Left Alive

 PlayStation 4
User Score
8.2

Generally favorable reviews- based on 1625 Ratings

User score distribution:
  1. Positive: 1,384 out of 1625
  2. Mixed: 27 out of 1625
  3. Negative: 214 out of 1625
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  1. RevolverCasemir
    Mar 8, 2019
    6
    There is really so much good in this game. The characters and their design are great, the general concept of escaping a small country overun by a foreign army, the story, the mech gameplay all great. You can make choices that have actual consequences. The fact that when other players die they leave you an item to pick up. The music is AWESOME, The survival aspect is so cool, I like thatThere is really so much good in this game. The characters and their design are great, the general concept of escaping a small country overun by a foreign army, the story, the mech gameplay all great. You can make choices that have actual consequences. The fact that when other players die they leave you an item to pick up. The music is AWESOME, The survival aspect is so cool, I like that you start with nothing and have to pick up whatever you can find and make gadgets in the field to make it through the level. The fact that you cant really survive a gun fight is great because it makes you more stealthy and more aware of your surroundings instead of just having the option to go in guns blazing.

    There was something special brewing here but its brought down by the unpolished feel of it all. The animations are really pretty bad which everyone has said already but its true, its really hard to keep playing a game if the gameplay doesnt feel fun or satisfying. I understand what they were trying to do here, but i can't tell if they just ran out of time to polish the game or if the dev got lazy? The worst part about all this is that the gaming industry will see this failure as a confirmation that gamers don't want these types of games, they wont look at the reasons why people are complaining, They will just show the score and say "See people don't want a stealth single player mech game, so lets just make another battle royale game instead". I hope the developer of this doesn't just give up on this game. Patch in some animations fixes and some polish overall to fix the bugs, please. If not whatever your next game is, please make an RTS like XCOm as i feel that is what you were trying to do here but in a third person shooter perspective. I think your team is talented and I hope the dev team isn't discouraged by the negativity and just push ahead and make a complete game next time around.    … Expand
  2. ShadowPeter
    Mar 22, 2019
    5
    Yes, I know when you look at the game wallpaper, you'll soon think of the Metal Gear series. And there's a good reason for that. Yoji Shinkawa, who was present at Kojima Productions and worked on Metal Gear, is one of Left Alive's artists. Shinji Hashimoto who produced the Front Mission series, is also present in the production of this Square Enix game. What can i say, this Left Alive is aYes, I know when you look at the game wallpaper, you'll soon think of the Metal Gear series. And there's a good reason for that. Yoji Shinkawa, who was present at Kojima Productions and worked on Metal Gear, is one of Left Alive's artists. Shinji Hashimoto who produced the Front Mission series, is also present in the production of this Square Enix game. What can i say, this Left Alive is a mixture of elements from Metal Gear, Front Mission and Armored Core.

    Mikhail, Olga and Leonid are the three main protagonists of this adventure, and are involved in a war in Novo Slava. During the cutscenes of the story mode, we can make several choices that can lead us to various ends. Although it isn't a masterpiece like the Hideo Kojima games, i generally liked the Left Alive campaign.

    However, the game creates very poor first impressions thanks to the very weak visuals and textures that needed to be washed, making me feel sometimes that I was playing a PS3 game. I understand that the low budget has not given more, but it is a negative point. As Left Alive's gameplay has the DNA of Metal Gear Solid, in most cases we have to sneak around and try to pass through the beards of our enemies, always with attention to alternative ways. It is a case to say that we will fight against the odds. Initially it is complicated due to the fact that we are punished in terms of weapons to shoot down this or that enemy that is obstructing our way. But be aware that ammunition is limited and it is sensible to use them only when necessary. At the arsenal level, there are Pistols, Submachine guns, Assault Rifles, Shotguns, Machine Guns, Sniper Rifles, and many other weapons and tools typical of these games. Although, this being a Stealth game, it is not clear why there are no weapons with silencers. In terms of target control, I have no reason to complain.

