ILG Player's Club plays Chrono Trigger

http://goodmorningcrono.com/

Rules are simple: you just need to start playing the game now. System is unimportant. Folks what have played it before (or just the curious) are welcome to join in the discussion.

I'm tackling this on my DS. This marks my second attempt at playing this game; I was something less than blown away by the first thirty minutes and my attention wandered. I'll do my best to have a serious go at it now. CT came out in a period when I signed off games very briefly, so I missed it in its original run.

First things first: who's in, what system are you using and have you played the game before?

I'll do it. I'm using an emulator. I'm worried I'll just fall really behind everyone else, though. But I'll try.

Oh, and I've played the game before, but it was several years ago, and after about 6-7 hours I lost interest. Still, I've been meaning to give it a go again.

Oh, I'm likely gonna be slow as shit at this cause I'm also reading this big ass 750 page novel (Humes' The Underground City) and doing a zillion other things at the same time so I'd be very surprised if I get ahead of you.

That's great! Actually, I'm thinking of getting it on DS, because starting tomorrow I have a 20-30 minute train ride every morning and evening to work. I could get in an easy 5 hours a week on the train alone, and then add in a few more at home and keep up.

i'm waiting until i find out if i'm employed again next week to decide whether to get the DS version or not : /

i have played this before tho - it's about a guy, with hair

...and it starts at a fair. I've actually started and stopped CT several times, usually without progressing beyond the fair. I'm really dreading playing through that fucking fair again.

I have this on my R4 cart. Thinking about playing it. Probably would have gotten a lot out of it had I played it during my formative years. Don't know if I would join you guys though - I would probably use a walkthrough/FAQ for the same reason that I'd use a skill tree guide for Diablo II; can't stand the fact of playing through a RPG and not getting every super item and best character ever.

Yep, the fair is about as far as I got too. I just convinced my girlfriend to play this on her DS at the same time (for as long as it holds her attention) so we're about to go downstairs and put in a half an hour on dual ds chrono action.
god we're nerds

The Fair? Seriously? Isn't that under 15 minutes?

I'll begin this tonight on DS. I'm so pumped b/c I've heard so much about it and it has been a long time since I played an old-school RPG (as you've heard me whine on other threads). I know nothing about this game except that it's an old-school and RPG, and caek's comment on the end-of-year thread that it in some way resembles the film I Heart Huckabees (about which I know nothing either, but I was intrigued). I don't really play RPGs for completeness or stats maxing, I play for grinding (let's be honest) toward leveling (what I do with the level isn't as important as the dopamine rush of leveling), and stories (RPGs are as close as I typically get to fiction).

idk if i'm on board for this - i havent played it in a decade+, but i've also beaten it at least 17-20 times (probably almost as many times as that crazy guy who was really demonstrative about wanting us to know he was playing it in japanese), but mb it's worth a stroll down mammary lane~~

i'm also really absorbed in kotor rn and dont wanna stop to play something else

also if ure doing it i think u still need to structure the discussion a lil bit, ie. have proper stopping points for everyone to talk about and shit

there's also always the danger that it might not live up to your memory... i have a limited number of good memories from my childhood and like to keep them sorta sacred, so I'd understand if you're not in.

Couldn't get past the fair again last night... keep trying to get enough silver points to win all the prizes in the tent and get hung up trying to fight the robot or jump on the lever+bell...

canks are you playing kotor 1 for the first time? on pc?

on xbox, and ya first thyme

(it's amazing btw)

iirc a couple of those fair games are rigged btw

cankles did u give up on beating xcom @ higher difficulty?

ive spent a lot of time w/ the game already & am pretty devoted to blazblue right now but id be into talking about ct tho - still have my snes copy around

KOTOR was maybe the last PC game I really got into; it's probably my fave Star Wars game of all time.

hah, no, i beat xcom @ higher difficulty - wasnt that difficult imo http://i43.tinypic.com/dggkra.jpg

yeah it's definitely the best SW game i've played - what's funny is i can see all the parallels to baldur's gate, but the qualities i found annoying in that game i have no problem with in this one. i think i have to face facts that the sword and sorcery trappings really just drag a game down for me

oh man, if i had time i would do this...as it is i have approx 2 hours/week for video games and i'm trying to play far cry 2 and point lookout. it would be a good excuse to get that DS reissue.

i played CT for the first time right after i graduated college, in the couple weeks before i got a job, on my roommate's SNES. i don't remember doing anything with my days but going for runs and playing CT. fond memories.

kotor >>>>> baldur's gate in pretty much every aspect imo

plus, just.... runnin around doin thangs is more fun than point and click shit

lol subtle suggestion that ilg should replay secret of mana instead?

