Wanna Play Some Old School PS1 Role Playing Games?

It's just as the topic suggests, I want to play some old school playstation 1 era role playing games (the best generation for the genre in my opinion). There's a lot of games that I've always wanted to beat but never have, and there are some I have never played. The ones I'm looking to beat are Parasite Eve 1 and 2, Threads of Fate, and Chrono Cross. With or without you, I'm planning on playing and beating these games, I just figured it would be more fun with you guys. Probably the first I'm gonna attempt is Parasite Eve since there are two games and I'd like to play a different game in the middle. I figured anyone could join in on these games since they're all available on the Playstation store and it seems like everyone has either a PS3, PSP, and Vita to play these on. Let me know if you want to join in on the level grinding fun!

I bought Threads of Fate during one of the sales. Never played it even though I own the actual disc and the digital. If you're talking about hitting a certain point in the story each week and then discussing it, I might do that.

I'm gonna level with you though, there are so many new games that have come out or are coming out these past few years that it's difficult to fit 40+ hour games into the backlog.

Shit, when was Threads of Fate on sale!? I've been wanting that one for a long time hoping it was at least half as good as Brave Fencer Musashi.

Yeah, I figured we could play and get to a certain point (what point I do not know since I haven't beaten these games) and discuss strategies, equipment, levels, etc.... Figured if it went well we could even move to some of the Final Fantasy games. I figured it would be best to stick to the games available on the store just simply because everyone has access to them.

I MIGHT be interested but I too have a big backlog. Good idea though!

I know there are some rpg fans on these message boards, and thought it might be a fun way to play through these old games again. I downloaded Parasite Eve yesterday and figured that would be a good start to the campaign. I remember getting to the last boss when the game first came out but I couldn't beat it, but I probably didn't really know what I was doing either since it was one of my first rpg games. Let's hope second time is the charm!

I can try to join you if you do Chrono Cross. I've been meaning to play that

I plan on doing that one at some point. Looking forward to that one the most I think since it seems the most similar to Final Fantasy games.

Sounds like fun but I also have a huge backlog that would probably keep me from committing to this.

... however, I'm always up for replaying a Final Fantasy game so if you get to that I'm in.

As of today I'm gonna start up Parasite Eve for those that want to play along. If you guys don't want to play along, feel free to share your memories of the game as well.

When Final Fantasy X and X-2 come out for HD collections, I definitely want to play those and discuss them.

Only PS1 RPGs I'm really up for are Chrono Cross and FFIX. I'd be up for FFX and XII though if we did PS2 as well as SMT Nocturne

I really need to get back to playing Nocturne. Forget the PS1 games everyone, lets just play Nocturne instead!

I'll do FFX/X2 when HD drops. I'm also down for Chrono Cross and Nocturne at some point. I may jump in if you guys do FFIX. I have to make sure my PS2 works if you guys do Nocturne..

This thread is your baby, Bret. You take votes and set it up!

I'll definitely do Final Fantasy IX, because it is my second favorite RPG behind Final Fantasy VII. Haven't played it in two years, so it is time for another play soon. Would love to do a lot more side quests, but a lack of a strategy guide for that game (square did some crazy play-online thing where the strategy guide basically told you to get on the computer from what i remember) so I never attempted many of them. Would love to do them though.

I'm about halfway through the second day. Man, Aya sure runs like a fucking snail. She runs as fast as most other RPG characters walk. Back when this game came out, I remember them describing it as a mix between Resident Evil and Final Fantasy. That is true in almost every way.

I could probably do any of the FF games myself. Right now, though, I'm playing through Tales of Destiny 1, which I finally managed to track down (I already owned Tales of Eternia/Destiny II).

I'm on day 4 of Parasite Eve. The game is really rather short.

Things are progressing quite nicely in Parasite Eve. I'm in day 5, and there is only one more day after that. This game has aged rather nicely. Besides a couple of lame story moments, the story is interesting and different from the usual Square melodrama. Combat is fun and offers a really nice variety. I'm just hoping that final boss isn't as hard as it was the first time. It was so hard, that I just quit playing it. I don't recall any game where I got to the end and just quit. Let's hope for better things this time around. After this, I think I might give Threads of Fate a go and would love for anybody to join me.

Has anyone played Parasite Eve and just want to discuss it?

To all of my followers:

Beat Parasite Eve! Beat the last boss on the first try! The same final boss that handed me my ass over 13 years ago was conquered on my very first try! Awesome.

More than likely I will be playing Threads of Fate next. I'll post some trailers of the game on here for those that don't know it, and hopefully I can get one other to join me.

