What do you get when you combine the creator of Final Fantasy, the creator of Dragon Quest, and the creator of Dragon Ball?
You get arguably one of the best RPGs of all time, and a game that maintains a strong legacy 20 years after its 11 March 1995 release.
Chrono Trigger is the brainchild of the aforementioned "Dream Team" of Hironobu Sakaguchi, Yuji Horii, and Akira Toriyama, although it naturally took a talented development team at Square to bring the game fully to life. Centering the game around time-travel was initially resisted, as it was feared that would lead to boring or repetitive routes.
Luckily, the team made time travel work in a most brilliant fashion, creating worlds and eras that feel unique yet deeply intertwined. Chrono Trigger is a game with a vast creative and emotional scope, told through a compelling plot that doesn't mire itself in paradoxes or other time-traveling muck. Add to it all an amazing soundtrack by Yasunori Mitsuda, Nobuo Uematsu, and Noriko Matsueda and you have a full package that has lodged fond memories deep into the minds of many players.
Originally released for the SNES, you can now find Chrono Trigger not only on the DS and Virtual Console, but a variety of other consoles and mobile devices as well. Many are aware of a sequel, Chrono Cross, that was released on the PlayStation in 1999. In 1996, however, a text-based game called Radical Dreamers was released, seen as a means of tying up a loose subplot in the original game. Unfortunately, this title has never been officially released outside Japan.
Is Chrono Trigger an important point in your gaming history? Share your favorite memories below!
Comments 59
For some odd reason I couldn't bother with seeing all of the endings. I don't get it either, lol. (I'm guessing it's because I had a difficult time with the final boss. xD)
One of the best games ever made. Pick up the DS version if you can't snag an SNES copy. Well worth it.
A masterpiece. I only got to play it when the DS version was released (meaning I had zero nostalgia for it) and the game still blew me away.
Happy birthday to the greatest video game ever made. It hasn't aged a day.
This game was ahead of its time.
I own the DS, PS! Classic, and VC versions. It blew me away on the DS, and this article reminds me that I need to get back to playing this in order to see all of the endings!
Chrono Trigger is great.
Chrono Cross is better.
First played this emulated, living in the UK. Then I got the DS version, which I would say is the best version available.
Amazing game.
Fantastic game. It's part of a trio of RPGs that defined my love for the genre during the SNES days, along with EarthBound and Final Fantasy VI (or III, like we'd call it back in the day).
I would be ecstatic if Square Enix decided to release it on the Wii U Virtual Console.
For me and along with many of my friends, we could but look at it from afar as PAL European gamers. This is why we worshipped "Super Play" magazine for letting us know what was being released in Japan and the US and "Chrono Trigger" was just one of many Super Nintendo games I would love to have back in the day but it was just impossible. I might not have played it in 1995, but when I did, I truly understood why it was special and it's one of the reasons why the SNES is still my all time favourite console. Truly timeless, they just don't make them like this any more. I think sometime along all the 3d craziness, they just forgot the art of making truly epic "16-bit only" video games.
Wowza, 20 years eh??? Crazy. I, like many others on here, got the DS version back in.......2009-10-ish.... I can safely say, I hated JRPGs before Chrono Trigger, sure I had played Pokémon RPGs, but I just couldn't get into the Final Fantasy's, DQ's, Earthbound's and whatnot. Chrono Trigger changed everything 2010 was the year that I went on a Dragon Quest/Final Fantasy RPG run like no other...man good times! Back in 2010 CT was fresh, stunning and beautiful, the story was specular, the soundtrack...my God the music! The best soundtrack in a game, hands down. Easily one of my favorite DS games and one of my favorite games of all time. Might be time for another playthrough!!!
My favorite game of all time. It is my perfect video game, and I feel very privileged to have experienced playing this so early in my life. I could go on for hours probably citing what's so damn good about it, but I'll save everyone the excessive reading
Congrats to the "Dream Team" for putting together such a masterpiece!
I've actually never played Chrono Trigger before. I know, I should probably be hanged for saying that, but I'm hoping to play it this year.
Made a account just to comment on this. This is hands down still one of my favorite games of all time. The DS version is probably the definitive one but I have it on the SNES and have always favored home console over handheld.
I played CT for the first time last year. Seriously one of the best games ever made, and that's not even taking into consideration the age of the game. This is the definition of "timeless" in gaming.
Chronotrigger. I believe I have purchased this game more than any other. Once on snes when it came out. Once on Ds, once on ps vita as a ps one Classic and once on iPhone. Worth every penny.