if we could actually get some kind of emu netplay going that would be AMAZING

probably won't happen, though

also lamp, you are totally otm about KOTOR vs. Baldur's Gate. It is also true about pretty much any other Black Isle-related RPG that came out during that era

lmao honestly i would be a lot more interested in replaying SoM! mostly because it's been a loooot longer since i've played it

"i don't remember doing anything with my days but going for runs and playing CT."
This is my goal for August!

started this tonight and I've def. got the bug already; leveled a bunch just playing normally, w/o grinding; beat Yakra, so that's where I'm at. Nice story too, with the Back to the Future-like time travel, "oh no she's being erased" thing. I screwed around in the fair a bit, beat the bell a bunch but then failed at the horror house game; whatever. I stupidly saved $ at the fair when I could have used better armor later on; now I've got like 3000 gold but since I finished the "find the queen" thing I should be able to find a store next. But yeah, I have to work tomorrow and then it's right back to this one. Fabulous.

canks you have beaten ct "17-20 times"?? is that that many playthroughs or 13 endings plus like four other playthroughs? either way i think you have qualified to moderate this discussion by picking the first set of stopping points for discussion ¬_¬

i am still playing dragon quest viii* and i am not sure i can cope with two lots of characters with horrible toriyama fetal alcohol syndrome-head thing going on, i might have to catch up later. for those of u who have played the game previously and wish to follow along there is a worryingly thorough let's play; that's, sadly, the least packed with terrible humour. (haha someone compared ILG to the somethingawful forums on ILE the other day, what in the hell)

*cough and er fallout 3 and odin sphere. lol funemployment

all the endings plus a few extra playthroughs, yeah - all of this was by, like, age 13 mind u

lol u read LP now?

it is a clever resource to stop me actually going back and playing any of the games in question

first stopping point is probably after everyone beats the cathedral in 600 AD?

looool thomp what do u think of odin sphere? im a HUGE stan for that game.

yeah it's definitely the best SW game i've played - what's funny is i can see all the parallels to baldur's gate, but the qualities i found annoying in that game i have no problem with in this one. i think i have to face facts that the sword and sorcery trappings really just drag a game down for me

― born s1ocki (cankles), Monday, July 20, 2009 4:11 PM (1 hour ago) Bookmark

Ohhh man better than TIE Fighter? I will have to pick it up

lamp i thought after the cathedral was where euler just got to? my memory of the game may be wonky.

odin sphere haha ER i can't decide if i hate it or not:

on some other thread someone said of it 'anime ruins everything' — totally get that — otoh, having just finished the first book, the demands on player/reader empathy have gone so far past the reasonable as to be almost interestingly alienating. i doubt that was what they were shooting for, though. aaaaaaaaand i would probably be less annoyed when the gameplay slips up (which it does) if i didn't have to watch these little wideyed idiots talk for hours alla time

the combat, every so often, seems to turn into "stay BEHIND the enemy. BEHIND" a lot. which is annoying. i wish it didn't pause when you looked at items - that stops it from ascending into proper action game zen "don't think, feel" business. and there's some annoying cheapnesses or just stuff that hasn't been playtested enough to quite be right - there was one boss that doing a combo on from the left hand side you'd pass through, but from the right hand side you wouldn't - which w/ the 'stay BEHIND' thing became really quite annoying for obv reasons

never played TIE fighter - i guess the best previous SW game i've played is jedi outcast, which isnt saying much

Tie Fighter is great; KOTOR is about two steps ahead.

Aw man you guys have me looking at prices for KOTOR. Any idea if the Mac version is good or should I just play it safe and go for the PC one?

never got past the first planet in kotor, didn't like the combat and dialogue trees gave me option paralysis.

i am basically never playing anything with a name like 'knights of the old republic'

unless it is eg. a counterfactual about oliver cromwell

odin sphere.

shh.

lamp i thought after the cathedral was where euler just got to? my memory of the game may be wonky.

yah sounds like it - but its the 1st major milestone i think? QUEST #1 COMPLETED and all that

item mgmt and use was probably the worst thing in odin sphere but i didnt really care about the tactical breakdown stuff i guess - i mean i see what your saying but theres enuff variety/challenge in the boss fights that it never bothered me is the boss fite your talking about velvet because i dont remember that tbh...

lol @ caring about the story in odin sphere tho who cares it looks pretty

lolz my ?!r@+3D copy of this hit a snag at the very first teleport and now I'm having to start over again at the FUCKING FAIR

lol

if only i could find a youtube link to a certain Big Star song, but i can't

Ha forks, exactly the same thing has happened to me, went into a teleport and the game hung. And I must've sat watching the screen swirl around for about 4 minutes before I realised it was broke.

I hadn't spent long in the fair though, just bought some armours then ploughed on through. Will try it again on the train to work this morning.

