Chrono Trigger – A New Game Plus

Chrono Cross: The Radical Dreamers Edition

I’m sure I’ve brought up Chrono Trigger before. It is my favorite game of all time, after all. It’s an objectively great game, but it’s also very important to me on a personal level. I played it at a turning point in my life. I got it for my 15^th birthday – my first after my parents had gotten a divorce and just as I was preparing to leave my middle school friends to start anew at a huge, intimidating high school. Not only did it distract me during those tumultuous times, it also fundamentally changed my relationship with video games and my identity on the whole. If I had to mark a specific time when I went from a kid who played games to a “Gamer,” it was just then. I’d loved games since I was a small child, but it never felt like much more than a fun distraction. My intense love for Chrono Trigger made me realize how deep my love for the hobby ran.

I could probably literally go on until the End of Time (eh? eh? get it?) about Chrono Trigger but suffice it to say I was beyond excited when Square announced a sequel would be coming to the PlayStation, which I had only recently acquired. Chrono Cross was released in 1999 in Japan, just four years after Chrono Trigger. Looking at the two games, that seems wild. It also seems wild to me because I am old now and four years seems like such a short period of time, whereas when I was 15 it seemed like a lifetime to wait for a sequel to the best game of all time. The game wouldn’t release until 2000 in the US, which made the wait that much more excruciating. I avoid prerelease hype for the most part now, but back then I devoured any scrap of info or media that I could find about this mysterious new sequel. I had only recently gotten the internet (insert old man emoji here), but I scoured sites like IGN and Gamespot for any rumor or news, and any gaming magazine that even mentioned it was an instant buy. The strategy guide, published by BradyGAMES, was released almost a week before the game and I snapped it up and tried my best to avoid flipping through it and ruining any surprises that were in store.

My original encounter with Chrono Cross was not quite as magical as my experience with Chrono Trigger was, which seems like a pretty common experience among Chrono fans. [Plenty of spoilers ahead.] Don’t get me wrong, I loved the game, and it was one of my favorite RPGs, but (like many) I was undeniably disappointed that the story wasn’t a direct continuation of the previous game. I wanted to know what my favorite characters were up to after Lavos was defeated. Did Crono still have all of those cats? What did Marle’s eventual reign look like? Where did Magus go? It felt, at the time, like Chrono Cross purposely neglected any and all questions of the sort. There were nods to the first game, but this felt like its own thing, and that was something of a letdown, if I was being honest. Even the major inclusion of Schala, one of my favorite characters from Chrono Trigger, seemed somewhat tenuous, at best. I loved Schala so much that I called the Nintendo Tip Line for the first time ever and asked if there was some way to save her from her fate in the Ocean Palace. I awkwardly, nervously lied and said, “I heard somewhere that there was a way to prevent her from dying so I, uh, just wanted to check.” The Game Counselor™ was like “uh… yeah, I don’t think so.”

So, when I found out that Kid, one of the central characters in Chrono Cross, was Schala’s clone, and that you were fighting to free the real Schala from the Time Devourer, I had mixed feelings. That young Joey that called Nintendo to try and find out if Schala could be saved should have been thrilled! But this Schala, or her clone, didn’t seem like the character I knew and loved from Chrono Trigger. She was the opposite, in fact. Instead of being quiet, reflective, concerned, selfless, and sporting flowing purple hair and royal robes, she is spunky, brash, reckless, determined, loud, and wearing sporty clothing with a blonde ponytail. Look, I really like Kid as a character, but she is more like a mix of Ayla and Marle than anything remotely close to Schala. This is just one example of the ways the game changed or kind of glossed over familiar elements from Chrono Trigger, making it feel more like a game inspired by CT and not a sequel. Again, I enjoyed my time with it and even got all the endings and characters, but I don’t know that it hit me as hard as I was hoping it would.

Enter the long-awaited Chrono Cross: The Radical Dreamers Edition. Like many Chrono fans, I’d had my fingers crossed for years that this would come out. While I love Chrono Trigger and would love some kind of remaster (Pixel Remaster, pls) or reissue, I’ve played that game on the SNES, PlayStation, Nintendo DS, Steam, and iOS, while Chrono Cross hasn’t been offered the same kind of multi-platform accessibility. Plus, it’s a 3D PS1 RPG, which requires a bit more polish to make it run and look good on contemporary hardware, whereas the 2D sprites of Chrono Trigger are pretty timeless. I was eager to try Cross again, not just because it would be slightly prettier and more accessible (and I could get trophies for it, heh), but because I’d hoped that with time many of my conflicted feelings about the game would situate themselves. I was worried, though. What if I didn’t like it this time? What if years of newer and more streamlined RPGs had spoiled me and Chrono Cross felt stiff and hard to navigate? I’d tried to play the Final Fantasy VIII remaster and quit shortly into it because of these reasons, so what if that happened again with one of my favorite RPGs of all time?

