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THE WORST FOE LAY WITHIN THE SELF What is Parasite Eve? Released in 1998 by Squaresoft, Parasite Eve was advertised as a "Cinematic RPG". Which is to say, in modern terms, its an Action RPG. Published for the Playstation 1, this game was developed soon after a little title no one ever remembers called Final Fantasy 7, and Parasite Eve borrowed a lot of themes and ideas that were left on the cutting room for from the development of that game, but it shares more technical resources with the later Final Fantasy 8 and the game even comes with a demo movie for it on a third disk. This game is a pseudo-sequel to a Japanese novel of the same name, the events and themes of which I intend to cover at some point. This game also has a sequel, which came out in 2000. There is no Third Game sadly, as I think it would have been awesome. Sadly, Square lost the license for this setting in the early 2000's, but there was apparently a filing in 2022 for it again, which may have been when the games were made available via the PlayStation Network. I'm not holding out hope for a Parasite Eve 3. I spent all that on Homeworld 3. Set on Christmas, 1997, Parasite Eve follows the story of Detective Aya Brea, NYPD 17th Precinct, as she gets caught up in the events of a monster that calls itself 'Eve' and her own connection to it. This game was rated M for Mature, and it does not shy away from body-horror or mass casualty events. How is the LP going to be structured? So, this game isn't long. I can reliably beat it in about 9 hours (plus another hour for reloads against the last boss), and I will be playing through the game in New Game Plus mode to access the True Final Boss and Ending. Which means, as I will explain in the LP itself, that I am going to be .... just a little overpowered for most of the game. But given the contents of the Secret Ending I'm going for, probably not enough. To that end, I will be playing through the game as normal, but shortly before the point of no return for the end-game, I will make a second save, finish the game, then go back to that other save and do the True Ending. This will be a Video LP, as I will be playing and streaming the game with my co-commentator, Speedball! We will be Sadly, by the time this goes live, we'll be done everything, so there won't be room for additional co-commentators, but I will gladly add good comments from the thread down below. I also got a new headset between Day's One and Two, and it took time for me to figure it out. The LP Itself! PARASAITE EVE IS RATED M FOR MATURE, AND IT EARNS THAT RATING FROM THE GET-GO. VIEWER DISCRETION IS ADVISED
Aya's Tour Guide to New York! Aside from just being awesome and enjoying the game with me, Speedball will be doing small writeups about the places we visit over the course of the game. Here they are! Additional Things During Day One, Speedball mentioned a high quality stream of Parasite Eve done by a player who had no experience with it. He has provided a link, here, for those who would like to watch. berryjon fucked around with this message at 16:56 on Apr 27, 2024 |
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Apr 13, 2024 19:20
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 Day 1 - [resonance]
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Apr 13, 2024 19:21
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Hey, Speedball here, and I'll be giving everyone the Cliff's Notes version of the various New York Landmarks we see. First up on Day 1... Prometheus! This gold statue depicts the entity who stole fire to give to mankind. This sculpture was created in 1934 by Paul Manship, is 18 feet tall and weighs eight tons! It's just off the Theater district by Fifth Avenue, so it's indeed right near where the action begins in Parasite Eve.  Prometheus typically symbolizes invention, teaching, art, and science, but also defiance of the natural order. We're gonna be seeing a lot of all of those in the coming days. .jpg) Carnegie Hall! This famous opera house has been around since 1891. It's got three auditoriums (only one of which we see in the game); the biggest seats 2,800 people, and the other two seat about 300 each.  The big one, Stern Auditorium, is clearly where we saw Melissa's disastrous play. Some embellishments were made for the sake of the game, but the basic shape of the area is as seen. Carnegie Hall's walls were made before steel reinforced walls were a thing, so they use heavy masonry load-bearing walls, which may be one reason it's not burnt to the ground after all that spontaneous combustion. It's hosted countless plays, operas, musical recitals and anything else you can think of that happens on a stage. Performers stretch from Russian pianist Tchaikovsky to the Beatles.
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Apr 13, 2024 19:22
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I think the commentary is slightly desynced from the video footage, you're commentating a bit ahead of what is happening on the video. Or I guess you just know what's coming.  Also the balance feels off, with Speedball being on the right and yours centered.