I beat the cathedral; not sure it said anything like quest #1 completed, though. Toad (well, I called him Turd) walked out of the castle in shame for failing to protect the queen, and I guess I'll be going to get him back next since he was a badass in combat.

The balance between melee and magic is nice even at this early stage. Lucca isn't great with the airgun but her magic is booming. Often in RPGs I end up sitting on magic on much later in the game, when it becomes pretty much the only thing I use in combat.

I just played Chrono Trigger for over an hour

Okay, the problem with the .nds file is an acknowledged bit of copy protection and fixing it is gonna take some google-fu, time and experimentation. Anybody old hand enough at this to explain how you work patches?

you could just emulate the snes version, you know

Yep, I've just been looking into this too.

http://gbatemp.net/index.php?download=3786

Haven't tried it yet, but I guess you unzip this, plonk your Chrono rom file in the same directory, run the batch then grab and rename the resulting "p4tc3ed.nds" file. I'll have a go in a bit and report back.

And yeah, if it doesn't work I'll switch to snesemu.

lol @ caring about the story in odin sphere tho who cares it looks pretty

haha yeah the cover copy is great/awful in how it recognises these priorities:

"Welcome to the lavishly illustrated world of Odin Sphere©!

Lands of snow, emerald forests, and chasms of fire beckon you. Follow the threads of an intricately woven story (blah blah) ... the kind of visual experience that every gamer dreams possible, but seldom plays."

xp

Oh, wait, that's a jp patch. US patch here:

http://www.mediafire.com/?nz5hyxmzxmm

(Although I think my copy is euro, grr).

i will be fucking with that shortly but BEE CAAAAAREFUL
Before trying any p@tch3s or hacked r0mzz, i recommend backing up your entire card, by browsing to your cards drive, Ctrl + A or select all, and copying to a temp folder, if all is clear and everything works, then delete the folder.

Yeah, I actually do that pretty much every time I plug it into my pc anyway, just so I know my save games are safe.

This game is fabulous. I don't know if we're, on this thread, supposed to pace things so that we can talk along, but I'm into this now and playing hard (for the 1.5 hrs a day I can get right now). And since this is my first time, I'm sure I can have wild-eyed talk if I do end up ahead.

I spent some time confused at first tonight, after I'd rescued the queen, as to what to do next. Toad/Turd had jumped across the bridge. But then I went to the right places eventually in my wanders and triggered the next events. I ended up back in the present, where I was framed for some bullshit. I busted out of jail, caught up with my babes again, and then as we were cornered by the chancellor and his guards, jumped into another gate. Now I'm way in the future, in a Fallout-like world of mutants and starvation. I helped the starving people find a seed, got some kickass armor and weapons, and located my next gate on the supercomputer. I'll up there again tomorrow.

I am loving the linearity of this, after playing non-linear RPGs for years (eh, mostly Oblivion, which took me a year lol). And I am leveling fast and getting new techs. This is really, really great.

Anybody happen to make the patch work?

No, but I found a pre-patched file. Email me.

Pretty sure you can search for a patched version on any major torrent site. That's how I got GTA: CW to work.

Emailed! Would love to start playing tonight, nudge nudge.

i swear I have played through the fair about six times in the past few days.

Ha forks, exactly the same thing has happened to me, went into a teleport and the game hung.

u guys should try going into the other teleporter imo

I did! It's on now.

http://www.offworld.com/assets_c/2009/07/stephtrigger-thumb-620x620-23775.jpg

I have trolled thru that fair a bunch of fucking times, got a bit further than that into it. Maybe got to a future bit once if it's this game I'm thinking of. Still don't get the fanatical devotion this thing inspires. Anyway I'm obtaining a patched nds and maybe I'll join in with this for a bit.

I made it through the future last night, got the robot guy and then ended up at the End of Time, where I learned magic, in addition to techs. I like the dual tiered spell system conceptually, though in terms of game play I guess it doesn't matter much since both draw off the same pool of "magic points".

I gotta admit that the future part dragged a little, b/c the colors were so drab in the domes and in the factory. It was hard to tell where I was going. The enemies weren't very compelling, robots and acid slimes and bugs. There was one difficult battle, the one with five or six of the most powerful robots.

But on the whole I'm still really enjoying this. I think the future part maybe obscured the main plot of the game...actually, I'm not sure I know what the main plot of the game is, yet...something about playing around with time. So I guess it's still early to evaluate the game's story.

That courtroom scene was fantastic, I loved the way they kept using flashbacks from my actual game to disprove the claims I was making. Proper "DOH!" moments.

I'm a bit stuck in the future now, one dungeon appears to be a dead end and the other has a kind of future car in it which doesn't do anything except trigger baddies. I was playing while very tired last night though, and kept dozing off, so I probably missed something obvious.

