The 3rd Birthday with its cryptic name is supposed to be the third installment to the Parasite Eve trilogy. Aya Brea is back, still not wearing anything that could be considered armor, and shooting away. That, along with a few returning characters, are the only similarities the game has to its predecessors. This is not necessarily a bad thing, as it incorporates a really unique and fun combat system, and it’s always nice to try something new in a series of games. Unfortunately though, an incredibly weak story and unlikeable characters ruin any momentum this game might have generated.
Game: The 3rd Birthday
Publisher: Square Enix
Developer: Square Enix
Genre: Horror RPG
Price: $39.99
Verdict: Fantastic gameplay that is marred by a predictable and weak plot.
Acquired via Publisher
The 3rd Birthday starts off pretty much like any other JRPG in that the player is thrown in media res (in the middle of things), the world is coming to an end, only the protagonist can stop it, and said protagonist has no clue as to what is going on. In fact, the protagonist, Aya Brea, has had complete amnesia ever since she was found in a bloodied wedding dress on Christmas Day. The game starts three years later (her third birthday…get it?), where New York has been overrun by these nasty creatures called the Twisted. The Twisted seem to come from these giant root-like structures called Babels that randomly spring out of the ground and kill people in really bloody ways–the blood spatter is often so outrageous, it makes the blood spatter from Dragon Age: Origins look minimal.
Aya has been recruited into the Counter Twisted Investigation (CTI) unit by the man who found her, Dr. Hyde Bohr. She has a unique ability to send her soul into another body and take control over them, what the CTI calls the Overdive ability. The CTI has also found a way to send Aya’s consciousness into the past, so that maybe she can change the present and save New York.
The greatness of the Overdive ability is not apparent at first, but it only takes dying a few times in the tutorial to see how useful and how much fun it really is. Aya can dive in and out of humans whenever she wants, as long as there is another body around. If the body she is in is getting low on health, she can simply dive into another. If she needs a certain weapon, she can dive into a soldier who has that weapon. Stuck behind a barrier? Dive into a soldier on the other side. Diving adds in a whole new level of strategy for moving around an area, coordinating a flank attack, and quickly switching positions to attack from a variety of angles–which is needed for practically all of the boss fights. Aya’s Overdive ability also allows her to dive into Twisted if they are vulnerable, which causes an obscene amount of damage and is often the only way an enemy can be killed.
In addition to the unique gameplay, The 3rd Birthday has something else that one would expect from Square Enix: beautiful cut scenes. Square Enix rarely disappoints on that front, and this game is no exception. I mentioned earlier that that blood geysers are outrageous, but in cut scenes, they are downright beautiful. Everything is so breathtaking and crisp, that it’s hard to believe that this game is on the PSP and not on a major console.
If everything else was as well done as the scenery, the gameplay, and the cut scenes, then we might have had a Game of the Year contender. The plot, though, is its biggest adversary.
In typical Square Enix fashion, the plot starts off as incredibly interesting and really snags the player’s intrigue. You genuinely wanting to learn more about the situation. Why doesn’t Aya remember who she is? Where are Eve and Kyle? Where did the Twisted come from? On top of that, numerous other questions spring up as the storyline pops around the timeline in a nicely done Pulp Fiction style. The story had me hooked until the very end. However, once the big secrets were revealed, all I had was instant deep disappointment. Obviously, I don’t want to get into it for spoiler reasons, but let’s just say, my initial reaction to the big revelation was, “Really? That? Really?” And I do believe I actually said those words out loud.
Not only was the plot weak, but all of the characters left something to be desired as well. Those who remember Aya Brea as a badass from the Parasite Eve days will be greatly disappointed in how much she moans, cries out and gasps in pain, not to mention how long she takes to recover from a simple knockback. Granted, there is a reason for all this, but it’s still a bit of a turnoff for returning PE fans and newbies to the series. Outside of Aya, there are very few supporting cast members, and none of them stick with the story for long for one reason or the other, only allowing players the tiniest bit of time to form an attachment. As a result, all of these ancillary characters come across as shallow, further stripping away any strength the plot may have had.
One reason for the shallow characters is the brevity of the game. It takes about 7-8 hours to complete, but this is mainly to encourage players to play more than once, kind of like Vanquish and Bayonetta, but without the ability to upload your scores onto a major leaderboard. (Though yes, you are graded for each mission.) If you play a second time, you keep all of the weapons you bought and customized the first time through, as well as your current level. The difficulty of the game does not curve to compensate along with your high levels, so if you beat the game on Normal, why not try it on Hard, Deadly, or Insane now that you are level 25? Playing multiple times opens up more unlockables, including an alternate ending, new costumes and weapons, and even a shower scene–no, really. If unlockables are your bag or if you aren’t a story-driven gamer, then you will absolutely love this aspect of The Third Birthday.
In the end, The 3rd Birthday is one of those games that we really, really wanted to be good, had so much potential, and then dropped flat. It started off as a promising RPG and somewhere along the production line it forgot its roots and morphed into a great looking action-arcade game. Fans of Parasite Eve should still give the third chapter a try, just be prepared to keep a completely open mind. If you’re a Square Enix or JRPG fan who depends on a good story, then you might want to look elsewhere.
GrE Grade: B-
Popularity: unranked [?]
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