Retro game review: Chrono Trigger

If I'm honest I'm not a big fan of retro games since they amuse me and call my attention more to the current ones, however I remembered that a long time ago I tried one of the best I've seen of retro role-playing video games and it is called Chrono Trigger. This being a role-playing game developed by Square for the Super Nintendo, PlayStation, Nintendo DS, Virtual Console, i-mode, iOS, Android and Steam platforms. Its publication was on March 11, 1995 by the same company that was in charge of its development; that is, Square. The plot of the game tells us how the main character and protagonist is Crono who happens to be a very charismatic character who will undertake an adventure through the kingdom of Gardia. In this kingdom was celebrating the millennium fair and it is there where our character Crono meets Marle where the latter volunteers to do a test that does not go well because she had an artifact that makes her travel in time, specifically 400 years ago in the past and that is where Crono begins an adventure in search of Marle accompanied by her inseparable friend Lucca, from the remote past to the most uncertain future, passing through the very end of time. Our three main characters that I already mentioned in this journey will meet different characters from various eras, where many have good intentions and others not so much. In short, this game has a story that tends to be very captivating, in addition to showing off the character of its different characters on screen with memorable moments and optional plots that you can play with pleasure.

Square Co., Ltd. or simply Square, known internationally as Squaresoft, was a Japanese video game company founded in September 1986 by Masafumi Miyamoto as part of a software development firm, called Denyuusha. In 2003 it merged with Enix, thus giving rise to Square Enix.
Source

Source

Beginning as always to develop the gameplay Chrono Trigger I can mention that it has a standard game mode that would be the story mode, where the player begins to control the main character as it is Crono and his companions, where they move through different scenarios either forests, cities and dungeons. These characters have certain skills with which they can defend or attack, these can be physical or magical, besides it has some features such as levels of attacks and life (hp), that when the latter runs out our character faints. It is important to mention that the player can only control three characters per battle. The battles are usually very easy to do because the character always stays attacking and when he is in danger he starts to use magic attacks. What you can criticize the gameplay of this game is the lack of strategy to be a role-playing video game, the game in this aspect has so little depth that not even added a defense command which gives us an idea of how easy it is to be the battles in this game, but it does not take away the fun that this retro game could and can continue to provide.

Source

The difficulty of this game is low, only the final battle is where we notice something of a high level and that complicates us a little more. As for the resources with which our characters count as weapons and armor I can tell you that there is little variety, where the main character Crono is the only one who can use the sword and when you find one this is higher level than the previous one and the other characters use a specific weapon or skill. Now the level of each of the characters will go up as we go through the missions and battles, where those who make up our teams will increase faster with respect to the others who will gain less experience, something that is quite accurate at least from my point since not if we use a character because it should level up with respect to our team. As for the length of the game itself that is short compared to standard SNES RPGs, but it is always important to remind you that this is a pretty retro game, from the 90s.

The characters of this game turn out to be quite nice and contribute a lot to the story of the game, so I can say that they are well developed. Among the characters of Chrono Trigger we have Crono, Marle and Lucca, who are the main characters, besides Frog, Robo, Ayla Magus, Alfador, Zala, Amanita, Balthazar, Chancellor, Commander Cyrus, Dalton, Flea, Cat, Cat, Guardian, Heckran, Kilwala, Kino, Lara, Mother of Crono, Kitchen Master, Ozzie, Ozzie VIII, R-Series, Queen Leene, Queen Zeal, King Guard XXI, Sarah, Slash, Taban, Dragon Tank, Tata, Toma, among others. Among the scenarios we have three houses, one is always the store, another is the inn and the remaining one, as well as other locations such as streets, forests, among other things. I think the game is really good as far as the characters and the locations or scenarios where the missions take place are concerned.

Source

At a visual level and considering that the game is from 1995 I think it's okay, it's not so outstanding but it has its things that are pretty good. Considering that the game is retro, specifically from 1995, a time when the PS1 and N64 generation of consoles was already emerging, it was necessary to exploit the predecessor consoles to the maximum, but Chrono Trigger went over the line because it exploited to the maximum all that the Super Nintendo could do. The scenarios look pretty good with a high level as well as the characters, they are quite colorful and no less is expected since the creation of these characters was in charge of Akira Toriyama, the creator of dragonball. The coloring and animations are shown at 16 bits which was a good thing for the time. The visual effects is something that I think lacked something to stand out a little more, especially during the battles. What is the fluidity of the game is correct with nothing to complain about as it works in a very fluid way and more if we play it in these times. I think that visually it is a game worth playing.

Source

The sound is one of the best things we are going to find in this game, it is almost perfect. The soundtrack is a marvel, so much so that it is considered one of the best of all time in terms of games. The same was commissioned by Yasonuri Mitsuda, but with the collaboration of the majestic Nobuo Uematsu, where both did a great job, some quite entertaining and catchy musical themes, with a good variety and very consistent with the type of game. The voices of the characters in the dialogues are heard very well, besides also having translation texts. The sound effects are also quite outstanding, both those that occur in battles and the environmental ones. The truth is that the sound of this game is unforgettable where it gives us freneticism, action, sadness, fear, claustrophobia, happiness and much more, all this in one thing, in the sound of Chrono Trigge.

In conclusion, Chrono Trigger is an excellent retro video game that we should all play at some point because it gives us a balance between exploration, battles and dialogues, as far as the gameplay is concerned, beyond being a fairly simple game with a difficulty level that is not so high but this game focuses more on fun and entertaining players. It has a story and an adventure that we will never get out of our minds with excellent characters, very charismatic and well created by the person in charge of it, both artistically and in its story itself, which represents its role in the game. The graphics is the weakest part of the game but nevertheless a good job was done and more for the time in which the game came out. The most interesting part is the sound and that is due to its great soundtrack, the best of all time, at least from my tastes and so was cataloged by many players, In short Chrono Trigger is one of the most important RPG video games in history, with turn-based battle. For everything described above is that I give a 9.5 to the gameplay, a 9 to the graphics and a 10 to the sound.

Source

For all the above, I give a 9.5 out of 10 to Chrono Trigger.It is always important to remember that my reviews and ratings are from the point of view of a normal user or gamer and not a professional videogame critic.