It did not, dear reader. After beating this edition of Chrono Cross five times, getting all the characters and endings, and snagging the platinum trophy on PS5, I can say that I have a much deeper appreciation for the core game now. It’s not perfect, but it was wildly ambitious, and I think it achieved much of what it tried to. For example, when I first entered combat and saw the multi-attack/hit percentage system, I was like “oh no.” I’d forgotten about this little wrinkle to the combat system, and even now I’m not a fan of the misleading percentages. But I think the system itself works. Having to think about whether I should swing big and go for a critical strike at the cost of possibly whiffing, or use lighter, more guaranteed strikes to build up my stamina for a big magic attack, made combat feel dynamic and active, which I liked. The magic system, where each character had an affinity, but you could slot most magic attacks into anyone’s inventory was perhaps needlessly cumbersome (I still wish there was an easier way to save builds, rather than manually slotting them in over and over whenever you switch characters, or using the crappy autofill option), but I also appreciated that it allowed for seemingly infinite unique builds of your enormous roster of teammates. Yes, I relied on the same handful of spells for most of my runs, but with every new playthrough I thought about new and interesting builds I could do if I was more adventurous.

I was also worried about how janky and jaggy it might look, and although it took me a bit to get used to the shuddering that seems to persist with remasters of PS1 games (where, say, character idle animations sort of shudder without cause), I was overall very impressed with how the characters look (in particular) They retain the odd proportions of early 3D humanoid character models, but the colorful, vibrant cast look so good now, and their new portraits are gorgeous. I read somewhere that they lost the original high-res files for the background art, so they had to use AI upscaling to make them 4K compatible, and it seems to mostly work. Some backgrounds do look a bit murky, making it hard to distinguish between paths that you can navigate and environmental art, but some backgrounds seem to look more ethereal and artistic, which was a nice surprise. The Sea of Eden looked especially stunning.

I don’t know that I need to say much about the music. Chrono Cross’s soundtrack has been lauded as one of the best in video games since it came out, and I’ve been happy to see new people discover how vibrant, eclectic, and haunting it can be. I can’t even say that it stirred my nostalgia like other video game music has, mainly because I still listen to it pretty frequently while I’m writing or doing something that requires concentration. What didn’t quite stick in my memory as well were the finer details of the story, though. And, having played it again several times now, I can see why. Like many Japanese games, the plot really requires you to pay attention (and even then, its vague, twisty nature means it can be hard to track). Having played it before allowed me to pay even closer attention to subtle details, and I actually came to a much deeper appreciation for the story and how it really does continue the core premise of Chrono Trigger. What I’d once thought of dismissively as “nods” to the first game are far more significant. There are characters that are close to CT characters, like Glenn (a brave knight, like Glenn from CT) and Luccia (a genius scientists with a lively laugh, much like Lucca from CT), and I used to think of them as not-so-subtle tributes. But there is a line in a late-game dungeon that talks about how people exist as forms across many timelines and dimensions, which makes me think that these are not “nods,” but legitimate alternate versions of known characters. A “what if this character was born in a different world or time” kind of thing. I also don’t know that I fully appreciated Robo’s role in the story back in the day, but his sacrifice moved me this time around. I also really loved Balthasar’s significant role, though I really wish they’d given him a Nu companion.

Okay, yes, let’s just move on, shall we?

Speaking of companions, the ability to recruit a sprawling, freaky cast of characters to follow you into battle was so ambitious and I appreciate the dev team for getting in as many characters as they did. I’ve read that they’d hoped to make it so that every character you speak with could be recruited but had to scale back due to scope, but I’m happy with the current roster. The game forces you to switch it up a few times (with the forced protagonist body and team swap), and I rotated pretty often, but some of my regular team members were Kid, Leena, Starky, Marcy, Riddel, Luccia, and Harle. Being able to slot most magic into any character meant that I didn’t have to think as much about who was good at what, so I usually went with who I thought would be fun to have in my party. I have to say, I feel like a Luccia apologist. She is framed as a typical mad scientist, more interested in making strides in science than morality or doing what’s “right” (plus she has poor Pip in a cage). I couldn’t help it, though. Look at her! Maybe it’s the new, high def character model, but I was smitten.

But she could never take the place of my main squeeze, Harle. I fell in love with Harle when I first played the game, and I guess playing Chrono Cross again after all these years does cast her in a different light. I remember her being a much more sympathetic character. While she does express conflicted feelings and regret about (seemingly) having to oppose you, she ultimately does just that. Was I mostly smitten with her because she seemed to have a thing for “me” (Serge)? I mean, she is adorable, and I love her French accent and how flirty and feisty she is, but she’s also pretty rude to my friends. At one point, she says “If you had to chooze between ze world and moi… which would you chooze?” I think I’ve always said that I would choose her, yet she seems unwilling to make the same choice for me. One of the endings does make it seem like you’re living a happy(ish) life alongside Harle as Lynx, though, so I guess that will have to be enough. With the rising popularity of romance systems in games, I do look back at JRPGs from this era, like Chrono Cross and Final Fantasy VIII and wish they could somehow retroactively add a dating system. If they did, I tell myself that I’d end up replaying the game many times over to date most or all the roster, but deep down I think I can admit that I would just keep picking Harle and muttering “next time. Next time I’ll choose Luccia” under my breath.