@Ps4all
This. I bought it on SNES, IPhone, Wii Vc, PS Classic, and played it on emulator for multiple systems multiple times. Seen all the endings. It's like a favorite book you read over and over again.
I still have my SNES copy as well as as a PS one copy. One of the greatest games on the SNES. Its really a shame that the sequel was nowhere as good as the Chrono Trigger.
My favorite game of all time. I have never beaten a game so many times. Save some of Mario's earlier games.
It would be geat if they put this on the wii u VC tomorrow to celebrate.
My favorite game of all time and the sole reason I started playing video games hard core. I remember riding my bike a half an hour across town each Saturday in elementary school to rent it, hoping my save file was still there. I remember this game capturing my imagination like nothing I'd ever exprienced before and it still does even today as a 30 year old. If youve never played this game, close down your computer right now and make it happen.
@millarrp I would love to see the DS version in the VC on Wii U. The SNES original was excellent, but I cannot go back once I played it with improved GUI.
Chrono Trigger has to be in my top 5 games of all time.
@Olmectron I would be happy with either version but your right, the improved UI would be appreciated.
I've been playing this for the last couple of days. I've got it saved just before the final battles. Then I saw this and now I feel like finishing it off.
Anyone who has never played this wonderful game needs to get it. Worth every cent.
This game is part of the big 3.~
Final Fantasy 6
-Chrono Trigger
-Xenogears
......They sure don't make 'em like they used to.
@Dr_Corndog Them's fightin' words!
@Dr_Corndog Absolutely
When the hell is square bringing it to the states??? Japan's wii U vc has had that and many other square classics for a while now!!😡😡 and they own all the Taito classics as well!!!
@ricklongo they did in japan bro!!
I have tried this game on 3 occasions, and each time I was left wanting something NOT Chronotrigger. Can't say I see what everyone likes about this one. Oh well, I think Final Fantasy III (VI) just spoiled me on SNES RPG's, because nothing compares in my mind.
@EvisceratorX Well, I had to say it.
I... bought the DS port last summer and I still haven't touched it.
...
SAVE THE PITCHFORKS AND TORCHES PLEASE I CAN'T STOP PLAYING SMASH 3DS AND MARIO KART
Heck, yes. I play through this one about once every year or so just to re-experience this fantastic game. Love the story, art style, and music.
Chrono Trigger is my best friend
Favorite game of all time!
Nice picture, Peppy. As you can see from mine, Chrono Trigger is unquestionably my favorite game of all time. It's funny - prior to playing it, I didn't care for RPGs at all. Mainly, I hated random battle encounters (which CT turned out not to feature). But when I saw this in a rental store back in early '96 (when I was 12), I picked it up, not even realizing that it was an RPG at first. (I thought it was more like Secret of Mana or Illusion of Gaia.) Well, I put it in my SNES, and . . . the rest is history. I went out a plunked down $70 for my own copy, and I still have it to this day - as well as on the Wii VC and the DS version. (I also have some figurines of all the playable characters, as well as a Marle keychain on, well, my keychain.)
What I love most about the game, what always stays close to my heart, is the characters. I love their personal stories, their personalities, their flaws; I love how they are, in a way, misfits - kind of alone - until they band together, from completely different worlds, and form a tight-knit camaraderie as they take down that which threatens their world.
Marle, my favorite character, is the perfect example of why I love these people. She is a deeply emotional person (which I can relate to), and undergoes a drastic transformation during the game, due to a traumatic event involving one of the main characters. Early in the game, she's a very bubbly, cheerful, maybe even careless, optimist. But after this heavy event, her emotional state turns very dark - first in a state of shock, then despondent, and finally fiercely determined to defy reality and undo what has happened, no matter what. And until this is done, she has a one-track mind - it's all she can think about. Her pain always felt so real to me. And that's the kind of thing I most cared about in this game - the emotional states of all the characters as they underwent their respective trials. I just liked who they were. Anyway, that's just me.
Oh, and (since the article encouraged us to share our favorite memories regarding the game) every time I played through this game growing up, I would always give Marle the name of the girl I had crush on for a long time.
I can't believe it was 19 years ago that this game first entered my life . . .
