Parasite Eve: Other M

I wonder if any developer could get the rights to the title “parasite eve?” Such nostalgia watching your videos and I praise your points on each game. PE1 was and still is one of my favorite games of all time based on the era of video games at the time. There really was nothing like it. If only we could get a New aged parasite eve. That would make my year. Keep up the good work!

It's been done to death, but I'd still enjoy a Silent Hill retrospective

I asked my friend why he had over 100 hours on this game. He told me that when you are left with no games with you other than the 2 you managed to convince your parents to buy, this kind of stuff happens. He played them, dig into the mechanics and systems, and did a lot of grinding. And after such a long time, he said that he really liked that game. I had sort of an enlightenment at the moment. "Gamers" nowadays pick up a game and expect the "fun" to be served to them instantly on a silver platter. And then when they are expected to earn the enjoyment, they cry and call the game "bad". Then there are diligent players who, despite the nature (or in some cases, quality) of the game, dig up their own meaning of the game. Some people find enjoyment in grinding in games like either 3rd Birthday, or Diablo. Some like simply wander around, and play open world games like a Walking Simulator. Some like to discuss game(s) and make videos about them in the internet... It made realize that many a times, an "objective review" is still insufficient do describe in many was how different people think about, or attach themselves to a certain game. A 6/10 game could be favorite game of someone who persisted with it long enough, and found enjoyment that others perhaps failed to notice. Sorry, my rambling went too long, but I find that sort of stuff, the "player-game attachment", to fascinating.

I do enjoy all of your retrospectives! It gives me a chance to visit certain games I'd otherwise never get the chance to. Hell if something looks good enough of course I'll check it out given the opportunity, but these really give me the opportunity to look into something I would otherwise ignore. Thanks for all the hard work!

Your reviews are awesome. KEEP UP THE AMAZING WORK MATE!

Absolutely great series of videos! I'll be sure to play the first two games now. They seem really interesting. Keep up the good work!

i love parasite eve series, thanks for doing a retrospective on them :)

3rd birthday is what got me to buy the first game I love both of them, haven't played the 2 yet but looking forward to it.

My mitochondria would kill to see a true sequel to this game series

Well, in all fairness, she doesn't act like Aya because she's not Aya. I was, at first, disappointed with her change in character and personality, until we learn that we're actually controlling Eve, who has Overdived into Aya's body. We only get a few lines of dialogue from the real Aya, but you can recognize her no-nonsense attitude and bad ass level of intestinal fortitude almost instantly when you get to the real thing.

Great retrospective man! Would love to see another in the future!

Parasite Eve was mentioned very briefly on a recent episode of IGN's Game Scoop podcast and because of your retrospective I knew what they were talking about! haha

And yes in this game NO Aya Brea at all! As creators killed her! Ha ha stupidity. You control like girl Aya saved from Pe2...

Would be interesting to see a Shadow Hearts retrospective, especially with Koudelka already covered and as always amazing work on these videos.

Neither Sarah Walker/Hannah McKay nor Dean Winchester could save this excuse of a sequel.

I remember picking this one up and being completely confused by the story. I didn't get very far but I enjoyed the combat, and while Aya certainly looks more in line visually with the first game, she also, as you said, isn't really the same character. Well done on this series, dude.

Good video and retrospective!

This reminds me a lot of the MGS: Portable Ops games.

This was awesome. These retrospectives are great. How about Prince of Persia? That should be interesting....and may take a bit 😊

I played PE when I was very young I wanna say 7 years old back in 2000 maybe even younger what really influenced me what Ayas strong character especially that opening. Aya holding a gun to the woman who burned everyone in an opera theatre and her cowardly date asking what they should do with her response being a shoulder bash. As a kid I thought Aya was the coolest person ever. As I grew up older it influenced the kind of women I would be attracted to as well. Now playing 3rd birthday it was confusing at first her character was completely different so I treated it as a different game all together with characters I may or may not recognize. What had me really REALLY enjoy 3rd birthday was after I completed the game first time around. I realized that the Soldiers that live in the levels you play from before are there fighting the final boss. When you first play 3rd Birthday you dont care about the soldiers you essentially take over you see Aya and you think your aya when in reality Aya was never actually there to begin with. From the worlds point of view these soldiers are the ones fighting these creatures they are the ones giving their lives to fighting something they dont fully understand and winning if Aya/Eve have anything to say about it. I thought that was pretty damn awesome so I played and grinded OVER AND OVER many times over just so Aya/eve would be strong enough to save another soldier. Thats when I started seeing the woman who influenced me come back bit by bit. Piece by piece. In my head its why she was so tired all the time, exhausted, suffered memory loss. Wanting to make someone she barely even remembers proud of her even though shes on the verge of tearing herself apart. I essentially made the game and story my own as I never played 2 so I filled in the blanks through my own interpretation. All it all take it at face value and youre bound to be dissapointed with a lot of things in life give it your personal touch and youll quickly love the game for what it is. I personally adore PE and 3rd birthday I hope someday theyll make a remake of the first just so I can see the amazing woman who influenced the way I see the world.

