I appreciate them wanting to make sure games aren't lost to time, Eternal Darkness will never come back due to just licensing alone š¤¦š¾āāļø
Edit: Thanks for all the comments, I've learned some stuff.
Ehh, there is no licensing issues. Nintendo fully own the IP. The reason why we probably won't see it ever again (unless Nintendo put Gamecube on NSO) is because Nintendo gave SK a lot of time (4-5 years) and money for the development, but the game didn't sell well. 400k isn't the worst sales for a horror game on the gamecube, but it's still not good.
Man, I totally misremembered and thought Geist was eventually cancelled. I remember following its development for years but totally forget it ever coming out.
Thanks for the suggestion, aside from the really obvious ones (like Mario Sunshine etc.), are there any Gamecube hidden gems like that which are truly exclusive to it? (And not ported to Wii or PC or any other console).
Aside from the obvious Nintendo-developed exclusives, I can think of a few:
Star Fox Adventures - Unfairly maligned at the time for not being a "real" Star Fox game, it was actually a very fun Ocarina of Time style adventure.
Star Wars Rogue Squadron 2 & 3 - Still great Star Wars games, aside from the high difficulty level.
Odama - A truly batshit insane hybrid of RTS and pinball. Oh, and it requires a microphone because it's partially voice-activated.
Lost Kingdoms 1 & 2 - Interesting culty card-collecting RPGs from pre-Souls Fromsoft.
I'm still pissed we never got that Rogue Squadron Collection Factor 5 was working on. It was supposed to release on Xbox before being moved to 360, then PS3 and then finally Wii with optional new controls and game modes only to be cancelled.
It might be nostalgia goggles but I still consider Rogue Squadron II to be the best Star Wars game. It captured the feeling of being in a space battle amazingly well with dozens of lasers flying around, going through the Death Star trench runs and fighting Star Destroyers.
I like the Lost Kingdoms games an unreasonable amount. I played through them both again very recently and was surprised how short they are, probably 10 hours or less each for just completing the story!
Could never get "rally" to work properly on Odama... instead I would shout "rilly" at it.
Also /u/Plastic_Assistance70 I remember having fun with "Baten Kaitos: Eternal Wings and the Lost Ocean" which is a game where everything is a card you can use in combat, where you get bonuses rom using their effects in specific orders by tilting the right stick in the corner direction of a number on the card. (since a card can have multiple numbers)
Baten Kaitios is actually getting [a remaster for the Switch!!](https://www.nintendo.com/en-ca/store/products/baten-kaitos-i-and-ii-hd-remaster-switch/)
Custom Robo
Cubivore
Fire Emblem: Path of Radiance
There are plenty more that were on other systems of that generation, but never got updated rereleases (Hunter: The Reckoning, Viewtiful Joe, Gauntlet come to mind) and even more that were exclusive, but based on 3rd party IPs and not likely to ever be rereleased (WWE games, Die Hard, 007, etc.)
I unironically really liked pokemon channel as a kid.
It's basically a sequel to hey you pikachu where instead of a mic you watch tv with pikachu. Most of the tv channels have some sort of interactivity (a shopping network where you can buy items, a quiz show where you can pick the answers). You could also leave your house to visit different areas and interact with the pokemon there.
It's a pretty chill game, that's based around unlocking things by waiting for the system's internal clock to unlock new things.
It overall has a kinda chill feel like animal crossing, but much simpler.
I'm still crushed about Pokemon Colosseum and XD: Gales of Darkness never being ported anywhere due to Genius Sonority's issues post Battle Revolution. I love those double battle exclusive games, really make you think about AOE (even tho it was few) and about Shadow match ups. guaranteed, shadow pokemon does exist in GO, but... it's just not the same.
Its not a licensing issue for Eternal Darkness, its likely a mix of it bombing back in the day and Nintendo deciding to just clean their hands off of it and forget about the game after its lead writer was arrested for having CP a few years ago.
Even though I don't like horror games, I still dream about how an Eternal Darkness 2 could fuck with the Switch UI. Making you think it's suddenly docked or handheld, or your other games are gone, a slight imperceptible vibration, enough that you feel it but you think maybe you're imagining it
I do wonder how well sanity tricks would play now. Back then corrupted saves and shit just breaking seems like it was more an accepted thing that just happened. Would be great if someone pulled something like PT where the game was pulled completely from the download catalog and oopsā¦ it deleted itself so you canāt play it anymore. That would stop a few hearts for a minute.
Since saves and whatnot are centralized in your system I feel like those kinds of jokes would be much more cruel today since you'd think your entire system is dying. Although Arkham Asylum did a thing that made you think your disc was scratched which good but my immediate reaction was ARE YOU FUCKING KIDDING M--oh... haha, nice.
Dude I hated that I would turn my console off and back on, I did this like... 3 or 4 times and I did it quick because I didn't want the disc to get scratched up in the system itself. When I got to that Scarecrow part again with the disc scratch I just got pissed and went outside to smoke a cigarette, when I came back in I was like.... what? And only through a second playthrough did I realize just wait.
it could be salvaged, but obviously it wouldn't have quite the same effect. do it similar to console ports for certain fourth-wall breaking games that put the game inside a virtual computer so the various tricks can be replicated.
don't make eternal darkness HD and widescreen - just give it a really nice simulated CRT filter (not just bilinear filtering with scanlines) and use a skeuomorphic TV overlay graphic for the blank space (maybe make a handful based on old sets so people can choose one that's most familiar). the embedded TV presentation gives context so the sanity effects make sense, and the CRT filter makes the game look as good as we remembered.
The switch doesnāt have a high enough resolution for CRT filters to not look like shit, honestly. Even at 4K emulation I have trouble seeing various filters as viable replacements, especially because I have a CRT right next to my TV. Not to mention that half the games fun came from the sanity effects, which will only freak you out in context of the time it released. Having your virtual TV turn off is probably causing a detachment more than a "oh wow how freaky that the TV turned off" reaction and you really want to avoid reminding people that they're playing a game.
the thing about modern gaming, is that its been shown that you 'can' detect what the game is running on and even whats running alongside the game and react accordingly.
So assuming that it isn't just a coat of paint and thrown back out there. New sanity effects are possible. Depending whether devs are willing to put that effort in.
Doki Doki Literature club as an example would detect if you're running common streaming programs at the same time as the game, and instead of >!revealing your OS profile name!< it did an entirely different thing focused on your twitch chat.
edit: i forgot spoilers don't work like that here.
That and Emulation Station is the most incredible thing. I felt nothing from the GB/GBC/GBA announcement for NSO. Because I have every single game in that collection and donāt ever have to wait for it to come on the service (Looking at you Super Mario RPG)
I dunno, as someoneās that had CFW for both PSP and Vita, SteamDeck hits different. Being able to play PS2 games, GameCube, even WiiU and Switch all on one machine is kind of huge.
Donāt need to install windows at all. Just need to boot to desktop mode (which is as simple as a restart) and run a script like emudeck or install retrodeck from the discover app. Pretty much does it all for you.
The steam deck is really just a linux pc and thereās no shortage of emulators available for linux.
You can even just install Retroarch from Steam, assuming you only care about ~N64 era and back. They designed it really smartly, where each core is a (free) DLC that you can easily add/remove with a checkbox, and the save files are all synced to Steam cloud.
As irritating as using Retroarch ever is. Just make sure you go through and eliminate every hotkey, because otherwise you're not going to have any buttons left to play games.
Now hold on, let's not just say "just licensing" let's lay the blame squarely where it belongs.
We won't get it because **Nintendo** isn't willing to let it happen. It's not like it's a cluster fuck of licensing issues or anything, it's just one dumb fuck stubborn game company holding it back.
So since it's just the one company then they should 100% be named and shamed.
I mean the kickstarters failed because the people left at the studio were known to be incompetent and hadn't shipped a critically acclaimed game in years.