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Apr 14, 2024 00:40
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I played a bit of this game a while back, but didn't get very far. I also don't think I knew about the bonus points, which appear to be applied to your equipped weapon? Considering one of the options is inventory space upgrades, it's kinda wacky to think that Aya's just stuffing medicine into her gun or something? This is one of the Square games I didn't have in the 90s, but I've always been curious about it, so I'll be tuning in to see it. Cooked Auto posted:I think the commentary is slightly desynced from the video footage, you're commentating a bit ahead of what is happening on the video.
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Apr 14, 2024 01:14
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Ah, I wasn't sure at first hen I posted it but then I noticed a noticeable delay right after the first major cutscene as I kept on watching. But I hadn't paid too much attention to the game audio being off too.
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Apr 14, 2024 01:16
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I didn't notice that on my end of things, but at this point, I blame me being rusty with my skills. I know Day 2 was a pain and a half getting things to line up for a couple hours until it didn't and I redid everything from scratch. Let it never be said that I am perfect at these games. or the work that goes into doing LPs. Just good enough.
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Apr 14, 2024 02:37
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Things missed in the video; The cupboard next to the wall where you get the N Protector is openable; it spits out a rat that promptly mutates and tries to kill you, but after the battle, on the right side of the cupboard, there's a handgun to collect. Random encounters are set upon screen transition; running around on one screen to try to trigger a random battle will never spawn a following battle unless the area is coded for it, and to my knowledge, no area in the game is. The Random fight on the stair loop in the Storm drain under Carnegie Hall is one of the first fights where you can get Revive items, which act as Auto-life spells from other RPGs. Die while one's in your inventory and it gets consumed and pulls you back onto your feet with about 50% health. Under the same stairwell on the right, directly opposite the door you pass through to further the story, there's a hidden doorway leading into a dead end with Four treasure chests, each of which has a Plus 1 or Plus 2 item to boost your weapons or armour. The reporter mentions that Aya is the Sole survivor of Carnegie hall; either her date is not counted as human, or the script cribbed from one of the earlier drafts, where the guy ended up lit up like a roman candle right next to her. This is also instantly rectified by Daniel, when he has a laugh at the guy's expense for running out of the place like his pants were on fire. Also, a subtle detail; Daniel's cop car is an older model with a manual transmission; right after Aya falls asleep in the car, you can see him shifting gears. As you guys can tell, I kinda played the game to death back in the late 90's, and only really stopped after my PS1 broke. (Then I bought a digital copy for my PS3)
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Apr 14, 2024 07:31
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The bad date's dad called up the NY Post and bribed them to say they never saw bad date there. Simple, so no other survivor
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Apr 14, 2024 14:22
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This is fairly close to being my favorite PS1 game, only very slightly edged out by Persona 2: Eternal Punishment. Aya is a complete badass and I love her to death. I played through this so many times on EX Mode just to max the pistol you get from the collectathon and to collect all the weapons received from the collectathon. The game really does change from a first playthrough to EX playthroughs; in the first playthrough grenade launchers are lifesavers but after that a pistol becomes way better. And there's some clear inspiration for the characters going on; you can feel the Danny Glover as Murtagh radiating off of Daniel.
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Apr 14, 2024 21:43
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RelentlessImp posted:you can feel the Danny Glover as Murtagh radiating off of Daniel. When I first was plotting this game out as an SSLP, I was going to find every 80's and 90's Black Cop and just rotate through their mugshots for Daniel for the LP. And see if people noticed if/when I changed Aya's portrait to her copycat later on. But I got Speedball involved, and now it's a VLP with loving commentary, and I think it's better this way.
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Apr 15, 2024 00:16
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The talk about how cutscene skip wasn't invented until 2008, Parasite Eve's brother title Vagrant Story does it. Or at least I thought it was its brother. Looking for something about them sharing at least some bits of engine I can't find it anymore. Still it has battle spheres.
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Apr 16, 2024 20:42
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berryjon posted:I didn't notice that on my end of things, but at this point, I blame me being rusty with my skills. I know Day 2 was a pain and a half getting things to line up for a couple hours until it didn't and I redid everything from scratch. Something must've glitched during encoding then because for one moment during the interview it was synced, but then it broke again. I noticed it after catching up with the video.
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Apr 17, 2024 00:57
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Cooked Auto posted:Something must've glitched during encoding then because for one moment during the interview it was synced, but then it broke again. I've double-checked both parts of Day 2, and they're good. So here's hoping.
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Apr 17, 2024 01:44
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Nice. 
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Apr 17, 2024 11:33
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Daniel PUNCH never gets old. They put a lot of custom animations in for the game at a time when that was highly unusual and time-consuming.