currently giving this 3rd "entry" a try. Hated it when it came out but since I came to enjoy PEII a few years ago after giving it a try I hope I will at least get enough enjoyment out of this one to finish it. Such a shame that no game came out that followed up on what PEI built

One of the things that disappointment mr aside from controversy if title change, Aya turning into a different person from 1 and 2 is thst her mitochondrian powers are gone. Her overdrive powers are very different that you might as well hired a different MC

I forgot why I subscribed to you. This series helped me remember why.

3 games and 3 separate genres 🤯

I remember being so excited for this game and when I finally got my hands on it being very disappointed that the third birthday wasn't parasite eve 3. as I grew up and replayed it later I've come to consider it a spinoff.

I played PE2 first during my survival horror phase and it was fantastic. Went back to PE1 years later and thought ‘eh 🤷‍♂️’ Suppose it depends on what you’re into and what you get exposed to first.

7:36 - well, that makes me the first one who played all three and enjoyed every game in the trilogy^^))

You could put a gun to my head and I will never call the birthday parasite Eve game! Nor should anybody else. I could never ever finish half this game for pretty much the reasons you just gave.

Great video. PE1 is one of my top PS1 games and I didn’t even know there was a 3rd game. Would you consider doing a video for Legacy of Kain? I loved the first one but I’ve never replayed it.

I'd love to see you do more retrospectives. It may be because parasite eve is on my mind, but I'd enjoy a final fantasy or Resident evil series

Parasite Eve was awesome! I am surprised nobody mentions Vagrant Story these days. That game was the shit!

Interesting seeing this retrospective, I only recently discovered this series of games (except for third birthday which I played a few years ago for a few minutes at a friends house, had no idea it connected to an rpg-survival-horror series based on the gameplay I experienced) cause I was looking for suggestions on reddit of games that mix classic survival horror with new interesting ideas, and they pointed me at the first Parasite Eve claiming it was the more horror oriented of them all, with the second one being considered way more on the action heavy side of things. but now seeing your reviews saying the first one is more on the rpg side and the second more on the survival horror side, I'm interested in seeing which feels more survival horror-ish to me. have already started playing the first one and so far definitely one of my new top coolest games from PSOne!

How do you record PSP footage? Do you emulate the games to record them or do you use some sort of cable to record them off the PSP itself.

Good job! I agree with your assessments of the games and look forward to more

I get such a strong MGS vibe from this game's visuals.

Great retrospective, if a bit quick. I think a few extra things could've been mentioned: 1) PE2's atmosphere and flavor text are its biggest selling points. Unlike in PE1, you can check pretty much everything around and Aya will have two, sometimes three things to say. The story is uniquely intriguing, just like PE1, and the music (albeit less iconic) provides suitable, characteristic ambience. 2) PE1 is compelling on a conceptual level, supported by fantastic visuals and music, but the quality of the writing- on its own- is poor. This might be down mostly to the translation. Sena's novel and the film are similar to PE1 in this regard though; they rely heavily on melodrama to support the excellent central premise, sometimes to the detriment of the sentient mitochondria hook. 3) PE1 and PE2 have deceptively complex gameplay. PE1's batons are actually very viable due to the time to raise/ recover mechanic, which you mentioned. Unfortunately, the Chrysler Building's final boss is impossible to beat with select weapons no matter how powerful they are; dodging and hitting the fast-moving boss requires the fastest weapon, otherwise you can't damage race her because you often won't get the shots off in time while you're also taking heavy damage. On the other hand, PE2 is very deep gameplay wise. Since there's so much backtracking involved for the best ending, the devs tried to make every single enemy spawn slightly different, and there's always a slightly more optimal way to tackle encounters that happen in the same place depending on what weapon you're going with, if you have support items on hand, and what PE abilities you might have leveled. Also, most people don't know this, but every one of PE2's weapons is viable throughout the entire game, making PE2 great for challenges. 4) PE2 has high replayability owing to the multiple endings and various "builds" you can test out (also some really fun additional game modes and unlocks), while PE1 has just one additional ending. 5) Third Birthday... you hit the nail on the head 100%. I have nothing to add. Does Kyle know he's creeping on Maya in Aya's body? Hmmn... Don't really remember how exactly the twist worked (been awhile). Other than that, love your reviews Avalanche. Your content is very well arranged and you have a great voice. Again, nice work on the retrospective. Enjoyed watching it!