In the end, I was shocked by how much I loved playing through this game again, over 20 years after my first time with it. There was some nostalgia, but that didn’t impact my opinion of it nearly as much as I thought it would. Yes, there are some minor performance issues and I wish I didn’t have to stand exactly in front of chests and doors to open them, but there was far more to love about this experience and after getting the platinum trophy I walked away reluctantly, somehow still wanting to play more. I have other games to get to and there’s not much else for me to accomplish in Chrono Cross, but these playthroughs brought with them a more profound appreciation for the colorful, quirky, lovely world and characters I spent so much time with. Square’s willingness to release this with such fanfare gives me some faint hope that, should this game find success, we might actually see the fabled Chrono Break someday. They trademarked the name at some point and seemingly dropped the project, but with their recent investment in HD-2D games and willingness to develop games with retro art styles that are less development intensive in terms of funding (like I Am Setsuna), I remain somewhat hopefully that they’ll see the potential in giving a small but experienced team some funding to close out a Chrono trilogy. I mean, they could also throw a ton of money at a 3D remake of Chrono Trigger. After this experience with Chrono Cross, I just want more, damn it.

Okay, so the fourth wall breaking was a little silly.

E3 2021 Hype-rule Warrior (it me)

E3 is back, baby! Well, almost. Kind of. Sort of. Not really, but there are a bunch of exciting videos and streams from most of the big industry publishers coming up, so that’s good enough for me. It’s been a while since I’ve written out a wish list, but I just published the latest podcast episode, all about this very subject, so I thought I’d revisit my old wish lists and put the power of my desire for these games into the universe on the off chance that it somehow reaches the hearts of these publishers many months in the past and they begin working on these games with enough time to produce and show something for this event. Did that make sense? Probably not, but let’s move on.

Like many gamers, I have that nasty habit of getting my hopes way up for E3. I can usually keep my expectations in check, but there are always those little embers of hope that will burn eternally for some new, exciting entry in a long-loved series, or maybe some shocking new IP from a favorite developer. There are things we know we can reasonably expect, but it’s the things that seem farfetched that are the most tantalizing to dare wish for. My previous wish lists have been a mix of the two, and while I’m usually slightly disappointed when most of my hopes are dashed by any given E3 showing, my track record isn’t a complete disaster. From the two lists above, we did end up getting a new Animal Crossing game on Switch, Final Fantasy VII Remake, Dragon Quest XI, a new Tomb Raider game, Soulcalibur VI, plus announcements of new Fable and Perfect Dark games. And I want more? Yes. Always. Here are some things I want from some of the big publishers and platform holders.

Ubisoft

Sure, I want to see a teaser for a new Assassin’s Creed game, and I’d be pretty hyped for a new Splinter Cell even though I never played through any of the previous entries. What I really want from Ubisoft this year is info on Skull and Bones, though. I know they went back to the drawing board in terms of the game’s direction, and that set them back a bit, but they have to have something by now, right? Right? If I’m really being sassy, I don’t just want a new teaser, either. I want a full reveal. I want more than just ship-to-ship combat. I want exploration. I want to hunt for an old wooden treasure chest buried deep in the sand. I want to swim away from a cute fifteen foot great white shark who wants nothing more than to chomp my widdle feets. I want to sail under the stars, riding the wind and singing shanties with me maties. I want to pirate, not just fire cannonballs at another ship. And I want the option to do it offline, please. Give it to me, Ubisoft.

Microsoft/Bethesda

I don’t really know what I want from Microsoft, to be honest. They’ve heard my prayers for a new Fable game and even a new Perfect Dark game, so what else could a boy ask for? Well, mostly more of the same. Meaning, just show me the things I already know you’re working on. Give me a big ol’ substantial Starfield reveal. Show me multiple planets I can visit, show me a better and more fleshed out romance system (than the Elder Scrolls or Fallout games), show me a release window. Show me a better and more impressive Halo Infinite trailer. And, if you really want to be generous, actually show me something from the aforementioned Fable and Perfect Dark games. I get the sense that the latter is probably still very early in development, but even a flashy, brief teaser would be good. Even though I mostly want to see what I already know exists, I am pretty excited for Microsoft’s presentation, because they’ve done a good job of dropping big surprises in recent shows. They might even give me something I don’t even know I want yet!

