Everyone loved Chrono Trigger. It’s not an exaggeration to place it as one of the best RPGs ever, at least using the scale of user reviews. So when a game that was supposedly a sequel to this timeless classic came out, everyone was expecting an enhanced, updated graphics Chrono Trigger. No, no one would probably say that’s what they wanted, since rehashes don’t tend to get good reviews, but that’s honestly what people were expecting. Instead, they got Chrono Cross. Is that really a bad thing?
So, the story of Chrono Cross revolves around Serge, who lives on the main island in the El Nido archipelago where the entire game takes place. He seems to be just an ordinary boy, but his life is turned upside down when he accidentally stumbles into another world where he died several years ago. Naturally, to set things right, he tries to repair the damage, aided by his friends.
And oh, the friends he has. There’s Glenn, the young knight in training (he can dual wield you know.) There’s Skelly, the skeletal clown whose bones you must find before you can recruit him. There’s Razzly, the fairy whom you save from a terrible hydra. And that’s just the tip of the iceberg. This game has a ton of unique playable characters, more than pretty much any other game that’s not in the Suikoden series. And you can’t even get them all in one playthrough. It’ll take at least one and three-quarters playthroughs to get them all, and that’s over three separate save files. That said, development isn’t a big theme for most of them. There are three main characters who get developed pretty well, and maybe another six secondary characters who get some decent development in side quests and the like. The rest are pretty much just a funny voice to go in the script. Yeah, a bunch of them have funny accents, but is that really significant? Not really, although it is fun seeing their in-character reactions to scripted events in the story.
Probably the biggest disappointment to fans of Chrono Trigger was the way techs were handled in this game. First off, there are far fewer of them. Second, those few that there are, are spread among the huge cast, so very few characters have any significant tech action at all. One contributing factor was the way magic was handled in the game. Basically, you can equip magic in slots of various levels, with higher level slots being able to equip more powerful spells. These slots recharge every time you enter a battle. A character’s unique special attacks are usually limited to one third level tech, one fifth level tech, and one seventh level tech. Since these can only be used once per battle, and using a dual or triple tech consumes all three spells, it’s rarely worth it. Anyhow, to cast spells, you store up successful hits on the enemy. The attack options are heavy, medium, and light, ranked from lowest chance to hit to highest. Light hits charge one spell level, medium two, heavy three. It sounds pretty complicated, and it is, but you’ll get the hang of it once you’ve played the game for a while.
One thing that fans of the previous game weren’t (or shouldn’t be) disappointed in is the replay value of Chrono Cross. Not only do you get multiple endings depending on when you end the game, just like in Chrono Trigger, you also receive definite power ups, like the ability to speed up or slow down the game. Not substantially game breaking, it does make the game more fun the second time around, when you can just speed through dialogue and scenes that you don’t want to see. Plus, new game plus is the only way to unlock the full cast of characters. Why you would need to do this, since most of the characters are interchangeable, is another question. So, then, the rating is “not unlimited, but good enough to keep you coming for at least two playthroughs.”
Down to the tough part. Giving this game a sum value. Now, a lot of people were disappointed because this game really didn’t have much to do with Chrono Trigger at all. There are a few references, but that’s about it. It’s really more closely akin to Magical Dreamers, which wasn’t really released stateside, so whatever. I don’t think it’s fair to consider this divergence from expectation a bad thing. Really, what you end up with is a great game, which has an interesting story, good game mechanics, and solid replay value. So, I’d have to give this one 9.0 out of 10. It’s not perfect, there’s little to break up the normal gameplay, and most characters are sparsely developed if at all, but none of these factors are major in any way.
Quick Tip: There are very few (three) characters in the game who can steal, and each of them can only do so once per battle. When you fight the fire dragon, make sure that he’s in his final form before you steal, or you’ll miss out on the great item he has.
Fun Fact: When you get to the center of the Dead Sea, the tragedienne enemies will introduce themselves to you, as if they were competing in a beauty pageant. One of them is Richard, age 29, who’s protesting sexism in beauty pageants.
If you liked this game, you might want to look into some of these other games. Suikoden and any of the games in that series, since they also have tons of playable characters in them. Tales of Symphonia or Tales of Destiny II, both of which deal with two worlds having to learn to coexist. Dark Cloud 2 also has some alternate universe time shenanigans bullshit, so that’s always a fun possibility.
No comments:
Post a Comment