Chrono Cross is one of the greatest video game experiences that I have ever had. This was back in Square's prime, when they dropped a fucklear bomb of legendary RPG's all within a couple years of each other. To me, Chrono Cross stood atop that mountain, and I still consider it the under-appreciated game of it's time. It's got an enormous story, a bajillion playable characters, gay French swordsmen, dwarves in tanks, skeleton clowns, a completely unique fighting system and two of the hardest boss fights ever programmed. It's also got a barn full of velociraptors that you have to feed corn too.
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| The toughest boss in the game is......this guy |
The game begins with cliche no-talkie-protagonist Serge falling into a parallel dimension where he died ten years prior. He treks across the continent, gathering friends in an attempt to set things right, get home, and stop this dude named Lynx from getting ahold of the Frozen Flame and fucking everything the shit up. It gets progressively crazier, and at every turn along the way is another teammate to recruit. Since there are so many, you end up doing everything from raising a dragon to stealing art just to get a new face in the party. The game's strength is really it's cast, and bringing those zany characters into your fights. I beat a giant ancient green dragon with a sentient voodoo doll, a bipedal cat swordsman and a martian named Sparky.
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| Materialistic bitch. |
There was a predecessor to Cross, Chrono Trigger, and I can't stand it. The reason that Cross is so much better is the attention to story. Chrono Cross's battle system is different than Trigger's, every move is a serious decision, the fights are much more tense, and the 70% critical hits are always a scary high risk high reward gamble. Square made it challenging, but in a rewarding way, not just straight-up train-raping you into level grinding for hours on end.
So when you think back to all those great late 90's Square rpg's, mention Chrono Cross alongside Legend of Dragoon, Secret of Mana, FF7, and Parasite Eve. It deserves the recognition.
You seriously prefer 100 collectible, meaningless, undeveloped characters over a core squad of 7 characters with deep emotional cores and actual character development integral to the story, a story which actually makes sense? Your hatred of Chrono Trigger upsets me greatly, though now I understand a little more your love of Pokemon.
ReplyDeleteYou know, I have never made that connection before. Suikoden 3, Digimon, Chrono Cross, Pokemon, and here I was thinking that I hated Chrono Trigger because of it's inferior writing, and it turns out, that its a couple hundred characters short.
DeleteTime to get petty: you wrote it's when you meant its, and its when you meant it's. Chrono Trigger wins. Internet victory.
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