Square Enix

Square Enix is a big one for me, due in no small part to the fact that they have made some of my favorite games and series of all time. They are one of the shows where my hopes are always way off the charts. Yes, I want to see more of Final Fantasy XVI and am hoping for a new Tomb Raider game, but what I really want I very much doubt I’ll get. Well, I’ll get Dragon Quest XII, because they just recently announced that at the Dragon Quest 35^th Anniversary event. It’s probably also too early to see anything from the follow-up to Final Fantasy VII Remake, but boy howdy do I want to. And it would be perfect timing, given that the next gen version of the first game and a new DLC episode is dropping this month. If they do show it, I’d love for confirmation that there will some kind of overworld or open world for us to explore. I also want confirmation that Jesse is still alive. *teary-eyed emoji* The things I really, really want are probably not going to happen, but every year I cross my fingers and pray to the ancient gaming gods for Square Enix to do something with the Chrono franchise. The original game seems to get more and more love with each passing year, yet Square has done virtually nothing with it. I think many of us would love something dramatic, like a remake or a sequel, but at this point I would settle for a remastered version or a remake/remaster of Chrono Cross. Just some sign that they are aware that they have control over one of the most revered and highly regarded games of all time. I would also love a new Parasite Eve game, even if it’s just remasters of the two original games. Lastly, and this is a new one, with the reveal of an HD-2D remake of Dragon Quest III, I would love to see some classic Final Fantasy games done in the same engine/style. That one seems more plausible than my other two impossible wishes, but it also seems like something that we wouldn’t see until next year at the earliest.

Take-Two/Rockstar

There are rumors of a Red Dead Redemption remake/remaster, and of course we’re all curious about the state of Grand Theft Auto VI at this point, but who knows if/when we’ll see that. No, what I want is something I’ve been dreaming about for a very long time: Bully 2. Rumors of a sequel to the first game have kind of ebbed and flowed over the years, with pockets of certainty followed by some interview snippet that seems to completely shut it down. At a recent investor call, a rep for Take-Two said that “new iterations” of existing Rockstar IP were on their projected development table, and while that might very well just mean new GTA and Red Dead games, there is a silly little part of my brain that is hoping beyond hope that they mean the long-awaited Bully 2. Even a remake of the first game in the new engine with added content would be fine.

Capcom

Okay, so when I hear “Capcom” I automatically think “Resident Evil.” I haven’t played a Monster Hunter game yet, and Street Fighter VI is just a given, right? So, aside from a surprise new Marvel vs Capcom or Street Fighter Alpha announcement (doubtful), what I most want is, well, more Resident Evil. I know, I know, they just released one of my favorite RE games of all time, but it’s not just that I’m a greedy glutton for more (though, to be fair, I am). Capcom has released four mainline Resident Evil games in the last four years: Resident Evil 7 (2017), Resident Evil 2 (2019), Resident Evil 3 (2020), and Resident Evil Village (2021). All of those games are excellent, and if I remember correctly at some point they stated that they intended to stagger new entries with remakes. If that’s true, it’s remake time, babyyyyyy. I get the sense that people want a Code: Veronica remake but expect a Resident Evil 4 remake. Either of those would be fine with me, but if I’m being honest, what I really want is a re-remake of the original Resident Evil, or maybe even a combination of Resident Evil 0 and that game, since their stories directly tie together and overlap. The original has already been remade, true, and maybe that will be what delays or prevents its consideration for the remake treatment. But that remake was released almost twenty years ago and was still using the pre-rendered backround/tank control-style of old school RE games. Imagine it remade in the new engine with an over-the-shoulder camera, like RE 2. *drools* Capcom did confirm that they’ll be talking about Resident Evil Village, and my hope is that we see actual DLC and not just more of Re:Verse. Resident Evil 7 had some excellent DLC, so I want to see more of that with Village. Maybe one pack that follows Chris’s exploits, and two packs dedicated to showing us more backstory for the four lords? Two lords per pack?

Nintendo

Nintendo seems to have a habit of either completely rocking people’s shit and being the talk of the show, or being the biggest disappointment. They can’t help it, though, if you think about it. They have the biggest, longest standing stable of classic characters and series. At every turn, people are asking when the next Mario or Zelda or Smash or Kart or Crossing or Paper or you name it. So it’s a given that there will always be a swath of Nintendo fans that will walk away sad that they didn’t see their favorite series or character represented. And Nintendo is in a very comfortable place right now in terms of both hardware and software sales, so it’s not exactly like they need to make a big splash. Still, I hope they not only show what’s become known as Breath of the Wild 2, but also give us a release date. Some people think it will be a 2022 game, but I have a hard time seeing it slipping from this year. If it really is using the same engine and assets as the first game, which it seems to be, I bet they’ve finished most of the core game by now and are in the polishing/testing phase. Mid-November to early December seems like a fair release window to me. Having said that, what do I want to see from a sequel to what’s become my favorite Zelda game? I not only want to see more Zelda, I want this to be a co-op adventure. If you had to switch back and forth between Link and Zelda for certain puzzles and if you could have a friend take the helm of one character, that would be pretty awesome.

