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Parasite Eve - Reader Review

Parasite Eve isn't worth your hard-earned money

By David Beoulve, Reader Reviewer


Review Breakdown
   Battle System7.0
   Gameplay5.0
   Music7.0
   Originality7.0
   Plot6.0
   Replay Value4.0
   Sound7.0
   Visuals9.0
   DifficultyModerate
   Time to Complete10-14 hours 
Overall
6.0

   I paid $52 bucks for Parasite Eve. I expected Squaresoft quality, cool graphics, suitable music and a gripping story-line.

   Parasite Eve has a few things going for it, first of all, the graphics are superb, the character animations are fantastic, the battle sequences are truly fun and the adventure seemingly straight-forward.

   Now the bad points. First of all, Aya moves far too slow. Her feet move faster than she moves, and it seems to take forever to run anywhere, and there's absolutely zero reason to walk. The game is incredibly dependant on finding a key or an item to progress to the next set of rooms, and if you fail to explore each and every side room, you'll miss a key and have to go back.

   Not only are these items ridiculously hard to find (a key that is needed to pass the stage was hidden in a miscellaneous drawer in a miscellaneous room) but difficult to plod through at Aya's slow running pace. Plus, there is hardly any music (compared to other Squaresoft games), and walking around in silence with the tip top sound of your avatar's feet gets old.

   Around the 3rd "day", the game livens up, and you begin to get over the problems of excrusiatingly linear key finding, just like you get used to back pain and forget its there. Once you learn that, no matter if you are chasing someone in hot pursuit, you MUST check out EVERY side room or you'll miss a key or armor or a weapon that you absolutely have to have in order to survive, and end up spending an hour searching for something you've missed... the game becomes more palatable.

   The Item system also stinks, as Aya has -very- limited supplies, although the menu system itself is typical of Squaresoft's quality layouts.

   All in all, the game seems to have too many elements that are meant to prolong the length of play without adding much to the game itself. If the items were more direct, Parasite Eve would be a short but sweet adventure game.

   As it stands, it is not even close to worth your $50 or $40 dollars, perhaps not even $30, but certainly worth a rental, if only so you can restassured you aren't missing much (other than great graphics and CG).

   Graphically, you simply can't beat the quality graphics Squaresoft comes out with. Every single screen is appealing to the eye. The battle spell graphics may seem lackluster compared to summonings, but it's a different game. The in battle graphics are quite enjoyable and do the game justice, even compared to FF7.

   Parasite Eve does not have enough music, and while what music there is has a nice tone and feel to it (which carries into any action story sequences with music), it's just not enough, and Aya's footsteps get old, although the battle sounds are fine.

   Here is where Parasite Eve falls short: while I've loved Square ever since the Secret of Mana, I can't plod through this game any longer. If I want to find keys all day, I'll shoot zombies while I'm at it, plus it's amazingly frustrating having no clue where to go and being punished for going the wrong way. In short, playing the game is what kills P.E., not the graphics or sound. I doubt even if the experience was whole-heartedly enjoyable, most people would want to play it again.

   In the end, Parasite Eve is not worth your $52, your $42, or $32. Rent it to see why you don't want it. If you like it, I'm glad, but most people haven't. Used copies showed up at our local game pawn shop almost overnight, quite literally.

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