Parasite Eve

"Read this review. Then sign off and get this game. Really."

What is Parasite Eve? A video game? Obviously, otherwise you wouldn't see it mentioned on this site (yeah, my humor needs loads of work). An accident waiting to happen? No way. An underrated game which deserves more recognition than it gets? Oh hell yeah.

The game has a simple premise. Aya Brea is a cop for the NYPD who stumbles upon a case that may lead her to the truth about herself. Too bad hundreds of innocent people have to die along the way. A woman who calls herself Eve has commited a mass murder in front of Aya in a form no one else has ever seen before. She set the whole audience on fire without laying a finger on one of them. There are only three survivors. Aya, her date (huh?), and Eve. It starts out very basic indeed--Good guy (in this case, a woman) must stop bad guy (another woman in this case) from carrying out plan to end the world.

That's the beauty of the plot, though. It gets cooler by the second.

First off, don't listen to anyone who says PE fails to be a true RPG or whatever. SquareSoft tried to cross RE2 and FF7. They didn't get the expected results. Instead, they created a whole new type of RPG.

The gameplay mechanics are just like FF7 when in the field (at the very least the characters aren't super deformed). But once you enter a battle, you notice the difference right away. You can dodge attacks (which you've been hearing about if you read the magazine reviews, so I won't go into that). And if you decide to kick ass with your Parasite Powers (that's a fault at heart, I'll get to that later), your meters recharge. This is helpful. Now you don't have to sacrafice valuable space for Ethers or Magic restorers or crap like that. Just wait for it to fill up again (which takes some time), and then attack.

Square also threw in a weapons customization mode. Now you can create the perfect armor and gun to fit your needs. Say you're a wuss, like the "Please don't hurt me" type. You can stick with the handguns, upgrading them when nessasary, but create armor that's so heavy you can barely move in it. But say you're violent and normally go throughout the game "YOU WANT SOME OF THIS? YOU WANT SOME OF THIS, YOU SCREWED UP FREAKS OF NATURE? COME GET SOME, I'LL TAKE YA ALL ON!!!!!". You can make a BIG FREAKIN ROCKET LAUNCHER and wear just enough armor to beat the game, upgrading when nessasary. And when you're satisfied, you get to rename the gun and armor at the end of the game and keep it by your side throughout the Chrysler Building in EX mode. So you can keep your "WklngD10" and wear your "OPArmor" with pride, or perhaps come prepared with your "BadassED" and show em you know the enemy is too weak with your "LMJacket". I love it! Too bad you're limited to 8 characters...

I should mention you can customize Aya in some ways, too. When you level up, beat the normal game, or complete a day in EX mode, you get Bonus Points, which you can use to pump up or weaken your active time and P.E. meter speed. You can also use the points to upgrade your weapon. Very cool.

I've always told myself that if the creators make a movie or game so that you're on the edge of your seat, wondering how it's gonna end, and you really wanna find out, they did a damn good job on the movie or game. This is the case with PE. Great job on the plot, Squaresoft.

The Music is very cool. Very moody, although I thought I recognized some music from RE2...oh well, the original music is cool. I love the music when you're fighting Eve. Makes you wanna kick ass and take names. The map music rules. The normal battle music needs work, though. If you're gonna engage in battle sevral times during the course of the game, you have to make the battle music for normal enemies cool.

Character development? There is none, and we don't need it. We just get all the info we need from the stop, with the exclusion of Aya. Now, the personas of each character...cool. Aya's a badass deluxe. One character, Wayne (a rebel), tried to pick her up. Response? "Cut the crap, Wayne. I need some guns. Where's Torres (the gun guy for the first few days)?" Daniel's an police veteran, Aya's partner, and the only one who believes Aya for a time. Torres has a vendetta against guns. Ben is Daniel's average son.

Of course, every game has its problems. This is no exception. At least almost every problem is contredicted. PE is too short. If you're skilled, you can beat it and clock in at about 4 hours. However, it is very cinematic, therefore, I don't care about the length. Some things aren't explained, for example, Aya's Parasite Powers (now that's something I'd like to know--how can she pull off those Parasite Energy spells?). Or how her date at the opera survived. Unless you're a nitpicker, that's all the problems you'll have with this game.

Like RPGs? Get this game. Don't like RPGs? Aw, that's too bad...GET IT ANYWAY. Don't have a PlayStation? GET THAT TOO, YOU DON'T KNOW WHAT YOU'RE MISSING, PEOPLE! Bottom line--GET IT. Play it without a walkthrough or GameShark codes for a while, too. If you don't do that, you don't know what your missing.

Reviewer's Score: 9/10, Originally Posted: 11/01/99, Updated 04/26/01