Thu Jan 15, 2009 2:08 am
Game Review: Chrono Trigger DS
Anybody who knows me is aware of my position on Japanese entertainment. For you, it may be strange to find me writing a review of Square Enix's Chrono Trigger for the Nintendo DS. Before you let your assumptions about me drive you away from this review, allow me to justify that my stance on Japanese entertainment doesn't come from a prejudicial standpoint (usually), but is based more on experience. This means that I am capable of being swayed away from my anti-Japanese tendencies should something out of the ordinary come along, such as Chrono Trigger DS has.
For those of you who are not aware, Chrono Trigger was originally released for the Super Nintendo. I recall, as a young man that during the Nintendo 64 era, I spied a copy of Chrono Trigger for sale at Toys 'R' Us for the low, low price of $54.99. For being a last-generation game at the time, that alone spoke volumes of its perceived value and quality. I had more or less ignored it, turned off by reports of turn-based combat, until a few years ago when I played it for a few days. Having lost a battle after a long period without saving, I gave up on it at the time. However, I still came away with a great impression of the game, and a genuine love for many of the game's characters and plot points. It is with this impression that I re-entered Chrono Trigger on the Nintendo DS after its recent release.
Chrono Trigger is a Japanese style RPG, complete with many things you would expect from an entry in that genre. Turn based (menu based) combat and a liberal mix of both fantasy and futuristic elements. Several characters with whom you can party-swap and pre-defined weapon upgrades for said characters. It has an "ultimate magic sword of destiny", a punk kid hero with crazy hair, an obligatory princess who would rather be adventuring, and even an angsty evil sorceror villain with long, straight, white hair. Each character has a pre-defined list of spells they can learn as they level up, and when they do level up, their stat bonuses are pumped automatically without any influence by the player.
These cliches (and yes, they were already cliche during the SNES era) are things that I'm totally sick of, and that's usually enough to turn me away from lots of Japanese entertainment. Heck, those cliches even drive me away from western fantasy novels. Okay... but now that we've covered everything that you expect from a JRPG, let's talk about the things you don't expect.
Combat. Like most JRPGs, Chrono Trigger has tons of combat. While there's no "random battles," there will ofen be ambushes where you're forced to fight foes, no matter how many times you've traveled through an area. There are many enemies which wander around as well, only attacking if you touch them. This makes battling a little more tolerable when you're able to take a break from it and skip by on the occasion you're bored with it.
Instead of being straight turn-based, each character's speed will determine how often they are able to act. You can make your fastest character act whenever he's ready, or you can also wait around for your slower characters to catch up, whether for a strategic advantage, or by allowing them to use specially designated synergy moves when everyone involved is ready.
These synergy moves provide versatility to most party match-ups, for example, allowing a simple "heal" spell to become a "heal all" spell when mixed with another character's ability. In some cases, like mixing a fire and ice spell, the magical reaction causes an explosion of dark energy. These details add another element to the typical strategic void of many menu-based combat systems.
In addition, there are some light tactical elements, which are more or less useful. Of course, there's the typical "single target" and "all targets" abilities, but there are also some abilities that effect a radius or a line of enemies. During combat, monsters move around and may cluster together, allowing you to take advantage of a radial spell, or perhaps they'll line up in a row. These abilities are mostly opportunistic in usage, but those opportunities rarely arise. Some might've been more useful, like the path abilities, if you could actually move your characters around, but you can't. Ultimately the use of these spells is often too limited to be practical, especially later in the game where you have access to spells that will afflict the whole screen. At first, I would wait around for the enemies to bunch up so I could take advantage of these kinds of spells, but because each turn is based on time, I realized I could've attacked two or three times in the same time that I attacked once.
Aside from that, combat is everything you'd expect from a JRPG. Regular enemies are generally very similar, some with weaknesses and resistances. Bosses are often huge and have very powerful attacks, plus typically a weakness that you can learn which will help make defeating them more simple. The other adherences to typical JRPG combat comes complete with the things that make it frustrating, like enemies with "reduce HP to 1" powers and debilitating status effects. But if you can tolerate that stuff, the things that make it different are a breath of fresh air.