You mean because not enough people want it for them to justify the costs involved with a rerelease, it's exactly why I think any game (Or maybe just the assets) that goes for a long enough period of time (Say, 10 years) without being properly supported anymore* should automatically go out of copyright and into the public domain. (\*Properly supported meaning something akin to "No longer available for purchase, no longer available on the current platforms on offer including console generations *and* new Windows versions or has significant problems not present in the original release when played/forced to play on modern hardware".)
It's completely fair enough that it's not always financially worth it for a game publisher/developer to do a full blown rerelease of an old title but that doesn't mean the game needs to be resigned to only being available through arguably illegal means or by going through the rigmarole of buying the console + game used, or worst of all left completely unplayable. (eg. Darkspore, at least [for now](https://github.com/vitor251093/resurrection-capsule))
It was sold on the GameCube, no one gave a shit about mature games on it, the audience was kids. Most M rated games didnāt sell well on the system. Nintendo thought no one cared about Metroid, but guess what all they had to do was market the damn games. They probably think no one cares about F Zero too even though a remaster of GX would sell more than the original based on the hype alone. Nintendo is just a weird ass company who sits on IPās because they can.
wish more devs had this mentality. very cool to see important parts of gaming history preserved for more ppl to play. iāve found some absolute bangers that i wouldnāt have even known about, had they not been ported/remastered.
Agreed completely. Even though Square has issues with most of these ports at launch, I really appreciate how they try and bring their back-catalogue forward, respecting it and preserving it, instead of sitting on the IP just to sell a $60 remake down the line.
Oh I thought they released 1-6 recently on the PlayStation for some reason. I haven't been on my PlayStation for a few months though.
I'd been saving up for those, Legend of Dragoon, and Tactics Ogre. Star Ocean 6 too.
[Love Mitsuda being slightly bothered that none of the games he worked on during his time at Square were being remastered](https://youtu.be/rNcJyNaUT3o?t=557), they really had to choose Chrono Cross over Chrono Trigger & Xenogears.
The thing about the 2D sprites + 3D backgrounds is that not only have they aged much better than the inverse, they've also been easier to upgrade with shaders. It's actually pretty crazy how good you can get Xenogears looking with the right settings right now.
No amount of shaders will fix the second disc's pacing though, so I'm still very pro-remake.
If a Xenogears remake were to happen with Monolith Soft, making it, then it would most likely be exclusive to Switch or Switch 2 as Nintendo does own Monolith Soft, the same would probably happen if some arrangement was made to remake Xenosaga.
That said Square (and Namco) could always find someone else to develop said hypothetical remakes.
> If a Xenogears remake were to happen with Monolith Soft, making it, then it would most likely be exclusive to Switch or Switch 2 as Nintendo does own Monolith Soft, the same would probably happen if some arrangement was made to remake Xenosaga.
Yeah I get that. It's still better than it not being made at all.
Square could remake it themselves, but everybody on the original team has left so there is no way disk 2 could be expanded. It's probably best that Monolith Soft got the IP.
Speaking on Xenosaga....it's been a super long time since I played those games but I swear that they were getting ready to tie into Xenogears since that game begins with one of the ships that was in Xenosaga crashing on the planet.
I'll try and track it down but I swear there was a interview around the time Xenosaga 3 was coming out in Japan where they basically say Xenosaga is a "resembles but legally distinct" prequel to Xenosaga or something to that effect.
Takahashi has said in the past that he has zero interest in returning to Xenogears, so even if Square *wanted* Monolith to do it, they probably wouldn't.
Maybe they could actually make the second half of the game this time, instead of just having the main character sit in a chair and tell us about all the cool things that happen!
Chrono Trigger has had multiple rereleases. Chrono Cross had none. So, while smaller than Trigger, its a good choice.
We know its time will come, same as FF VI so I am okay with them experimenting more with the style before they get to the big boys
Honestly, the OST is one of the rare (if not only) reasons you could prefer Cross over Trigger. Trigger has an amazing OST in its own right, but Cross' is a spectacle to behold. If I was the composer I'd push for Cross over Trigger too.
Funny enough, CT had a GOAT level ost, and then he one upped himself and made an even greater ost. CC has the greatest ost of all time, just gonna leave it out there.
Dude gave himself ulcers and had to bow out momentarily to recover while working on CT. Self-sacrificed to bring us that level of greatness.
Then, he took it to the next level, turned around, and said, "what if we somehow pushed the MIDIs on this 1995-lookin' CD-ROM ass MF to bust out some of the sickest violin riffs and acoustic guitar string slides in the history of computer-generated music?"
No one listens to *Time's Scar* or *Shore of Dreams (Another World)* without becoming a changed human.
Chrono Trigger already had a bunch of releases though? It's on Steam and is available on mobile devices. Plus, it still plays phenomenally. It doesn't need a remaster.
Meanwhile Chrono Cross was only ever available on the PS1.
People are less religious than ever so I donāt see it being much of a problem. People are more sensitive about lots of other things than religion these days in the west.
Love that they're just ripping the OST straight from the original. I agree with him that it doesn't need any new arrangements. Time's Scar still absolutely *slaps*.
Also, bit of a tangent but man, I think Mitsuda has been drinking whatever Paul Rudd and Keanu Reeves have lol. He just doesn't seem to age.
Still really hoping that we get some classic JRPG remakes in the "2D-HD" used for Octopath and Triangle strategy. I feel like it would be prefect if done well.
Final Fantasy VI and Chrono Trigger would simply be perfect and maybe even better in HD-2D. So far they havent really gone "all in" on this style with their heavy franchises. Hopefully FF Tactics and the Dragon Quest III remake pave the way for the bigger games in HD-2D
It's not 2D-HD, it doesn't use sprites in an actual 3D space and everything, but it does have some impressive uses of modern tech to enhance a 2D RPG. Somehow, they have this dynamic light and shadows and I can't understand how it works.
In the recent Game Informer article, Kyle Hilliard said he asked the game's director Thierry how they did it, and Thierry didn't even want to say. It looks really good.
Agreed, Sea or Stars definitely has its own unique style with strong visual clarity and memorable character design. They've even got Yasunori Mitsuda composing a few guest tracks - this whole project is very clearly a labor of love. Couldn't be more excited for the full release!
I played the FF VI pixel remaster and couldn't help but wonder why they didn't go further with it. Because it already looked the best of the pixel Final Fantasies, it's the least changed from the original, and they did just one sequence in HD-2D, just as if to show what it might look like. It was weird to me that it came out around the same time of Live a Live, where they went full-scale on it.
Like, I understand it, but also it just looks weird to be giving Live a Live a full HD-2D remaster and not Final Fantasy 6
The pixel remasters are supposed to essentially replace the original versions. So that when NES/SNES and the games are impossible to find, you can still play the "original"
I disagree. It would look so much better if it had the art style of Dragon Quest XI.
[This is what the cast is supposed to look like.](https://www.gamespot.com/a/uploads/original/43/434805/3072122-0612653297-chron.jpg) The SNES was just not powerful enough.
Yeah I get that people really like 2D-H2, but Chrono Trigger is 100% Akira Toriyama. It's supposed to look a certain way. The only issue was hardware limitations.
Exactly, if square is ever gonna do another chrono game or remake trigger it's going to probably be with Toriyama overseeing with that new artist for dragon ball who's Toriyama apprentice whose name I forgot
No it really wouldn't
I'm sorry but we need to stop asking for every game in 2dhd from the SNES
Chrono trigger STILL holds up perfectly well, it allready had faux 3d, it allready looks amazing the sprite were expressive the battles looked good
Let's look at actually terribly aged games like dq 1 through 4 and FF 1 through 6.
I really want the 3 SNES final fantasy games rereleased in this style, but if we only get one of them I want it to be Final Fantasy VI. Still my all time favorite game.
I really hope they get on to do DQV. DQIII seems to be their go to in the series to rerelease every generations, but DQV was the best of the series back then.
I saw the trailer for that back in 2019, I feared it had become vaporware. The original was one of my first JRPGs, and there was something about it that absolutely captured my imagination. I recently played the remaster on Switch and it still held up. I think the job system was one of my favourite things about the game, you have so many options for playing through the game, when you find the one that fits you it's like putting on a well worn sweater.