Oh yeah, and I also learned to play some of my favorite pieces of music from Chrono Trigger and Chrono Cross (I purchased the official sheet music books years ago) over the last couple of years. (Though I'm far from enamored with Chrono Cross as a whole - due, partly, to the "fates" that it handed out to many of the characters I loved from Chrono Trigger - I do love its music.) Here's a link to 6 that I recorded and put up on YouTube last year, for any who might enjoy it:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JEBRh3esp0c&list=PLmHtaAyAgiciqiU05cx819OOHkMv0eirH
Happy birthday to the game that every JRPG should strive to match in amazingness!!
We love you Chrono Trigger.
@Rocky2418
Awesome keyboarding, bro! I share all of your feelings about this, the single greatest game in history. There are just too many memories and emotional attachments to this game to mention but one is the end credits song, To Far Away Times, which brings a tear to my eye every time. I even heard it played live by the Utah Symphony and I was crying like a baby. Haha.
I had to chuckle when you mentioned your tradition of naming Marle the name of your current crush. I did that too! (As I'm sure every 90's RPGer did.) With voice-acting featured in most RPG's now, that's just one of those little things that I loved about old-school RPG's that has died with time.
If anybody wants to check it out, I drew a CT picture in Colors!3D which you can view below (it took for bloody ever) but if you can view it on the 3DS itself and see the 3D effect, it looks much, much better:
http://colorslive.com/details/1007037
Well said! This is why I love Nintendolife and its sister sites! The comments are always a warm welcoming conversation!
That's a funny coincidence about the 20th anniversary. Maybe it hit me subconsciously, but I just downloaded this game a few days ago to my Wii (which is still hooked up to a CRT vs the Wii U on the HDTV), since I haven't played it in a long time. Not since borrowing a SNES from my cousins and borrow the game from a friend back in grade 7 or 8.
@Rocky2418
You're pretty good! You should play Wind Scene, that's the song that plays in the over world of 600ad. My favorite track from the game
I remember turning 10 years old and my dad taking me to Toys R Us. Ive never even heard of the game before. I was just walking down the video game lane, saw the box art and pointed at it and said that one! Took my pull out sheet and to the register and got my copy. I really think that was the game that made me a gamer for the rest of my life, everything about it was magical, going through the story 3-4 times that summer and never using Rob once! Goid times.
@invictus4000 "I had to chuckle when you mentioned your tradition of naming Marle the name of your current crush. I did that too! (As I'm sure every 90's RPGer did.)"
True. Though I was likely more on the unusual side - I had a crush on just that one girl for 11 years (all of the '90s, plus a bit after that).
Your drawing is awesome, BTW. I don't have Colors 3D (is that game? or an app?), but I at least checked it out online.
@JellySplat
Yeah, sorry, I haven't learned any new ones recently; either way, I generally gravitate more toward learning the pieces that I feel an emotional connection to - based on the music itself, but more so based on what it's linked to in the game, story-wise. Wind Scene is very nice (of course, there's few that are NOT nice in this game), but being basically just an overworld piece of music, I'd be less likely to put in the effort to learn it, unfortunately.
@Rocky2418
Hey, no worries man, just a suggestion. I'm not a very emotional person, but I am quite attached to many of the songs in this game, Wind Scene taking first place. I only played the game for the first time last year, but I definitely see why people love it so much. Its truly an awesome game!
BTW if you are an artist, I would definitely recommend Colors 3D. its an app for the 3DS.
This game is amazing, the fun thing is dou that I never managed to beat it.
I've only ever played a couple of hours into this game but it's def a classic. Don't actually know why I stopped playing
... I never could get into it. Not even when I tried it on DS.
Please can they bring it on the wii u vc!!! I want to play it on my gamepad!
You/we should care more about great older games.
Not made preorders of new ones and dont buy them, for price they want on day one becuse they dont worth that sum of money. They even dont worth half or1/4 of that price.
Thanks to Chrono Trigger that i bought it for reasonable price in 2012(or 2011). Maybe they (older games got crappy graphic but they are masterpieces and are complete). Not to mention about games that are now, they are all cut to pieces (DLC is work of Satan).
Such a good game.
@joey302 Well, they did release the DKC trilogy in Japan first, so we can hope, right?
To this day, still, my favorite game of ALL-TIME!
I remember buying it with paper route money.
The music in Chrono Trgger as well as Chrono Cross it some of the best rpg music ever to be heard. Hands down.
I love this game.
@oats-81
Indeed - without question.
@Gobelee ...Crono Trigger is the most orver rated Snes game of all time its a 6 out of 10 not as good as Breath of Fire or Final Fantasy 3....Crono Trigger Is And will Always Be A Average Game And Thats Fact
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