Story. In my opinion, most Japanese RPGs (and Japanese media in general) are loaded with self-referencial, faux-philosophical, preachy bullcrap. What they lack in relatable characters, they make up for with thinly veiled cliche messages about the sanctity of mother earth, the beauty of innocence, or how a robot can have a soul. AKA uninteresting and unentertaining drivel. One of these days I'll tell you how I really feel.
Chrono Trigger, however, does not fall into this trap. The game's story, carried lovingly by four very interesting and complex characters, manages to flirt with cliche without being dominated by it. For those of you who are familiar with the cast, that means that three of the game's other characters are being dragged by those four as well. Regardless, because the game allows you to compose your party however you please, your connection to the story always remains interesting and relatable.
It's funny, the story seems to poke at the typical trends as I mentioned earlier, but none of them becomes the cornerstone of the story. The core story of the game is a genuinely original plot with complexity enough to span through eons and touch each of the game's playable characters in a very personal way.
Depending on your party choices, different quests may be available to explore their background, or to solve things that they're passionate about. But, in a nice narrative touch, your party will also often comment on the situation, regardless if it's specific to them or not. Your midieval age cohort may say "Yon flickering tapestry doth seem to indicate a trap on the parapet." However, if you have the techno-geek girl in your party, she might instead say "The computer says they've rigged the walkway on the fortress wall." It's touches like this that keep you on the same page with your characters as they travel through the story, and it's something I greatly appreciated. It's almost worth playing through various parts of the game with a different party, just to see the different things they might all say.
Something else which I'll applaud in this section is the game's various paths. Depending on your choices, things you may do or prevent in the past may cause or prevent things in the future. The game designers use this cleverly to set up situations where you plant items for yourself to retrieve in the future, use time travel to acquire two of the same item, and even change the game's world map and features on the face of the planet.
This freedom of choice, atypical for many Japanese games, also extends to 11 possible endings and a couple "optional" playable characters, depending on how you do things. I value the ability to have a different experience than my friends if they are playing the same game, and that's something Chrono Trigger does very well.
DS Specific. The touch screen interface is quick and intuitive. I would never use the movement system they've included (point and drag to walk, etc). It's far too sloppy for trying to place your characters accurately, as is necessary to avoid monsters or open chests. Happily, D-Pad controls remain intact.
Sometimes the game will seem to detect a double-tap, queuing an action when it wasn't intended, but these occasions were few and far between.
It can get frustrating tapping through the combat menus as the game's real-time-turn-based combat moves on without you. However, if you prefer, there's an option you can set to make it pause whenever you have a character ready to attack. Personally, I played it with the option set to off (by default), as it makes the battles a little more exciting.
A new monster-raising metagame and battle mode have been added in the DS version. I spent just enough time on this feature to realize that I don't care. It was not addictive or fun, nor did it feel important or interesting. The game has plenty of content as it is and I was perfectly comfortable ignoring this feature.
The visuals on the DS are nothing to write home about. Of course, I don't begrudge the pixel art. However, the game's 256 color limit from the Super Nintendo makes the game quite a bit more bland to look at. Recreating the game's sprites, given the enormity of the game, would've been a huge task. But with a $40 price tag for a 10-year old port, it would've been nice.
You may've read complaints about the text size, but if your vision is good it won't be a problem; I'd rather have small text than a whole screen occupied by it.
The DS version has also included some anime cutscenes that were created for a Playstation port of the same game. These are brief, but well done. I'm not an anime fan, but it really was nice to see some of my favorite characters in a much more fluid and intimate view. You can turn them off, but I don't know why you'd want to.
The port has also done something great that many legacy game ports are doing; adding a library of each of the game's endings, videos, creatures, and even full maps of enemy and treasure locations as you see them in-game.
The game's music is phenomenal. It's possible that rearrangements with higher quality instrument samples would've been an appropriate update, but the sheer quantity and memorability of the game's tunes earns some respect. Characters have special themes, time-periods have special themes, even many dungeons have special themes. The music goes a long way in filling out the game's widely varied atmosphere.
