One in a Million!
I can't stress enough to you how this game just does everything right. Nothing is too difficult to figure out. You don't get stuck forever hating a boss. You never curse at the controls. To this day, I still love the way you enter letters using a dial instead of the usual "keyboard on screen". The story is very compelling, and it actually drives the game. I especially love taking inventory of the bioresources of each new place with a camera. The characters and environment are interesting in every way - physical appearance, background, psychology, abilities, etc. Music and sound effects are what you need and fit the mood.
The gameplay isn't artificially padded with difficult/frustrating things to do to drag out the length of the game. Kills are not superviolent, but totally satisfying. The game is always fun, never work. Stealth is way more optional and shorter wait to return to normal than in "Metal Gear" and other stealth games, therefore actually fun (and even funny - those guys are hilarious). The graphics are beautiful, no errors or overly-contrived things to take away from your immersion in this environment.
I don't know what it was about the packaging of Beyond Good And Evil that made me decide I wanted to play it, but I'm really glad my intuition proved right. BG&E is a really superb game, probably the best of 2003 and one of the top games I've played on PS2.
First of all, BG&E is *original* - and it's really not often you can say that about a game these days. Sure, it's not original in every respect - many of the gameplay mechanics are familiar, but it does have some very original aspects - most noticably the use of the camera, which is a simple mechanic that is very well developed and utilised throughout the game. The second aspect in which it shows originality is the presence of other "NPCs" that you must co-operate with. Nothing like Halo's "here's some extra guns to die for you", these are real characters with special abilities that complement Jade's own, and must be properly utilised (and protected) to get through the game. The use of email communications is another novel aspect.
Most of all though, BG&E is just incredibly well designed and implemented. Varied, dynamic and inventive levels are put together beautifully - never too challenging, but never let you just switch your brain off.
There just aren't many other games out there of this caliber, so what are people buying instead? I really hope it proves to be a sleeper hit as word of mouth gets out about just what a refreshingly good game it is!
Whatever your excuse is, (I can hear it now, "I just like cute Mario type games", "I don't like platformers, I like to shoot stuff", "I don't have time for adventure games") just give this a try. All the things that annoy you in other games simply don't exist in this one. As so many others have said here, you won't regret it. I hope the game makers have more chances to make gems like this, games with soul, instead of more mass-marketed junk.