It's the definitive [good-design game-loop]. It is so [good-design game-loop] even I have finished it. Maybe also for the combat, which I thought was pretty nice and flashy.

I couldn't care less for the crafting, side missions, looting, collectathonics and similar gibberish, each moment I had to see an upgrade screen for my gear I was a step closer to quiting.

Really interesting when people say this is showing real maturity from the story, when it is the same shit from previous games, although this time more needlessly complicated. They have concepts and ideas, sure, but neither Kratos nor the gods know what they're doing at any moment, following the age-old journey of the "AAA-gymkhana-open-world-extravaganza", where parenting still means crushing the skull of your enemies to the pulp (so mature and a real departure from previous games!). The supremacist tantrum from Atreus in the middle without any repercussions is also super funny. Again, it seems better than previous games because the acting is good and Kratos now looks at his scars, like every Serious and Important story about damaged parents must do.

The game has some nice vistas and it is technologically pretty, but the whole long take gimmick is SO SO SO unnecessary and inconsequential that reads more as, again, some prestige self-seriousness than anything that could add to the energy of the scenes, cause some of them end up looking really fucking dull.

Writing this it seems it's fucking awful, but really I don't think is as bad as some in here put it, it is salvaged for the most part by the combat and by having a nice tight structure (although sometimes bloated) if you avoid any side stuff. However, thinking this is some sort of "big next step for Kratos" or "a mature game about complex relationships" is beyond me.

Also, is Freya, the only female character in the whole game, the only person that doesn't emote???

There is something deeply ridiculous about Gamers™ complaining endlessly about games that are not action-orientated ("walking simulators" etc etc), whilst a game like this gets away with pushing all the most exciting and intense moments of action into cutscenes whilst the fighting you get to actually engage in is largely the repetitive, in between grunt-work. The game thinks having a bunch of quick-time events included will make up for this but being forced to constantly be alert for button symbols appearing on the screen rather than getting to enjoy the show is somehow even less immersive.

This kind of style-over-substance approach echoes throughout the whole game. The myriad climbing sequences feel oddly emblematic for this; nothing can actually go wrong in them meaning that despite the perilous context for them (clinging to the side of mountains and buildings by just your hands, leaping great distances from one to the next) there's never any reason to feel any actual tension or danger, it's just meant to look flashy and plays out closer to an interactive cutscene than actual gameplay. The single-shot gimmick is another great example, there's no narrative or thematic reason for it, it leads to the camera feeling needlessly claustrophobic a large amount of the time, but it looks impressive and that's apparently all that matters.

The combat is largely tedious. The occasional moments of excitement from the first few hours largely dissipated as the game made me fight the same collection of enemies, and the same troll and ogre mini-bosses, over and over right up until the end of the game. This overuse of the same enemy designs starts to feel even more grating considering the game's habit of cramming in additional fights wherever it possibly can, even when it doesn't make narrative or tonal sense, out of fear that if you go more than five minutes without attacking something you might get bored. The two modes for most of your fighting, beyond special attacks that leave you invulnerable or near-invulnerable for their duration thus draining tension from what's happening, are either keeping your distance and using projectiles whilst your son Atreus keeps the enemies distracted (which is both painfully slow at times, whilst also just feeling bizarre because Atreus is with seldom exceptions actually invulnerable to damage in combat), or getting in close and mindlessly button mashing until the enemies roll over and die (which is just boring). There are lots of fancy additional close-combat moves you can use but the game never really gives you the motivation to learn them, so it largely ends up being just this for the entire playthrough, as you fight the exact same enemies fifteen hours deep that you were fighting at the start of the game.

There are many ways to make the combat not get quite so tedious by the end, but the simplest one is to just have the game be more compact and streamlined, yet all throughout the game instead pushes to be larger, more expansive, with as many features as it can fit in. People like rpg systems, so why not cram in gear crafting and upgrading and all sorts of different enchantment systems? Never mind that it never makes the combat feel like it plays any differently, or that the best approach to these needless sprawling menus is to just use the things that have the biggest numbers. People like open world games, so why not do that too? But God of War's notion of exploration is mostly just wandering around the lake in a circle, ticking off locations one by one. The game also just features countless collectables, all kept track of in the map screen, as if you can't include anything within a game without it making some resultant number go up.

