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Why Chrono Trigger is Better than Final Fantasy
An LJ post by Me
"FINAL FANTASY IS AWESOME! FINAL FANTASY RULES ALL! OMG CLOUD IS SOOO HOTT LOL! TIDUS IS SO HOT!" You've heard them. The Final Fantasy crazed people, spouting their love for this increasingly growing series. It's spouted two movies, an anime, 13+ games, and a slew of followers. I even agree with many of the above statements, as Final Fantasy is, or was, indeed an excellent series.
But I'm here to say that Chrono Trigger is better.
Now, background information. The term "Final Fantasy" means that each game should stand on its own. Every game, save one, does -- that one game being Final Fantasy X-2. This is where Square made a boo-boo. Now, no one can say that the earlier games were affected by this, but the name has been tainted ever so slightly. The word "final" no longer applies, and that saddens me. Chrono Trigger never made such a promise, and yet only spawned one sequel/similar game, that being Chrono Cross. Both games are insta-classics; however, on the other side, most people have only heard/played Final Fantasy 7 on up, 7 being the only classic.
When Final Fantasy first came out, it was pretty innovative. You could choose classes! No longer was your sprite confined to being a fighter, your 2nd character a healer, so on, so forth. The trend continued through the years, with small changes in classes, leveling, and battling. The story, too, is fundamentally the same, with different characters, relationships, and story arcs. However, this is the problem:
Underneath all the fluff, it's the same game. Find the crystals and save the world.
Now, that in itself does not make the games bad; there are other contributing factors(FFVII's camera angles, FFVIII's characters/story arcs, FFIX's story....etc etc). Now, as far as classics go, there are three that stick out in my mind - 5, 6, and 7. That's three out of 13+. And those are only *my* insta-classics; a lot of the world never played 6, and even less played 5. Others might say 7 and 8 are instaclassics. Whatever, it's still only 2-3 out of 13. That's only 23%, folks. Now, we must include Final Fantasies 1 and 2, at least, because without them there wouldn't be the classics. But that still only makes it 38%, as opposed to the Chrono games, which has a success rate of 100%.
Chrono Trigger has an exciting story, which is still 'save the world' but under different pretenses. There is no collecting-of-mythical-stuff here, and you're not entirely sure who the bad guy is. Even the ones you KNOW to be the bad guys can be extremely comical (I look to Flea for this comment). The characters have complex backgrounds, even if their roles are fundamentally the same in other RPGs. Their relationships are complex and odd at times. The story is rich with sub-plots and relationships and characters that you don't think have anything to do with one another. It's all around an exciting, complicated game.
And at the same time, it's fairly simple. Unlike Final Fantasy, if you don't play for a while, you can reasonably quickly find your place again by going to the Guru of Time. If you don't love this character now, you will learn to, as his hints give you great places to start if you put the controller down for a while. Final Fantasy doesn't do this. I've had to restart VII many times because I couldn't remember for the life of my where in the world I was supposed to go. I quickly add that I have yet to beat it.
Why is that anecdote important? I have a pretty low attention span. Not that of a flea, mind, but pretty low all the same. I don't have the patience to go through most games. I've beaten mainly platform games. I don't beat RPGs; there's just too much training, too much walking aimlessly, etc. I've beaten Chrono Trigger. I remember coming home from school thinking "Ok, now, just get the homework done and you can play CT. Homework, CT." I'd then proceed to play for hours. Given a weekend, I'd probably play for 8 hours a day.
Characters, gameplay, fundamentals, storyline, and extra features all combine for me to say that Chrono Trigger is better than Final Fantasy. (Yes, every game is grouped under that one title.)
Thank you for your time. :D
An LJ post by Me
"FINAL FANTASY IS AWESOME! FINAL FANTASY RULES ALL! OMG CLOUD IS SOOO HOTT LOL! TIDUS IS SO HOT!" You've heard them. The Final Fantasy crazed people, spouting their love for this increasingly growing series. It's spouted two movies, an anime, 13+ games, and a slew of followers. I even agree with many of the above statements, as Final Fantasy is, or was, indeed an excellent series.
But I'm here to say that Chrono Trigger is better.
Now, background information. The term "Final Fantasy" means that each game should stand on its own. Every game, save one, does -- that one game being Final Fantasy X-2. This is where Square made a boo-boo. Now, no one can say that the earlier games were affected by this, but the name has been tainted ever so slightly. The word "final" no longer applies, and that saddens me. Chrono Trigger never made such a promise, and yet only spawned one sequel/similar game, that being Chrono Cross. Both games are insta-classics; however, on the other side, most people have only heard/played Final Fantasy 7 on up, 7 being the only classic.
When Final Fantasy first came out, it was pretty innovative. You could choose classes! No longer was your sprite confined to being a fighter, your 2nd character a healer, so on, so forth. The trend continued through the years, with small changes in classes, leveling, and battling. The story, too, is fundamentally the same, with different characters, relationships, and story arcs. However, this is the problem:
Underneath all the fluff, it's the same game. Find the crystals and save the world.
Now, that in itself does not make the games bad; there are other contributing factors(FFVII's camera angles, FFVIII's characters/story arcs, FFIX's story....etc etc). Now, as far as classics go, there are three that stick out in my mind - 5, 6, and 7. That's three out of 13+. And those are only *my* insta-classics; a lot of the world never played 6, and even less played 5. Others might say 7 and 8 are instaclassics. Whatever, it's still only 2-3 out of 13. That's only 23%, folks. Now, we must include Final Fantasies 1 and 2, at least, because without them there wouldn't be the classics. But that still only makes it 38%, as opposed to the Chrono games, which has a success rate of 100%.
Chrono Trigger has an exciting story, which is still 'save the world' but under different pretenses. There is no collecting-of-mythical-stuff here, and you're not entirely sure who the bad guy is. Even the ones you KNOW to be the bad guys can be extremely comical (I look to Flea for this comment). The characters have complex backgrounds, even if their roles are fundamentally the same in other RPGs. Their relationships are complex and odd at times. The story is rich with sub-plots and relationships and characters that you don't think have anything to do with one another. It's all around an exciting, complicated game.
And at the same time, it's fairly simple. Unlike Final Fantasy, if you don't play for a while, you can reasonably quickly find your place again by going to the Guru of Time. If you don't love this character now, you will learn to, as his hints give you great places to start if you put the controller down for a while. Final Fantasy doesn't do this. I've had to restart VII many times because I couldn't remember for the life of my where in the world I was supposed to go. I quickly add that I have yet to beat it.
Why is that anecdote important? I have a pretty low attention span. Not that of a flea, mind, but pretty low all the same. I don't have the patience to go through most games. I've beaten mainly platform games. I don't beat RPGs; there's just too much training, too much walking aimlessly, etc. I've beaten Chrono Trigger. I remember coming home from school thinking "Ok, now, just get the homework done and you can play CT. Homework, CT." I'd then proceed to play for hours. Given a weekend, I'd probably play for 8 hours a day.
Characters, gameplay, fundamentals, storyline, and extra features all combine for me to say that Chrono Trigger is better than Final Fantasy. (Yes, every game is grouped under that one title.)
Thank you for your time. :D