Parasite Eve was released in 98 with alot of anticipation. It was the next big budget production from the makers of Final Fantasy VII and was called "The Cinematic RPG." But the anticipation and what not was probably not all that worth it plying the game. I've played the game through three times and beaten it, it will take you about 6 to 8 hours the first time and most likely, you'll have smashed your tv through a few times. Parasite Eve centers around a very interesting story, based on a Japanese best selling novel. It revolves around Aya Brea, a NYPD cop who takes after her father and is going to Carnegie Hall for a date to the Opera on Christmas eve. She gets more than what she bargains for when the lead in the play turns into a mass of ooze and bursts Carnegie Hall into a pyro technics display.
The Game can attribute to itself a few good things. It's graphics, at the time, were the best of the best. Now, they don't hold water in any way, but the spectacular pre-rendered backgrounds, and breathtaking cinemas of New York City were the best and still can beat out some of the lesser made Playstation II games. The game also relies on a fantastic storyline, that makes you want to continue playing it. It sucks you in and with some fantastic revelations, it keeps you intuned to every nook and cranny. The music of the game ius one of the best video game soundtracks I've ever dealt wtih, going from intense classic music, to opera, to hard core trance and dance music. It has a mainstream feel that helps the games odd plot, which is not american at all, be easier to swallow.
Now these things I just mentioned, they make a great movie, not a great video game, and Parasite Eve is far from a great game. It's play mechanics, even in 1998, are awful. The discraceful ATB system that was used for almost every Squaresoft game before FInal Fatasy X is here, but instead, programmers tried to mix in the formula with an action game. This was a dire mistake, since it doesn't work out at all. The gam eis frustrating to play, the encounter rate is off the wall, and bosses are simply unfair. Your character, Aya Brea, is ridiculously slow compared to every single enemy she encounters, and bosses usually will land at least 2 hits on you for every hit you put on them. To even pass some bosses, you will have to spend about 20 minutes simply leveling up, and the ridiculous battle system doesn't make it fun at all. Who the hell said stopping where you are and just leaving yourself open for attack is fun. It's not, especially when Aya's weapons take forever to load, and if you're hit, the attack will start over to load all over again. These are the mistakes Squaresoft endured trying tyo comhbine an rpg and an action/survivor horror game, and they are shockingly unsuccessful in doing so. And the in-game graphics, like most FInal Fantasies again, are discraceful, Pixelated, grainy, every bad word in the book you can attribute to them describes them, excluding teh magnificent pre-rendered graphics.
When it comes down to it, Parasite Eve had the makings of a fantastic movie, with it;s directions, but to play it is another story. Not only does it get unfun after a while, it just isn't worth it eventually. The only reason i finished it once was to complete the story, which to this day is one of my favorite video game stories. I finished it a second time with gameshark to relive the story, and did the same the third time to relive some of the great cinemas. But what ameks tshi game enjoyable is not playing it, but experiencing it, which ultimately sometimes isn't worth it. I give it **1/2 out of *****