Mario Kart 8 is one of my favorite games of all time, and with the original release being a full seven years ago, you’d think we were due for another entry. 8 has been selling like gangbusters month after month since the Switch version released, though, so I kind of doubt Nintendo is rushing the next version out the door. Still, it would be exciting to get a teaser, at least, as unlikely as it is. The reveal of new Smash characters is always fun, and rumors about which multiplatform character might show up next are always a good time. I said this in one of the previous wish list posts, but the time seems more right than ever for Master Chief. Would I love a character from Chrono Trigger? Magus, preferably? Sure. But that seems like a long, long, long shot. Nintendo’s already put two Microsoft fighters in (Minecraft Steve and Banjo & Kazooie), so the emerald-armored Spartan seems more and more likely, especially given the presumably close proximity of Halo Infinite’s release. Given my love for Fire Emblem: Three Houses, I also want a peek at the first true Switch Fire Emblem game. Three Houses started life as a 3DS game, and with how simplistic and muddy some of the environmental art is, it showed. I’d settle for a game that looked the same if the story and characters were just as good, but I’d love for them to wow us with a game that takes advantage of the rumored Switch Pro.

And, of course, the two games I will never stop wishing for until Nintendo delivers them to us: Mother 3 and a new Eternal Darkness game. I mean, I’d take anything from either franchise. The long-awaited English translation of Mother 3, an EarthBound remaster, a whole new game in the series. An Eternal Darkness remake, ala Resident Evil 2, a sequel that utilizes the HD rumble and other Switch features, whatever. Just do something with one or both of those series, damn it. I fear that the most likely window for some EarthBound news has passed, with the 30^th anniversary of the first game in the series and the 25^th anniversary of the second having passed. Sigh. It seems like an eventuality, because the call for a localization or port have only increased over the years, but when we’ll finally hear something seems a mystery. Also, where is our new Virtual Console, Nintendo? The current set-up can’t hold a candle to the previous catalog.

Bandai Namco

Bandai Namco have lots that they could show, put there are two pretty specific things that I want: remasters of the first two Tales games (Tales of Destiny and its sequel), and Ace Combat 8. Given the fact that Project Aces, Namco’s internal development team behind the AC games, had to reportedly fight for the chance to make AC 7, I have to wonder about the possibility for a sequel. Still, it was fairly successful both critically and commercially, so I’m holding out hope. Can you imagine a photorealistic flight sim that takes advantage of next gen processing power? As the kids say, “sheeeeeeesh.”

Sega

Persona 6. I want to just leave that here. No explanation. But I can’t. It’s probably my most anticipated game for the near future, but we’ve heard virtually zero about it. We know it’s in development, but at what stage is Atlus in? Persona 5 came out in Japan five years ago, so it sure feels like they must be pretty deep in development by now, even if P-Studio did help out with all of the bonus Persona games we’ve been treated to these five long years. Like Square Enix, Atlus/Sega has been targeting worldwide launches as of late, so my deep, deep hope is that we see a teaser at E3, get a trailer by the end of the year, and see the full game released next year. In the meantime, give us a remake or remaster of Persona 3, you cowards! You’ve already made new assets for the dancing game! Do it! Please!

And what about all of those Sega acquisition rumors? They’ve persisted for years, ever since Sega moved away from hardware, really, but they’ve always seemed kind of silly and star-gazey. It wasn’t until GamesIndustry.biz reported that Sega’s parent company had divided its assets, including its games division, in what could be preparation for a sale of some (but not all) assets. Sega has made some acquisitions of its own in recent years, including Atlus, and it may have been part of an effort to bolster its appeal for a sale. The rumors always seemed far-fetched to me until now. But who would they sell to? The name I keep hearing is Microsoft, and while that would make sense from Microsoft’s side, Sega is an old, storied Japanese company, so I have my doubts about that. That’s not to say I can’t see it, but it would surprise me more than if Sony or even Square Enix picked them up, even though those two don’t “need” it as much (and could Square Enix afford it?). Either way, if the rumors are true, and we learned about it at E3 – holy shit. What a historic year that would make this.

EA/BioWare

While EA is doing its own thing, as usual, I’m including my wishes for them here. They have a huge portfolio of games, but there are only a few I’m dying to hear more about or, dare I demand, see. New entries in both the Dragon Age and Mass Effect series have been teased, but only very recently. Do they have enough to show something substantial? Probably not, but I would love to see it, if they did. I do think they could probably have a short sizzle trailer for Dragon Age by this point, so that would be amazing to finally get a glimpse of. In terms of a surprise, though, I’d fall out of my proverbial chair if they showed anything from the long-rumored Knights of the Old Republic remake. I think I remember reading that BioWare is not working on it, but I assume EA still has the rights, so if it was going to be at a show, it would probably be this one, right? If we did see it, it would shoot to the top tier of my most-anticipated games list for sure.

