Cupid Parasite: Sweet and Spicy Darling Review

Game Set-up for Cupid Parasite: Sweet and Spicy Darling

We get a decent amount of content in the game. When starting a new game you get three options: After Drama, New Parasite and Bonus Episode.

After Drama

After Drama follows the best endings of the original Cupid Parasite, here we get the choice of all the characters we played in the first game. You have to navigate the story while choosing the sweet or spicy answers. If you find the right balance between sweet and spicy you will end up with the Best Ending known as Sweet & Spicy Ending. You also have a sweet ending and spicy endings. This makes three endings in total.  But along the way, some characters have other endings as well. This is more similar to the short bad endings in some other Otome games. But in this case, they are most often “bitter” as they call it.

New Parasite

New Parasite is the story of the 6^th parasite. This is an entirely new character to the game; this new character is Merenice Levin. His story picks up after the end of the common route in the original game. This is the ending where all 5 Parasites cancel their memberships.

Bonus Episode

The Bonus Episode options are only available when finishing a certain ending of a character.

Like some other Otome games, Cupid Parasite: Sweet and Spicy Darling has a flowchart. The number of steps is already indicated and we get an overview in each part if we receive a choice and/or CG (Computer Graphic). I always like using the flowcharts just to see how many chapters there are left and if there is an important choice to be made that will influence the ending. But if this is not something you enjoy you can just not open the Flowchart option.

Another feature is the map that you can access of Los York and the newly opened D’armour Paradis. When you finish certain endings, you will receive voiceovers that introduce certain locations where you spend a lot of time on the route. The voiceovers will of course be from the LI’s.

The Parasite Seven

Since this is a Fan disk, the route order of Cupid Parasite: Sweet and Spicy Darling doesn’t matter. I chose to do Gill’s route first because I wanted to get him out of the way. And the other routes I did in the order I played the original game. I played the new parasite’s route last, because and wanted to complete all the happy endings for the original characters first. The order I played was: Gill -> Ryuki -> Shelby -> Raul -> Allan -> Peter -> Merenice.

Gill Lovecraft

Gill Lovecraft is a freelance editor who writes for several magazines and book publishers. In the original game, we met Gill, the overbearing roommate Lynette had when she came to the human world. He helped her find her way in this other world and taught her how to “act” like a human. Very quickly Gill nurtured an infatuation for Lynette. Eventually, though, they fall out of touch because of an unknown and unanswered love letter. Lynette eventually reconnects with Gill because he signs up for Cupid Crop.

When we meet Gill again Lynette remains clueless as to Gill’s feelings for her. Eventually, they find one another through love letters and look back upon the time they spent together in college. Lynette finally realizes she loves Gill, and they enter a relationship which ultimately leads them to marriage.

In Cupid Parasite: Sweet and Spicy Darling, Gill has taken over the family company and he and Lynette travel to his hometown Boltamore. Here they want to celebrate their union once more and Lynette gets a glimpse into Gill’s life.

I wanted to start with Gill because he was my least favourite LI (Love Interest). I wanted to get his story out of the way. What I hoped was that the game was going to turn my opinion around in my dislike for Gill. I had high hopes that maybe once he married Lynette, he would act less like the overbearing mother hen and start acting like a likeable character. But to be honest, my dislike for Gill has gotten worse. They stuck with the Lovelorn character here. It makes sense that he would stay true to his Agape kind of love, but I hoped the game would give me something to like Gill. But uh, no…  And to make it worse, Lynette makes a huge decision in his after-story that felt a little out of character for me.

You know all the comments on Gill aside, I think the gamemakers are doing an amazing job. The fact that I feel so strongly about a character says that I am just super into the game and I care about the characters.

Ryuki Keisaiin

We meet Ryuki as the Glamour Parasite in the original game. He is a successful fashion designer, and he comes from the well-known Keisaiin fashion dynasty. He has started his own clothing line “rYUKI” and is thinking about starting a clothing brand for women as well. As suggested by the dynasty, Ryuki is Japanese and still has a lot of love for his culture even though he lives in Los York. His grandmother plays a big role in his life and is the director/owner of the family fashion like KeiSai:In. Ryuki has to prove himself to his grandmother to become the designer he always wanted to be.

