THE iDOLM@STER: Million Live! (アイドルマスター ミリオンライブ！ Aidorumasutaa Mirion Raibu!) is a 2013 video game by Bandai Namco Entertainment and part of the iDOLM@STER franchise, originally released on the GREE platform featuring the original cast of The Idolmaster, along with 37 brand-new idols to produce.
In June 29th 2017, a sequel to the GREE game called THE iDOLM@STER: Million Live! Theater Days was released for iOS and Android, which added Rhythm Game elements and full 3D graphics to the Million Live franchise along with two new idols to produce. The release of Theater Days eventually led to the shutdown of the original GREE game on March 18th, 2018, leaving Theater Days as the only entry in Million Live that is currently online.
The game has a few manga adaptations, most notably the Million Live manga serialized in Monthly Shonen Sunday (complete with five volumes), Blooming Clover and Brand New Song.
An anime adaption of the game was announced in July 2020. It is produced by Shirogumi and premiered on 7 October 2023 (as part of their 50th anniversary, alongside Godzilla Minus One).
The iDOLM@STER: Million Live contains examples of the following tropes:
open/close all folders
In General
Million Live provides examples of:
- Ascended Extra: Minako Satake, Kana Yabuki, Yuriko Nanao, Serika Hakozaki, Anna Mochizuki, Shiho Kitazawa, and Nao Yokoyama have a significant appearance in The Movie.
- Art Evolution: Newer card illustrations are drawn better or with more complexity.
-
Cash-Cow Franchise: There was never any question of it. - Collectible Card Game
- Continuity Nod: Several towards iM@S2.
- 100% Completion: Exploited. Entirely variant and upgraded cards are added at regular intervals.
- Metagame
- Power Equals Rarity
- Crossover: The original 765 Pro are featured in Million Live as successful sempai the cast hopes to emulate.
- Alternate Universe: The anime and console game continuity presents the Cinderella Girls as part of a rival agency known as 346 Pro. The Movie formally established the Million Live idols as the "next generation" talent under a globally successful 765 Pro. Cinderella Girls and Million Live take place about two years after the original series cast have become superstars.
- Passing the Torch: Million Live embodies this a great deal more than Cinderella Girls. Especially with the movie showcasing girls from ML and none from CG.
- Fanservice: Present even in greater amounts than the original game and Cinderella Girls, even featuring cards with the girls looking obviously uncomfortable or at the verge of crying.
- Idol Singer: Goes without saying.
- Job Title: Million Live is the goal each idol seeks to achieve: performing live before 1,000,000 fans. This isn't unrealistic
. The Producer is obviously the Idolmaster. - The Powerof Friendship: Storyline cornerstone of character interaction in iM@S.
- Merchandise-Driven: It's probably easier to list what doesn't get merchandised. The official company stance is, "anything not made to intentionally harm." Therefore you won't see products packaged as Million Live weaponry or insecticide. However everything else from food to clothing to toys to pet supplies are perfectly valid and do exist.
- Mobile Phone Game: Both the original and Theater Days.
- Music for Courage
- Show Within a Show: The Idol Space Wars and Idol Heroes series, in which many of the idols participate.
The Original Game
- April Fools' Day:
- 2016: Akane-chan Maker, an Idle Game in the vein of Cookie Clicker, where the aim is to make one Akane-chan doll for every person.
- 2017: A platformer involving Reika.
- Denser and Wackier: The original Million Live game is generally agreed to reach the craziest levels of the franchise when given the chance. An example is the evolution of the theater as the player levels up — starts off as a tent, becomes successively larger but still realistic for the first ten or so levels, then goes through all manner of strange themes such as a waterfront complex, a snowy stagenote , a floating island, a Japanese castle, and eventually a space station.
- Great Escape: In the Idol Prison event, all the idols get imprisoned in The Alcatraz and have to escape.
- Show Within a Show: There are events based on the Namassuka?! Sunday show previously seen in the anime.
Theater Days
- Anti-Frustration Features:
- One of the rewards you can receive by clearing songs are auto-live tickets. An auto live ticket does Exactly What It Says on the Tin; it makes the game play any live automatically when used provided you have cleared the chart in question at least once already. These auto lives count towards your clear count for that song (though not towards the score or combo rewards for it, for obvious reasons) and give the same event rewards you would get by playing the song manually.
- Additionally, if you need to spend your stamina, but simply don't have the time or tickets to auto-live, there's also Oshigoto (Work) mode, where you can spend you stamina to start a communication with a random idol. Rewards vary depend on the type of Communication you get, but are generally lower than playing a live. However, it is by far the fastest way to accumulate event tokens, so expect to be using Oshigoto a lot if aiming for the highest tiers.
- And Your Reward Is Clothes: Whenever you acquire an SSR or a PST event tier reward idol, you receive an exclusive outfit alongside the card. Furthermore, whenever you train one of these cards reaches master rank 4, you unlock a recolor of their original outfit. Unlocking Master Rank 5 gives another recolor.
- April Fools' Day:
- On April 1st 2018, there was a special one-day event titled The iDOLM@STER Million Lie: Fisher Days. This event featured a fishing minigame that played itself, with the goal being to get the scripts from each stage to unlock Machiuke Prince as a playable song. Staying in the fishing game for longer to unlock all of the achievements also unlocked titles for 765 Pro secretaries Misaki and Kotori, and there was even a leaderboard who caught the biggest stage-exclusive "fish" (ranging from blue goldfishes to alien spaceships) in each stage.
- 2019 had an Idol Heroes minigame.
- 2020 had a Super Beach Volleyball minigame with the idols being split into themed pairs.
- For 2021, the team was able to get into contact with Tekken's Harada and make a full blown fighting game for the girls.
- Award-Bait Song: Hummingbird, Kaori's solo song, is very much in this style.
- Blog: An in-universe example. Each of the 52 idols keeps their own blog which they occasionally update (usually corresponding to acquiring one of their SSR cards, being featured in an event, or upon clearing their main communication story for the first time) that you can leave a "like" on.
- Cap: Producer Level was previously capped at 400 before being expanded to 999 in 2019. Once you reach this level, you will not gain any more stamina refills from leveling up, forcing you to rely entirely on your resources to refill stamina beyond the natural regeneration rate.
- Disc-One Nuke: Shika and Leon's SR cards, the former of which was a former event reward that you can get for 1 Platinum Star Piece and the latter is straight-up handed to you for reading her guest commu released in November of 2019. They come max-leveled out of the gate and can be easily ascended and brought to Star Rank 4 through playing their respective Image Songs with them in the unit, making them insanely strong early on.
- Rhythm Game: Theater Days turned Million Live into one of these.
Adaptations
- All-CGI Cartoon: The anime is made almost entirely in 3D, a first for a standard TV length iDOLM@STER anime installment. 2D background elements are utilized from time to time for incidental characters and settings.
- Canon Welding: The A-1 Pictures version of 765's producer serves as the Chief Producer role in the anime, making the rest of the A-1 iM@S continuity canon.
- Out-of-Context Eavesdropping: In chapter 18 of Brand New Song, Kaori talks with Producer about her feelings about being an idol. Konomi overhears Kaori asking him to take responsibility for her feelings and ends up believing that Kaori fell in love with him.