Sony

Sony is also doing its own thing again, but unfortunately we don’t have any clue when that might be. Guerrilla Games recently said that they are still shooting for a 2021 release date for Horizon Forbidden West but are waiting until they’re more certain before announcing a date. Are they waiting for Sony’s event, or is Sony holding off on their event until they have a firm date that they can announce? That’s the last bit of info for Horizon that I’m interested in. I want it. Just give it to me this year. God of War: Ragnarok was originally slated to release this year but has since been pushed to 2022, but that means they are well into development at this point. Far enough along to share some actual footage, right? So I’m looking forward to that. I’d also love to see a new Uncharted game, but who knows if Naughty Dog will have had enough time to produce something showable, given that The Last of Us Part II came out just last year. The real thing I want to see at Sony’s show, though, is PlayStation VR 2. They’ve announced it and teased its features, but I want to see it in action. Well, as much as you can with a VR headset. I want to hear about the comfort, the convenience, the games – give me all the deets, damn it.

There are other things I’d love to see, of course, but these are the big ones. I listed more than I have in the past, so maybe now if only 20% of these hopes/dreams/predictions come true, I won’t be as sad because that will still be several games I’m getting. *wink* Who am I kidding? The moment the Nintendo showcase ends and we’re left with no Mother 3 again, the post-E3 depression will set in, regardless of the fact that we got surprise Metal Gear and Silent Hill announcements and the Resident Evil 4 remake looks rad. Just kidding. I would absolutely settle for that. Until then, I’m grabbing my nachos and Coke Zero and settling in for an exciting few days coming up!

My Gaming Tattoos

I’ve been meaning for a fair while to write a blog about my gaming tattoos, but my problem is that, uh… I can’t stop getting them. So every time I sit down and think “time to write that blog,” I remember that I have a new design in mind for a few months from now. Oh, and one for a few months after that. And I’ll probably get one when… Ultimately, I’m working on a “piecemeal” sleeve, which is basically a sleeve of various tattoos that aren’t necessarily connected (though usually there is a “filler” between them that brings the disparate pieces together). So I still have a few small-medium designs that will fill the gaps on that arm, and then some tiny-small designs to act as filler. I’ll share those at the end, but because I’ve been collecting these for some time, I guess I want to start at the beginning.

[Cue nostalgic 8-bit video game music]

[Cut to a younger Joey, age 16, doodling in a notebook]

[Joey turns to camera, slightly surprised and bemused]

“Oh, hello. I’m Younger Joey. And I thought this was a good idea but now that I’m writing lines for my younger self, I realize how absolutely dumb this is. Let’s go back to normal writing, like a normal person.”

Ahem. I’ve wanted a tattoo or two since I was a teenager. I used to doodle ideas of what I wanted my first tattoo to be, including (as you might imagine of a 90s teen), band logos, a scorpion, my astrological sign (Scorpio, and yes I had a pet scorpion and a silver scorpion ring and many other scorpion-related things, I WAS 16 OKAY), something with Freddy Krueger, video game icons, and more. It wasn’t until I joined the Air Force when I was 20 that I decided to actually go through with it. I was getting a decent-sized, steady paycheck, after all, and there were several tattoo shops of varying quality around Keesler Air Force Base, where I did my technical training. My first tattoo was not gaming related, however. I had a fresh new notebook that I was doodling ideas in, and there were several video game designs (an NES controller, Pac-Man and ghosts, a Tri-Force, and other now-cliché concepts, I WAS 20 OKAY), but it wasn’t until about a year later that I got my second tattoo, a Starman Deluxe from EarthBound.

Let me pause here and apologize for a few things. First off, I am not photographer, and some of these pictures were taken by me. The non-photographer. I mean, I’m not even, like, a decent Instagram picture-taker. So please excuse the bad lighting, posing, focus, etc. It’s hard to take pictures of your own tattoos, man. Second, some of these pictures are fresh, meaning I took them immediately after the artist finished, so they are puffy, raw, and maybe a little bloody. Having someone scrape a violently vibrating needle across your skin for a couple of hours will do that. Lastly, I must apologize for my skin. I know that some sections of my body look like paper-thin sheets of slightly hairy pig skin stretched over a sack of moles and blemishes, and I’m okay with that. So just overlook it, alright?

Where were we? Ah, yes. I deliberated for a long time about which video game tattoo would be my first. I spent hours scanning through hundreds of images from some of my favorite games. Because I’d only had one tattoo, and I wasn’t planning on getting all that many more, I felt like this tattoo had to pack a lot of meaning into a relatively small space. I decided on a Starman Deluxe because EarthBound is one of my favorite games of all time, and the art design from that game seemed to me to be a lot more tattoo-friendly than, say, Chrono Trigger, my favorite game of all time. There are many great characters and enemies in EarthBound, but I landed on the Starman Deluxe because, well, it’s a badass robot from space with shoulder spikes. Plus the Starmen (Starmans?) are pretty iconic, and given the number of classic rock references in the game, I have always assumed they were inspired by David Bowie’s song “Starman,” and I love David Bowie. So it all just kind of made sense.