I feel like I could go on and on (as I already have) and still not run out of things to say about Chrono Trigger. The game took me a staggering 35 hours to complete and I still haven't played through some of the New Game+ content that's been added for the DS version.
If you've never played Chrono Trigger before, I'll suggest it's a must-have. You will be proud to own a copy of this appropriately iconic Japanese gaming masterpiece. If you have played it and already own it for another system, do yourself a favor and go replay it. And try putting Lucca in your party this time, she's got some great synergy techs.
Gameplay: 6 / 10
Running around the map, activating objects and the combat system really are the only things to speak of regarding Chrono Trigger's gameplay. While its innovations and deviation from other JRPG combat trends earns it some points here, it's not enough to hide the fact that it's still menu-based combat. You may certainly find yourself breathing a brief sigh of disgust for each combat encounter when you get near to the end of the game.
Fluff: 10 / 10
Chrono Trigger delivers a new setting so completely in a way I've never seen before in another game. Each character, each piece of the environment, every town and every family seems to have a historical or geneological history that reaches back to the prehistoric era and into a post apocalyptic future. The game does this with incredible ambiance and character-specific storylines that are emotionally engaging.
Innovation: 7 / 10
The game uses tried-and-true JRPG standbys as a platform to try new things. The game's writing and story-presentation also contribute to this score, as I've considered it. I won't give a ton of points here, but it earns a little love for spreading its wings beyond the usual fare.
Production: 9 / 10
The sheer amount of content in Chrono Trigger is enough to earn it a pretty good score, and even the visuals and certainly the music elevate it beyond some current DS titles. There's loads of enemy sprites that aren't often palette-swapped and the music is varied and abundant. It doesn't reach perfection only because I know the DS can handle better.
Longevity: 10 / 10
On a fairly complete playthrough (no loose ends as far as I was aware), the game took me 35 hours and there's still a bunch of stuff I haven't done yet. If you count the multiplayer mode, the game's lasting appeal is very, very high. There are about 5 or so hours in there that really feel like artificial time sinks, for instance, a huge string of fed-ex quests that require you to walk a very long distance. However, those things are optional and only cut the total game time down to 30 hours, which is still impressive. I'm comfortable giving it a perfect score here.
Overall: 8.4 / 10
I like Chrono Trigger. It may not be for you if you want something fast and fun, but if you're looking for something on the DS to sink your teeth into, Chrono Trigger's the one for you.
For those of you who are not aware, Chrono Trigger was originally released for the Super Nintendo. I recall, as a young man that during the Nintendo 64 era, I spied a copy of Chrono Trigger for sale at Toys 'R' Us for the low, low price of $54.99. For being a last-generation game at the time, that alone spoke volumes of its perceived value and quality. I had more or less ignored it, turned off by reports of turn-based combat, until a few years ago when I played it for a few days. Having lost a battle after a long period without saving, I gave up on it at the time. However, I still came away with a great impression of the game, and a genuine love for many of the game's characters and plot points. It is with this impression that I re-entered Chrono Trigger on the Nintendo DS after its recent release.
- Chrono_1.PNG (351.25 KiB) Viewed 240 times
Chrono Trigger is a Japanese style RPG, complete with many things you would expect from an entry in that genre. Turn based (menu based) combat and a liberal mix of both fantasy and futuristic elements. Several characters with whom you can party-swap and pre-defined weapon upgrades for said characters. It has an "ultimate magic sword of destiny", a punk kid hero with crazy hair, an obligatory princess who would rather be adventuring, and even an angsty evil sorceror villain with long, straight, white hair. Each character has a pre-defined list of spells they can learn as they level up, and when they do level up, their stat bonuses are pumped automatically without any influence by the player.
These cliches (and yes, they were already cliche during the SNES era) are things that I'm totally sick of, and that's usually enough to turn me away from lots of Japanese entertainment. Heck, those cliches even drive me away from western fantasy novels. Okay... but now that we've covered everything that you expect from a JRPG, let's talk about the things you don't expect.