    In addition, as we collect resources such as Cans, Bottles, Explosives and Vodka, these can be used to make Molotov cocktails, Explosive Cans and traps. It's a point in favor about the gameplay of this Left Alive. But it's just one point in favor, because the problems are not long in coming. The gameplay itself is limited, not going to lay or crawling, and as if that were not enough, the controls are hard and slow, which doesn't help when we are trying to get out of a high alert situation. I've often seen the Game Over screen on that. It is as if the production team had gone to seek inspiration from Metal Gear, without actually ever playing a Metal Gear.

    I feel that the detection of our enemies needed to be reviewed and corrected, since it was sometimes too easy to be detected even without light. For example, in the case of Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain, if the enemy suspects something, that enemy goes to that location to see their suspicions. Yes, this also happens in Left Alive, but it's rare. Most of the time, what happens here is that even trying to pass the enemies to the side and with care, was enough to be discovered and studded with shots. A second or two under these sights is more than enough to get on high alert.

    During the campaign mode missions, we can rescue civilians from the claws of our enemies and take them directly to the safety of a shelter. In some cases, these civilians have a predefined path to their destination. We have to be careful when we send civilians to walk the way, because they can face the enemy and carry lead to death. Which means that we have to "clear" the way, so that these civilians have free path. There is, however, one point to ask about the saves system. If the user saved a civilian, the game doesn't autosave. By this I mean if the user loses his life, he will have to do the same task again. I also found something that i didn't like about not having autosave when we defeated a certain boss. Which isn't good at all, especially in this game.

    You may have wondered why you said that Left Alive had links to the Armored Core and Front Mission. Well, with the passage of time, we will have the possibility to control Wanzers, giant machines. As you would expect, when we entered the cockpit of a Wanzer, we entered high alert immediately. And not surprisingly, the Wanzers have a powerful arsenal at their disposal. However, the controls suffer from the same problem as when we are out of it. Stiffness and slowness are more than sufficient reasons to be immense times beaten by enemies, resulting in pure frustration. And without forgetting the small bumps in the framerate and the "fight against the odds".

    As for the soundtrack, although it isn't excellent, it is good and suits well to the style of play and the present situations. That said, having a soundtrack competent, a good story and the possibility of crafting, doesn't make Left Alive a good game, due to the immense problems it has in terms of gameplay. It's a case to say that Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain has yet to find any rival to its height.    … Expand
  3. NothingReviews
    Mar 13, 2019
    5
    Left Alive has so much promise to be at least decent. Let's go for the positives

    The art style looks fantastic as it from the same artist who the works of Metal Gear Solid Franchise which was so great to see. The world is filled with so much interesting thing like with giant mechs and taking place at this dystopia world in Russia. The graphics here you look really good and I have no    Left Alive has so much promise to be at least decent. Let's go for the positives

    The art style looks fantastic as it from the same artist who the works of Metal Gear Solid Franchise which was so great to see. The world is filled with so much interesting thing like with giant mechs and taking place at this dystopia world in Russia. The graphics here you look really good and I have no problems with it. The voice actors/actress is meh but I could tell that they put in a lot of effort

    The things I hate about it is that it's copying Metal Gear Solid entirely. From the graphics, character design, mechs, art styles, gameplay, and even the story. The script that the voice actors were given were garbage, cartoonish and not at all talking itself seriously.

