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[Saints News] Hales Tales Retro Review - Chrono Trigger


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Retro Review: Chrono Trigger

 

By Haley Niamh Connor

 

 

   In today's bloated video game industry, rife with microtransactions, loot boxes, and day-one DLC, I choose to say NO. I will not be treated like some infinite piggy bank by heartless publishers pumping out incomplete content for sixty dollars then expecting you to buy more! I refuse! I reject this!
 

   Instead, I cozily look to the past to reinforce my already jaded opinion. So far into the past in fact that I end up playing many games that were released before I was born. Today, I want to take a look at the game that started a life-long love affair with JRPGs for me. It was released two years before Haley Niamh Connor, and I'd venture to say that it's an even bigger masterpiece than what my parents offered the world. Chrono Trigger for the Super Nintendo.

 

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   Does that art style look familiar to you? Maybe you've never played or taken a look at Chrono Trigger but you still feel some sense of familiarity when your eyes land upon the cover of the game. I've never been one for anime, but the the art direction of this game probably looks so nostalgic to you because Akira Toriyama created it. Akira Toriyama also created the Dragonball series, which regardless of if you enjoy anime or not, is part of the West's cultural zeitgeist. You may have never played this game, or even actively watched Dragonball Z, but you have definitely seen Toriyama's art before.


   Of course, this is a sixteen-bit Super Nintendo game. The in-game graphics don't consist of hand-drawn anime characters. I'd venture to say that even today though, Chrono Trigger holds up as a beautiful game. The color palettes of each time period the player will explore are different, setting a mood before even one line of dialogue is read. Here are the first sights you see upon booting up Chrono Trigger.

 

https://streamable.com/x1xnc

 

   It's gorgeous. If you disagree, then you're objectively wrong and should feel bad about yourself and your tastes. From the outset, Chrono Trigger uses its art to set the game's mood. The beginning chapter is meant to feel carefree, fun, relaxing even. The bright colors, the sounds of seagulls before the fireworks going off above the Millenial Fair as waves crash pleasantly along the shoreline. This conveys to the player that at the outset of this adventure, all is well in your little corner of the world. This doesn't stop. The colors, design, and sounds of each of the game's areas are expertly put together to convey the vibe the developers were going for with said area. It's truly fantastic.


   Oh right, the sound. It'd be a complete injustice to not cover Chrono Trigger's sound and music. So much so, that if I forgot to do it I would turn myself over to the LSPD and demand to be jailed. If they refused to jail me, I'd steal something so they'd have to. I'd never write again. I'd live out my days as a hermit in some uncharted forest, forever ashamed.


   That should tell you what you need to know about this game's sounds. But here. Take a listen. We'll continue to dissect the opening sequence of the game. Here's the first taste of the game's music you get.

 

https://streamable.com/4502c

 

   The track that plays upon being awoken sounds like a pleasant morning. The mood is set. Then you head downstairs and the music changes up.

 

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   That sounds comfy. That sounds warm. That sounds like home. Let's listen to the track that plays when you make your way to the Millenial Fair.

 

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   That sounds fun! Festive. Happy. This is continuous and consistent throughout every second of Chrono Trigger. The game doesn't tell you everything you need to know through text and dialogue. It shows you through its art and music. From the bright and beautiful palette of colors and cheerful music at the beginning of the game to the dreary and bleak setting of the far future, every area in this game does it so well that I could spend the rest of this piece talking about it. But we'll move on.


   Chrono Trigger isn't just beloved for its brilliant art and sound design. This game gets the JRPG formula right in a way that makes an enjoyable experience even for the biggest haters of the genre. The game isn't long like other JRPGs. It clocks in at about twenty or so hours, give or take depending on your playstyle. Your playstyle can also affect how the game progresses. Minor spoilers start here.


   Let's keep on with the opening of the game. At the Millenial Fair Crono literally runs into Marle, your first party member. Upon the collision, a pendant falls from the girl's neck. This is where a sequence of game affecting choices start. You can choose to check on Marle first or go grab her pendant. When she asks to enjoy the fair with you, you can find a knapsack on a table to the left of where you met. Stealing and eating the meal will restore your health and magic points completely, but it also makes you a thief. You're urged to do this because the screen to the north contains a giant feline robot named 'El Gato' that you can fight. This gives you a taste of Chrono Trigger's combat system but also depletes your HP and MP. On the same screen where you found the knapsack, a cat will begin to follow you. You can take this cat back to a little girl who'd lost it or choose to ignore the errand. At the entrance of the fair, there's a merchant who will attempt to buy Marle's pendant. You can try to convince her to sell it, or refuse his offer. Before the plot progresses, Marle will stop to buy candy from a vendor. This doesn't play out with a simple dialogue box. You can still move, and if you attempt to rush away twice, Marle will quip that you're acting like you've kidnapped her.

 

   Every choice here subverts the mentality that most players approach a game of this genre. If you had played JRPGs up to this point, you were used to looking in every nook and cranny for a free item, rushing through boring dialogue to move the story forward, selling off seemingly useless items for more money to buy needed supplies. In Chrono Trigger, these choices have consequences.