Combat. Like most JRPGs, Chrono Trigger has tons of combat. While there's no "random battles," there will ofen be ambushes where you're forced to fight foes, no matter how many times you've traveled through an area. There are many enemies which wander around as well, only attacking if you touch them. This makes battling a little more tolerable when you're able to take a break from it and skip by on the occasion you're bored with it.
Instead of being straight turn-based, each character's speed will determine how often they are able to act. You can make your fastest character act whenever he's ready, or you can also wait around for your slower characters to catch up, whether for a strategic advantage, or by allowing them to use specially designated synergy moves when everyone involved is ready.
These synergy moves provide versatility to most party match-ups, for example, allowing a simple "heal" spell to become a "heal all" spell when mixed with another character's ability. In some cases, like mixing a fire and ice spell, the magical reaction causes an explosion of dark energy. These details add another element to the typical strategic void of many menu-based combat systems.
In addition, there are some light tactical elements, which are more or less useful. Of course, there's the typical "single target" and "all targets" abilities, but there are also some abilities that effect a radius or a line of enemies. During combat, monsters move around and may cluster together, allowing you to take advantage of a radial spell, or perhaps they'll line up in a row. These abilities are mostly opportunistic in usage, but those opportunities rarely arise. Some might've been more useful, like the path abilities, if you could actually move your characters around, but you can't. Ultimately the use of these spells is often too limited to be practical, especially later in the game where you have access to spells that will afflict the whole screen. At first, I would wait around for the enemies to bunch up so I could take advantage of these kinds of spells, but because each turn is based on time, I realized I could've attacked two or three times in the same time that I attacked once.
- frog.jpg (17.78 KiB) Viewed 238 times
Story. In my opinion, most Japanese RPGs (and Japanese media in general) are loaded with self-referencial, faux-philosophical, preachy bullcrap. What they lack in relatable characters, they make up for with thinly veiled cliche messages about the sanctity of mother earth, the beauty of innocence, or how a robot can have a soul. AKA uninteresting and unentertaining drivel. One of these days I'll tell you how I really feel.
Chrono Trigger, however, does not fall into this trap. The game's story, carried lovingly by four very interesting and complex characters, manages to flirt with cliche without being dominated by it. For those of you who are familiar with the cast, that means that three of the game's other characters are being dragged by those four as well. Regardless, because the game allows you to compose your party however you please, your connection to the story always remains interesting and relatable.
- robo.gif (8.22 KiB) Viewed 238 times
It's funny, the story seems to poke at the typical trends as I mentioned earlier, but none of them becomes the cornerstone of the story. The core story of the game is a genuinely original plot with complexity enough to span through eons and touch each of the game's playable characters in a very personal way.
Depending on your party choices, different quests may be available to explore their background, or to solve things that they're passionate about. But, in a nice narrative touch, your party will also often comment on the situation, regardless if it's specific to them or not. Your midieval age cohort may say "Yon flickering tapestry doth seem to indicate a trap on the parapet." However, if you have the techno-geek girl in your party, she might instead say "The computer says they've rigged the walkway on the fortress wall." It's touches like this that keep you on the same page with your characters as they travel through the story, and it's something I greatly appreciated. It's almost worth playing through various parts of the game with a different party, just to see the different things they might all say.
Something else which I'll applaud in this section is the game's various paths. Depending on your choices, things you may do or prevent in the past may cause or prevent things in the future. The game designers use this cleverly to set up situations where you plant items for yourself to retrieve in the future, use time travel to acquire two of the same item, and even change the game's world map and features on the face of the planet.
This freedom of choice, atypical for many Japanese games, also extends to 11 possible endings and a couple "optional" playable characters, depending on how you do things. I value the ability to have a different experience than my friends if they are playing the same game, and that's something Chrono Trigger does very well.
- Epoch Machine.PNG (174.66 KiB) Viewed 239 times
DS Specific. The touch screen interface is quick and intuitive. I would never use the movement system they've included (point and drag to walk, etc). It's far too sloppy for trying to place your characters accurately, as is necessary to avoid monsters or open chests. Happily, D-Pad controls remain intact.
Sometimes the game will seem to detect a double-tap, queuing an action when it wasn't intended, but these occasions were few and far between.