    In fact, I had people who think that this a spin-off series to the MGS franchise which I wouldn't disagree with. Honestly, Left Alive had so much promise but all it did it just sink down even further.
    Would not buy it if I was you. Just go back and actually MGS series. They are literally pieces of art    … Expand
  4. Toxic_Boy
    Mar 11, 2019
    6
    Left Alive places a brutal emphasis on stealth, conservation and tactical use of gadgets. You will not get far just by sneaking and hoping for the best. The limited ammo you have is best used for triggering explosions from fuel barrels (after luring as many enemies as possible using cans/bottles) or finishing off a single enemy.
    The gameplay is high stakes, you have to think hard about    Left Alive places a brutal emphasis on stealth, conservation and tactical use of gadgets. You will not get far just by sneaking and hoping for the best. The limited ammo you have is best used for triggering explosions from fuel barrels (after luring as many enemies as possible using cans/bottles) or finishing off a single enemy.
    The gameplay is high stakes, you have to think hard about the path you take to an objective, what resources to craft, what gadgets you can afford to use and what enemies to avoid or take down.
    The systems surrounding this gameplay are when things start to let the gameplay down. The level of enemy awareness is hard to gauge, as there is a mere second or two before being spotted completed. The AI system to aid your awareness tends to repeat the same signals ad naseum and proves to be little help in these situations.
    The character controls are stiff, slow and feels like it may have been a deliberate attempt to force you to be slow and deliberate because the controls will make it that much harder to get away once you have being spotted.
    You have to have a strategy in place in case you are spotted, some kind of fall back position or hiding spot like a container. If you don't make this consideration and are spotted then generally it is game over as you are heavily out gunned.
    Times when you are not out gunned come in the form of Wanzer events where you control a giant mechanical weapon and blast several different types of weapons. These segments are a brief relief from the suppressive stealth gameplay and are a blast in general. However these parts are where the frame rate issues come into play the most, making for a janky experience.
    The story is rich and deeply set in several personal stories with war as a backdrop. There are plenty of tense interactions with survivors which can influence the story overall and various collectibles to add to the database providing context and nuance to what is going on around you.
    The soundtrack is excellent, the visual style is not what we expect from triple A but serviceable overall.
    Enjoyed my time with Left Alive but feel as though it didn't live up to its promise. It had a bad habit of demanding a lot from the player without holding it up with polish on its end.    … Expand
  5. ZeroAbbadon1
    Mar 6, 2019
    7
    It's hard, sometimes unfairly so. However it's also Japanese jank at its best, the story is melodramatic, the action is tense, the AI is simultaneously dumb as a rock and the perfect sharpshooter, it's a good time but know going into it that you're going to get frustrated at times.
  6. cas514
    Mar 5, 2019
    5
    Are you kidding me Square and Shinkawa Youji? This was a game i really wanted to love as soon as it was announced. A mech game with third person stealth mechanics akin to MGS, with awesome characters designs by the great Youji. What we got however was a lot wasted potential. I never felt like i was scammed after buying a game until i played this. I feel so betrayed.

    Gameplay: I wonder    Are you kidding me Square and Shinkawa Youji? This was a game i really wanted to love as soon as it was announced. A mech game with third person stealth mechanics akin to MGS, with awesome characters designs by the great Youji. What we got however was a lot wasted potential. I never felt like i was scammed after buying a game until i played this. I feel so betrayed.

    Gameplay: I wonder if anyone making this, actually tried to play the game. The gameplay is not fun due to the fact that the "stealth mechanics" consist of throwing object to distract enemies, no stealthy take downs. Stealth is a joke because Ai can see through walls in some instances, in others you can run right pass an enemy or an enemy can spot you from a mile away. Theres melee weapons but you have to hit enemies 3 times to take them out. The animation is terrible which makes the gameplay is worse. People keep saying that this feels like a PS2 game but I would dare to say the PS2 had some games that had better animation than this. The shooting mechanics are so unsatisfying due to the crappy animations..you would think after so many years of shooters people would know how to make a half decent shooting mechanics but i guess this dev doesn't.

    Graphics: I really don't care about graphics, but with this game it must be said that the environment is next level bad. EVERTHING is out of proportion, have you ever seen xmas lights the size of a human head? or a dumpster that hits your waist line? It's hard to believe that a AAA studio made this and had the nerve to charge $60, especially with all the bugs. It's like you thought you could get away with this because the artwork was great.