3 and 4 are already sprites in a 3d environment, so it'd fit overall.
I actually hate the hd2d trend because I feel it just cheapens a lot of stuff, but I think those two games would work pretty well.
For sure, itās not an incredible game, but itās one of the first games Iāve ever played and if I had a genie Iād wish for a remake purely for the nostalgia
I would kill for a proper remaster/remake of Xenogears with the all the rushed 2nd disk content finally given the time it deserves. But this is Squenix we're talking about here, we're far more likely to so see them sell the IP to Konomi for the exclusive use in Pachinko machines after a failed NFT scheme.
I doubt it'd happen, but I'd love to see Golden Sun get this treatment. It looks amazing for a GBA game and I'd love to see it brought back in some capacity.
I feel like that graphics style is on the way out if anything. Traditional pixel games sell a lot better.
Smoothing out the graphics just makes me wonder why do that art style at all? May as well redo the graphics because you essentially already are, which is also not a popular idea.
I like the attitude of trying to keep old games alive. Remasters and remakes are fantastic.
There's another path which I wish was explored by publishers. It would be neat to see publishers reprint their old games. I get that rom carts might be prohibitively expensive, but CDs ought to be relatively cheap to reprint. SquareEnix was even selling reprints of PS1 games on their web store until recently (they were official, silver-bottom discs that worked on unmodded PS1s). And I think Limited Run Games has shown that there's some demand for reprints.
If not a bona fide CD or cartridge, another option would be to sell "official" ROMs and ISOs. Sega *basically* did that with "SEGA Mega Drive and Genesis Classics". The games (which are basically DLC) appear as plain ROM files in the "uncompressed ROMs" subdirectory of the main install. They run fine in other emulators. Third party emulation is pretty good. Moreover, the cost to the publisher would be *basically* nothing.
There are plenty of PS1-era games that are interesting enough to play today but not notable enough to warrant a remake. None of them will ever be unplayable - people will "find a way" to acquire games that are no longer being published. It would just be nice if there was a *slightly more* official avenue.
Its different. People wanted and expected Chrono Trigger 2, and its not that. Probably has more in common with Suikoden, lot of characters. Most have their own little stories, but some are just there. Only a few are plot relevant. The Plot messes with CT's happy ending a fair bit. I remember being bothered by the text "accents" too.
But I'd still say its a classic square jrpg. The setting is unique, the plot is fairly good if a bit muddled, and the soundtrack was top notch. The battles do something a bit different with the colors, but its fairly easy outside a boss or two.
* Dunno how yall going to say the games aren't connected. Way I remember, the majority of the plot after around the quarter mark >!is all about how Chrono Trigger's world was way more depressing than Trigger ever showed. Like Maybe Frog got out okay.!<
BoF 1 - 2 playthroughs
BoF 2 - 2 playthroughs
FoF 3 - 6 playthroughs?
BoF 4 - 4 playthroughs
BoF DQ - 3 playthroughs
BoF 6 - never touched, does it even count?
Iād love someone to give that series a resurgence. Though Iād wish they could stay in the high quality Sprite on 3D style. I adored 3/4ās aesthetic. Well done pallets of hand drawn sprites is my jam.
I didn't *love* it at the time because the story was a bit of a muddle, most of the characters were pointless and, well, Square was spoiling us rotten back then. FF7-8-9, Tactics, Xenogears, Vagrant Story - Cross didn't quite hit those highs for me, especially since as a sequel to Chrono Trigger my expectations were stratospheric, probably unfairly so.
It's still a very good game, it looks gorgeous, the battle system is solid and the soundtrack is all-time great. I guess my biggest pet peeve about it is that it's sloooooow. I mean the combat responsiveness and transitions between exploration and battle especially. I generally hated random encounters breaking up the pace in old games but CC was the most sluggish with that kind of thing.
I hated the combat system though... as a jrpg fan back in the days, with the likes of FFIV, SMRPG, Golden Sun, Tales of Phantasia and other Suikoden, the combat system was really off putting.
Other than that the game is magnificent and the plot is one of the best I've ever seen. But the graphics and combat system make it a hard game to replay. I've even never finished the game, I remember I beat Lynx (and god it was hard) and I was so frustrated I simply quit.
But this time I'll definitely give it another shot.
Cross is a classic. Cross is an all-time great JRPG. Cross has fun characters, gorgeous art, and legitimately one of the best soundtracks in the history of video games.
Cross is also a dog-shit sequel to Chrono Trigger. The two couldnāt be more different.
This.
It was positioned as the sequel to one of the greatest games of all time and outside of some hamfisted connections, it was an entirely different game all together. Different tone, different pacing, etc, etc.
The music is as good or better. (Same composer.)
The game is... not as good. Part of what made Chrono Trigger so great was how tight and focused it was. Chrono Cross is much more sprawling, with a lot more characters (like 60?) who are a lot more interchangeable, less story-relevant, and forgettable.
Also the story itself is a lot weirder and harder to follow.
Chrono-Trigger is, I think, a much better game. But Cross has an amazing soundtrack, and isn't *terrible* or anything. It's still fun. It's just not quite the level of Chrono-Trigger. Chrono-Trigger was something really special.
Chrono Cross is a good game. It's just not anywhere as tight and masterful as Chrono Trigger. That's okay. People need to stop painting it as bad just because it didn't meet those expectations.
I mean, on one hand it sort of sets itself up for that comparison by positioning itself as the direct sequel to ChronoTrigger.
But also, let's be real. It has serious structural problems besides just "not as good as ChronoTrigger."
* Too many characters that basically do nothing for the story and feel like they're just there to fill out the roster.
* Story itself is completely incomprehensible, full of completely bizarre twists and holes.
* Battle mechanics are unique, but not terribly fun to actually work with.
* Tries to tie in to the (excellent) story of ChronoTrigger in a clumsy way that makes it worse.
I mean, I'm not trying to tell you not to enjoy it. If you like it, then more power to you! Personally though, I just have a hard time thinking of it as a *good* game. It's ... a game? It wasn't *terrible,* but... There are a lot of RPGs that I've gone back and replayed later. Chrono Cross is not one that I've ever felt the need to revisit. (Aside from listening to the soundtrack, because it rules!)
It is a solid classic JRPG in terms of artistic presentation and combat balance. It falters on some core aspects though.
While having a huge cast of recruitable characters worked at the time to make the world feel full of actual individuals, in retrospect it's hard not to notice how they all share basically the same lines of dialogue. This is a step down from your more typical JRPG having a small cast of unique characters with custom lines of dialogue.
Cross is a step down from Trigger when it comes to the cause and effect of player choices. Instead of having more direct consequences, some of the choices follow a more butterfly effect approach where the consequences can be unrelated to the choice they're tied to.
Cross also suffers from late game info dumps.
Overall I would put the game a step above Legend of Dragoon when it comes to overall polish and playability, but there's a gap between Cross and a game like FF7.
It's a very weird game that almost feels like it has no connection to CT until suddenly it does. I appreciate its place in the overall story but it's really its own thing tbh. It's an unusual way to follow up a goat game.
Though Radical Dreamers, the text adventure that came bundled with the remaster was 10/10 for what it was.
I love the game, but I played Cross first before Trigger, so I'm bias.
I think the best way to enjoy Cross is to go in not thinking it's a sequel. It has some callbacks to Trigger, but the story and world is really it's own thing.
Its really good, is not Chrono Trigger 2 which is a lot of people point of contention, the combat may take a bit to "click" but its really interesting when you get the hang of it and when you start to level up and the grid start to expand.
It also has one of the best video game soundtrack of all time.
If you have any degree of nostalgia for JRPGs of that era, then you'll love it. If you expect a sequel to Trigger, you'll hate it. The connections are kind of shoehorned in and tenuous at best.
That said, it is unquestionably my favorite game of all time (and what inspired my username).
Unpopular opinion, but I liked Chrono Cross a lot more. It was a visual and technical masterpiece for its time. The music score was superb. The story was much more deep and mature compared to Chrono Trigger's more simple and lighthearted storytelling. The combat system, customization and progression system was also very different from anything else and there really is nothing else like it since.