Not sure I like my core team that much, Chrono is becoming a bit of a tank while the two girls just seem to be fairly ineffective range fighters with weak magics. Liked the frog, hope he comes back.

What do people think of the battle system? I don't really feel like I've got a grip on it yet, tend to find I'm missing stuff happening on the top screen while I'm choosing options on the bottom screen. Also, I've got it set to "wait" mode but it still mostly carries on with or without my input. It's a weird mixture of turn based and real time, and I'm generally finding it a bit confusing.

Totally agree on the "wait" thing: I'd set it up that way, but if I wait, the enemy seems to attack anyway. I'm getting better at aligning combos which are great when you're taking on five or six enemies, or need a mass heal (as I did repeatedly in the harder battles).

Courtroom scene was boss: is it possible to avoid eating the old man's lunch initially?

The girls get a lot better as they level and pick up eq, which I guess is obvious. But really it's the eq; with some decent armor and better weapons, which are just around the corner for you Jim, they're really nice. I now have four people to choose from, but the new character seems like just another tank so I kept the girls instead; Marle is a healer, and despite the profusion of healing potions, my RPG tendency is to hoard healers and avoid potions as much as I can (b/c you don't know when you'll need a potion but have run out, whereas with a healer you usually can go a lot longer). I suspect not everyone plays this way, and I can't really rationally defend it better than I just did.

oh yeah, I kept Lucca b/c she's a very nice blaster already, and I figure will get better yet. The robot (I called him Squack) is more a blaster tank, which I like as my main character but not as a second character; I tend to prefer to keep my characters pure, division of labor and all that.

lol @ me remembering this but for marle and lucca their dmg output is calculated so that it grows exponentially - theyre pretty crap @ the beginning but they own in the l8 game. the others growth rates are more balanced. also i think the two girls use a different, non-STR stat for the calculation which also starts low

the robot is probably the best non-chrono character iirc - dope all around fighter w/some healing some array and a decent elemental spread. and his techs are pretty cheap and his double/triple techs are all pretty good - so he works well with any party

Do characters waiting at The End of Time level when your main team levels?

i dont think so - u need to level a pair or a trio together to unlock their techs anyway but im not sure tbh

Courtroom scene was boss: is it possible to avoid eating the old man's lunch initially?

yah - SPOILER - depending on how u behaved @ the fair u can be found innocent. u cant eat the oldster's food and theres some other stuff - i think u have to find a lost cat? basically if u act like a real bro then the court will find u innocent but if u were a jerk then ~heads roll~ its basically the same u still end up in jail and have to break out but i think u get some extra items if u were innocent

- MORE SPOILERS -

oh also fwiw the courtroom scene and the jail break were total revelations to me as a little kid ~ i rented this game one wknd and played through to the future but never got to rent it again. i finally bought it and remembered the trial so i changed my pattern & also waited to be let out ~ tht it was so rad that the game had these divergent paths

I was found innocent (yeah, I saved the cat) but still ended up in jail and sentenced to death by the cockface chancellor. So I figure the chancellor has a key role to play in the main story, usurper of power or something like that.

Well, the medieval baddie was disguised as their chancellor, wasn't he? So I'm guessing this is still the same monster in disguise, or something.

That's right! It could be a coincidence, but with so little to go on right now, that's a reasonable posit.

im playing this in "new game +" mode with lvl 50+ characters & all the items from the previous walkthrough. i managed to get all jury members to side with me during the trial for the first time, which didnt change a thing, gameplay-wise.

also the outdoor tune in the zeal kingdom, which is where im at now, is v pretty, possibly my favourite square games tune ever.

I've played this a bit further. I've found the blade and hilt of the broken Masamune, and after a trip back to 100000000 BC or whatever, found the dreamstone evidently needed to refuse the sword. The parts with Ayla were pretty confusing---she seems to have the hots for Chrono, but does she also have the hots for Marle? The dialogue was confusing, as were the flashings of eyes at the wild dance party. One thing I don't like about old school RPGs is they don't all keep track of past dialogues for you, so if you missed a detail about what to do next, you can be totally adrift. Hopefully the guy at the End of Time can help you get back on track if you lose it? I've avoided walkthroughs so far and hope to continue to do so, but not if I end up spending an hour wandering trying to figure out how to trigger the next plot event. That's especially important in a game like this that does such a great job of making grinding unnecessary.

the music in this owns

^absolutely, one of the best soundtracks

btw that reminds me, for the guy who was like "Still don't get the fanatical devotion this thing inspires" earlier, i think u can pretty much sum it up w/"production values" - there's nothing mind-blowing about the game, i could tell it was treading well worn territory even when i was 10 years old, but it's just incredibly well executed on every level; art direction, design, music, writing, presentation, basically everything is polished to a sheen. plus it's got an abundance of ~*~*hEaRt & sOuL*~*~

cankles is right about "production values" - this is maybe kinda sorta the first 32-bit RPG, apart from, you know, not being 32-bit

i have not been able to download this because my broadband stopped working. hrmph