    I really wanted to love this game,I really did... the premise sounded great, Escape the city akin to Resident Evil 2 with mech battles sprinkled in, and the character designs look awesome but they couldn't the execute on anything. Square-Enix you lost a fan today, you are now on same list as EA, Bethesda and Activision. I have no hope for the FF7 Remake.    … Expand
  7. Peaxx
    Mar 5, 2019
    7
    Left Alive the new game from Square Enix is a stealth action game with a choice and consequence story with different endings, interesting characters and a lot of enemies approaching you.
    Yeah it has its flaws, for example every time you´re close to an enemy your navigator voice will tell you that an enemy is approaching, not once but until you´re far enough away from the enemy or you    Left Alive the new game from Square Enix is a stealth action game with a choice and consequence story with different endings, interesting characters and a lot of enemies approaching you.
    Yeah it has its flaws, for example every time you´re close to an enemy your navigator voice will tell you that an enemy is approaching, not once but until you´re far enough away from the enemy or you killed all enemies in the vicinity. There´s no stealth takedown if you don´t have a melee weapon with you, also Melee weapons will break after a few enemies. The difficulty is quite hard been playing on standard difficulty and I died a lot so if you put off by difficulty this game might not be for you. Oh and despite it playing in the Front Mission universe this is not a Front Mission game so if you love Front Mission and want another Front Mission, this game is probably not for you. This is a very tactical game but it isn't what Front Mission players are used to so be wary of that.

    But despite the flaws it has it does quite a few and important things right.
    First of all the difficulty, yeah I died a lot and if you don´t know how to approach some segments you will struggle, but that is kinda the point of this game the most fun I have with this game is trying out different ways to get to the mission objective, looking around in the environment to find a few more crafting materials so you can craft some landmines, grenades or explosive wire traps which can help you immensely. Not crafting tools and weapons will make the game a lot harder in some situations.
    The feeling of overcoming these hard situations by carefully thinking about what route to take and when and what tools to use is really satisfying.

    I will not say much about the story because I havent finished the game yet but I´m already looking forward to playing the game again and getting better endings and save more characters. You will be presented with multiple choice answers during the story that can determine if some characters will live or die and when the first character I encountered died it really made me think if and how I could have saved him.
    There are also several Side-Missions you can try to complete during the normal missions but they can get quite hard as well requiring for you to clear or scout out the route that´ll bring the side characters to safety.