Then, after six years and four non-gaming tattoos, I got my second game related tattoo – uh, yet another EarthBound tattoo. I know! I know. I love a lot of different games, but after getting the Starman Deluxe I really wanted to get the four main characters from the game, too, so they were always near the top of my list of tattoos-to-get. I like that they all have a distinct look, there are multiple colors going on, and my artist (Brian at Spider Tattooz in Sycamore, IL) actually honored my request to do them in their original pixel form. I don’t think I quite appreciated at the time how difficult that is to do, but since then I’ve had several artists compliment them and reveal that it’s a really tricky thing to pull off. So I am very happy with them, and I think they are holding up nicely (unlike the Starman, which you can see is already starting to fade a bit, sad face emoji).

By this point I’d realized that I probably wanted a few other video game tattoos on that arm, so I began collecting pictures and ideas to make a piecemeal sleeve. I made a folder on my laptop and filled it with characters, logos, symbols, etc. from my favorite games, and after yet another couple of non-gaming related tattoos, I made an appointment to get my next tattoo from my current artist, Erin from Proton Tattoo in DeKalb, IL. I’d looked up her work and really liked a thick-lined Link from The Legend of Zelda that she did, so I felt that she was the right person to do a Princess Peach tattoo, which I’d been looking forward to getting for years. It turned out that her handle is Sweet Peach Parfait, and, as she informed me as we discussed the design, the “Peach” was for Princess Peach herself. Serendipity at its finest. I gave her these three pieces of official artwork and asked her to make a design based on her own personal style.

And here is what she came up with. She went with a bust framed by a heart, and she added a flower because those are kind of her thing.

Princess Peach was my very first favorite video game character. Granted, I hadn’t encountered all that many unique characters by the time I’d played Super Mario Bros. 2, so I hadn’t really even thought of who my favorite characters were, but in that particular game she was a clear winner for me. She wasn’t as fast as the other characters, and maybe you had to try a little harder to pull up vegetables, but I loved that she could hover using her dress. Later, when I fell in love with Mario Kart 64, Peach was again my go-to character. So much so that I became irrevocably tied to her among my close friends, and would then always choose her when playing Mario Party, Mario Tennis, Mario Golf, or almost any of the party-based Nintendo games. I was so happy with Erin’s work on this tattoo that I decided that I would go to her for my next tattoo as well, which was:

Ann, from Persona 5! I gave Erin the pictures above and again asked for her to come up with whatever she thought best, and she went with another bust coming out of a geometric shape. This time she went with an oval, which she filled with a beautiful teal that contrasts so well with the red of Panther’s Phantom Thieves outfit. I couldn’t believe how good it looked when she was done. I think even she was impressed with her own work, because she commented that it looked like she slapped a sticker on my arm. I saw someone on Twitter post a picture of their Ryuji tattoo, so I decided to comment on it with a compliment and a picture of my Ann tattoo, and Erika Harlacher (Ann’s voice actor in the game) actually liked and commented on it! How cool was that?

It was, Dear Reader, exceptionally cool. Insert the cool emoji here. The one with the little sunglasses. Cool. Like Ann, who was my bae in Persona 5, a game with incredible style and a million tattoo-able characters (some of which I plan on getting in the future). Interestingly enough (to exactly one person – me), I got that Ann tattoo exactly a year ago today. And it was at that time that I’d decided I wanted to stick with the theme of video game ladies as the primary components of my sleeve, so the next tattoo I got was Chun-Li, my oldest video game crush and the subject of a previous blog of mine.

Once again, I gave Erin the above images and she produced a breathtaking bust framed by a new geometric shape. This might be my favorite tattoo, in terms of aesthetic. It has the thick black outlines that she loves to do, but the delicate line work on Chun-Li’s eyes, nose, mouth, ribbons, etc. always makes me happy that I chose to get this one on my wrist, where I frequently catch glimpses of it. I love the mix of pink, blue, and yellow, too, though I do have to say that in terms of pain, this was one of the worst spots. It swelled a lot. My wrist looked absolutely pregnant when I unwrapped it later that night. It did not, sadly, produce any little baby street fighters, however.

I got my next two tattoos as a part of the Halloween sale that Proton puts on annually. Among the designs that I’d given Erin for future tattoos was a Bob-omb, from the Mario games. For the sale, she posted a whole sheet of Nintendo designs that she’d drawn up for the occasion, the Bob-omb and a Boo among them. I loved the Boo, so I really wanted to get that, but I also wanted to get an original design she made for the sale, which was the Prince from Katamari Damacy rolling a jack-o-lantern. Because, well, it’s the Prince from Katamari Damacy rolling a fucking jack-o-lantern. She was generous enough to allow me to get both designs, which was awesome. Prior to these, I’d always gotten tattoos that I had some kind of personal connection to, so these were the first I got just because I liked the way they looked. I mean, you could count Boo in with my personal history of Mario games, but that’s not why I got it. And that’s okay with me.