Just arrived at Deling City in FF8. It's fun playing this right after IX just because it's nice to see a series where the games are not at all interchangable. The story, mechanics, art, music all feel totally different.

The game is very...teen-angsty but that's kind of the charm of it. Drawing magic...annoying.

I still have my original copy of Parasite Eve. It really was a fine game, although I felt it got overshadowed by Xenogears later that same fall. It was the first game I ever preordered, and it was genuinely creepy, as opposed to the campiness of Resident Evil 1 and 2. Someday I plan to do another playthrough of it.

You should have done your playthrough with me! I was all alone. When this and Xenogears first released I probably would have given the nod to Xenogears. However, after replaying Xenogears I feel that game didn't stand the test of time, and Parasite Eve did more so. I'm looking forward to when I play the second one, and eventually 3rd Birthday. Never played those two.

Drawing magic sucked the life out of that game for me. That and when Squall does a total 180 and figures out he cares about Rinoa, even though he's been giving her the cold shoulder for most of the game. It's the part when Rinoa is dangling from a the ledge of a building. No one else seems to want to save her, and he's all gung-ho flailing his arms like he's a maestro, as if he's always had feelings for her.

Here's the next game I'm thinking about playing. Thought I'd post a video in case no one heard of it. From user comments on youtube, it sounds like it was a pretty great game. Always meant to play it because when it came out I remember them saying it was in a way a successor to Brave Fencer Musashi, which I loved. You have the choice of two characters to play from. Also, it's Square from PS1, which rarely went bad.

Decided to write a review for Parasite Eve.  Tried to take myself back to '98 so I wouldn't see the shortcomings since I've been spoiled with current gen.  



I've never been one for the opera, but I remember back in '98 it never could have looked sweeter.  The opening scene sets the mood right from the start:  There will be singing, spontaneous combustion, and action.  A Final Fantasy/Resident Evil hybrid, Square's attempt at horror was a mighty fine attempt.

The story revolves around Aya Brea, a rookie cop from a New York Police Department that just happened to be at said opera when beautiful singer Melissa turns femme fatale and burns every audience member to a crisp, besides Ms. Brea.  Throughout the game, Aya is the only person impervious to the ever growing power of Eve (formerly Melissa, the host for parasite Mitochondria Eve).  Occasionally the game will cut to a flashback of a sick Aya, and a past she can't quite remember.  Are these forgotten memories the reason she is unaffected?  What happened when she was a child?  How is she connected to Melissa and Eve?  The mystery slowly unfolds, and you begin to understand the bond between Aya and Eve.  

If attempting to mix games like Final Fantasy and Resident Evil, your villain best pack some Sephiroth/Wesker evilness.  Eve is no slouch when it comes to schemes and fiends!  By affecting the mitochondria, Eve has the power to manipulate humans and animals alike.  Cute little rat transforms into a snarling beast, a beast so rabid that it makes that giant gopher sized rat from The Princess Bride look like a cuddly pet.  When she's not burning an audience to a crisp, she's then turning groups of people into giant blobs.  She even gets some old dinosaurs to be reanimated!  With these devious spins on animals that Eve creates, the foes you face are varied and fun.  However, enemy encounters mean nothing in a game like this if the battles aren't a joy, and luckily they are.

Like Final Fantasy games, the action is somewhat turn based.  Wait for Aya's attack gauge to build up, and unleash your fury.  Like Resident Evil, the weapons at your disposal are an array of guns.  Hand guns, assault rifles, shot guns, etc...  But also like Final Fantasy games, you do get some magic type spells called Parasite Energy.  After your conquests, your character will slowly level up and gain familiar Final Fantasy powers like Heal (regenerates Hit Points), Detox (cures poison), and Barrier (increases defense), and there are offensive spells like Energy Shot where Aya channels her Parasite Energy into a single bullet for a devastating attack.  Each enemy you encounter has a different set of attacks, and being able to freely run around is something that you'll have to get acquainted with.  Dodging enemy attacks will become very important until you level up so that you can ensure survival, but the benefit of dodging doesn't end there.  Upon leveling up, how successful you are at dodging will improve the amount of Bonus Points you'll get.  Bonus points can be used to improve the strength, range, or bullet capacity for guns, strengthen your armor against physical or magic attacks, improve the speed of your Active Time Bar, or allow your character to carry more items in your inventory.  They are points that you'll have to carefully use, because once they're spent they're spent.  