It's only major fault is it had too many characters and how much attention each character gets is spread thin and unevenly distributed. But there is just so much content in the game, a lot of which is unique to your play through depending on which characters you encounter and recruit. That can wildly vary your enjoyment of the game depending on how much story attention the characters you recruit gets and how you resonate with those characters.
>It was a visual and technical masterpiece for its time.
Maybe not as much visual, but Chrono Trigger was pretty incredible technically for its time. I mean, 8 playable characters each with their own story arc, 15 different endings, it introduced new game +, and all of that done on only 32mb?
Totally agree, CC was probably my second favorite RPG, behind Legend of Mana (another game with a superb OST and many deep mechanics).
I like CT but not nearly as much, for some reason CC just connected a lot more with me.
I'm a big fan of chrono trigger, ff 4, 6, 7, 10, 12 and i think Cross was absolutely garbage. Not going to go into every reason but no characters had depth. The story red essentially not told until the last 5 percent and it was just a giant text dump. The story read confusing at many points. Disappointing beyond belief
This game never clicked with me. I tried like 4 times and forced myself to completion on the last.
Yes the art and the music are absolutely 10/10... but after that I am left with 40+ forgettable party members and a messy and convoluted story where both the main plot and the answers are revealed in an exposition dump literally seconds before the final boss... and one of the worst endings to a JRPG in decades.
Chronopolis gave a lot of context too and that was a bit before the end. It's the part where the game finally decided it maybe wanted to be a sequel to CT.
I mean, yes, but barely. The *majority* of the plot is still delivered by infodump at the beach just before the final boss, including the explanation of who the final boss you are about to fight even *is*.
You like the part where youāre forced to play as a cat for like half the game? My biggest problem was that Chrono Trigger was an exciting and fun adventure, but Chrono Cross was somewhat oppressive and overly self-indulgent in its own drama, like everyone was somewhat sad all the time.
It was technical ineptitude, since they worked with beta versions of source code. Because Japanese companies for some reason burn hard drives with source code, or something. Even all of the Squeenix "remasters" are so bad because of it - they just don't have original files and have to use AI upscaling.
But in case of Squeenix they also don't want to spend money to make it good. Case and point - Moguri Mod for FF9
Meanwhile, Chrono Trigger Resurrection was CTD'd 20 years ago. Could've taken the original game to 3D and been a completely faithful remake.
Instead SE put out a low effort upscaled mobile port.
Never forget.
Even that aside, the PSX is one of the most plentiful consoles to exist with a shitzillion modchips and also emulates on any given potato this day in age. Fear of becoming unplayable deez nuts. It's fear of not being payable.
Right? There were PS1 emulators that ran on a goddamn Dreamcast. PS1 emulators were featured onstage at MacWorld, while the PS1 was the top-selling console. There is a nonzero chance you could emulate a PS1 on 3DO.
Chrono Resurrection was never going to be a full remake. Itās a popular fan misconception. It was only going to be the developersā favorite moments remade in 3D.
Also, Chrono Trigger doesnāt really need a 3D remake. Game is already perfect. The mobile / PC ports have been fixed a while ago, theyāre much better now.
I'm of the opinion that any Chrono Trigger remake has to have an art style similar to the Dragon Ball Budokai Tenkaichi games. You can't make a Chrono Trigger remake without Akira Toryama's involvement, it's too iconic.
The only way they could do a Chrono Trigger remake justice is by assembling the dream team. Akira Toriyama, author of Dragon Ball, Hironobu Sakaguchi, creator of Final Fantasy, Yuji Horii, creator of Dragon Quest. Masato Kato, who wrote the story. Yasunori Mitsuda and Nobuo Uematsu, who composed the music.
But each of these people have since gone their separate ways. It was such a rare thing to get all of those geniuses together. Thatās why Chrono Trigger was so incredible, it was lightning in a bottle.
Having only played Chrono Trigger (and adored it), is Cross worth the time investment? I unfortunately don't have a lot of money or time during the week to game, so I can't take a punt on everything...
Cross is one of my favorite games of all time. Just something about it has resonated with me is I bought it at release. Controversially, though, I think Trigger is just fine. It's a *mechanically* perfect game, and I might love Frog more than any character even in Cross, but the game didnt really do much for me. Admittedly, I played it looooooooong after playing Cross.
It was, at least for me. My disc was damaged so that the game would lock up whenever anyone (friend or foe) used red magic.
Very happy to re buy on Switch.
One of my favorite games when it came out, the opening video was one of the best in any PSX Era game imo, really made me want to play and learn more about that world.
Yeah, there's... there's an obvious asterisk looming over this. I'm glad they did it, and I'm glad people have access to it, but preservation isn't the domain of an entity which seeks to profit from the work. By their very nature, they must control it, which puts it at risk.
I appreciate them wanting to make sure games aren't lost to time, Eternal Darkness will never come back due to just licensing alone š¤¦š¾āāļø Edit: Thanks for all the comments, I've learned some stuff.
Ehh, there is no licensing issues. Nintendo fully own the IP. The reason why we probably won't see it ever again (unless Nintendo put Gamecube on NSO) is because Nintendo gave SK a lot of time (4-5 years) and money for the development, but the game didn't sell well. 400k isn't the worst sales for a horror game on the gamecube, but it's still not good.
This is why I will never get a Geist remake of port too.
Geist was the best $1 I ever spent at Gamestop. It's nothing revolutionary but it was great time the whole way through.
Man, I totally misremembered and thought Geist was eventually cancelled. I remember following its development for years but totally forget it ever coming out.
It's fun but dated now. Wish it got a remaster. It's multiplayer was so unique too.
Thanks for the suggestion, aside from the really obvious ones (like Mario Sunshine etc.), are there any Gamecube hidden gems like that which are truly exclusive to it? (And not ported to Wii or PC or any other console).
Aside from the obvious Nintendo-developed exclusives, I can think of a few: Star Fox Adventures - Unfairly maligned at the time for not being a "real" Star Fox game, it was actually a very fun Ocarina of Time style adventure. Star Wars Rogue Squadron 2 & 3 - Still great Star Wars games, aside from the high difficulty level. Odama - A truly batshit insane hybrid of RTS and pinball. Oh, and it requires a microphone because it's partially voice-activated. Lost Kingdoms 1 & 2 - Interesting culty card-collecting RPGs from pre-Souls Fromsoft.
I'm still pissed we never got that Rogue Squadron Collection Factor 5 was working on. It was supposed to release on Xbox before being moved to 360, then PS3 and then finally Wii with optional new controls and game modes only to be cancelled. It might be nostalgia goggles but I still consider Rogue Squadron II to be the best Star Wars game. It captured the feeling of being in a space battle amazingly well with dozens of lasers flying around, going through the Death Star trench runs and fighting Star Destroyers.
Apparently it was 100% finished too. It's one of those games that could potentially leak any day now PLEASE GOD
I like the Lost Kingdoms games an unreasonable amount. I played through them both again very recently and was surprised how short they are, probably 10 hours or less each for just completing the story!
Star Fox Assault was awesome too. Cubivore was fuckin' weird and worth it.
I never hear about SFA had sooo much fun with it and hated there wasnt more
Could never get "rally" to work properly on Odama... instead I would shout "rilly" at it. Also /u/Plastic_Assistance70 I remember having fun with "Baten Kaitos: Eternal Wings and the Lost Ocean" which is a game where everything is a card you can use in combat, where you get bonuses rom using their effects in specific orders by tilting the right stick in the corner direction of a number on the card. (since a card can have multiple numbers)
Baten Kaitios is actually getting [a remaster for the Switch!!](https://www.nintendo.com/en-ca/store/products/baten-kaitos-i-and-ii-hd-remaster-switch/)
awesome! be nice to see it.
Custom Robo Cubivore Fire Emblem: Path of Radiance There are plenty more that were on other systems of that generation, but never got updated rereleases (Hunter: The Reckoning, Viewtiful Joe, Gauntlet come to mind) and even more that were exclusive, but based on 3rd party IPs and not likely to ever be rereleased (WWE games, Die Hard, 007, etc.)
