Right now I’m going to divide the lot of you into two camps, those who love Chrono Trigger, and the rest of you who were squealing in diapers when the Super Nintendo was the law of the land. There really is no third party, here. Chrono Trigger was the Final Fantasy VII of the 16-bit era, only better. In all ways. Ever.
I bring this up because a few days ago Square Enix ported Chrono Trigger to the Nintendo DS and it kicks untold amounts of ass.
Sadly, some of you out there aren’t familiar with Chrono Trigger, in much the same way that you aren’t familiar with having a driver’s license. Fair enough, time does move on, after all, and we can’t all have been born in the days of glory. Chrono Trigger is an RPG where you wander around a vast overland map that turns into a battle screen when your party bumps into a wandering monster. Only the fight takes place in the area you were running through before being ambushed, with your party taking up positions to get their ass-kicking on. The key deal is that you can travel through time, and your actions in one era will come echoing back to affect things up the timeline. Not only can you change the past, but the future as well, which comes in very handy for many things.
Because of all this time-wonkery, the game offers some thirteen different endings, with the new DS version tacking on another. The various characters in your party will also open up sidequests that allow you to explore the history, personality, and, er, character of the characters. In summary, Chrono Trigger is huge, and you could replay it until your teeth fall out and your grandkids put you in a home.
The new DS release takes advantage of the hardware by adding in new cutscenes, new content, that extra ending in case a mere thirteen aren’t enough, and a two-player wireless mode. There’s also a new translation on the script which adheres more closely to the original Japanese, which is both a curse and a blessing. Oh yeah, and there’s also a Pokemonesque battle arena in there, too.
So far, reception of the new Chrono Trigger has been mixed, in the sense that those I asked either ignored me entirely while playing or tried to club me in the teeth with their DS before going back to playing. The rare few who were waiting to play between charging cycles used phrases like “timeless classic” and “…perfect” and “God made this port.”
Here’s the intro cinematic for Chrono Trigger DS, and if the art style looks familiar, that’s because Akira Toriyama of Dragon Ball fame did the character designs. Enjoy.
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