Chrono Trigger has all the ingredients of a quality RPG: a unique battle system, an interesting story, and a variety of diverse characters. What immediately stands out about it are the character designs by Dragon Ball and Dragon Quest artist, Akira Toriyama, and the winding role of time travel in exploring what the world has to offer. The charm of Chrono Trigger is its simplicity. The story isn't too hard to follow and the battle system isn't too difficult to master. You would expect such a game to be bland, but since Chrono Trigger succeeds so well in executing each of these elements, it never gets old.
Chrono Trigger is set in the standard medieval fantasy world, with some clear technological advances in machinery. Like in the Persona series, the main character is a stand-in for the player. The story is less about him that it is about how he reacts to those around him. Very early on in the game, it becomes clear that the decisions you make affect the game's later outcomes. They first start out small, for instance, if you help a girl with her kitten or try to sell a lost pendant, these acts will be brought up during a later trial of character. Though as the game goes on, the deeper an impact these choices have on the story. Your perspective on various events in plot can change depending on who you have in your party, not to mention that characters can even die depending on your choices. As such, there are several endings, which makes the game very replayable.
Chrono Trigger opens during a fair in town. Chrono runs into a mischevious girl named Marle, who is really a princess in disguise, trying to escape royal duties. You also run into your childhood friend, Lucca, an inventor who has unveiled a teleportation machine. However, something goes awry in the machine which opens a portal in time, and Marle falls in. You follow her in 400 years into the past, and meet a frog knight seeking to restore his honor. As you travel across time, many other colorful characters join you for the quest. In prehistoric times, you meet the wild woman Ayla, and the robot Robo in a post apocalyptic future. Part of the fun in playing Chrono Trigger is traveling to different times and exploring the changes in the same places.
The battle system is similar to Final Fantasy's Active Time Battle, in which your turn starts as soon as your gauge fills up. Unlike Final Fantasy, however, the monsters are usually visible throughout the dungeons or fields and can be avoided by walking past them. Like most JRPGs, each character has unique abilities that lend them to various strategies. Chrono is a fairly well-rounded character with a physical his sword attacks and lightning spells. Marle has powerful ice spells and can be an indispensable healer. Ayla is a physical berserker type who can charm rare items from enemies. I enjoyed most the battle with Magus, because it forced you to switch around the various spell attributes. It made me realize that in this game, even at a high level, you can rarely get away with spamming one powerful attack on all enemies. Other fun additions to Chrono Trigger's battle system, are the Dual and the Triple Techs. If you wait until two or three characters have their gagues filled, you can perform a massive attack on your enemies. These are particularly helpful, since many battles, especially boss fights, will have you to fight with many enemies at once, with some only vulnerable once one regenerating part is destroyed.
Aside from the gameplay, two other major highlights of Chrono Trigger are the music by Yasunori Mitsuda and the art by Akira Toriyama. The technical capabilities of the SNES system that allow these elements to shine. It's worth appreciating that even by today's advances, Mitsuda's soundtrack retains a distinct aura. I think back to the moment when you first travel to the misty period of 700 AD. The melody is first plucked out by digital strings, before being joined by other instruments, and finally, rising to cresendo. I also noticed an air of mysticism and the exotic in the tracks, "The Corridors Of Time" and "The Secret Of The Forest." Being familiar mostly with Toriyama's art in the Dragon Ball series, I gained a newfound appreciation for his ability to bring life to the medieval, the prehistoric, and futuristic. We can appreciate in Chrono Trigger the youthful character he brings to the designs, especially the dinosaurs, that would be lost in an earlier system.
One can't help but feel that like Final Fantasy VI, another JRPG for the SNES, Chrono Trigger is tribute, but not to any particular series. It is a tribute to the JRPG genre, and a fond farewell to 2D. Alongside, Toriyama, already a veteran of Dragon Quest, Chrono Trigger is the brainchild of Dragon Quest creator Yuji Horii and Final Fantasy creator Hironobu Sakaguchi. The both of them bringing their unique experiences to this work, creating a game that carries shades of both franchises, but retains its own originality.
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