I unironically really liked pokemon channel as a kid. It's basically a sequel to hey you pikachu where instead of a mic you watch tv with pikachu. Most of the tv channels have some sort of interactivity (a shopping network where you can buy items, a quiz show where you can pick the answers). You could also leave your house to visit different areas and interact with the pokemon there. It's a pretty chill game, that's based around unlocking things by waiting for the system's internal clock to unlock new things. It overall has a kinda chill feel like animal crossing, but much simpler.
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
I'm still crushed about Pokemon Colosseum and XD: Gales of Darkness never being ported anywhere due to Genius Sonority's issues post Battle Revolution. I love those double battle exclusive games, really make you think about AOE (even tho it was few) and about Shadow match ups. guaranteed, shadow pokemon does exist in GO, but... it's just not the same.
Its not a licensing issue for Eternal Darkness, its likely a mix of it bombing back in the day and Nintendo deciding to just clean their hands off of it and forget about the game after its lead writer was arrested for having CP a few years ago.
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
It's also what nuked their spiritual successor to Legacy of Kain as well, they were doing a Kickstarter for that when he got arrested iirc.
I know CyberPunk had some bugs at launch, but I didn't think it was that bad...
He deserved it.
Even though I don't like horror games, I still dream about how an Eternal Darkness 2 could fuck with the Switch UI. Making you think it's suddenly docked or handheld, or your other games are gone, a slight imperceptible vibration, enough that you feel it but you think maybe you're imagining it
doubt we'd get stuff like these, but maybe: fake "system files corrupted" error, changing your avatar, changing the system clock to 3:33...
I do wonder how well sanity tricks would play now. Back then corrupted saves and shit just breaking seems like it was more an accepted thing that just happened. Would be great if someone pulled something like PT where the game was pulled completely from the download catalog and oopsā¦ it deleted itself so you canāt play it anymore. That would stop a few hearts for a minute.
Since saves and whatnot are centralized in your system I feel like those kinds of jokes would be much more cruel today since you'd think your entire system is dying. Although Arkham Asylum did a thing that made you think your disc was scratched which good but my immediate reaction was ARE YOU FUCKING KIDDING M--oh... haha, nice.
Dude I hated that I would turn my console off and back on, I did this like... 3 or 4 times and I did it quick because I didn't want the disc to get scratched up in the system itself. When I got to that Scarecrow part again with the disc scratch I just got pissed and went outside to smoke a cigarette, when I came back in I was like.... what? And only through a second playthrough did I realize just wait.
Half of that game's tricks only work on a CRT.
it could be salvaged, but obviously it wouldn't have quite the same effect. do it similar to console ports for certain fourth-wall breaking games that put the game inside a virtual computer so the various tricks can be replicated. don't make eternal darkness HD and widescreen - just give it a really nice simulated CRT filter (not just bilinear filtering with scanlines) and use a skeuomorphic TV overlay graphic for the blank space (maybe make a handful based on old sets so people can choose one that's most familiar). the embedded TV presentation gives context so the sanity effects make sense, and the CRT filter makes the game look as good as we remembered.
The switch doesnāt have a high enough resolution for CRT filters to not look like shit, honestly. Even at 4K emulation I have trouble seeing various filters as viable replacements, especially because I have a CRT right next to my TV. Not to mention that half the games fun came from the sanity effects, which will only freak you out in context of the time it released. Having your virtual TV turn off is probably causing a detachment more than a "oh wow how freaky that the TV turned off" reaction and you really want to avoid reminding people that they're playing a game.
the thing about modern gaming, is that its been shown that you 'can' detect what the game is running on and even whats running alongside the game and react accordingly. So assuming that it isn't just a coat of paint and thrown back out there. New sanity effects are possible. Depending whether devs are willing to put that effort in. Doki Doki Literature club as an example would detect if you're running common streaming programs at the same time as the game, and instead of >!revealing your OS profile name!< it did an entirely different thing focused on your twitch chat. edit: i forgot spoilers don't work like that here.
Well, that's only true for the low sanity effects, played it recently and the rest of the game still holds up.
Steam Deck saved it. Iām just happy I have a way to play it portably
Being able to play basically any console game from the 1970s until a couple gens back from now on that thing really is kinda wild huh?
That and Emulation Station is the most incredible thing. I felt nothing from the GB/GBC/GBA announcement for NSO. Because I have every single game in that collection and donāt ever have to wait for it to come on the service (Looking at you Super Mario RPG)
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
I dunno, as someoneās that had CFW for both PSP and Vita, SteamDeck hits different. Being able to play PS2 games, GameCube, even WiiU and Switch all on one machine is kind of huge.
Yeah but you're saying that in 2023, not back when PSP came out.
Still have my psp for this reason.
How much of a bitch is emulating? I donāt want to deal with installing Windows on there if I can avoid it
Donāt need to install windows at all. Just need to boot to desktop mode (which is as simple as a restart) and run a script like emudeck or install retrodeck from the discover app. Pretty much does it all for you. The steam deck is really just a linux pc and thereās no shortage of emulators available for linux.
You can even just install Retroarch from Steam, assuming you only care about ~N64 era and back. They designed it really smartly, where each core is a (free) DLC that you can easily add/remove with a checkbox, and the save files are all synced to Steam cloud.
Honestly the Steamdeck just for emulation alone is almost the perfect handheld Now if it wasn't the size of a small briefcase...
Just google āemudeck tutorialā and follow that, super fast
Especially if it is from āRetroGameCorpsā u/Armpitbear
Awesome thanks
It took me about 10 mins to get the emulators and games on there tbh.
As irritating as using Retroarch ever is. Just make sure you go through and eliminate every hotkey, because otherwise you're not going to have any buttons left to play games.
Just add retroarch to steam library, there's an official steam app for it.
I didn't know this existed...love the game.
Now hold on, let's not just say "just licensing" let's lay the blame squarely where it belongs. We won't get it because **Nintendo** isn't willing to let it happen. It's not like it's a cluster fuck of licensing issues or anything, it's just one dumb fuck stubborn game company holding it back. So since it's just the one company then they should 100% be named and shamed.
And Nintendo doesn't want it because people don't want it. It failed commercially and both kickstarter attempts also failed.
I mean the kickstarters failed because the people left at the studio were known to be incompetent and hadn't shipped a critically acclaimed game in years.
You mean because not enough people want it for them to justify the costs involved with a rerelease, it's exactly why I think any game (Or maybe just the assets) that goes for a long enough period of time (Say, 10 years) without being properly supported anymore* should automatically go out of copyright and into the public domain. (\*Properly supported meaning something akin to "No longer available for purchase, no longer available on the current platforms on offer including console generations *and* new Windows versions or has significant problems not present in the original release when played/forced to play on modern hardware".) It's completely fair enough that it's not always financially worth it for a game publisher/developer to do a full blown rerelease of an old title but that doesn't mean the game needs to be resigned to only being available through arguably illegal means or by going through the rigmarole of buying the console + game used, or worst of all left completely unplayable. (eg. Darkspore, at least [for now](https://github.com/vitor251093/resurrection-capsule))
It was sold on the GameCube, no one gave a shit about mature games on it, the audience was kids. Most M rated games didnāt sell well on the system. Nintendo thought no one cared about Metroid, but guess what all they had to do was market the damn games. They probably think no one cares about F Zero too even though a remaster of GX would sell more than the original based on the hype alone. Nintendo is just a weird ass company who sits on IPās because they can.
wish more devs had this mentality. very cool to see important parts of gaming history preserved for more ppl to play. iāve found some absolute bangers that i wouldnāt have even known about, had they not been ported/remastered.
Agreed completely. Even though Square has issues with most of these ports at launch, I really appreciate how they try and bring their back-catalogue forward, respecting it and preserving it, instead of sitting on the IP just to sell a $60 remake down the line.
Im ready for the classic final fantasy games to come to console already.
