During its lifespan, the Sony PlayStation had several characters from various games that could have served as their “mascot” of sorts. Crash Bandicoot was all over commercial and print ads for years, until he became a multi-platform franchise. Spyro met the same fate. One could even argue the fact that Sweet Tooth, from the Twisted Metal franchise, would have been a good choice. But there’s one character that represented the image and attitude of what Sony was trying to promote with their system. That character had a great look, appreciated by men and women alike, and his game brought together everyone that watched and played it. That character was PaRappa the Rapper, and his game might have been shorter than a speed-run of Super Mario Bros., but the charm, great music, lyrics and fun all around keeps this game going to the ends of time.
PaRappa is such a lovable little pup. He wants to do whatever it takes to impress the girl of his dream Sunny Funny. Anytime he tries to impress her with something, someone else has something doubly impressive, which ends up with PaRappa wrecking his own thing. What’s a dog to do when the chips are down and he needs to get something fixed to impress Sunny?
Yeah, I know! I gotta believe!
PaRappa has style. Every aspect of the game has a style all its own. You might be quick to dismiss PaRappa as a kids game with how it looks, but it’s really geared towards everyone. The characters look like paper cut outs, with bold colors and no real color shading. Even though they look like paper cut outs, they twist and move around, making them come to life. Emotions are conveyed perfectly with hilarious facial changes. Backgrounds hold the same type of coloring, with characters that move around, areas that start falling apart when you perform poorly and most importantly, they all look and feel authentic to the setting that are taking place in. Chop Chop Master Onion’s karate dojo feels like something you would see in a comedy movie with a dojo setting, Prince Fleaswallow’s flea market has that feeling of being outdoors and shopping for the most random things. What looks like an extremely simple and bland game, turns into a world and look that is unmistakable and thoroughly enjoyable.
Throughout the game, you have ‘rap battles’ with other characters while drive a car, bake a cake, and even to get ahead in line to use the bathroom. I’m not necessarily a fan of rap, hip hop or just about anything outside rock, metal, jazz and whatnot. However, the beauty behind PaRappa the Rapper, is that you don’t have to be either.
The first two stages are quite easy compared to the rest of the game, but you better have good timing throughout the game.
Through its colorful and whimsical cast of characters, and the vibrant world around them, the lyrics and beats are both intelligent and powerful. There’s no random incoherence in the middle, you can clearly understand everyone, and the rhyming and lyrics in general fit into the situation perfectly. Each character you face has a different style and timing, to further make each stage fresh and new. These are all lyrics, songs and beats you’ll be repeating for years to come, either hours after you play or randomly in the middle of the street. PaRappa The Rapper presents gamers with one of the most memorable soundtracks in gaming history.
Being that this is a music game, you play this game by pressing specific buttons at specific times to make PaRappa rap. Although its not easy to get the timing so that PaRappa doesn’t sound like Stuttering John, it works well enough so that you can still understand what he says. You have four different ratings to your current rapping: Cool (unlocks after beating the game), Good, Bad and Awful. Your goal is to stay on either Good or Cool when beating the stage. If you start to perform poorly, your meter will drop, the music will alter slightly, and sometimes the stages start to fall apart on you. On the first play-through, timing is crucial, as the room for error is slim to none. If you mess up a verse, you will drop to a lower rank. For the majority of the game, it’s a fun gameplay mechanic that perfectly compliments the music. It does become harder as you progress, but you’ll still enjoy it all.
With how well the game plays, the style it portrays and as memorable it sounds, there’s a few shortcoming to your rapping experience. The main issue is the game length. You could watch an episode of Family Matters in the time it takes to beat PaRappa the Rapper. Literally, it’s like a 30 minute game. What saves PaRappa from being nothing more than a footnote in gaming history, is that the game is so fun, easily accessible and so memorable, that you’ll find yourself coming back more often than other games you beat. Anyone can pick up and play and feel like they never lost a beat.
If you start to dip too low on your rapping scale, the stages around you start to change, or come down on top of you!
Which leads to another issue – the difficulty. With the exception of Cheap Cheap’s stage (I swear there’s ZERO room for error with her!), the game never gets too difficult. With the second play-through and the ability to hit the Cool status (allowing you to to bust a solo freestyle rap) as well as a slightly noticeable relaxation of the strict timing needed, the experience becomes a lot less demanding. Finally, there’s no pausing the game. Pressing Start ends your stage with a defeat. A bit weird, but it’s nothing major.
While the length of a game is important with most games and most genres, PaRappa the Rapper proves that a short game can still turn into a long lifespan. With a charming and memorable cast of characters, one of the best soundtracks of all time and its addicting nature, PaRappa the Rapper will always be one of the most beloved video games in history. If there ever was an icon in which Sony could have capitalized on as their poster boy, PaRappa was it. Rap fans, non rap fans, gamer fans, non gamer fans, casuals, non casuals, just about everyone can enjoy playing the game, bringing together a more diverse demographic than most any game in this current generation.
Rating: 9.0
Hayatatatachaaaaa!
Kick! Punch! It’s all in the mind
If you wanna test me, I’m sure you’ll find
The things I’ll teach ya is sure to beat ya
But nevertheless you’ll get a lesson from teacher…
Keep up the good work man
Great review! And I’m glad you picked this one, it’s a great game
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