I didn't hear you mention it, but to avoid spoilers even though maybe I shouldn't, if you consider who Aya you play really is in this game, there's a definite reason I think it's a game where everything related to it should probably be purged in fire. It makes the whole creepy Maeda a hell of a lot worse than any surface sexism someone could argue. Then there's the unlock-able shower scene features, which just further shows the devs knew exactly what they were doing in this game.

As someone who loved the second game and place the first as an all time favorite I will stay clear from TTB, since as you say it can't really be considered a PE game. I really wish that Square will one day make another survival horror, and that they take notes from what made PE such a masterpiece.

So what if "Aya" isn't actually herself? As a lab rat, the kid was trained to kill unthinkingly. And being brought up by Aya, even if only for a few years, should have given the kid some spine. But they _really_ did Maeda dirty.

At first I was like, “wait, a third? How the hell did I not know”? But, upon seeing this video and hearing it was for the PSP, I understand why. Glad I missed it.

This actually what got me into Parasite Eve by playing this game as i had a psp game when i was young and was stunned on how it good it looked for a psp game so yeah i enjoyed this game so much i play even today i really hope we get a remake of this i hope somehow someday Square could reacquire the rights to Parasite Eve cause damn i would love to see what they could do with this franchise in today's hardware if done right

"gets naked after taking enough damage" *interest intensifies*

Have you any thoughts on either Dead Space or Fatal Frame\Project Zero?

Hey man i like your vids and for a retrospective i would like to see would be the Bioshock retrospective

I fucking love third birthday one of the best games on the psp

What i loved about this game is the gameplay.. Not to mention the game's engine is similar to ff type-0..

amazing retrospective. question did you read the book I'm curious about it.

I get a weird feeling that this game started as a new IP that was struggling to get its game off the ground while the PE mobile game was in development, and they just said "Hey, let's make this a single game!" As for this retrospective, I loved it, and I would be excited to see a few other *coughGrandiacough* less-talked out series get some spotlight

Whoa. Had no idea that there was a third PE!

One thing i realize is that The 3rd Birthday and MGSV has some stuffs in common: >you thought you're playing as the main character but nope(Aya/Eve, Big Boss/Venom Snake) >your sidekick went through a complete personality overhaul(Maeda and Miller) >Trailers hyped it way too much and the actual game was a disappointment.

Another great video, I like all the action of this game and stuff, since I ever play days after finish Resistance: Retribution, so that could or could not affected my feelings to the game. Anyway, I understand how is hard to get this saga, the 1 was action RPG, the 2 was survival horror and the 3 was a shooter, really is hard to follow up, but its a good series overall, I guess. :)

This looks like a beautiful game, it's a shame the rest of it doesn't hold up... And it sounds like you enjoyed the "body hopping" in this, so I kinda recommend FEAR 3, though I think you unlock that character after first play through, but is definitely available as 2nd player (I only played in co-op)

I remember not liking the 3rd, though I do recall trying to get as much of the game done as I could. There were some gallery things that just refused to unlock!

Absolutely brilliant 3-part analysis, Jared! :D This was an fantastic series you put together with "Parasite Eve". You are amazing!

Can you do a retrospective on okami? I know its only two games but their so good tbh :)

I loved PE2, one of four PSX favourites. PE3 seems like the amnesia killed most of Aya's being, personality, i mean what we are if not a history of events that slowly shape us.... I wonder if you did Front Mission retrospective. lets find out.

I figured they lost the rights. They never mentioned mitochondria. There was too much evasion.

I have the novel, but have yet to read it. I once owned the movie, but made the mistake of selling it. I'd love it on Blu-Ray. As an aspiring filmmaker, I'd love to make an adaptation of the game.

Nice retrospective on the series. Let's say someone is a bit addled and wants to start with the 3rd birthday to get the lowest point of the series, are they're going to get spoiled for the other games ?

