Front Mission 5 and Front Mission Evolved, in the year 2127, and focuses on the Garmoniyan invasion of Eastern European city of Novo Slava.

Left Alive features three primary protagonists and playable characters- Mikhail Alexandrovich Shuvalov, Olga Sergevna Kalinina, and Leonid Fedorovich Osterman. The story focuses on the three of them as they attempt to survive the invasion and fight back against the invaders while trying to protect and rescue survivors.

Gameplay

Left Alive is a third person action adventure game that involves shooting and stealth mechanics. Combat is mostly done in a cover based over-the-shoulder shooting manner, but the game places an emphasis on stealth as well, and players have the choice of how they wish to approach combat situations. Out and out combat and stealth are both options, while players can also use traps against enemies to aid them in these scenarios.

Piloting mechs, which are known as Wanzers in the game, is also a feature- however, this is not a persistent mechanic. Players can only do so at certain times, when the game presents the opportunity to do so. These are mostly encountered as enemies, but players can hijack them and pilot them to their own advantage. However, Wanzers are guarded heavily by enemies, and players have to figure out how to steal them. The campaign will switch across the three main protagonists throughout the story, and will be segmented into linear levels. However, what path players take to get to the end of a level and what actions they take in that duration will be open to choices. The maps for each stage are also large and non-linear.

Players will also often come across NPCs who are citizens of Novo Slava who might be in need of aid across several different scenarios and situations. Players can either choose to aid them or to ignore them and simply go about their objective. Different choices made in such situations can lead to different outcomes- for instance, rescuing a civilian from getting executed by hostile soldiers will alert enemies to the player’s presence; agreeing to help civilians might lead to players having to lead them to safety; and so on. These interactions also often involve dialogue choices. While the main ending to the story will remain unaffected by player choices, individual character arcs and fates of secondary characters will be altered based on what choices players make.

Crafting mechanics are also included in the game. Players can craft equipment such as IEDs, tripwires, traps, and more that they can use to their advantage in both stealth and combat. However, the developers have confirmed that customization of Wanzers won’t be included. Players also have to manage ammunition and health- skilled shooting is thus required in combat in case of the former, and medicine can be crafted for the purposes of the latter. Meanwhile, players can also use items and tools such as radars to pinpoint the locations of enemies and aid them in stealth situations.

Note: This wiki will be updated once we have more information about the game.