It can get frustrating tapping through the combat menus as the game's real-time-turn-based combat moves on without you. However, if you prefer, there's an option you can set to make it pause whenever you have a character ready to attack. Personally, I played it with the option set to off (by default), as it makes the battles a little more exciting.
A new monster-raising metagame and battle mode have been added in the DS version. I spent just enough time on this feature to realize that I don't care. It was not addictive or fun, nor did it feel important or interesting. The game has plenty of content as it is and I was perfectly comfortable ignoring this feature.
The visuals on the DS are nothing to write home about. Of course, I don't begrudge the pixel art. However, the game's 256 color limit from the Super Nintendo makes the game quite a bit more bland to look at. Recreating the game's sprites, given the enormity of the game, would've been a huge task. But with a $40 price tag for a 10-year old port, it would've been nice.
You may've read complaints about the text size, but if your vision is good it won't be a problem; I'd rather have small text than a whole screen occupied by it.
The DS version has also included some anime cutscenes that were created for a Playstation port of the same game. These are brief, but well done. I'm not an anime fan, but it really was nice to see some of my favorite characters in a much more fluid and intimate view. You can turn them off, but I don't know why you'd want to.
The port has also done something great that many legacy game ports are doing; adding a library of each of the game's endings, videos, creatures, and even full maps of enemy and treasure locations as you see them in-game.
The game's music is phenomenal. It's possible that rearrangements with higher quality instrument samples would've been an appropriate update, but the sheer quantity and memorability of the game's tunes earns some respect. Characters have special themes, time-periods have special themes, even many dungeons have special themes. The music goes a long way in filling out the game's widely varied atmosphere.
I feel like I could go on and on (as I already have) and still not run out of things to say about Chrono Trigger. The game took me a staggering 35 hours to complete and I still haven't played through some of the New Game+ content that's been added for the DS version.
If you've never played Chrono Trigger before, I'll suggest it's a must-have. You will be proud to own a copy of this appropriately iconic Japanese gaming masterpiece. If you have played it and already own it for another system, do yourself a favor and go replay it. And try putting Lucca in your party this time, she's got some great synergy techs.
Gameplay: 6 / 10
Running around the map, activating objects and the combat system really are the only things to speak of regarding Chrono Trigger's gameplay. While its innovations and deviation from other JRPG combat trends earns it some points here, it's not enough to hide the fact that it's still menu-based combat. You may certainly find yourself breathing a brief sigh of disgust for each combat encounter when you get near to the end of the game.
Fluff: 10 / 10
Chrono Trigger delivers a new setting so completely in a way I've never seen before in another game. Each character, each piece of the environment, every town and every family seems to have a historical or geneological history that reaches back to the prehistoric era and into a post apocalyptic future. The game does this with incredible ambiance and character-specific storylines that are emotionally engaging.
Innovation: 7 / 10
The game uses tried-and-true JRPG standbys as a platform to try new things. The game's writing and story-presentation also contribute to this score, as I've considered it. I won't give a ton of points here, but it earns a little love for spreading its wings beyond the usual fare.
Production: 9 / 10
The sheer amount of content in Chrono Trigger is enough to earn it a pretty good score, and even the visuals and certainly the music elevate it beyond some current DS titles. There's loads of enemy sprites that aren't often palette-swapped and the music is varied and abundant. It doesn't reach perfection only because I know the DS can handle better.
Longevity: 10 / 10
On a fairly complete playthrough (no loose ends as far as I was aware), the game took me 35 hours and there's still a bunch of stuff I haven't done yet. If you count the multiplayer mode, the game's lasting appeal is very, very high. There are about 5 or so hours in there that really feel like artificial time sinks, for instance, a huge string of fed-ex quests that require you to walk a very long distance. However, those things are optional and only cut the total game time down to 30 hours, which is still impressive. I'm comfortable giving it a perfect score here.
Overall: 8.4 / 10
I like Chrono Trigger. It may not be for you if you want something fast and fun, but if you're looking for something on the DS to sink your teeth into, Chrono Trigger's the one for you.
Art Director - Novo Interactive