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Apr 17, 2024 21:46
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Only thing I remember was the last boss and how bad it was and that I couldn't build a weapon type exactly as I made it. You had a custom weapons system and you failed me!
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Apr 18, 2024 02:01
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I'll cover weapon modifications when I start on the Chrysler Building. Out of curiosity, what sort of weapon were you trying to make? ... You know what, I haven't gotten to this point yet, for 300, should I go for Pistol, Rifle, Grenade Launcher, MG or Shotgun?
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Apr 18, 2024 02:20
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is there any other choice besides ice grenade launcher?
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Apr 18, 2024 02:26
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FeyerbrandX posted:is there any other choice besides ice grenade launcher?
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Apr 18, 2024 02:30
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FeyerbrandX posted:is there any other choice besides ice grenade launcher? I won't put non-Acid elements onto any weapons because damage resistance is a bitch. Speed and I cover this later, but the game always prioritizes resistance over weakness, so if I have, say, Fire and Ice on the same weapon, it will hit the resistance, even if the enemy is weak to the other one. Acid resistance just reduces the DoT effect. berryjon fucked around with this message at 03:10 on Apr 18, 2024 |
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Apr 18, 2024 02:31
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Is it spoilers?
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Apr 18, 2024 02:43
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berryjon posted:You know what, I haven't gotten to this point yet, for 300, should I go for Pistol, Rifle, Grenade Launcher, MG or Shotgun? The pistol is the boring, but superior, option if I'm remembering correctly; more mod slots without forced mods like the MG or Shotgun's fire rate mods, making it the only really, truly fully customizable weapon. But I could be misremembering.
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Apr 18, 2024 02:50
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Coinflip between Pistol and Rifle; by the time you get to the point you've snagged a 300 weapon, you're going to be force-feeding it so many +<Attribute> effects that eventually it'll be able to cleanse entire combat areas regardless of its starting stats. The big difference at that point is entirely the firing delay between 'aimed' and 'shoot', and the pistol, by far, has the smallest delay between those two actions. It's still fun to see Aya Jiggle laterally as an evasive enemy tries to defeat her locking onto it before she opens up with her gun; It's best seen with a rifle, though.
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Apr 18, 2024 04:11
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FeyerbrandX posted:The talk about how cutscene skip wasn't invented until 2008, Parasite Eve's brother title Vagrant Story does it. Or at least I thought it was its brother. Looking for something about them sharing at least some bits of engine I can't find it anymore. Still it has battle spheres. I remember reading something a while back that this game's engine was the test bed for Final Fantasy VIII.
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Apr 18, 2024 06:14
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 DAY 2 - [fusion] - (part 2) Today's update is a two-parter. The first part is 45 minutes of exposition, and the other half is an hour of action!
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Apr 20, 2024 23:59
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Speedball here again. Central Park! It's a park. In Manhatten. What else do you want? Well, fine, let's talk about a couple of the features in it. Central Park Zoo!   The map here is fairly close to the general idea of the zoo as seen in the game. We only had a seal statue in what is supposed to be the seal zone, and there is indeed a tropical zone with monkeys in it. No giant earthworms as far as I know.  Belvedere Castle It's a really small "castle" originally built for the view around Manhatten (which in 1872 was a lot more woodsey.) Over the years it's been used as a weather station, a series of offices, a hobo encampment when the offices were abandoned in the 1960s, and the most important plot element of Alone in the Dark 2008. It has nothing to do with Mr. Belvedere.
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Apr 21, 2024 00:13
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Speaking of stretches, that casualty number seems a bit too exaggerated. Unless it also counts everyone that was in Central Park at the same time. Also I think Godzilla 98 did the whole "Evacuate New York" as a plot point as well.
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Apr 21, 2024 02:51
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Cooked Auto posted:Speaking of stretches, that casualty number seems a bit too exaggerated. Unless it also counts everyone that was in Central Park at the same time.