Yes on production values; and while I'm happy to play more RPGs like this after I finish it, I wonder when the next big leap in RPG construction will be. Oblivion sure wasn't it, with a basically linear quest that revolved around your character. I'd like to play an RPG where my character is just another character in a vast drama, where my decisions won't ultimately determine much about the fate of the kingdom/nation/planet/galaxy/whatever. I want there to be big events that happen independently of my character, and that I can take part in to a limited, human-scale extent, without being a leader or whatever. Like let me be a foot soldier in a massive army campaign, but make it an RPG: you could even work in character progression/leveling somehow if you were wedded to that. If I could get some venture capital I'd put together a team and try to build one of these, though my friends in the industry say the money's really only in MMORPGs nowadays.

holy shit he cut a mountain in half

I dunno, this isn't really capturing my imagination yet? I have barely started but it feels real static. I will soldier on.

i beat kotor yesterday, so today i dusted off my snes (had to whip out the compressed air actually~ ::adjusts glasses::) so i could join u guys and found that i no longer have an ac adapter for that shit. and nintendo stopped selling replacement shit for the nes/snes like literally last year ;____;

also its probably not captureing ure imagination because ures is the imagination of a jaded 40 year old or w/e

nm, found the adapter!!!!! time to son some fools

[10:27] me: what should i name crono
[10:27] me: i'm thinkin BALLZ
[10:27] jumaan: wake up NIGGER its the day of the millenial fair
[10:28] me: lol, i wish
[10:28] me: five char limit tho ;_;

i went with Nelly

i'm doing new game+ so i can school u lil nublets

crono is level ★★ with ★★ power, ★★ speed, ★★ mag, ★★ stam, ★★ m def, rainbow armor and rainbow weaponz, 254 attack 224 def

~_~

damn i could really use a new controller, my down button and start button have to be pressed super hard to work :[

i love that you bothered to find the character for the star

i futzed around in the fair for a while and then said fuckit and started a new game of KOTOR :/

mmmmm hmmmmm!

beat Magus tonight; combat wasn't too tough in the Fiendlord Keep b/c I've figured out the rhythm for healing. But the story is great, with a Back-To-The-Future moment (spoiler for the few of us who haven't memorized this game) where Marle is now my babe in the present. Now if only I can get Ayla to be my backstreet girl...

Still playing this, just got out of jail free.
Everybody still going?

hell yes I'm still going; got the Wings of Time tonight after some good luck in renegotiating the future world (I had a flash-back-forward-whatever-I-can't-tell-what-direction-time-is-going-anymore showing me a dome with a magic door I could open, and the first dome I tried was right). After a little joyriding I went back to antiquity and the Mountain of Woe where I got my ass handed to me; so saved there and will try again tonight.

Am I the only one playing this? Eh, it's still very fun. The latest fights have been pretty tough: those Golem sisters were brutal. Without getting into massive spoilers, I'm enjoying how I'm forced to shuffle my party around, because my instinct would be to bunker down with the same characters regardless of their suitability. Once you have the Wings of Time there's a fair bit of non-linearity in the game should you want it, but for the most part I'm just following the main plot and going to the prescribed next era after each cataclysm.

I've just gone into the future. The linearity you're digging on upthread feels like rails to me. Dunno, I promised myself I'd finish this, but it honestly just feels like work. Having not played this before, there's no nostalgia buzz.

i didnt see the goonies when i was a kid, and now i probably never will because i'm an adult (technically), so between that and the lack of nostalgia there's just probably not much i would get out of it. u kno wut im gettin at?

told u we shoulda done secret of mana btw~

yeah, that's kinda what I'm feeling here.
Let's soldier through with it for another few days and then do psychonauts? unless there's more to discuss on this one?

Also: you're not missing that much with the goonies. Except the video game. Which was dope! but not now. only if you played it then.

Yeah, I have no nostalgia for this, or really for any RPG like this; the only RPG I've played like this for like 20 years is Golden Sun 2 (oh, and I mudded like hell in college). I've never played an FPS except in teeny doses, so the combat in this is no prob. for me. The plot is convoluted but interesting. Gameplay is straightforward, I guess: hack and blast and heal, but without the tedious need to wait while regenning like in Oblivion. So this is hitting a fun spot for me, but I'm 16 hours in and I would guess close to winning, maybe a night or two away.