God of War had a surprising amount of narrative focus, and there's some genuinely cool moments. I enjoyed a bunch of the early-game content surrounding Freya, Baldur is compelling right until the game just forgets he exists for the vast majority of its story, and there's some potentially really interesting stuff in here about familial trauma, abuse and neglect that the game doesn't come close to having anything impactful or coherent to say about in the end. This is its whole own problem as hinting at Kratos's abuse and neglect towards his son (and never even confronting that in any sort of meaningful fashion) clashes pretty harshly with framing him as someone whose every punch should be thrilling to us, in the same way that his talk towards the end of the game of stopping the cycles of violence clashes with the fact that all game long the finishing moves zoom in on every gorey detail, trying its best to make the tearing of flesh and sinew seem salacious. Even the framing for the story is off here, and downright enraging; every single time you're sent to one corner of the world to see a character who can supposedly help you on your quest you can bet they'll be ready to retort that sure they can help you but first you need some obscure item from some other corner of the world. The story is never allowed to flow, always nestled between countless fetch quests, and sometimes fetch quests within fetch quests.

By the half-way point I was extremely ready for this game to be over, but I kept persevering due to some combination of sunk-cost fallacy, a curiosity to see where the story would head, and irritation that the game seems near universally acclaimed. God of War is certainly very pretty, but there's so little of worth here beyond that.

I'm gonna be thinking about this game for a good long while.

I've heard nothing but praise for this game since it was released, and I'm ashamed that it took me this long to sit down and play it. I knew that I wanted to play Replicant first so that I could try and fully immerse myself in this world that Yoko Taro has created, and it 110% paid off. This game is remarkable, and I'm floored by how deeply + effectively it explores the themes of nihilism, absurdism and mortality. I also want to give a huge shoutout to Kyle McCarley, the English voice actor for 9S. What an incredible voice performance--I could feel every hint of emotion that 9S experiences throughout game and it was all the more powerful for it. I feel like I can't do NieR: Automata justice with a single review, but I am so happy that I was able to experience this fucking game.

This one didn't really click with me. I found many of the game's systems to be pretty tedious like the world tendency and upgrade paths. The bosses also did not provide the rewarding challenge the series get its reputation for; many of them were trivial if you could figure out their gimmick.

That said, the game of course earns points for its remade visuals, which are stunning. The environments are fun to explore for the most part, and the item and weapon variety helps replayability. I also enjoyed the linear nature of the areas, but some people may prefer the interconnected-ness of later souls games.

A lovely homage to the early Zelda games that’s well polished, and has its own unique spin on the top-down adventure that makes it stand out despite its influence.

The best way to describe it is vague. It doesn’t tell much of anything about itself, and it just sets you off without direction with only a stick to fight with. Then you’ll see the game’s text isn’t actually readable, and any information you’ll want to know about its mechanics or hints on what to do is found through missing pages of an old school instruction manual.

The manual is a neat concept since it’s still cryptic and you’ll have to pay close attention to its drawings to understand it. The level of detail in its visual design is both cool to look at and essential to navigating through the game’s areas and finding obscure secrets.

The art and ambient music are also wonderful, and the level design is excellent. There’s so many clever shortcuts and paths hidden in plain sight that can actually bypass much of the game in hindsight. Most of it isn’t gated either, so progression can just depend on if you know it’s there or not which was awesome.

Though combat isn’t really a highlight since it’s simplistic and kinda floaty, which doesn’t really match with how aggressive the bosses can be. And the other gripe I had was its final puzzle felt excessively obtuse to me on a mechanical level compared to the rest of the game. But overall was super impressed with Tunic.

A timeless classic. In all my years of gaming Chrono Trigger is still my favorite game of all time.

My experience: I played Chrono Cross first and loved it to pieces. I really wanted to experience the original title. I really didn't know much about it at all. I knew it was a favorable game but that was about it. Prices of the SNES cart were really high at the time and none of my stores had a copy and I couldn't buy it online. Then I heard that Square was porting it to PS1 with Final Fantasy 4 and adding new anime cutscenes. Finally I can try it for myself and experience it as if it was new with others. My expectations where somewhat high cause I really loved CC but at the same time I know it was a SNES game originally so I really only expected to like it and not LOVE it. I knew it was going to be different from Cross but that's okay I'm being open minded about it. It shattered my expectations. What I got was just a straight up fun adventure game that I felt catered everything to my taste in a complete package. I did eventually track down a SNES cart at a local cd game exchange store and even paid 60 bucks for it. I knew it was never gonna be cheap and it was still worth every penny. I played every version of this game so so much. I even almost maxed out every stat on every character, which if know this game is a long long unnecessary grind. I think just about everything outside of Ayla magic stat lol.