His sister signed Yuki up for Cupid Corp, but marriage is the furthest thing from his mind. He doesn’t even see people in the way the rest does. He views them as colour codes. for example, he sees Lynette as #da536e. Ryuki and Lynette constantly butt heads, but Lynette tries to understand his ways and Ryuki starts to see her as something more than a code. Love blossoms and eventually on New Year’s Eve Ryuki proposes to Lynette and they are on their way to plan their wedding.

Ryuki was the first LI I played in the original Cupid Parasite. At first, I wasn’t a fan of him, and I could never see him having a loving and healthy relationship. But in the first Cupid Parasite, he completely won me over. Even though he is younger than Lynette, I thought he was quite mature and had ambitions.

This route followed up on his maturing and coming into his own with his clothing line. We also get to see a little bit more information about his Japanese heritage, like food and traditional clothing. I was bummed that we didn’t get to see much of the old Ryuki anymore. In the first game, it was very funny to me how he would give people colour codes and spray everyone’s faces with a mist to keep them moisturized. But as I mentioned he was a lot more mature and focused more on finding his voice with his clothing line. The endings were mostly very sweet and beautiful, whereas the Sweet ending and the Sweet Spicy ending were pretty similar. But the Spicy ending was the one that shocked me a little bit. Like how would that situation ever arise? Anyway, if we are talking Spicy endings this was it.

Shelby Snail

Ah yes, my favourite LI personality-wise. Shelby Snail is a very successful entrepreneur and the founder of the company Cupid Corp, where Lynette works. In the original game, he was well-known as a devoted husband. But as we quickly find out, he doesn’t have a wife and enrols at his own company as “Monsieur Esse” to find a wife. Worse yet, he is named the Prestige Parasite because his only passion is work. He doesn’t even show up for his practice dates and sends his assistant Owen instead.

In desperate need of a fitting wife, after receiving threats to expose his secret, he and Lynette agree to a contractual marriage to convince everyone he is actually married. Slowly but gradually, they bond over their passion for work and their shared values, and they grow feelings for one another. In the end, they married for real at Cupid Corps headquarters.

I fell in love with Shelby in the original game and my love for him only strengthened when playing Cupid Parasite: Sweet and Spicy Darling. The main storyline is Shelby and Lynette finding a good balance between work and home/love life. They are both pragma love types which fits their story very well. In the real world, Shelby would be my type, for sure. The fact that he is this savvy businessman who is always looking sharp and is passionate about his work, but also tries his hardest to be the best devoted husband at the same time, just gives him full marks in my book. I mean, where do you find someone like this…

Their After Story was mostly about them finding the balance between their married life and work. We also find out that Shelby is an absolute simp for Lynette, his inner dialogue made that very clear. He would do anything for her and everything she does is cute to him. The route made me smile and some of the scenes in this route had me laughing out loud. The innuendos that were made were so funny and pretty spicy at times. I won’t spoil the fun but keep an eye out for bananas. This route was the best so far, I thoroughly enjoyed crushing and obsessing over Shelby. And Shelby’s CGs were the most beautiful ones, they adopted a bit of a manga style.

Raul Aconite

Raul is a world-famous movie star who has starred in several action movies. His parents were archaeologists, and he grew up visiting several excavation sites. Because of these trips, he has nurtured an interest in everything mythology from a young age. The problem with Raul is that when he talks, he will always talk about mythology and never stop. This has earned him the nickname: The Obsessed Parasite.

Raul joins the matchmaking agency to help him prepare for a new movie role, at his agent’s behest. He needs to learn what love and romance is to act like he is in love. Raul becomes Lynette’s pupil in the ways of love, but they quickly notice their differences when it comes to romance. Eventually, they grow closer together and romance blossoms.