This compares badly to a Zelda game? I'd like to play a Zelda if they're that good; I've not played once since 2, I think.

told u we shoulda done secret of mana btw~

lol a friend and i have started replaying som

euler where are u @ ~~~ game is longer than u think cuz if u just beat magus, tortured soul, u still have some hourz left esp if u want to hit the big sidequests (rec'd) and get u characters 2 cankles lvl double stars

I'm looking for the doll to resurrect Chrono.

i think this is the best time in the game to finish most of the sidequests (sun stone, frog ghost) ~~~ v. much worth it imo

kickass, will start in a few mins

fucking skeleton motherfucker in the sunken desert, cannot beat

haha

good progress euler!

i've not played anything other than peggle for the past week. i woke up and didn't want to play videogames anymore. i don't know why peggle is an exception. it seems weird to me too.

beat that skeleton finally; it helped when I just went for the head, as probably is obvious to fps fans

popping through the sidequests, spent way too long getting the damn "L-A-R-A" thing to work but I couldn't stand the idea of not healing Lucca's mom so I did it like 15 times. Which was a bad idea because I meant I heard that awful scream when she got her legs cut off like 15 times.

oh duuuuude i empathize w/u so hard on that - saving lucca's mom was such a big deal 2 me, and her scream WAS HORRIBLE

I'm way behind everyone now, because the boy has chosen this week to fall in love with Mariokart...which means that every time I pick up my DS, the battery is flat.

MKDS is the best

xposts ;_; i remember

i think i FAQ'd the lara puzzle - it wasn't very obvious on emulators, bcz lol l and r buttons who uses those

am i right in thinking there's almost no in-game benefit for saving her? i mean, other than her being saved - there's no secret tech you learn or anything?

yeah I think it doesn't matter qua bonuses, but the promise of fixing a past horror was too seductive for me to pass up...although after screwing it up for 20 minutes or so, I briefly considered...

still doing sidequests...got the upgrade Masamune now so Toad is kicking ass...it's tough to decide who to use now b/c they're all totally awesome now

am i right in thinking there's almost no in-game benefit for saving her? i mean, other than her being saved - there's no secret tech you learn or anything?

only the secret tech called having a soul ~~~ also i think u get the life 3 relic or w/e

masamune sidequest was def my fave altho the sun stone one is pretty dope too. have u been getting the rocks (gold rock, black rock &C) those are the items that give u the "hidden" triple techs

I got one of the stones (gold, I think); there are still some places I haven't been so I figure I'll find some more of them. But I just got Rainbow and so I'm aching to get Chrono back...and then prob. play this mf again with my badass powers.

i'm playin this now - it turns out that i am basically that crazy guy who was screaming about playing it in japanese, because i haven't played this in at least a decade and yet i still remember every single beat and detail of this motherfucker. opting to play newgame+ was probably a bad idea too, because it just makes an already-easy game kinda boring.

figuring out the hidden triple techs was one of my fav things back in the day, back before walkthroughs it just seemed like such a cool little thing and idk man~

hey Euler, you got the "secret" character, right?

only the secret tech called having a soul

it's been so hard not to spoil that for euler

i'm playin thru the factory rn, and can i just say that this game owns as hard as ever?

there are parts of it that still give me, like... ~*emotions*~

http://ebooks-imgs.connect.com/product/400/000/000/000/000/052/558/400000000000000052558_s4.jpg

the part where robo gets gangraped by his old buddies.... d-damn

this game is so evocative, moreso than most modern stuff i've played... the time traveling noises, the fukkin end of time, everything.... dang

imo the key to this game is that it's just paced insanely well... no grinding... every jprg is manbaby central but chrono trig doesn't waste your thyme, no spreadsheets necessary, its not gayass bullshit

also giving you the option to literally walk around fights = awesome (what a fukkin concept)

fukkin spekkio

scott spekkio

ade r u going to finish this within 24 hours now

probably

oooh man i just remembered the whole sun stone sidequest for some reason i remember that despite it being such a huge fukken pain to safeguard for lo those many millennia it was one of the moments that it really it u that u were ~time travelers~ watching things grow and die from the techno comfort of your time ship ~deeeep~

cankz ~ yah its funny 2 compare this to FF6 which had so much pointless grinding to get magic or just wandering the fukken veldt to get those rages for the NOBLE SVGE in your party. when i was kid i tht the story in chrono trig wasnt as EPIC and the characters not as romantic and real but replaying ct as an adult ~~~ much more satisfactory

ff6 did seem much more 'adult' to me when i was a kid, but it was also harder and kinda dark and ugly (fukk amano) so i preferred the pathos of CT

the mode-7 opening credits of ff6 are kind of the apex of square's achievements tho

huge parts of the ff6 story are really rich and subtle at least compared to other video games but the parts that are bad are really terrible~~

the more i think about the more i feel like secret of mana is really the pinnacle for square peaking @ the point where u get shot out of cannon into the north country

ahaha that is a great choice

SoM also gave me big-time EMOTIONS when i was young... fukkin dylock or whatever, man. so sad ;_;

