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Game Data -
Publisher: Square Electronic Arts - Developer: Squaresoft - Platform: Sony Playstation - Genre: RPG - Players: 1 - Memory Card: 1 block - Released: NA Aug. 15 '00 | JP Nov. 18 '99
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Chrono Cross - It's controversial. It's divisive. But is it any good? Find out if Squaresoft's extremely polarizing followup to Chrono Trigger is a hit or a miss! |
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Controversy
Chrono Trigger was concieved by the creator of Final Fantasy, Hironobu Sakaguchi, the creator of Dragon Quest, Yuji Horii, and Akira Toriyama. They were considered a dream team for good reason, needless to say. The result was arguably the greatest console RPG ever made, and even if you'd argue that it isn't the best, being in the conversation for "greatest of all time" is still pretty good.
Simply put, Squaresoft had captured lightning in a bottle when it developed Chrono Trigger. It was a once-in-a-lifetime game, born from once-in-a-liftetime circumstances, and recapturing the lightning was simply impossible. It would be foolish to even try.
But they decided to try it anyway.
And so they created Chrono Cross. The dream team would have no involvement in its creation, which immediately cast a cloud of doubt over it. Then the previews began to trickle out and it quickly became clear that Cross wouldn't measure up to Trigger. But how could it? Nothing could fill those giant shoes. Of course it fell short. There was no way it wouldn't.
People were divided into two camps over this. Some forgave Chrono Cross for falling short of a masterpiece and appreciated it for what it was, rather than slamming it for what it wasn't. Others totally slammed it for what it wasn't.
A lot of Chrono Trigger fans fell into the latter camp. Full of indignation, they declared Chrono Cross to be the worst RPG ever.
In response, Chrono Cross fans declared it to be the best RPG ever.
It was a very silly battle. And, as usual with silly battles, both sides were wrong. Chrono Cross was neither perfect nor hopelessly flawed. The truth lay somewhere in the middle.
Story
I'll cut straight to the point. The story of Chrono Cross has problems.
The first and perhaps most apparent problem is pacing. Some interesting stuff happens, but sweet mother of Christmas, does it take a long time to happen. This is the slowest paced story I've ever encountered in any medium. Video games, TV shows, movies, books - you name it. It's the most glacial bar none. This doesn't make it bad, after all a good yarn that takes forever to unfold is still a good yarn, but the sloth-like pacing is downright excessive.
Compared to Chrono Trigger's rollercoaster thrill ride, this is like a lazy Sunday drive with your grandma. Again, I have to stress that doesn't make it bad. It's just laid back. Really, majorly, almost ludicrously laid back.
One of the biggest contributors to this is the antagonist - his goals and motives remain a complete mystery for 95% of the story, which results in a virtually constant lack of urgency. What are you trying to prevent him from doing? You don't know. What's at stake? Unclear. There's absolutely no rush to defeat him.
On one hand, this low pressure is actually kind of refreshing. Instead of being thrust into a frantic quest to save the world like you are in most RPGs, you feel free to just chill out in the game's lush tropical paradise and smell the roses. But on the other hand, this hurts your motivation to progress. There's no reason not to put the main quest on the back burner and meander around doing side content.
Another story issue is its sheer unfriendliness to newcomers. In fact, it's downright hostile to them. You can't start with Chrono Cross. You have to play Chrono Trigger first or else you'll have no idea what's going on and none of the "big reveals" will make any sense. Of course everyone should play Chrono Trigger, but Cross is so inaccessible to people who haven't played it that it's frankly unreasonable.
Ultimately, the story's neither great nor terrible. There's definitely fun to be had, and the cheerful, lighthearted tone makes it generally entertaining. But it's also undeniably flawed. These flaws aren't enough to ruin it but they're a constant albatross around its neck.
I can't finish this section without mentioning the multiple endings. Yes, Chrono Cross has several different endings, although only two can be accessed on your first play through. Starting a New Game + unlocks the others. It would've been nice if every ending was available from the start, but I guess Squaresoft figured this was a good way to add replay value.