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Apr 21, 2024 03:16
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If I remember correctly from the game's PS1-era manual, Aya's 25, and has been on the force for all of 6 months. The fact that she's been fast-tracked from 'Patrol' to 'Detective' in that time suggests she's definitely on the ball for investigative purposes and education, mind. Also, as per the manual, she's 5'2 and 107 pounds, meaning Aya's barely above the minimum height requirement to even apply as a cop, and is so lightweight that the M16 Torres gives her is nearly eight percent of her total body weight. Daniel, in comparison, is 42, making him 'The Leathery fossil' of the party if this were a JRPG. Instead, he's a fountain of impressive and relatable moments throughout the game, and is basically what happens if Murtaugh from Lethal Weapon was trying to be decent to his kids while still too married to the job. (He's listed as 5'11" and ~210 pounds as per the PS1 Manual, which is below average for a New Yorker, but makes him the tallest human in Parasite Eve 1 and 2) Notably, Douglas Baker, aka. 'Da Chief', is listed as being a year younger than Daniel, and they basically spent their years as partners on the force until Baker went to desk work. (Also, as per the manual, he's 5'7" and about 250 pounds, so he's started going to pot)
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Apr 21, 2024 06:31
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The game is throwing heals and junk at you and laughing at your limited inventory. It wants you to grind. That there is an item called junk and gives you lots of it is funny.
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Apr 21, 2024 12:13
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Sel Nar posted:If I remember correctly from the game's PS1-era manual, Aya's 25, and has been on the force for all of 6 months.  slapped over top of things. Aya's height does line up with one of those cultural concepts.But I just checked my manual, and there's no mention of her age/height there. Her age is listed as she gets out of the car to go to the opera, but the manual says she's only been with the 17th for six months, not what she was doing before then. Scalding Coffee posted:The game is throwing heals and junk at you and laughing at your limited inventory. It wants you to grind. That there is an item called junk and gives you lots of it is funny.  I'll get to that much later!
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Apr 21, 2024 12:15
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Huh OK, so I never played this game but had always just assumed it was more of a resident evil style horror game and much less of an RPG than this. In fact the relatively seamless transitions between the combat and non-combat environments are actually reminding me a bit of chrono trigger. It looks like the order of the day is to run around like a headless chicken trying to dodge everything until your action bar fills up, then unload and repeat - does it get a lot more complex than this, say trying to herd enemes together for splash damage, or bullet-hell style dodging? In any event it's fairly interesting. I wasn't expecting things to go post-apocalyptic so quickly, I was digging the slightly janky detective movie vibes. Interested to see how this one turns out, although the background in anti-organ-donation rhetoric is kinda yikes from my own personal point of view (I have a few people close to me whose lives were saved by organ transplants).
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Apr 24, 2024 00:33
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According to Aya's bio in PE2, she had worked for the NYPD for three years before the events of PE1.
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Apr 25, 2024 19:46
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I think mitochondria works differently in this universe, just like how certain people are catching fire internally and shrugging it off later.
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Apr 25, 2024 21:43
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Crazy Achmed posted:It looks like the order of the day is to run around like a headless chicken trying to dodge everything until your action bar fills up, then unload and repeat - does it get a lot more complex than this, say trying to herd enemes together for splash damage, or bullet-hell style dodging? In any event it's fairly interesting. There are a few places where you can run around to herd enemies up to hit them with AOE damage (generally from grenade launchers), and you're expected to manually dodge certain energy attacks some enemies have, but it never really approaches the kind of hardcore dodging/strategic placement other games at the time did - but at the time it was pretty revolutionary to have full movement in RPG combat, something that only the contemporary Tales of/Star Ocean games were really doing then. (Star Ocean: the Second Story, released four months after Parasite Eve, was the first of the series to move things to a 3D-ish plane.) The second game did allow for better tactical use of AOE damage, though, and a change in mechanics (larger ammunition selection to juggle with less access to refills) encouraged more strategic usage.
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Apr 25, 2024 22:11
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Koudelka and Parasite Eve are both games that try to thread the needle in combining RPG with Survival Horror, and it's so very interesting to see the different ways they tried to go about it... and how their sequels differed! Parasite Eve 2 leaned a bit harder into Survival Horror while Shadow Hearts abandoned the Horror beyond some thematic elements and became a RPG (albeit a fairly unique one).
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Apr 26, 2024 00:17
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 DAY 3 - [selection] In my opinion, second-best boss fight in the game, and also the most disturbing scene in the game. One leads right into the other. (This thread is now a Good Dog appreciation Thread)
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Apr 27, 2024 16:53
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In appreciation of Good Dogs. Today I am trapped under my snoring doggo.
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Apr 27, 2024 16:58
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Sel Nar posted:If I remember correctly from the game's PS1-era manual, Aya's 25, and has been on the force for all of 6 months. Apparently in the lore, their precinct refers to the two as "The Father & Daughter Team"
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Apr 27, 2024 17:12
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