^^^ yeah secret of mana is darker and kind of cruel w/o being maudlin and ott like FF6 i mean how blase is the game about banishing u from the only home u have ever known w/o nothing but a measly 50 GP. "hey kid looks like uve been stuck in this shitty town and some abusive homosocial relationship with a stocky bully but now u get to enter a more emotionally abusive relationship with a distant and uncommunicative father figure. also u save the world and magiks. peace."

playing chrono trigger and ff6 around the same time, 13 or so, post-ff7 - chrono trigger i found genuinely affecting, ff6 i kind of, you know, it was about a clown

haha yes both of u otm

whaaaat must disagree. not about CT as it is classic in every way, but FF6 was really the supreme opera of JRPGs. weak parts yes, but vastly outweighed by the wonderful story and character bits sprinked throughout. dreaming with shadow, COME ON. (and Kefka rules, even the final part of his final battle theme is awesome)

secret of mana is great but far better as a game than in the storytelling dept, probably about the same level as FF4. not a slight against it, but i don't think it's quite in the same category/has the same ambition as the wild stuff you see in CT and FF6. SoM also has lots of wonderful little moments and music tho (the aforementioned canon shooting, techno air fortress, hype up boss music, MULTIPLAYER)

feel like i'm still crawling through this; just at the post apocalyptic future, just past the jet races... beginning to see it open up a bit in variety and cleverness

oh dude you've barely started. i just began today and i'm already wayyyy past u

what's the secret character? I kept Magus fwiw and got Chrono back loaded with the rainbow and prism specs. If only he could wear a dress... it's brutally hard to pick a party now, though; keeping Lucca out for now in favor of Marle for healing but they're all soooo good now.

oh, it's magus. i always liked to keep the 'core' party of marle & lucca together, but i also like magus too much to exclude him so i usually go with magus/crono/lucca, but then again magus/lucca/marle have a pretty sweet triple tech iirc so idk

i just pop a megaelixer whenever i need healing, which is never, but you need a couple of playthroughs to really accumulate those

yeah I'm starting to get megaelixers but after finishing the sidequests I'm finding a lot less need for healing b/c my defense is finally decent and the prism specs mean the killing is done quickly.

yeah maybe I'll go back to Lucca, her gun with the random damage is pretty ace as is megaton bomb

pretty much any party with chrono in it ends up owning cuz dude BEASTS @ high lvls. also hes the natural one when it cums 2 giving out those tabs and he learns some brutal dual techs. i think magus and lucca have the two highest dmg output single techs so a party with those three is evil.

my fave party was chrono robo marle just cuz i like those three the best. but the cavewoman (ayla?) has ♥charm♥ which is a necessity in a bunch of boss battles. also she and marle have some ~killer~ duals. i think theres supposed to be ideal parties for every sidequest and l8 game story dungeon except black omen but it doesnt really matter

ayla was putting up 9999's when i was mercing reptites earlier, plus she got some fat titties

i would like to have as a ringtone that insane grinding noise that lavos makes

I'm loving that it doesn't really matter because it frees me to try other combos and still kick ass. I need to play Ayla more; so far I've only used her when it's forced me to.

yeah i never thought about it before but it is unique how all the characters kick quite a bit of ass - usually there's a bunch of useless ass mofos who u never use

I'm hoping Marle and Ayla have a cat fight for Chrono at the end. That, or Chrono keeps the Wings of Time but sends the two to their different eras and so can keep them both without conflict.

i feel like there IS an ending where chrono bones ayla but tbh i don't remember too many of them

I gotta aim for that one, then (btw I have no idea how to trigger different endings and will studiously avoid looking it up so as to ensure maximal surprise when Chrono marries Robo or whatever)

i wont spoil any of them, i'll just say that the mechanics for getting them are all the same - basically just choosing to jump ahead & fight the final boss at different points in the game's story, which is an option u get in new game+

sorry for the quality

http://i28.tinypic.com/vgl7gi.jpg
http://i29.tinypic.com/29krm9i.jpg

i feel like there IS an ending where chrono bones ayla but tbh i don't remember too many of them

pretty sure theres one where lucca comes out as a lesbian but its hard 2 get~~~~

I hope there's one where Chrono IS Lucca, Smokey Is The Bandit-style.

i regret not changing Magus to Fagus

i loooove the idle animations on the world map screen - also i love when you leave robo w/fiona to replant the forest and every time you go back to 600 AD he is doing a different agricultural ass activity, like wearing a bandana and planting seeds or turning into a tractor and shit

beat it

somehow it is even more amazing than ever... japan really shoulda just packed it in after this one