Characters
Chrono Cross sports an astonishing 40+ recruitable party members. And if you think they must be pretty shallow because it's impossible to flesh out such a huge cast of characters... Yeah, you're right.
While some of them get a moment or two to shine, they have little personality beyond a silly accent or speech pattern for the most part. Which can actually be amusing, but don't expect to get too emotionally invested. Take the characters for what they are: a strange assortment of simplistic weirdos who talk funny. Go in with this expectation and you can enjoy them.
One character in particular is kind of a problem, though. Chrono Cross never gives you a reason to care about her, yet it inexplicably expects you to. She never says or does anything particularly endearing, and although she isn't bad, she's nothing to write home about. If you made a list of the most interesting characters in the game she'd rank somewhere near the bottom.
But the plot assumes you're totally infatuated with her. It tries so little to make you care about her while expecting you to care so much. It's bizarre.
Other than that, the characters are fine for what they are, and collecting them, discovering their unique skills, and uncovering all their story scenes provides plenty of replay value.
Music
The music of Chrono Cross is mostly good. Some of it is even really, really good. But none of it is great.
It isn't catchy or emotionally stirring enough to leave a big impression, and a lot of it blends together because it's so tonally similar. "Soft and soothing" describes about 70% of the soundtrack. I'm talking soothing to the point that it can sometimes make me sleepy, which isn't really knock against it because I mean, hey, that's pleasant, but it probably should've been a bit more exciting.
This isn't to say there aren't any exciting tracks, because there are, and they're pretty nice. With the exception of the normal battle music, that is, which is a frantic cacophony of violins and percussion. Although it seems totally okay at first, it can get grating once you hear it for the thousandth time. Battle music needs to have infinite listenability and this doesn't have it.
Over all, the soundtrack is perfectly serviceable but not particularly memorable. You'll probably have two or three tracks stick in your mind and forget the rest. Honestly, the best way to describe it is bland but also enjoyable.
It's blandjoyable.
Battle System
The gameplay of every RPG revolves around its battle system, and the battle system in Chrono Cross is all kinds of weird. It's difficult to even explain.
Upon entering battle, your party members each get 7 stamina points(which is the maximum). Every action you perform costs stamina. A character can't act when his or her stamina reaches 0.
When one party member spends stamina, everyone else including the enemies gains the same amount of stamina. So if Party Member A spends 3 stamina points, then Party Member B, Party Member C, and the enemies all gain 3 stamina.
When an enemy gains enough stamina, it attacks your party.
That's the gist of it. Now let's get into the many, many details.
Your party can equip spells, otherwise known as Elements. These can only be used once per battle but are instantly replenished once the battle ends. In other words, you could equip Fireball, use it during a battle and for the duration of said battle you couldn't use it again. But the next time you enter a battle it'll be useable again.
There are a handful of exceptions to this, though. A few Elements are actually consumable, meaning you lose them when you use them. But most of them are non-consumable.
As your party members level up they're able to equip more, and also stronger, Elements.
Now, do you think you can just use Elements? You think it's that easy? Oh you poor naive fool, you have no idea just how complicated Chrono Cross is. Before you can use an element you have to power it up first using physical attacks.
There are 3 physical attacks you can perform; weak, medium, and strong. Weak has the highest accuracy, strong has the lowest accuracy. They cost 1, 2, and 3 stamina respectively. Each time you land an attack(missing doesn't count), your Element power level is raised by the amount of stamina you spent. For example, land a weak attack and your Element power level will be increased by 1, meaning you can use level 1 Elements. Follow it with another weak attack and you'll be able to use level 2 Elements. Then follow that with a strong attack and you'll be able to use level 5 Elements, and so on.
Once you use an Element, your Element power level is reduced by the level of the Element you used(i.e., using a level 4 Element will reduce your Element power level by 4). Also, Elements cost 7 stamina. So if a party member uses an Element, then everyone else regains 7 stamina, right?
Wrong! When one of your party members uses an Element, your other party members(and the enemies) only regain 1 stamina point. Because Elements are weird that way.