Again, a really enjoyable route. Raul and Lynette are ready for marriage and have revealed themselves to the public eye. But not everything goes the way they would have wanted, and marriage may prove itself to be a difficult desire. In the original, I was a big fan of the Ludas love type Raul represented, which resulted in a few spicy scenes. Now, being together with Lynette, he is different in that he is completely devoted to his goddess Lynette. But his love type will still come into play in different ways. Throughout his route I found him to be absolutely adorable and his devotion to Lynette was great to see. The comparison of Raul being like a big dog was an accurate distinction.

This ending was crazy though. My literal reaction when the “plot” was revealed was: What the… Raul’s route in the original game was strange in a sense as well, that things happened that would only happen in movies. This ending had the same note for me but add 10x more craziness to it. It made absolutely no sense to me, but maybe they just wanted to add a funny plot to the route, because it is, after all, a fan disk.

Allan Melville

Allan was the wildcard of all the Parasite 5. He was the main sales employee at a luxury pillow store. Here they create custom pillows for their customer. Everyone who buys a pillow here raves about the amazing sleep they have and even the strange dream that occurred. But unbeknown to most, Alan is an incubus. A demon who feeds on people’s dreams. Known as the thieving parasite he will only date women who are already in a committed relationship.

Lynette tries her hardest to help him find a perfect match, but he keeps breaking all the company rules. She quickly realizes there is no changing Allan Melville. After a chance encounter, Lynette reveals she is Cupid and that Allan is an incubus. Due to a misfire of Lynette’s Cupid Arrow, she falls for Allen, for 30 days. But in this time deep secrets are uncovered, and Lynette turns from a god to a fallen angel. Destined to walk the same path as demons together they have the luxury to create their future. But what will this future hold?

If I gave this route a summary it would be that I thought it was sad. I had the same feeling in the original game as well. Everyone both of them knew died because they have eternal life and it just felt so sad to me. Even some of the dialogue was about how everything fades and changes around them while they are standing still. Eventually, they did find a way to be happy together, but it left a bitter aftertaste for me. What I was happy about is that we got way more information on the demon realm and everything being a demon entails for Lynette.

Allan’s After Drama was also long… The Sweet and Spicy ending was way longer than any of the other routes. So in terms of game time, you are not wasting your money.

Peter Flage (aka Jupiter)

This character was a bit of a wild card. In all the different routes he had a lot of different jobs. We first got to know Peter as the director’s assistant on the TV show Parasite House. He was amazingly clumsy and would break a lot of the camera stuff. In the secret route, he became an intern at the same time as Lynette. But he would not know how to communicate with others, again would break stuff and he would run away the moment he heard a strange noise. He even became known as the sixth member of the Parasite group, called the Sensitive Parasite. Early on it is revealed he is Lord Jupiter, the leader of the Dii Consentes, and has taken the form of a strange creature/familiar to keep watch over Lynette. This creature is called Chii, and we have seen him throughout all the other routes already.

After Cupid misfires one of her arrows, it hits Peter, and he falls in love with her for 30 days. Very quickly it becomes apparent that Lynette is falling in love with Peter as well and their pretend relationship is no longer pretend. They both experience their first love together. In the end, a major catastrophe threatens the lives of the people in the Human Realm. Lynette and Peter need to recruit the Parasite 6 to defeat this great threat. In the end, the position of Juno, the goddess of marriage, must be filled. Lynette accepts this high honour and officially marries Jupiter as well. Making them the official couple of Jupiter and Juno, hopefully without all the cheating 😅.

I must admit that in the original Cupid Parasite, I had a hard time getting into this route. And there was no specific reason for that other than… well I still don’t know. I think it has to do with his skittish personality. But having only played this route very recently, it was fresh on my mind and enjoyed the After Drama to its fullest. The story in this route was not wildly different from the previous game, but reading and seeing more of Celestia was entertaining. And I loved seeing Lynette in the role of Juno, the Goddess of Marriage. I think she is an awesome Dii Consentes and has the strength and kindness for it.