 

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After returning from 600AD, Crono is put on trial for "kidnapping" Marle.

 

   Every single choice detailed above comes back to help or hurt you when Crono is later put on trial for having "kidnapped" Marle, who turns out to be the daughter of the king. By the point the trial takes place you've already traveled back in time to 600AD to save Marle, and subsequently made it back to your own time period. You've done so much that you've invariably forgotten these seemingly mundane choices that you made at the outset of the game. You've been familiarizing yourself with the combat system. Immersing yourself in the story and its cast of characters. Then boom. Those little mundane choices come back into play.

The game is rife with these plot-altering choices. The game has a lot of endings. Here (<-- link). If you're up for major spoilers just take a look at this list. The intricacies of how each conclusion to the story is reached are expertly woven in such a way that replayability is almost paramount to your enjoyment of the game. Chrono Trigger has so much to explore and does so much right that you'll want to do it all.

 

   I'm not going to harp on the storyline of the game. It's fantastic, and you should experience it for yourself. If everything I've said up to this point hasn't inspired you to check out Chrono Trigger then I don't know what else to do- oh, wait. Gameplay.

   

   Remember when I said that Chrono Trigger provides an experience that even JRPG haters will enjoy? It's true. I'm a journalist so I can't lie to you even in extremely biased opinion pieces like this. The battle system is fantastic. At the very very beginning of the game, right after the title screen, the game will give you a choice between "Active" and "Wait" style combat. Choose active. It's the way the game's meant to be played. Like many JRPGs that'd come after, and Final Fantasy VI that came shortly before it, the 'Active' option makes combat work on a timer-based system. Each character and enemy has a speed stat that dictates how quickly their timer will charge up and when it does they can choose to attack, use a technique or spell, or use an item. The game also subverts the classic JRPG formula by doing away with random encounters. You see the enemies you're going to fight on the screen (or they ambush you), then you fight them where you stand. The positioning of enemies can dictate the effectiveness of different techniques. For example, soon after arriving in 600AD Crono will gain enough experience to learn the "Cyclone" technique. If enemies are grouped up closely this attack can hit all of them, decisively weakening the lot or even instantly ending the battle. Sometimes grouping will dictate that you can only hit one or two with an attack like cyclone. It costs MP, so considering grouping and when it's most effective to use your techniques comes into play - all while having to think quickly due to the timer.

 

   This becomes more intricate and interesting when other characters are introduced into the party. Each character has their own set of strengths and weaknesses as well as abilities. But your party composition can also add up to more than the sum of its parts. "Double Techs" are techniques that two party members can use together. For example, Marle has an ability called Aura which is your standard heal one character for X amount of HP spell. When combined with Crono, they can cast a double tech called Aura Whirl in which Crono will employ his cyclone technique to become a whirling blur of party-saving recovery. On the offensive side, Lucca has an ability called Flame Toss which is, once again, your standard burn an enemy for X damage spell. When combined with Crono, this can become Fire Whirl. Crono will once again use his spinny swordsman skills to spread the fire amongst the enemies. Triple techs are a thing too. Crono, Marle, and Lucca can use Delta Force which hits all enemies with a blast of elemental magic. As characters level up with each other more double and triple techs become available. There are 55 double and triple techs to master.

 

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Left: Double Tech "Flame Whirl" Right: Double Tech "X Strike"

 

   As I stated earlier, the world-building and art direction in both sound and visuals along with well-written dialogue and a fantastic story make Chrono Trigger worth playing alone. I won't be going into the story as I said. You should do it. I will, however, say there's a sword-wielding frog, a friendly robot, and a cavewoman in your party by the time it's complete (along with another character if you make the right choices). The time-traveling mechanic gave the developers of this game the opportunity to create an array of contrasting environments for the player to explore, and they took full advantage of it.
 

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The same spot of the overworld over three different eras - Present day (left), 600AD (middle), Far Future (right).

 

   I'm going to finish up this love-letter now. I could go on for a few thousand more words, I promise. But a few thousand more words aren't going to convince you to check out this all-time classic if you're not already convinced. Chrono Trigger is absolutely fantastic in every way a JRPG can be. To this day I still think it takes the prize as both the best JRPG ever made as well as the best game for the Super Nintendo (which has an incredible library to choose from). There's a reason this game gets brought up when people talk "best of all time".  If you've read this far, thank you for joining me on this nostalgia binge. Replaying Chrono Trigger is something I do pretty often, but putting into words just what makes this game so good was so much fun. If you haven't played it, I can't recommend it enough. If you have? Hopefully, the plethora of achievable endings or just a fondness for how incredible this masterpiece is will bring you back. If I gave scores in my reviews, Chrono Trigger would get all the points out of all the points. Go play it.
 

 

 

The content of this piece does not reflect the opinions of Saints News as a whole, but those of its author Haley Niamh Connor.

 

 

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Edited by borhoi
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