I played the original two games back in the day when they came out and I fell in love with the aesthetic style of storytelling. That being said I had no idea of this game's existence until today. Thx for posting. Sounds like a good thing I missed out on it, from what you say

I think another problem is that the first two games were modern and sci-fi while this felt like they were adding too many Final Fantasy elements to it.

I actually enjoyed the overdrive mechanic of the 3rd Birthday. Would be good to have SE make a remake for PE. Same gameplay, console graphics.

I know you're a big fan from the first Parasite Eve, but I actually really liked this game, I know it's not perfect, the story makes no sense (I really just stopped caring about it by the middle game), but the Overdrive system is really cool. This is for me the best third person shooter on the PSP.

The 3rd Birthday's story may be crazy but you have to read all the info in the game and pay attention and you can put it together.

Man I missed my mitochondria science

oh i enjoyed PE3 gameplay a LOT ! Its peaty hardcore actually. You know story also impressed me, and i was feeling so damn sad choosing shoot Aya or not :( i know story was s mixed up - but it was fun for "alternate reality PE". Spin off stuff. By the way music ingame is reminding me old PE and it was cool ! Wish to see full remake of all 3 games !

i never finish playing this game... weird since i love PE1-2 to death

i havent played that, i havent even heard of it..i ve played pe2 and was amazing

7:35.... i did, the games are unique in there on way.

I remember 3rd birthday, and I dont think its all a bad game. I think it should have been its own game and not parasite eve though

Why is this playlist in backwards order? Did you do this on purpose?

I wonder why sequels often turn out like this. Is it really that hard to make something similar but still a little different?

I forgot what the ending was, but I recalled it was some really messed up and confusing twist

Thinking about this and a bunch of classic games that were released in the 90's & set in the 90s, I feel that the sequels to those series should still be set in that era. Maybe its nostalgia, or maybe cause i want to see what happened immediately after. Other games that would fall under this idea would be Street Fighter, Resident Evil, Final Fight, and some Sega classics. Maybe easier to digest a world from 2 decades ago rather than devs making different variations of tomorrow land.

honestly i enjoyed this title in the series, yeah story wise it wasn't a parasite eve and the gameplay was different but honestly i enjoyed it for what it was, a fun time waster, still play it from time to time on my Vita

After being vocal and signing petitions to get a 3rd game, we finally....got something? Look, I was grateful that SE even bothered putting resources in making The 3rd Birthday a reality. Yes, I waited for walmart to stock the game at midnight at release,lol. From the very start of playing, I knew it was completely different. And, i was weirdly okay with it. Maybe it was for the simple fact that all die hard fans of the series got our last and final "hurrah" before the series completely died. It was a bitter sweet end for all of us. And after putting down the game after beating it in a few hours, i felt relieved. We did it. I can rest after 10 years of hoping and praying....

6:34 I am actually. I am a fan of ridiculous non-sense and unresolved plot threads. I happen to be replaying Metal Gear Solid 2 at the moment...

Wait.... i was wondering why there were 3 parts to this retrospective because I didnt know there were 3 games. Wtf! I feel completely dumb for not knowing this! I need to play this

Really is a shame. While the second game had strayed quite a ways from what the book and first game established, it at least felt reasonably sensible to what was there in the lore. Then you have this game, it just feels like some weird anime that slapped in the names of fairly well-known characters, like a murder mystery that decided to include the cast of Family Matters. Would be nice if Square could mend the fences with the author, though odds are, even if they did regain the rights for PE, they probably would still make a new game or even remake with a vastly different gameplay system. Of course, I'd be willing to give it a try, so long as it meshed the exploration and combat elements well enough, and was able to deliver on the body horror that made the first 2 games so iconic.

Not sure if you're a fan of the F.E.A.R. games but that would be a cool series retrospective.

Any plans to do a Dino Crisis Retrospective?