The guns and armor you come across can be improved by other methods besides Bonus Points.  With tools that you find throughout the game, you can take elements of some guns and transfer them to new ones.  Perks such as bullets shot per attack, attack strength, auto medicine, and a myriad of others allow you to tailor your style and character however you choose.  Customize careful though, because once you transfer aspects of one weapon to another, the one weapon will become lost for good.  

There is some strategy to the battles that you face and the weapons you choose.  Some weapons will be high in strength, but low in range.  So being careful and avoiding an enemy from afar might seem great, but if the weapon you have equipped has no range, your attacks are literally useless as they will land no damage.  Other guns will have one shot per turn, while others can have five.  I found it most useful to have a weapon with good strength, range, and 2-3 shots per turn.  An aspect of weapon customization that made little sense to me was transferring bullet shots from one gun to another.  The more shots the gun took, the weaker the gun became.  I couldn't much wrap that concept around my head, since being able to shoot more should have made your gun more powerful, not weaker.

Like with all Square games of the Playstation era, the music is great.  It does a great job of creating a moody and spooky atmosphere, and the leitmotif of Eve becomes as recognizable as Sephiroth's tune, or as eerie as Nemesis' track.  

In the game you'll find some pre-rendered backgrounds of various locales of New York city.  You'll find yourself in sewers, museums, hospitals, Chinatown, and warehouses, and each location has it's own distinguishable look.  Like games before it, Square delivers some beautiful FMV cut scenes.  From mutating animals to sweeping shots of New York, these visual treats showcase some of the best FMV's of the time.  At times nothing but mere eye candy, other times they do a great job at progressing the story through a visual standpoint.  The character sprites are all varied, and each have a lot of different types of animations, all though some actions they do can be a bit jerky or over animated.  It's a shortcoming that's easy to overlook since it isn't a game breaker.  Another draw back to the graphics is how dark the game can be sometimes.  Rooms you enter are so dark, it is often hard to see the very dark chests that contain important items and bullets, and some doors are hard to tell that they're actual doors, which can be a problem since you need to enter it to advance the story.  I know the game is purposely dark to accommodate the story being told, but it can make for a frustrating experience at times.  

Even with some of these minor problems, if you're a fan of the J-RPG I do not see how this game will disappoint you from beginning to end.  Classic elements of the genre are present such as turn based combat, character customization, dungeon-like exploring, a fun likeable protagonist with a mysterious past, and a rich story with an evil “destroy the world/humans” antagonist.  It mixes two of the biggest game franchises for the Playstation in Final Fantasy and Resident Evil and does a great job that elements from both games are present.  So if character growth/customization and survival aspects are your cup of tea, Squares homage to the role playing and horror genre is adventure that any adventurer shouldn't miss.

Pros
Great battle system with lots of character customization
Nice developed story with mystery, horror, and a little science/science fiction thrown in
A great hero and villain and a nice supporting cast
An End Game +, where your character stats are carried over for another playthrough
Diverse soundtrack that compliments the story

Cons
Dark colors make it hard to navigate at times
Some laughable character dialogue
Some RPG enthusiast might be bothered by the 15-20 hour length
Occasional difficulty spikes.  Once you make it to the last boss, there's a point of no return which actually made the game unbeatable on my first play through
Somewhat linear
Questionable weapon stat upgrades

1998 review – 4.5 out of 5
2013 review – 4 out of 5.

Nice review man. Might check it out at some point

Thanks. It's a pretty good game. If you do check it out and finish it, maybe we can do a Parasite Eve 2 run together. That one is completely new to me. Never played it because I never beat the first one.

Nearing the conclusion of Threads of Fate.  Really short game, but since there is two characters to play as with some changes in the story/dungeons I guess that can be forgiven.  

There's two games I'm considering to play, and those are Chrono Cross and Parasite Eve 2.  I know others said they'd be down for a Chrono Cross run, was wondering if those people still would be?

So the current games I'm looking to replay are...

Chrono Cross
Parasite Eve 2

Anyone else that might want to join in can add a game, only rule is that it has to be on the Playstation Store. If enough people have the physical copy and are able to play it, feel free. I'm just not about to spend $150 on a hard to find game.

I'm still in for playing Chrono Cross but I'd want to replay Chrono Trigger first. I could probably get right on that if you want since I'm stuck at an annoying bit in Alan Wake

I was thinking Chrono Cross would be the next play. I was going to do Parasite Eve 2, but figured I might get lucky and get Parasite Eve 2 or the sequel 3rd Birthday for cheap come Halloween with Playstation Plus. Unlikely, but it's a chance I'm willing to take. So I was thinking Chrono Cross would be the way to go, since that will never likely be cheap.

So get on that Chrono Trigger!