    The game is unfortunately not as polished as a Metal Gear game but all in all it is really better than the first look would make you think. If you like stealth games and a challenge with a varied story and interesting characters then you can get a lot of fun out of the game if you don´t and always need the best graphics and most polished games out there you might want to wait for the price to drop a bit but if you can take the game for what it is and not for what everyone thinks it should be you can have a lot of fun with it and the game is great.    … Expand
  8. terins
    Jan 18, 2020
    7
    Good game, nothing more. The only thing that sent me forward, to finish the game, is the very interesting political plot, and the soundtrack. But it is also very lacking in the technical aspect.
  9. OwtDaft
    Oct 15, 2019
    6
    + I like the crafting idea and collecting resourses.
    + Semi open world is a great middle ground between PS1 MGS and PS4 MGS5.
    + Keep wanting to try again when I die. - Stealth in the game is barebones, flaw and forced on you with the lack of ammo. - No stealth kills. - The game has a overly huge aiming cycle so the bullets mostly don't go where your aiming. - When getting shot at it    + I like the crafting idea and collecting resourses.
    + Semi open world is a great middle ground between PS1 MGS and PS4 MGS5.
    + Keep wanting to try again when I die.
    - Stealth in the game is barebones, flaw and forced on you with the lack of ammo.
    - No stealth kills.
    - The game has a overly huge aiming cycle so the bullets mostly don't go where your aiming.
    - When getting shot at it pushes your aim off direction way too much.
    - Enemies take too many bullets to go down, having to reload to take down one guy. Geez.    … Expand
  10. Beryn
    Jan 24, 2020
    6
    Ultimately a game with a good story, perhaps not the greatest but still good. A good survival game, even if very frustrating in certain senses, is able to give its best when learning the best use of the weapons that are on the battlefield, while the major flaws concern the graphics and animations. But if you fly over these last two aspects it can still prove to be a game with goodUltimately a game with a good story, perhaps not the greatest but still good. A good survival game, even if very frustrating in certain senses, is able to give its best when learning the best use of the weapons that are on the battlefield, while the major flaws concern the graphics and animations. But if you fly over these last two aspects it can still prove to be a game with good entertainment qualities after all.… Expand
  11. Leonidmalkoff
    Feb 8, 2020
    6
    От меня 6 баллов, я покупал коллекционку за 15 000 рублей. За кровные 15 000. Игра не настолько плохая как про неё принято говорить. Давайте к обзору, чё тянуть-то?
    Начну с плюсов, они тут есть!
    Первый - Это конечно качественные Русские надписи, за это разрабам респект! Второй - Саундтрек, он просто взрыв мозга! Отличный!!! Третий и неоднозначный - Персонажи, они как бы и разные и    От меня 6 баллов, я покупал коллекционку за 15 000 рублей. За кровные 15 000. Игра не настолько плохая как про неё принято говорить. Давайте к обзору, чё тянуть-то?
    Начну с плюсов, они тут есть!
    Первый - Это конечно качественные Русские надписи, за это разрабам респект!
    Второй - Саундтрек, он просто взрыв мозга! Отличный!!!
    Третий и неоднозначный - Персонажи, они как бы и разные и интересные, но они практически не запоминаются.
    Четвёртый - Антураж, он примерно русский, тоже всё плохо, как в жизни на окраине.
    Пятый - Сюжет цепляет.
    Шестой - Аниметян... ладно это шутка, на самом деле это отличная коллекционка Mech Edition. Но тян тоже нормально.
    А теперь минусы:
    Первый - Графика и анимации устарели лет на шесть! Они лучше даже в MGS V (Ей больше пяти лет), чьим аналогом Left Alive и является кстати.
    Второй - Очень спорный геймплей, это стелс-экшн в котором нет быстрого убийства!
    Третий - ИИ, искусственный идиот. То они тебя за укрытием видят, то перед собой не видят (К слову это делает игру забавной)!

    Мой вердикт - "Берите на свой страх и риск, игра далеко не для всех. Фанаты смешного трэша среднего пошива - Must Have, остальные - подумайте хорошенько..."    … Expand
  12. Gyryun
    Jul 7, 2020
    7
    I've found this game a, surprisingly, enjoyable experience.
    A really nice challenging stealth action game.
    The plot and the music is easily the best part of the game.
    I really loved the awesome OST made for this game.
  13. RTCWFAN
    Jun 21, 2023
    7
    At release, this game was a buggy and frustrating mess. But updates fixed it and now it is a pretty decent game. Especially for MGS fans. Overall rating: 7.3.
  14. Noob90
    Apr 24, 2023
    6
    In general, the game suffers from multiple graphics and game design issues, but the story was really good.

Awards & Rankings

46
#46 Most Discussed PS4 Game of 2019
15
#15 Most Shared PS4 Game of 2019

Critic Reviews

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Metascore
37

Generally unfavorable reviews - based on 39 Critic Reviews

Critic score distribution:
  1. Positive: 1 out of 39
  2. Mixed: 9 out of 39
  3. Negative: 29 out of 39
  1. PLAY! Zine
    Apr 12, 2019
    65
    Left Alive is a reason to question the reason. A game to question taste and good will among gamers. It is not a superb title, it's clunky, unpolished and can drive you insane, but there is just that one weird part of it that could make it up to you... It's surprisingly cool, for reasons unknown. If you consider yourself a brave man, give it a go. You just may find something worth your while.
    Read full review
  2. Softpedia
    Apr 12, 2019
    50
    The only people that will truly enjoy the game are either those that actually love a challenge, or those of you that are more interested in the story aspect of a game than the mechanics, since this is the only department where Left Alive impressed me.
    Read full review
  3. Playstation Official Magazine UK
    Apr 10, 2019
    30
    Left Alive is most disappointing because it had such potential to revitalise the stealth genre. Instead you get something far behind even the titles it tries to emulate. [Issue#161, p.85]
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