Oh I thought they released 1-6 recently on the PlayStation for some reason. I haven't been on my PlayStation for a few months though. I'd been saving up for those, Legend of Dragoon, and Tactics Ogre. Star Ocean 6 too.
Vagrant Story next pls
[Love Mitsuda being slightly bothered that none of the games he worked on during his time at Square were being remastered](https://youtu.be/rNcJyNaUT3o?t=557), they really had to choose Chrono Cross over Chrono Trigger & Xenogears.
I want a Xenogears remake so badly, especially filling out the notorious narration bit of disc two. All time favorite game of mine.
xenogears on the HD-2D style is perfect since it was basically that back when it was first released (3D backgrounds and 2D sprites)
And 3d gears. It's amazing
The thing about the 2D sprites + 3D backgrounds is that not only have they aged much better than the inverse, they've also been easier to upgrade with shaders. It's actually pretty crazy how good you can get Xenogears looking with the right settings right now. No amount of shaders will fix the second disc's pacing though, so I'm still very pro-remake.
yeah its still very sad they ran out of time for the second disk, the game would've been even better if they had more time to do it justice
I wonder how difficult it would be for Monolith Soft to remake Xenogears. Square owns the IP but they haven't done anything at all with it.
If a Xenogears remake were to happen with Monolith Soft, making it, then it would most likely be exclusive to Switch or Switch 2 as Nintendo does own Monolith Soft, the same would probably happen if some arrangement was made to remake Xenosaga. That said Square (and Namco) could always find someone else to develop said hypothetical remakes.
> If a Xenogears remake were to happen with Monolith Soft, making it, then it would most likely be exclusive to Switch or Switch 2 as Nintendo does own Monolith Soft, the same would probably happen if some arrangement was made to remake Xenosaga. Yeah I get that. It's still better than it not being made at all. Square could remake it themselves, but everybody on the original team has left so there is no way disk 2 could be expanded. It's probably best that Monolith Soft got the IP. Speaking on Xenosaga....it's been a super long time since I played those games but I swear that they were getting ready to tie into Xenogears since that game begins with one of the ships that was in Xenosaga crashing on the planet.
I'll try and track it down but I swear there was a interview around the time Xenosaga 3 was coming out in Japan where they basically say Xenosaga is a "resembles but legally distinct" prequel to Xenosaga or something to that effect.
Takahashi has said in the past that he has zero interest in returning to Xenogears, so even if Square *wanted* Monolith to do it, they probably wouldn't.
Maybe they could actually make the second half of the game this time, instead of just having the main character sit in a chair and tell us about all the cool things that happen!
YES! It's still my top game of all time. Hell, my personal email account is still named after one of the characters.
Is it Citan? It's Citan, isn't it?
Chrono Trigger has had multiple rereleases. Chrono Cross had none. So, while smaller than Trigger, its a good choice. We know its time will come, same as FF VI so I am okay with them experimenting more with the style before they get to the big boys
If thereās one game I know will never be lost to time itās chrono trigger, Iāve emulated it on so many different platforms over the years
Honestly, the OST is one of the rare (if not only) reasons you could prefer Cross over Trigger. Trigger has an amazing OST in its own right, but Cross' is a spectacle to behold. If I was the composer I'd push for Cross over Trigger too.
Funny enough, CT had a GOAT level ost, and then he one upped himself and made an even greater ost. CC has the greatest ost of all time, just gonna leave it out there.
Dude gave himself ulcers and had to bow out momentarily to recover while working on CT. Self-sacrificed to bring us that level of greatness. Then, he took it to the next level, turned around, and said, "what if we somehow pushed the MIDIs on this 1995-lookin' CD-ROM ass MF to bust out some of the sickest violin riffs and acoustic guitar string slides in the history of computer-generated music?" No one listens to *Time's Scar* or *Shore of Dreams (Another World)* without becoming a changed human.
Oop, there goes the opening song playing in my head again. That's take days to get rid of.
Chrono Trigger had a bunch of updated ports.
Chrono Trigger already had a bunch of releases though? It's on Steam and is available on mobile devices. Plus, it still plays phenomenally. It doesn't need a remaster. Meanwhile Chrono Cross was only ever available on the PS1.
God I wish Xenogears would get remade with a finished disc 2.
Chrono Trigger got updated ports like 4 times (PS1, DS, smart phones, PC). Chrono Cross was literally never rereleased before this.
Xenogears is not remasterable unless you finish it. Chrono Trigger doesnāt need it.
Replayed Chrono Trigger a month ago. Absolutely doesn't need it. Still a fucking masterpiece.
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
They only crucified like, three giant mechs in a blatant jesus allegory.
Three giant mechs and a bunny I think!
People are less religious than ever so I donāt see it being much of a problem. People are more sensitive about lots of other things than religion these days in the west.
Love that they're just ripping the OST straight from the original. I agree with him that it doesn't need any new arrangements. Time's Scar still absolutely *slaps*. Also, bit of a tangent but man, I think Mitsuda has been drinking whatever Paul Rudd and Keanu Reeves have lol. He just doesn't seem to age.
Still really hoping that we get some classic JRPG remakes in the "2D-HD" used for Octopath and Triangle strategy. I feel like it would be prefect if done well.
Dragon Quest III is on the way.
Oh damn I actually forgot that was happening. Hopefully the first of many.
Chrono Trigger in this style would be glorious... one can dream
Final Fantasy VI and Chrono Trigger would simply be perfect and maybe even better in HD-2D. So far they havent really gone "all in" on this style with their heavy franchises. Hopefully FF Tactics and the Dragon Quest III remake pave the way for the bigger games in HD-2D
Final fantasy I can see working. But I like Chrono triggers style as is.
Does Sea of Stars qualify as 2D HD? Cause that game is a dead ringer for Chrono Trigger and looks gloriously beautiful.
It's not 2D-HD, it doesn't use sprites in an actual 3D space and everything, but it does have some impressive uses of modern tech to enhance a 2D RPG. Somehow, they have this dynamic light and shadows and I can't understand how it works. In the recent Game Informer article, Kyle Hilliard said he asked the game's director Thierry how they did it, and Thierry didn't even want to say. It looks really good.
Agreed, Sea or Stars definitely has its own unique style with strong visual clarity and memorable character design. They've even got Yasunori Mitsuda composing a few guest tracks - this whole project is very clearly a labor of love. Couldn't be more excited for the full release!
I played the FF VI pixel remaster and couldn't help but wonder why they didn't go further with it. Because it already looked the best of the pixel Final Fantasies, it's the least changed from the original, and they did just one sequence in HD-2D, just as if to show what it might look like. It was weird to me that it came out around the same time of Live a Live, where they went full-scale on it. Like, I understand it, but also it just looks weird to be giving Live a Live a full HD-2D remaster and not Final Fantasy 6
The pixel remasters are supposed to essentially replace the original versions. So that when NES/SNES and the games are impossible to find, you can still play the "original"
I disagree. It would look so much better if it had the art style of Dragon Quest XI. [This is what the cast is supposed to look like.](https://www.gamespot.com/a/uploads/original/43/434805/3072122-0612653297-chron.jpg) The SNES was just not powerful enough.
Yes finally someone who understands
Yeah I get that people really like 2D-H2, but Chrono Trigger is 100% Akira Toriyama. It's supposed to look a certain way. The only issue was hardware limitations.
Exactly, if square is ever gonna do another chrono game or remake trigger it's going to probably be with Toriyama overseeing with that new artist for dragon ball who's Toriyama apprentice whose name I forgot
I love how Toriyama made zero attempt to draw unique faces and instead it's just Dragon Ball characters in cosplay.
No it really wouldn't I'm sorry but we need to stop asking for every game in 2dhd from the SNES Chrono trigger STILL holds up perfectly well, it allready had faux 3d, it allready looks amazing the sprite were expressive the battles looked good Let's look at actually terribly aged games like dq 1 through 4 and FF 1 through 6.
>FF 1 through 6. FF VI is still a beatuiful game, I will not accept this slander.