Graphics: The beautiful SNES pixels and sprites are really detailed and express a lot of emotion for a game of it's time. Lots of color variety from a whimsical festival to a moody forest or a dark scary tower or even a magical floating city. Everything realized and clear. The added anime cutscenes on the PS1 version are fun and I like how they extended the ending a bit. The characters are nicely detailed and stand out. The game has a nice animated look. Attacks look great and the magical effects are nice. The only graphical downside is that characters look a little goofy on the overworld map cause the sprites are just too small.

Sound: What can I say. CT has the most consistent OST to any game. Every track has presence and purpose. Even little jingles like getting up in the morning or the moody sewer music to the muted future theme. Everything serves it's purpose flawlessly. The music gets me pumped up after every battle or when the main theme kicks in when an important part happens. Dramatic moments feel dramatic. Somber moments feel heavy. There is a reason why CT is one of the most remixed games out there. The sound effects sound good too and clear as to what they are supposed to be.

Gameplay: CT is a simple but fun game. I think it's a game anybody could play. It's a really easy RPG to get into. The gameplay battles happen in the world instantaneously. You run into an enemy you fight them right then and there, there's no cutaway split screen like many RPG's of it's time. There is just the simplicity of Attack, Tech and Items commands. On paper that might sound too simple and boring but each member can learn up to eight or so techs and can be combined with other party members to create new moves using both characters at the same time. Use two attacks using ice and fire simultaneously, or go for a two party strike force or even do an entire three person team attack. You can do like about 60 different special moves combinations. So then it becomes a strategy of what characters to use and with who and when. There are no useless characters here and all have incredible strength. There are many different weapons and armors to collect for each characters. Lots of enemy and boss variety and secrets to explore and side quests galore. Multiple endings and a excellent New Game Plus feature creates a lot of replay value in a genre where most people are one and done. The game is excellently paced and there is not fat to trim. It's one of the games best features. A ten to twelve hour nonstop adventure that doesn't lose the plot or force grinding for game time. If I had to give a negative I would say that Chrono Trigger is in my opinion too easy. An seasoned RPG player won't have any trouble what so ever. Then on NG plus with my powered up characters I can almost turn my brain off during battles. Some people might find this refreshing though.

Story: You play as Crono. A young man who goes to the millennial fair and bumps into a woman who he befriends and shows her around the fair. An accident at an attraction ath the fair happens where the woman disappears into a portal. Jumping after her Crono ends up in the past. Looking to get back into their own time Crono finds out that in the year of 1999 apocalyptic event occurs that destroys the world. Knowing what they know about their planets future they decide to do whatever they can to stop that from happening going on an adventure across space and time. It's an easy set up for an time traveling game but an effective one. What makes it so compelling is it feels like a grand epic fantasy adventure and not some over complicated drama. It has a little of everything action, humor, monsters, beautiful locales, dinosaurs, magic, horror in a detailed world. You go from the moderen era of upbeat promise and color to the middle ages in a war torn era to a dystopian future of ruin to the ancient past of the natural world to even a era of magic and wonder. All of the characters have their own arcs and personalities and everyone works well together. Every moment goes from somber exploration to epic set piece in such a well tightly paced game. You are always seeing and doing something new. Even minor or side characters of good arcs. By the end of the game it really does feel like an adventure epic. It's a simple story but honestly one of the most fun ones I've ever had to have the pleasure of playing.

Overall: Chrono Trigger is a must play title and even after 30 some years of gaming and playing it many years after it came out it is still my favorite game. You can play it on multiple things today. The SNES version is still the best experience IMO. The PS1 version has nice extras like the anime cutscenes and ending, in game walkthrough and bestiary and ending guide but has added loading times to battles which sucks but it's still playable. The steam version is great but has to be modded as the version is the worst version and has an ugly filter. The DS version has everything including a new translation of the game. I greatly prefer the original SNES translation however. It has more character and flair but the DS one is more of a 1 to 1 translation. Either way you can't go wrong with this game. I urge anybody who hasn't tried it to give it a shot, even those who normally don't like RPGs or even JPN's style of games as it really is a good title for anyone and any age, it could end up being your favorite too.