Even more confusingly, despite Elements costing 7 stamina to use, that doesn't mean you need 7 stamina to use them! If a party member with, say, 1 stamina tries to use an Element, they'll actually be able to do it, but they'll enter a 6 stamina deficit. Yes, that's right, they'll end up with -6 stamina!
Having negative stamina is known as being "Out". This isn't terribly significant, it just means that a character will have to work their way up from negative stamina to positive stamina before they can act again. Sometimes putting a party member "Out" is worth it, sometimes it isn't.
Adding yet another wrinkle to the combat system, you can switch between party members at any time as long as they have stamina. So you could perform an attack with Party Member A, immediately switch to Party Member B to perform an attack with them, then switch back to Party Member A. You can execute a couple of different strategies by juggling your party members like this.
Defending is also an important part of combat. Each party member can Defend, which tremendously reduces the amount of physical damage they receive and regenerates 1 stamina for everyone, including the defending party member. If all non-incapacitated party members(meaning those not dead or "Out") defend at once, then everyone receives a massive stamina boost but at the cost of the enemy attacking.
Then there's elemental alignment and field effect. Each character, and this includes party members and enemies alike, has an elemental alignment. What does that mean? Well if a character has a red elemental alignment then they'll excel at using red Elements and receive a damage bonus against characters of the opposite alignment, blue. They also won't be very good at using blue Elements.
As for field effect, this is a system that "remembers" the three most recent Elements to be used during battle. If you use a blue Element, than the color blue will appear on the field effect gauge, and blue Elements as well as characters with blue alignment will receive a bonus. Red, meanwhile, will receive a penalty. Entirely filling the field effect gauge with one color will yield the highest bonus, and it will also allow you to use Summons.
One very convenient feature is that at the end of a battle, dead party members are automatically revived with 1 HP, and you're given the option to instantly heal your entire party using both consumable and non-consumable healing Elements. Although the latter are only available if you have enough stamina left over to use them.
Surprisingly, you can also run from any battle, including boss battles. Sometimes they don't let you run far, but you can always get away just enough to regroup and try again.
I'm glossing over some of the nuances and minor details of the battle system for the sake of brevity but this overview is enough to get a solid understanding of it. And yes, it's just as complicated as it sounds. Chrono Cross turned tradition on its head with this wild, crazy reinvention of RPG combat and amazingly enough it works.
Squaresoft tried other experimental battle systems during the Playstation era with Xenogears and Final Fantasy VIII, but I think those missed the mark. This one hits it. It's well thought out, well executed, and I'd say it's the absolute highlight of Chrono Cross.
Stuff and How to Get It
In keeping with the rest of its weirdness, the way you obtain things in Chrono Cross is a little abnormal.
Money is won by defeating enemies, said money can be used to buy Elements, and items are found in chests, but that's where the normalcy ends. You also obtain Elements and materials from beating enemies, the latter of which needs some explaining.
Various enemy types yield different materials such as feathers, bones, eyeballs, and more. These materials can be used to forge weapons, armor, and accessories. Stronger items require more and rarer materials. There actually aren't that many enemy types and the materials they give are fairly logical(birds give feathers, etc.), so forging never gets overwhelming.
If you think hunting down monsters for their sweet, sweet body parts sounds boring and tedious, then rejoice, because you're given have the option of simply trading Elements for materials. Although the best ones can't be traded for.
In Conclusion
Following up Chrono Trigger was a terrible idea but I'm glad Squaresoft did it, because Chrono Cross is a fascinating, frustrating, beautiful mess. Its bizarre existence is interesting, which is more than can be said for a lot of things, and the world would be duller without it.
Every fan of RPGs should experience this oddity if only to gawk at its oddness. In fact, considering how much it throws tradition out the window and changes all the rules, even people who don't typically like RPGs should give it a try.
You might love it. You might hate it. Or maybe you'll fall somewhere in the middle. But either way, your life isn't complete until you've played Chrono Cross.
I can't recommend it highly enough.
RATING: THE MOTHER OF ALL ACQUIRED TASTES
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On the week Chrono Cross was released...
Space Cowboys climbed to the top of the box office, making it the surprise hit of the summer and finally fulfilling America's need to watch a bunch of surly grandpas bicker in the ionosphere. |
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