In any case, congratulations Chrono Trigger! I am not surprised that this title won. After all, it is one of the greatest RPGs in the world of video games. How can I possibly write a post that hasn't already been written about such a fulfilling and mind-blowing game? Simple, I'm going to go on tangents and drop tips along the way. This approach usually turns out alright.
Now get in the car Marty!
Where to start...how about the title? Chrono is the name of the main character, the spikey red haired dude pictured above. However, a Chrono Trigger is a magical weapon in the game. Its purpose is revealed about halfway through the game. As always, I'll stay away from major spoilers. I want you to play this game, remember?
Fun Fact: The FMV, full motion video, cut scenes as well as the box art were drawn by Akira Toriyama aka, the father of Dragonball and DBZ.
The game itself is about a group of adventurers trying to stop an alien life-form that is devouring the planet. This monster has a name, Lavos. Depending on when, yes when, you stop Lavos, you will experience a certain ending of the game. We'll touch on those possible endings later. For now, bullets baby!
- Storyline is amazing
- Chrono is the main hero
- Six other party members
- The sixth member is a secret
- Soundtrack is beautifully overwhelming
- Magic attacks depend on characters
- Creepy Fair Games
- Replayable with overpowered stats
- You can name your playable characters, anything
- Countdown attacks
- Riddlesome* Quests
- Magic combos
SakeSoup drinking contest
Ahem, Chrono himself is not all that interesting. I say that in the sweetest way possible. Similar to my beloved Link from the Legend of Zelda series, Chrono is a silent character who is designed to be a reflection of the player. There is nothing wrong with this style. It worked. It still works. Regardless, the game went above and beyond by trying something new for the time; it gave the player six five other main characters with distinct personalities. Rather than imagine character traits, Chrono Trigger assigns them via character specific dialogue, attacks, and quests.
Quick Tip: The game allows you to switch between the characters once your party exceeds three members. Try to play with different character combinations in order to not only unlock all group attack sets, but to also experience different dialogue reactions. Having a kickass all-girls team is most satisfying.
By the by, let's quickly summarize these various characters. I'll even include my names for them:
- Marle (Mare) the cheeky daddy's girl/white mage of the group. She is honestly the best healer and can also dish out some sick ice attacks too. I only named her after me because her name is one letter away from Mare.
- Lucca (Bulma) the brains and mechanical know-how in every situation. She is Chrono's best-friend and burns enemies with her fire magic. Like Bulma, she is a scientific genius. Also like Bulma, Lucca has purple hair (books). Unlike Bulma, she is not an obnoxious damsel in distress at all times.
- Robo (Droid) the personified robot aka The TANK. Robo can handle several hits to the face and is one of two playable characters who does not use a type of magic.
- Frog (Kirby) is well, a talking frog. He is a so-so fighter and healer, kinda the red mage of the crowd. Though, even there he is in second place, wink wink secret character. His healing targets the entire group but does not heal as much as Marle's spells. His magic is water based...he's British though?
"What you say? No rubbish, or NayNay head go boom!" - Ayla (NayNay) is the barbarian babe of every nerd's erotic fantasy. She speaks in broken English but has a strong wit about her. Ayla is the other non-magical character, preferring to use her strength. She also does not have a weapon, just a rock hard fist. I named her NayNay after one of my best-friends for two reasons; she's a beautiful blonde, and the fact that the name "NayNay" sounds hilarious in caveman dialogue.
- ...there is a sixth companion but that identity is going to stay secret. I'll tell you this though, I named that character Cell. Yes, from Dragonball Z.
Those are the main characters in a nutshell. You can change their names after a while, a nice trait if you make any spelling errors or regrettable jokes. Also, your party appears as a group in the overworld as well as the towns. That's right, one character does not represent your entire party. Instead, they are all realistically displayed onscreen. Their outfits don't change, but put this game in its era. Having multiple sprites as a moving entity was big for the mid nineties.
Quick Tip: You can save in the overworld as well as swap out your party members, heal, change game settings, etc. It took me far too long to realize that all of these options were available to me there. I kept going to The End of Time...avoid that stupidity.
Now, this game's central setting is time travel. In the beginning, you are only exposed to a limited number of eras. This, of course, grows over the course of the game. The End of Time is the central hub for all your time-travel needs. Before your Delorean that is. You can name that too! Mine's called Nimbus.
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| Go Nimbus Go! |
Enough with the names Mare. Let's cover some battle tactics now, shall we?
