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dkirschner's Chrono Trigger (PC)

[August 29, 2025 08:02:10 AM]

A classic, completed! I never had an SNES or a DS, so I never found my way to Chrono Trigger. It's one of Sasha's favorites, and a classic JRPG, so I found the Steam port and played over the past several months, most of which was concentrated in the past few weeks. I know it's 30 years old and was revolutionary at the time for the multiple endings, time travel, side character-focused side quests, detailed sprite work, and so on.

I'm playing in 2025 around the time I'm playing JRPGs like Clair Obscur and Persona 5. Chrono Trigger doesn't hold a candle to those games, but those games wouldn't be possible without decades old games like Chrono Trigger paving the way. So, my playthrough of Chrono Trigger was one of trying to appreciate something classic rather than thinking, "This is going to be a great [by today's standards] game!" Indeed, I was often frustrated or bored, going through the motions of leveling up or grinding, making liberal use of the auto battle option, and following occasional walkthroughs to speed things up.

The story and characters were less serious than I thought they would be. I was thinking that this would be more on par with FFVII, but the "silliness level" of this was a middle ground between FFVII (which could be profound) and Earthbound (which was often funny). The characters and story weren't that interesting to me. Chrono could have been a jug of milk. The 65,000,000 BC cave woman (whom I so creatively named "Wolfy" because she wore animal skins) made me laugh because of how dumb she talked, and at the end because she basically says she's ready to have a lot of sex with her boyfriend. The frog was over-dramatic. I named him Queen (I don't remember why), which became really confusing because there are actual queens in the story. Characters also often referred to the frog with his original name instead of what I selected for him.

But what was cool was the centrality of Lavos, this ever-looming threat across time. I liked that you could challenge Lavos whenever you wanted. By the time I was ready to give him a serious attempt, I was around level 50 and he annihilated me with a magic attack right off the bat. I changed my party composition and used the three characters with the highest magic defense, which worked like a charm...until he used a massive physical damage attack. Turns out characters with high magic defense often have low physical defense. I only had two characters who were fairly balanced with defense (Chrono and the frog), so I figured I should do some of the side quests that the game offered me. That would get me some more levels and probably some better gear. Turns out I had done a few of those side quests already, and I did almost all the rest. Yes, better gear and a few more levels. Now we're around level 55 and have significantly improved defense and attack, having gotten ultimate weapons for most characters.

I annihilated Lavos and saved the world. Hooray!

This is something very "classic JRPG" about Chrono Trigger. If a boss defeats you, you can just go grind away for a while, come back, and smack it to death. I did this two or three times during the game. And given that you can turn on auto battle, the grinding feels almost automated. I would just sit by Sasha, watch an episode of something, and run back and forth through whatever area auto-battling my way to higher levels. It took no thought. I think that's a larger critique of this game for me, is that I didn't have to think much. Sure, some enemies have strengths and weaknesses, and bosses often had a trick to figure out, but that was such a small percentage of battles. I'm comparing it to something like Clair Obscur where EVERY battle could go horribly wrong, where you could parry and dodge. Or something like Persona 5 where the combat system is predicated on enemy strengths and weaknesses that you need to pay attention to (plus 10 other combat mechanics).

Chrono Trigger (understandably) feels basic in 2025. It was really cool getting to experience a classic, basic as it feels today. Next time I play a game with time travel, I'll compare it to Chrono Trigger! Next time the hero's mother steps through a time portal at the end of the game (cue laugh track), I'll also think of Chrono Trigger! And the next time someone refers to Chrono Trigger, I will confidently say that yes, I have played Chrono Trigger (instead of being shamed for having no gamer cred)!