In terms of storyline, this route was so mind-blowing to me. In a good way of course. It did not go where I thought it would go and the connections to our own reality were well done. But let me talk about the spicy ending… It was spicy for sure. But I am not sure if this level of spicy will suit everyone. I wasn’t bothered by it, but I do want to give a sort of warning to people.

Merenice Levin

This is a new character to the game and his romance story is available to play immediately. Quickly he is introduced to us as a famous fortune teller, who as the title suggests tells customers their fortune. But Merenice is not a con artist like most other fortune tellers. His fortunes are actually true, although they can be quite vague. Merenice is quite mysterious, and it is said you are even lucky to find him if you want a reading. Even the way he talks and acts is very mystical. But the one thing he loves is doughnuts, he goes to a doughnut shop every day to buy a box. He even uses them in his readings by looking through the hole.

Normally a character like him would not attract me. But upon starting his route I was immediately drawn to him. He is a very different character from the other Parasites. He does have his own quirks like the other Parasites, but Merenice is very focused on Lynette from the start and wants to be with her all the time. Except for Gill, none of the other LI’s were interested in her at all. They were very much focused on their job. That is probably the biggest difference between Merenice and the other Parasites. And while I think it doesn’t entirely fit the vibe, I liked playing the route and learning more about him.

Visuals and Sound

Sound

Let’s start with the music. I loved the music in the original Cupid Parasite. It fits the theming so well and there was a lot of variety in the BGM (Background Music). The BGM in Cupid Parasite: Sweet and Spicy Darling was good as well but I missed something that I couldn’t quite put my finger on. The character themes were different from the first game, and that funnily enough was one of the elements for me that made the first game so good. It’s not that I can’t appreciate the new music, but I just thought the LI themes in the original game were better.

But the opening and ending songs were so good! They really hit it out of the park again with them. The opening and ending songs are performed by the same group, The Biscats. This time The Biscats are accompanied by Osamu Misaki. The Opening song is “Fondant Chocolate of Love” and the Ending song is: “Sweet & Spicy Darling”. Since playing the game I have been listening to the music nonstop.

Visuals

The visuals are once again stunning. They are very colourful and just beautifully drawn, and they all have this overall purple/pink colour theme in them that would I guess refer to Lynette being Cupid in the original game.

And an additional note, I so enjoyed the spicy character graphics the game gave us. I think this is what a lot of people (or at least me) wanted to see in the fan disk called Cupid Parasite: Sweet and Spicy Darling.

Overall Thoughts

I bought the original Cupid Parasite a year back during a Black Friday sale and played it in different intervals throughout the months after. Only finished Allan and Peter’s route a few weeks ago. But even before I finished all the routes, I was already excited to hear that this Fan disk was going to be localized. And it certainly did not disappoint me. Every After Drama had a story and plot, which made it exciting to play. And not just to see how extremely happy a couple is all the time

What Cupid Parasite: Sweet and Spicy Darling does really well is keeping you on your toes. In some routes, the story takes very weird turns or at the last second, like a major event will happen And I must admit I had a lot of actual reactions in this game. Normally, outwardly, I am quite reserved, and I don’t show my emotions easily. But this game makes me laugh, be sad and gives me “what the… moments”. This Whirlwind style of writing does sometimes leave potholes here and there. but I don’t mind that.

A fun feature that they added was the name selection. If Lynette married at the end of Cupid Parasite, her last name was that of her husbands. I thought that was a nice little touch.

One thing I did want to mention is an issue with some CGs. In the CGs that had twinkles in them, my screen flickered quite a bit. I don’t know if this is because my switch is a little older. Or if this is an error in the game. It did bother me at some point.

Conclusion

Would I recommend Cupid Parasite: Sweet and Spicy Darling? YES, most definitely. I enjoyed the game very much. Of course, the original game will always be the better one, but if you are in for a laugh and want more spicy and romantic scenes then I would recommend picking this up. At some moments there was some crazy stuff going on, but I didn’t mind it. I actually like that a game can stand out by adding loads of goofy elements. And it had a very decent play time as well, with a lot of content.

Final verdict: I like it a lot

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