The only thing I really hated from Parasite Eve was the controls, there is no way to be 100% accurate when trying to analize or open a container half hidden in the backgroud. As for the story, the music and the visuals the game is impressive. My favorite part will always be the Central Park, specially the location were you see a little bridge and in the background the entire Manhattan covered by mist and darkness, a metropolis now turned into a ghost city, the new Pripyat. For Parasite Eve 2 the turret controls were VERY wellcome, they replaced the RPG mechanics with a more action oriented ones (mostly because the original Parasite Eve used the FFVIII engine wich is 100% JRPG to the core) but it worked very well. Yes you could have some hard moments due to fuckups in the system but the same can be said of the control scheme of the first one (the already mentioned fuckups with the oh-so-much needed accuracy, e.g: trying to analize the lockers in the Police Station could be a pain in the ass), so like the first game, this is 50/50 good/fuckups with the controls and combat. Parasite Eve 3 (to say this is a spin-off/spiritual sucessor/not canon with the series is a BIG mistake) is a clusterfuck from the very beginning. But let me say this: Yes, they lost the license for using the story and the name "Parasite Eve", but instead of doing something completly diferent (e.g: a new jandra like Darkworks did by creating Cold Fear using the work already done for Alone in the Dark 5 before they lost the rights) Square Enix decided to milk the living shit out of Aya Brea. They didn't care about the massive fuckups with the story (and the side characters from past games), for Square Enix the most important thing was to turn the main character into a waiffu/whore/bonner machine (typical of the Jrpgs from the company) that can keep the atention of the consumers by trowing aside as much cloth as humanly possible. If Parasite Eve 2 was diferent from the first one, this is the bastardization of the series, replacing the MEANING of the story and its characters with action packed nudity that makes Dead or Alive a PG-13 title.... er... well... maybe not. The only thing I applaud from Square Enix is that they killed any chance for a fourth game meaning that the series won't be milked to death like Resident Evil or Alone in the Dark. And for a bonus for anyone who readed the entire wall of text: if you finish Parasite Eve 3 about 15 times or so, you can unlock a censored (yet PORN) scene with Aya in the shower, half moaning and half touching herself :/

i would luv to see you do a ninja gaiden 1-2-3 retrospective.

Excellent retrospective! Any plans for Xenogears/Saga? I tried, but I couldn't get into this game. It looks great, but it's just boring. I ended up just playing PS1 games on my PSP, like Parasite Eve.

Ugh, 3rd Birthday. Square dipping into the eternally perplexing waters of low-budget otaku cheesecake fodder with one of their more unique IPs has never really made sense to me. I suppose there must have been enough people who saw Aya as top-tier waifu material to make it look like something profitable to them, but there it is. I never knew about them losing the rights to the novel, though. That explains a fair bit about it. I'll probably dust off my much-neglected PSTV and drop ten bucks on the digital release once I finish both of the other games just to say I completed the whole "trilogy," but I'm not super-looking-forward to it. I'm a stickler for a good leading lady in my games and the way you describe what they did to Aya's character here sounds like the kind of thing that'd give me indigestion on contact.

i think that too,this one is a good game but nothing of the feeling of parasite eve,one more of the problems that square enix have,we miss squaresoft will always be missed

I love this game. It's a horrible parasite eve game but its an amazing 3rd person shooter/action game with horrifying monsters

Tabata what have you done

Parasite Eve Street Racing

Motomu toriyama is a menace. Jus sayin

♡♡♡♡♡

I didn't know square lost the rights to the story that sucks. Now that I know that I can see now what happened and I agree with you with 3rd birthday now that I know that I wonder what it would have been if they still had the story. I did beat 2rd birthday and there were times that the enemy had Ridiculous amounts of health they it took a long time to kill just one monster and that was not a boss. I game was decent and I can't say I recommend this game ether but it was alright to say the lease.

Good point on the game being created by people “who never played the originals”, not to mention how bad the voice acting was.

I want pe1 in this graphics..

I'm glad this game is non canon.

To me if there is no Aya Brea then that is not PE (although Eve is her sister/watever same gen). Thus to me 3rd Birthday is just a side-story. So, Aya back on PE4, yay dreaming.

PE3 has great bgm, and super good make use of PSP's graphic, nice and neat GUI, and great mosnter design, but a little weird story, twisted as a higher dimension time creature is very a unique design based on my understanding Lastly is it Square intentionally makes Aya's avatar twisted? lol

l'll be honest... l found the gameplay pretty damn fun in this game. Unfortunately, as you said, the writers apparently didn't even play the first two games. They don't even seem like their old selves, and the story is your typical badly written confusing mess in a typical Japanese game. Aya herself is the most egregious example, being far from the tough NY cop we've seen. There is a legit reason why she's like this, but it still would've been nice if they didn't play it off as actual canon Aya until the big reveal. All in all, this game isn't THAT terrible, as long as you see it as fanfiction and not canon.

it was a okay game but I liked the first two more played this one got it almost unlocked everything but a few achievements