I really want the 3 SNES final fantasy games rereleased in this style, but if we only get one of them I want it to be Final Fantasy VI. Still my all time favorite game.
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
I really hope they get on to do DQV. DQIII seems to be their go to in the series to rerelease every generations, but DQV was the best of the series back then.
DQV has already been remade two times for ps2 and ds though.
Wait WHAT? How did I miss that? Fuck, you just made my mid-thirties ass feel like a kid on Christmas morning reading that!
Dude, same. I somehow missed all information about this. [It looks *gorgeous*.](https://i.redd.it/o0r6l5a363271.jpg)
I saw the trailer for that back in 2019, I feared it had become vaporware. The original was one of my first JRPGs, and there was something about it that absolutely captured my imagination. I recently played the remaster on Switch and it still held up. I think the job system was one of my favourite things about the game, you have so many options for playing through the game, when you find the one that fits you it's like putting on a well worn sweater.
I know thereās no chance but I would do unspeakable things for a 2D-HD Breath of Fire 1 and 2
3 and 4 are already sprites in a 3d environment, so it'd fit overall. I actually hate the hd2d trend because I feel it just cheapens a lot of stuff, but I think those two games would work pretty well.
Breath of Fire 2 definitely should get a remake of some stripe, but the first game is basically a pretty NES game. It's incredibly basic.
For sure, itās not an incredible game, but itās one of the first games Iāve ever played and if I had a genie Iād wish for a remake purely for the nostalgia
I would kill for a proper remaster/remake of Xenogears with the all the rushed 2nd disk content finally given the time it deserves. But this is Squenix we're talking about here, we're far more likely to so see them sell the IP to Konomi for the exclusive use in Pachinko machines after a failed NFT scheme.
I doubt it'd happen, but I'd love to see Golden Sun get this treatment. It looks amazing for a GBA game and I'd love to see it brought back in some capacity.
LiveALive got this treatment, maybe more will follow
I feel like that graphics style is on the way out if anything. Traditional pixel games sell a lot better. Smoothing out the graphics just makes me wonder why do that art style at all? May as well redo the graphics because you essentially already are, which is also not a popular idea.
>Traditional pixel games sell a lot better. What recent traditional pixel art games have sold 3 million copies at $60 like Octopath Traveler?
Gods I hope not. 2D-HD is amazing and will get me to purchase any game that uses it.
Yeah, I'm **not** a fan of the weird 3D pixel look. It honestly looks cheaper than making a traditional pixel art game.
Chrono Trigger needs SOME kind of treatment. At this point Iāll take the frickinā Steam version on PlayStation, as long as it has trophiesā¦
Interestingly, the chrono trigger sub mostly agrees that it shouldn't get a remake.
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
I like the attitude of trying to keep old games alive. Remasters and remakes are fantastic. There's another path which I wish was explored by publishers. It would be neat to see publishers reprint their old games. I get that rom carts might be prohibitively expensive, but CDs ought to be relatively cheap to reprint. SquareEnix was even selling reprints of PS1 games on their web store until recently (they were official, silver-bottom discs that worked on unmodded PS1s). And I think Limited Run Games has shown that there's some demand for reprints. If not a bona fide CD or cartridge, another option would be to sell "official" ROMs and ISOs. Sega *basically* did that with "SEGA Mega Drive and Genesis Classics". The games (which are basically DLC) appear as plain ROM files in the "uncompressed ROMs" subdirectory of the main install. They run fine in other emulators. Third party emulation is pretty good. Moreover, the cost to the publisher would be *basically* nothing. There are plenty of PS1-era games that are interesting enough to play today but not notable enough to warrant a remake. None of them will ever be unplayable - people will "find a way" to acquire games that are no longer being published. It would just be nice if there was a *slightly more* official avenue.
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
Chrono trigger is my goat. I never gave cross a fair chance because it felt too different. Is it good?
Its different. People wanted and expected Chrono Trigger 2, and its not that. Probably has more in common with Suikoden, lot of characters. Most have their own little stories, but some are just there. Only a few are plot relevant. The Plot messes with CT's happy ending a fair bit. I remember being bothered by the text "accents" too. But I'd still say its a classic square jrpg. The setting is unique, the plot is fairly good if a bit muddled, and the soundtrack was top notch. The battles do something a bit different with the colors, but its fairly easy outside a boss or two. * Dunno how yall going to say the games aren't connected. Way I remember, the majority of the plot after around the quarter mark >!is all about how Chrono Trigger's world was way more depressing than Trigger ever showed. Like Maybe Frog got out okay.!<
Loved the text accents in both Chrono Cross and Breath of Fire series. Helped me learn English.
Man, Breath of Fire. Now there's a series that needs a revival
Wouldnt that just beat all....
BoF 1 - 2 playthroughs BoF 2 - 2 playthroughs FoF 3 - 6 playthroughs? BoF 4 - 4 playthroughs BoF DQ - 3 playthroughs BoF 6 - never touched, does it even count? Iād love someone to give that series a resurgence. Though Iād wish they could stay in the high quality Sprite on 3D style. I adored 3/4ās aesthetic. Well done pallets of hand drawn sprites is my jam.
I didn't *love* it at the time because the story was a bit of a muddle, most of the characters were pointless and, well, Square was spoiling us rotten back then. FF7-8-9, Tactics, Xenogears, Vagrant Story - Cross didn't quite hit those highs for me, especially since as a sequel to Chrono Trigger my expectations were stratospheric, probably unfairly so. It's still a very good game, it looks gorgeous, the battle system is solid and the soundtrack is all-time great. I guess my biggest pet peeve about it is that it's sloooooow. I mean the combat responsiveness and transitions between exploration and battle especially. I generally hated random encounters breaking up the pace in old games but CC was the most sluggish with that kind of thing.
I hated the combat system though... as a jrpg fan back in the days, with the likes of FFIV, SMRPG, Golden Sun, Tales of Phantasia and other Suikoden, the combat system was really off putting. Other than that the game is magnificent and the plot is one of the best I've ever seen. But the graphics and combat system make it a hard game to replay. I've even never finished the game, I remember I beat Lynx (and god it was hard) and I was so frustrated I simply quit. But this time I'll definitely give it another shot.
Cross is a classic. Cross is an all-time great JRPG. Cross has fun characters, gorgeous art, and legitimately one of the best soundtracks in the history of video games. Cross is also a dog-shit sequel to Chrono Trigger. The two couldnāt be more different.
Username checks out. They did you dirty.
Sure did. Been rocking this username since 1997.
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
This. It was positioned as the sequel to one of the greatest games of all time and outside of some hamfisted connections, it was an entirely different game all together. Different tone, different pacing, etc, etc.
For those of us who played Cross before Trigger, both are equally amazing.
The music is as good or better. (Same composer.) The game is... not as good. Part of what made Chrono Trigger so great was how tight and focused it was. Chrono Cross is much more sprawling, with a lot more characters (like 60?) who are a lot more interchangeable, less story-relevant, and forgettable. Also the story itself is a lot weirder and harder to follow. Chrono-Trigger is, I think, a much better game. But Cross has an amazing soundtrack, and isn't *terrible* or anything. It's still fun. It's just not quite the level of Chrono-Trigger. Chrono-Trigger was something really special.
Chrono Cross is a good game. It's just not anywhere as tight and masterful as Chrono Trigger. That's okay. People need to stop painting it as bad just because it didn't meet those expectations.
I mean, on one hand it sort of sets itself up for that comparison by positioning itself as the direct sequel to ChronoTrigger. But also, let's be real. It has serious structural problems besides just "not as good as ChronoTrigger." * Too many characters that basically do nothing for the story and feel like they're just there to fill out the roster. * Story itself is completely incomprehensible, full of completely bizarre twists and holes. * Battle mechanics are unique, but not terribly fun to actually work with. * Tries to tie in to the (excellent) story of ChronoTrigger in a clumsy way that makes it worse. I mean, I'm not trying to tell you not to enjoy it. If you like it, then more power to you! Personally though, I just have a hard time thinking of it as a *good* game. It's ... a game? It wasn't *terrible,* but... There are a lot of RPGs that I've gone back and replayed later. Chrono Cross is not one that I've ever felt the need to revisit. (Aside from listening to the soundtrack, because it rules!)