In the pantheon of what people consider "perfect games", it's not gonna be hard finding Chrono Trigger being name-dropped.

Playing it all these years later, it's understandable to see why it has such a highly regarded reputation. Chrono Trigger moves along at a brisk and well thought out pace, establishing its world, tone, and characters in a few short and memorable scenes, right before sending you off on a time travel adventure to save the planet from ultimate annihilation with your best friend and a damsel in distress.

This is Chrono Trigger's biggest strength: the ability to not waste your time, presenting a compelling and fun diverse cast of personalities and enough intrigue and pathos to propel you on your quest. This is accomplished by the expertise of Square Enix's "Dream Team", a group of talented devs that included Sakaguchi (titan of the JRPG genre, famed for creating Final Fantasy), Toriyama (the man behind the iconic character design of Dragon Quest) and Uematsu (legend composer of the Final Fantasy series), along with other just as important members, who gave Chrono Trigger its classic art style and design, charming and witty dialogue and characters, a memorable and haunting soundtrack, and engaging combat system.

Beyond the bond and interplay between the main characters that happen during the cutscenes, the combat itself also reinforces that narrative, with its focus on cooperative techniques that have the team members joining together to deal more powerful attacks to the enemies. Added to that, the combat isn't as abstracted as other JRPGs like Final Fantasy, where the characters and enemies just stand in direct opposition to each other, statically waiting for their turn.
In Chrono Trigger you can see the enemies walking around in the field before encounters, and during combat they move around and are affected by their position in relation to your team members, creating a much more dynamic and expressive burst of action.

Chrono Trigger doesn't' necessarily push the boundaries of its main core components. The story is enjoyable all the way through, but it's not the greatest literature ever put on a cartridge, and the gameplay is satisfying enough but it's not gonna break the mold of JRPGs anytime soon. It's however the marriage between all its pieces that produce a blockbuster of 16-bit glory.
It's hard not feel some form of fascination and excitement during moments like when you are showing Marlie around the town fair, when you find yourself transported to the future and witness the world destroyed, when you fight Magus in his dark castle, when you find the lost magic kingdom that's suspended in the air, or when you save a team member who sacrifices himself to save the rest of the group from certain death.

As you find yourself at the end, having gone through space and time fighting a gauntlet of enemies and boss battles, and defeating a challenging and multiple phased final boss, it's difficult not to look back at the game and not be impressed by it's perfected simplicity.
Regarding which version to be played, the SNES is the right decision. The DS version, while more faithful, does a disservice to the characters by making the line delivery more stoic and stilted, and the game is intended to be played on a big screen, not on such a small device where the pixel magic will be lost.
Certified classic.

I was led to believe that the praise this game had was due to Nostalgia. I was glad to find it wasn't the case.
What I instead found was a deeply charming and inspired adventure. The spritework is flawless, the time sensitive combat avoids the player from falling into the "Best posible move" dilemma, rewarding quick thinking. The final boss had me mashing buttons and crying of joy when my heal triggered a split second before the massive AoE.
The OST was just wonderful, I even had times where (much like a child) I went AFK in certain areas just to hear the tune of that zone a little bit longer.
The game feels like a story you played in your head as kid during a boring class, or a long summer trip; And I love every second of it.
The fact that this is originally an SNES game blows my mind and if you read this far, I hope it blows yours too. It's a game about time, and it's time you play it as well.

A short and sweet emotional journey that really tugs at the heartstrings. I have a deep respect for any piece of media that can make me feel some significant amount of emotion and Rakuen pulled this off in a very genuine and heartfelt way. The character stories all hit hard while also having a distinct "family-friendly" vibe to them. The art looks very nice and the music is great and very emotional, particularly the vocal songs. The dialogue has an endearing charm to it that kept the game feeling uplifting when it should despite the overarching dread of where the plot is going and the fate of the characters. Even though I was carelessly spoiled on the basis for the story, the small revelations of the events before the story pertaining to the boy's family and his hospitalization still kept me invested. The only problem I have with the game is the lackluster controller support that wouldn't allow me to use my d-pad and the fact that I had to patch it to be able to sprint which felt like it should be in the game by default.