Alliance Alive

The Alliance Alive is a role-playing video game in which the player takes control of a group eventually numbering twelve characters (however, Robbins, Shiki, and Matilda are optional), navigating an unnamed fantasy world in a quest to free it from the control of otherworldly beings called Daemons. Players explore a world map, first on foot and later using vehicles which can unlock previously inaccessible parts of the map. During the course of the story, the party unites human-staffed Guilds scattered across the land, based in Guild Towers which are either found on the world map or can be built by the player in select locations. There are five types of Guild Towers available, which grant different status buffs to the party, with the type of Guild Tower available to build depending on which characters have been recruited into the party. Guild Towers can communicate with each other during the course of the game using the Telegraph system, which allows Towers to gain experience levels and unlock new abilities.

Enemy characters are represented within environments and on the world map as symbols, with battles triggering when the party runs into them. Multiple enemy parties can be tagged for a series of back-to-back battles. Battles are governed by a turn-based battle system within a themed battle arena. Characters are arranged in formations on a three-by-five grid, with different formations granting unique defensive and offensive abilities.

The Alliance Alive takes place in a fantasy world divided into four lands separated by ocean. A thousand years before the story begins, the world of humans was invaded by Daemons, who feared an energy from the human realm called Chaos. Their invasion culminated in the creation of a barrier which caused catastrophic climate changes and generated a cross-shaped flow of energy dubbed the Dark Current to destroy much of humanity. Those that remained were quickly subjugated, and the Dark Current settled into the world's oceans, cutting off each land from its neighbors and turning the sky black. By the game's events, the world is divided into zones ruled by a hierarchical government with the Daemons as its supreme rulers.

The nine main characters are members of the Night Crows, a human resistance group who fight the Daemons and seek to restore control of the world to humanity. They are Galil, a young boy with a kind personality; Azura, a cheerful woman who often drags Galil on her adventures; Renzo, an optimistic young man with a wealth of information; Barbarosa, a monster soldier who swore loyalty to Azura's father after he saved his life; Vivian, a historian and the daughter of a Daemon overlord; Ignace, Vivian's Daemon butler; Tiggy, a young girl studying the Dark Current; Gene, a man who has acquired magical powers due to an associated with the Daemons; and Rachel, a kind-hearted mercenary. The player may also recruit three additional characters; Robbins the Penguin, Shiki the samauri, and Matilda the Dragoon.

Following the release of The Legend of Legacy in 2015, Masataka Matsuura looked at what his next project could be. During discussions for a new game on the Nintendo 3DS, the suggestion of a sequel to The Legend of Legacy was frequently raised, but Matsuura felt that an adequate sequel which addressed player criticisms could only be done on more powerful gaming hardware. The main requests following the release of The Legend of Legacy was for a deeper story and characters, but as this would make the game a sequel "only in name", he insisted that the game should be completely original. Concepts for The Alliance Alive were around during the development of The Legend of Legacy, and Matsuura was determined to develop the game as a "normal RPG" using his experience making The Legend of Legacy.

When pitching the project, he was afraid its scale and budgetary requirements would result in it being rejected. The game was primarily developed by Japanese studio Cattle Call, with additional design work by Grezzo and general supervision by the game's publisher FuRyu; these developers had also worked on The Legend of Legacy. Matsuura, who acted as both producer and director, wanted to gather a prestigious team indicative of the type of games he wanted to emulate to develop the game. SaGa series veteran Kyoji Koizumi acted as game designer, and SaGa background artist Masayo Asano was the game's art director.

The Alliance Alive and its remaster received mixed reviews, with all versions receiving a 74/100 on Metacritic.

During its first week of release in Japan, The Alliance Alive debuted in second place in gaming charts behind Nintendo Switch exclusive Arms, with sales of over 31,000 units.