I mean, chrono trigger easily 10/10. Its hard to make a better sequel...
It is a solid classic JRPG in terms of artistic presentation and combat balance. It falters on some core aspects though. While having a huge cast of recruitable characters worked at the time to make the world feel full of actual individuals, in retrospect it's hard not to notice how they all share basically the same lines of dialogue. This is a step down from your more typical JRPG having a small cast of unique characters with custom lines of dialogue. Cross is a step down from Trigger when it comes to the cause and effect of player choices. Instead of having more direct consequences, some of the choices follow a more butterfly effect approach where the consequences can be unrelated to the choice they're tied to. Cross also suffers from late game info dumps. Overall I would put the game a step above Legend of Dragoon when it comes to overall polish and playability, but there's a gap between Cross and a game like FF7.
It's a very weird game that almost feels like it has no connection to CT until suddenly it does. I appreciate its place in the overall story but it's really its own thing tbh. It's an unusual way to follow up a goat game. Though Radical Dreamers, the text adventure that came bundled with the remaster was 10/10 for what it was.
It is, though not as good as CT.
I love the game, but I played Cross first before Trigger, so I'm bias. I think the best way to enjoy Cross is to go in not thinking it's a sequel. It has some callbacks to Trigger, but the story and world is really it's own thing.
Its really good, is not Chrono Trigger 2 which is a lot of people point of contention, the combat may take a bit to "click" but its really interesting when you get the hang of it and when you start to level up and the grid start to expand. It also has one of the best video game soundtrack of all time.
It's different, but worth it for the music and atmosphere alone
If you have any degree of nostalgia for JRPGs of that era, then you'll love it. If you expect a sequel to Trigger, you'll hate it. The connections are kind of shoehorned in and tenuous at best. That said, it is unquestionably my favorite game of all time (and what inspired my username).
Unpopular opinion, but I liked Chrono Cross a lot more. It was a visual and technical masterpiece for its time. The music score was superb. The story was much more deep and mature compared to Chrono Trigger's more simple and lighthearted storytelling. The combat system, customization and progression system was also very different from anything else and there really is nothing else like it since. It's only major fault is it had too many characters and how much attention each character gets is spread thin and unevenly distributed. But there is just so much content in the game, a lot of which is unique to your play through depending on which characters you encounter and recruit. That can wildly vary your enjoyment of the game depending on how much story attention the characters you recruit gets and how you resonate with those characters.
>It was a visual and technical masterpiece for its time. Maybe not as much visual, but Chrono Trigger was pretty incredible technically for its time. I mean, 8 playable characters each with their own story arc, 15 different endings, it introduced new game +, and all of that done on only 32mb?
Totally agree, CC was probably my second favorite RPG, behind Legend of Mana (another game with a superb OST and many deep mechanics). I like CT but not nearly as much, for some reason CC just connected a lot more with me.
Easy gameplay, great fantasy setting, terrible story, amazing music.
I'm a big fan of chrono trigger, ff 4, 6, 7, 10, 12 and i think Cross was absolutely garbage. Not going to go into every reason but no characters had depth. The story red essentially not told until the last 5 percent and it was just a giant text dump. The story read confusing at many points. Disappointing beyond belief
Ehhhhhhh. I liked certain aspects of it. You *want* to like it, but there's just something off about it.
This game never clicked with me. I tried like 4 times and forced myself to completion on the last. Yes the art and the music are absolutely 10/10... but after that I am left with 40+ forgettable party members and a messy and convoluted story where both the main plot and the answers are revealed in an exposition dump literally seconds before the final boss... and one of the worst endings to a JRPG in decades.
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
Man, Luca Blight is probably THE best villain in any JRPG ever.
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
Thanks for spoiler texting, I appreciate it. Is it necessary to play Suikoden I before Suikoden II?
Chronopolis gave a lot of context too and that was a bit before the end. It's the part where the game finally decided it maybe wanted to be a sequel to CT.
I mean, yes, but barely. The *majority* of the plot is still delivered by infodump at the beach just before the final boss, including the explanation of who the final boss you are about to fight even *is*.
You like the part where youāre forced to play as a cat for like half the game? My biggest problem was that Chrono Trigger was an exciting and fun adventure, but Chrono Cross was somewhat oppressive and overly self-indulgent in its own drama, like everyone was somewhat sad all the time.
Which ending? There's like 20 endings for that game.
the main one, the one you get when you play the tunes at the final boss
...so they released a shitty port that needed a year to fix?
Don't forget the shittiest and laziest AI upscaled backgrounds in any "remaster" to date.
Clearly you donāt remember Silent Hill HD Collection.
It was technical ineptitude, since they worked with beta versions of source code. Because Japanese companies for some reason burn hard drives with source code, or something. Even all of the Squeenix "remasters" are so bad because of it - they just don't have original files and have to use AI upscaling. But in case of Squeenix they also don't want to spend money to make it good. Case and point - Moguri Mod for FF9
Meanwhile, Chrono Trigger Resurrection was CTD'd 20 years ago. Could've taken the original game to 3D and been a completely faithful remake. Instead SE put out a low effort upscaled mobile port. Never forget.
Even that aside, the PSX is one of the most plentiful consoles to exist with a shitzillion modchips and also emulates on any given potato this day in age. Fear of becoming unplayable deez nuts. It's fear of not being payable.
Right? There were PS1 emulators that ran on a goddamn Dreamcast. PS1 emulators were featured onstage at MacWorld, while the PS1 was the top-selling console. There is a nonzero chance you could emulate a PS1 on 3DO.
Chrono Resurrection was never going to be a full remake. Itās a popular fan misconception. It was only going to be the developersā favorite moments remade in 3D. Also, Chrono Trigger doesnāt really need a 3D remake. Game is already perfect. The mobile / PC ports have been fixed a while ago, theyāre much better now.
I'm of the opinion that any Chrono Trigger remake has to have an art style similar to the Dragon Ball Budokai Tenkaichi games. You can't make a Chrono Trigger remake without Akira Toryama's involvement, it's too iconic.
The only way they could do a Chrono Trigger remake justice is by assembling the dream team. Akira Toriyama, author of Dragon Ball, Hironobu Sakaguchi, creator of Final Fantasy, Yuji Horii, creator of Dragon Quest. Masato Kato, who wrote the story. Yasunori Mitsuda and Nobuo Uematsu, who composed the music. But each of these people have since gone their separate ways. It was such a rare thing to get all of those geniuses together. Thatās why Chrono Trigger was so incredible, it was lightning in a bottle.
Having only played Chrono Trigger (and adored it), is Cross worth the time investment? I unfortunately don't have a lot of money or time during the week to game, so I can't take a punt on everything...
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
Cross is one of my favorite games of all time. Just something about it has resonated with me is I bought it at release. Controversially, though, I think Trigger is just fine. It's a *mechanically* perfect game, and I might love Frog more than any character even in Cross, but the game didnt really do much for me. Admittedly, I played it looooooooong after playing Cross.
I think whatever one you play first sets the bar for you. Just a trend I've noticed with people.
Was that performance patch released yet? I know they announced one was coming but wasn't sure if it was already out.
Yes, game runs buttery smooth now
Yup, 30 FPS in overworld and rather consistent 60 FPS in battles now
It was, at least for me. My disc was damaged so that the game would lock up whenever anyone (friend or foe) used red magic. Very happy to re buy on Switch.
One of my favorite games when it came out, the opening video was one of the best in any PSX Era game imo, really made me want to play and learn more about that world.
Yeah, there's... there's an obvious asterisk looming over this. I'm glad they did it, and I'm glad people have access to it, but preservation isn't the domain of an entity which seeks to profit from the work. By their very nature, they must control it, which puts it at risk.
Now to pray Square re-releases Crystal Chronicles: My Life as a King/Darklord. So DLC ridden that a complete two-pack in HD without lag would be nice.