I made it to the Lavos fight last night, beat the series of "Lavos changes his attack modes" and then got wiped out on the next battle by surprise; I guess I hadn't healed enough and so one of his big attacks took out everyone all at once. Blah. Should I just aim at one side first?

is that the one with the giant arms? i liked to do full screen attacks w/that one... they regenerate, so dont worry too much about killing them off, just get them out of the way when u can

yeah like blast with luminaire? I thought I was doing fine until BLAST fuck what happened? I guess it was cool to see the world end.

yeah, luminaire is your daisy cutter anyway - i'm never not using it when crono's in my party

when i beat it just now my party was magus/frog/lucca, so i would do dark matter w/magus and the firefrog double tech w/frog and lucca (forget what it's called, the one that's a giant ass frog that is also on fire)

i prefer ayla / robo / frog for the final battle because their triple tech can take out the left lavos bit in one blow, and cure wave is the best way to keep your party in shape. and also because they are my favourite characters.

I won! This has a terrific ending, too. I think I'll play again, though maybe not until tomorrow.

okay, now that i got the robot, i'm starting to get in the groove a bit here. wish i could carve out some multi-hour playing periods.

in new game + i went to the right telepod after marle joined @ the fair, beat lavos, and this is where im at right now:

http://i4.photobucket.com/albums/y109/fez_/ct.jpg

??
:B

lol this thread is so insanely spoilery

mods delete that post plz

tempting

lol I started another game last night b/c I can't quit Marle...and b/c I read some walkthroughs and apparently Magus has a bunch of spells that I never got! He only has 3 spells, Lightning 2, Ice 2, Fire 2 (I think), but apparently he can get a bunch more. And Ayla evidently has some great spells but I didn't use her enough to get them (I won with Chrono, Marle and Lucca just blasting the fuck out of Lavos). And I think Robo has more too. So I'm going to focus on Magus, Ayla, and Robo. It's funny replaying it because obviously I'm walking through all the battles that were tough at first, but it's still taking time to do it because of loading time etc.

What's the earliest point I can fight Lavos at? I guess I have to get to the End of Time at least?

hahaha nope.

let me put it this way, don't even consider it until you've finished New Game + at least once

(trying to get to/beat Lavos before End of Time)

yeah I'm just level 50 now so that's prob. right

magus has HIDDEN TRIPLE TECHS that u need special items to use... it owns prettty hard

Yeah I think I have the special items now (bunch of gemstones) but I don't even have Dark Matter! Which according to walkthroughs is a pretty fine spell.

hell yes

you have to equip it on one of the party members who can perform the triple tech, and then have all the ppl in ur party i think

yeah but I also have to have the right max spells for each party member to allow triple techs, and that's what I don't have at present.

aaahhh right-o

Superfluity, Thy Name is Lost Sanctum

Parish criticizing the new sidequests added to the DS version, then goes into a general anti-padding rant. Sounds like they're not worth the trouble, and it's not like the game really needed more content, but it doesn't seem like they usually succeed in these remake additions.

Huh. I think I skipped the Lost Sanctum on my first playthrough. Maybe I'll try it this time (I'm playing on DS). S/he's right that the game is short enough to make a second playthrough worthwhile. I took about 25 hours on my first playthrough. The Black Omen was a pretty badly designed dungeon I thought, way too much walking through vast boring empty spaces. I guess it showed how cavernous the ship is, but for little payoff. And the combat was dumb by that point too, because I could kill everything in it without magic or healing.

S/he makes a nice point regarding the lengths of contemporary RPGs also. I got burned out on Oblivion, because I have completist tendencies, but after 120+ hours I'd had enough of fetch quest and weak plot (by then I'd long dispensed with the final quest). It was a pity because the assassination quests were actually interesting (relatively speaking) but I just didn't want to be in that universe anymore by then. Plus my 360 started locking up on one of those quests, both the first time and on further reloads from save. So CT's brevity was a virtue I appreciated.

JEREMY parish is a dude btw

Okay, I'm officially quitting this as I'm just not enjoying it. Glad I gave it a college try but it's just not quite doing it for me.

did you ever finish this forks

lol, i did not enjoy it! my secret shame. just lost interest and never got back into it.

this is such a great thread. i should be unemployed and play videogames again

its a good racket if you can get your foot in the door

for shame!!!

hacked my SNES mini. Wasn't sure I'd be able to play another top-down RPG after Earthbound but here I am. I'm really gutted I didn't go in the Tent of Terror before zapping myself back 1000 years :-(

I can't stop listening to this too: https://open.spotify.com/track/713XSUuab0bJX0AGFWUsxd <- one of the best bits of music in a 16 bit game I can think of. Wish there were more decent orchestrated versions of SNES game soundtracks on Spotify

sometimes I wanna tell people about the feels I get off this game and then I realise I'm being a weirdo so I'm saying it here

it's incredible