I'm somewhat torn about how to judge. If I were to be reductive I could just call Fear & Hunger a shock-value RPG Maker game with the usual issues of being so, but its more than that honestly.

The art of this game is palpably grotesque, even the "normal" human characters have this macabre tainted aura around them. The thick-lined styling and heavy colors are very well-made, and I can't discredit or nitpick at it at all.

The exploration of the dungeon and beyond is very stressing especially as a first impression, combat is brutal especially when you're still alone and you'll dread every encounter you can't escape. Other than that you'd be looting alot for anything that gives you an edge while you're trying to grasp the madness in every floor and room.

But honestly I dislike how hard the game goes on you on how it doesn't teach you or build scenarios to learn anything at all. Everything must be learned through trial, and with how the game treats saving you will pay dearly for screwing something up. That results in a tedious loop of you - or maybe just me - scumming a save file repeatedly trying to find out how god affinities work or what weakness should you leverage against a particular enemy. This is my biggest bane and I wish I could have a better way to explore the dungeon because I am genuinely sold on it.

While it's not simply a murder mystery, Golden Idol draws a still scene for you to parse, whether it's a murder or a disappearance and so on. Instead of ruffling the scene for clues to add to a list, you earn words to use on a mad-libs type scroll to make sense of assailants, objects, or actions.

I dig the art even if it shows its seams at times, the only thing that felt especially jarring is the occasional comic style cutscenes between some chapters. Being pre-rendered it strips away the charm of the art and introduces laughably bad speech boxes that look amateurish at best.

Puzzle design is fun and the story itself interested to progress with, but some level had inconsistently long leaps of logic between the solving steps that it turns into guesswork with the scroll. Since it gives a special warning when you've got two or fewer mistakes, meaning you can keep swapping pieces while using confirmed pieces as a control group. I can't describe this as me spoiling my fun, since most of those instances were when I found the solution but was struggling with composition of the pieces.
I did like how it lets you do some minigame style puzzles to unlock hints, I only needed to use it once, but it's a nice idea of breaking the thinking tedium and jog your mind elsewhere. As a fun way to re-tread the events, you can also check previous chapters and solutions to eliminate some of the guesswork for scrolls, the game even prompts you to do so at the final chapter.
Music was really nice and fitting though, especially the first expansion. It was standout kind of good.

The first expansion; the spider of Lanka is a prequel to the events of the game. Animation is improved however the scenario script was too convoluted for my tastes. I spent more time switching pieces than I did exploring the scenes.
The second expansion is a continuation that bookends exactly where the base game begins, more of the same, don't have much to say.

It does have apparent flaws, but it's a good detective puzzler with a nice story to follow.

A fantastic experience to say the least, Chrono trigger is a very playful game if that's the correct word to use. It has one of the most gripping intros I've played in recent memory, it prods and pranks you, it tosses underhanded jokes with and at you.

The combat is one of the best turn-based systems I've played, using turn gauges instead of a back-and-forth loop gives headroom for experimentation and the combo techs (moves) gives it even more depth.

Chrono's story isn't just one item to speak of, its the main plot or each character's backstory and origin or the results of your actions and the ripple effect they cause. CT has a good way of materializing your actions into tangible results on the world. Not to forget it handles time travel very tastefully.

HOWEVER PLEASE DO NOT PLAY THIS OR THE DS PORT. Additional areas like the dark sanctum is offensively cheap filler that has you backtrack A L O T through some of the most uninspired areas. It degrades the original game and will just steal about 6 hrs of your life, please go for the PS port for the Anime cutscenes by Toriyama's studio, or for the original SNES port for faster loadings. THE ADDITIONS ARE SHAMEFUL TO BE BUNDLED WITH THIS GEM.