I mentioned that there are countdown attacks in Chrono Trigger. This means that a certain amount of time must pass before you can attack an enemy. This is represented by a depleting bar that is located underneath each character while in battle. The speed of the bar depends on individual levels as well as character choice. For instance, Robo has a slow countdown since he is the defense tank. Whereas Marle is all about agility and healing, so her countdown is much faster.
Depending on whom you have in your party determines the overall quickness of a battle. This matters greatly later in the game; there are some nasty enemies who love to paralyze your party before you can even land a blow.
Other aspects of battle, ah! I mentioned magic and combos before on the list too, right? Magic is elemental in this game and is assigned to specific characters. In order to unlock magic, Chrono and the gang have to deal with Spekkio. He's annoying as all hell but does give you elemental magical powers. You'll meet him. You'll hate him. Guaranteed.
Anything else on battles. Hmm. I'm certain that I left out Magic Points. Let's talk about that!
Magic is different than Magic Points, MP, because something has to be confusing. Magic Points are what enable your party to do special attacks, Techs. The other two letters in battle, TP, refers to Tech Points. This is your general experience that is earned from each battle. As you level up your characters, they are able to do more Techs and hold more MPs. The maximum amount of Magic Points is character specific and plateaus at level sixty. Health will also reach a maximum, 999/999, eventually. Though there are only a certain number of Techs in the game, TP does not cap like health or MPs. Go EXP TP!
Now magic is a lot of fun to use. There are five factions of magic; light(ning), ice, fire, water, and shadow. Magic Techs will be represented by an elemental symbol in the attack selection. Enemies are elemental as well, this is displayed in battle, and can have up to two element types. Light Techs will hurt water enemies, but things become tricky when an enemy is both water and light affiliated.
Obviously, same elemental attacks will do squat against the same magic-based enemy. Keep that in mind when exploring new areas. You don't want to be fucked over having to use Lukka against lava monsters.
Just like enemies, you too can have elemental combos. In fact, you can have tribos, triple combos. Certain Techs exist between characters. This means that you will need to have both, or all three, characters active as well as the Techs unlocked in order to execute the attack. These Techs cause massive damage but cost a pretty penny to use.
Quick Tip: There are some hidden triple Techs in the game. They are unlocked via gemstones scattered across dungeons and time. You must have the unique gemstone equipped in order to use these awesome Techs.
The enemies in Chrono Trigger are pretty story specific. Certain ones exist in certain areas as well as eras. You enable battles by triggering parts of an area, rather than random encounters on the overworld. These triggers can be anything from grazing an enemy sprite to stepping on a certain patch of grass. After exploring certain areas so many times, you'll have the fastest routes mapped out.
Besides possible spoilers, I suppose I could mention the coolest part of Chrono Trigger, the endings.
What? Is that an oxymoron? Mare, how can you talk about the endings without spoiling the game? Easy, there are twelve possible endings to Chrono Trigger. I actually have achieved them all, serious Lavos dedication. They are triggered when you initiate the fight with Lavos, the big bad alien/planet eating parasite. Since there are several eras to visit, and certain era changing events that occur in Chrono Trigger, there are many possible conclusions to the game. My personal favorite involves dinosaurs which requires a second play-through.
Don't Panic: Chrono Trigger is designed to be replayed. Once you beat the game for the first time, you are able to roll over all of your experience and weapons to a new file. Basically, you play as an overpowered renegade and can do so again and again.
Anything left? Well, yes, so much left. But what to talk about? I did mention the save-thing already. Also the riddlesome quests, though I don't want to spoil those beyond the word "riddlesome". Perhaps you're wondering about the fair games or the soup drinking contest, audience?
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| Games from Hell...Eh, they're weird. |
Ha, those are actually important to the plot, namely the soup drinking. The fair games function as optional mini games too, but are necessary at one point. There is one game where you can win cat food. The more cat food you win the more cats you'll have in your home. The number can be a normal two to a ridiculous twelve. Even the crazy cat ladies of the world are shown some love in Chrono Trigger.
This game is beyond fantastic. It is, not was, revolutionary in the world of gaming. Chrono Trigger gives the player choices with vastly different outcomes, an actual RPG. Not the,"good" ending, "bad" ending, and "crap" ending choice of the subsequent RPGs. It introduces multi-functioning attacks that required the player to experiment with all of the characters in order to have the full scope of the game. Then the dialogue diversity revolved around party selection, it is just amazing.
Chrono Trigger was so ahead of its time, hell, it's ahead of this time. Whoa, just like in the game. Chronoception.
Until next time audience! Here's some music to bridge the gap.