The next two on the list were also done on the same day (as each other, not the previous two), and one of them was the previously mentioned Bob-omb. I gave Erin a simple Bob-omb design and she went all out and added text, a bright explosion, and an old-school comic style. It is eye-catching and because of its central location on my arm, it really pulls everything together visually. That central location is my elbow pit, sometimes called “the ditch.” And let me tell you, it hurt like “the bitch.” That didn’t quite work but just go with it. But seriously, it hurt so. Bad. I got the other tattoo first, on the back of my wrist, and as she was doing it I remember thinking “this isn’t so bad. It hardly hurts. It’s more like a minor annoyance.” When she was tattooing my ditch I remember thinking “I might die and defecate at the same time, holy balls, can I just bite on something, does she have something I can bite on, is that weird, has anyone had a heart attack from getting a tattoo, I think I might have a heart attack and die and defecate, shit.” Or something along those lines. For, like, an hour and a half. It was fun. But worth it! It ended up not healing well, because I unconsciously bent it a little in my sleep on the first night and the scab formed weirdly because of that, but I’m going in for a touch up soon.

The other tattoo I got on that day, at long, long last, was a Chrono Trigger design. As I mentioned before, the art style of the game is such that there aren’t many symbols or icons or designs that would make a unique tattoo, so I wanted to get a character. And, since I was filling this arm with ladies, I went with the villain Flea. “Flea!?” I hear you gasp, mouth agape and fingers gently fanned out on your chest. “Not Marle? Or Lucca? Or Ayla? Or, one of your favorite characters, so much so that you’ve considered naming a future daughter after her, Schala!? I thought I knew you, man.” Well, it does sound like you know me, mysterious and fictional person who I just invented, but I went with Flea for a few reasons. First, I loved her character. She was so flirty and fun and I wished I could recruit her to my team instead of having to kill her. Second, I love her design. In a tall, dark tower filled with bats, skeletons, and three heavy metal edgelords (Magus, Slash, and Ozzie), she’s out here in white and pink, with a high, perky ponytail. Third, she has one of the best lines in the game. When Frog tries to out her as a man, despite her presenting and identifying as a woman, she says (in the SNES translation), “Male, female, what’s the difference? Power is beautiful, and I’ve got the power!” I also think the issue of her gender is interesting and perhaps historic, but that’s the subject of a future blog.

This brings us to my latest video game tattoo, one that, as a huge Legend of Zelda fan, Erin was pretty excited to do: Princess Zelda. Like Chun-Li, I wrote a blog about my love for the character, and also like Chun-Li, she is now my favorite tattoo. It’s difficult to choose between them. They share a level of grace and smooth detail, and I am honored to have them on my body forever. This was the largest of the pieces that Erin did, and it’s in a sensitive spot, right on the inside/back of my bicep. The colors are so bright and crisp, the lines are elegant, and she added one of those flowers that she loves – this time, a silent princess flower, which is obviously so perfect. I completely love it. Now I do that obnoxious thing where someone flexes their bicep and kisses it, but I’m just doing it to give Zelda a little smooch. I’m just kidding, I don’t do that. Because I just thought of it. So now I will probably start doing it. Forever.

People get tattoos for all kinds of reasons. For some, they are showpieces – reflections of their personalities through art. I won’t deny that I’m not super flattered when someone compliments my tattoos, but I mostly get them for myself. They are a celebration of the things that I love. I like looking at them, even now. I am planning on going in for another one or two in a couple of weeks, and I have several more planned. I was going to write about those future tattoos now, but this is already woefully long, and I like the idea of posting an update blog in a few years, when the sleeve is totally done. Until then, thanks for reading, Dear Fictional Reader, who I am fantasizing made it all the way to the end of this blog.

Dragon Quest XI Performs its Best Puff-Puff: Joey has an Enormous Grin on His Face

Dragon Quest VIII is high on my list of favorite games of all time. I bought it on a whim while on vacation, and I spent two solid weeks playing it for hours and hours. I hunted down and crafted all the best gear, I beat all of the post-game quests, and I took down the most difficult optional bosses. It was the kind of game that made me want more, even if it was just merchandise, so I ran out while I was still playing it to buy the official strategy guide and this beautiful and completely ridiculous controller:

That was almost fifteen years ago. Since then, I have been desperate for a new console DQ game. I’ve played DQ IV, VII, and IX on the DS/3DS, and I bought but haven’t yet played V. These portable versions of the DQ experience are excellent. They vary slightly in mechanics, but they all capture their own version of the classic and magical DQ formula. But I have always preferred my RPGs on console. It would be easy to say that it’s because the graphics are often better, allowing for more fully realized and visually stimulating worlds, but I think it goes beyond that, in a way. For some reason, I forget about portable games more easily. Sometimes I even have trouble remembering which portable DQ game was which. I still loved them, but there was something missing, and only a new, full console entry would satisfy that craving I had.

And Dragon Quest XI: Echoes of an Elusive Age did indeed satisfy that craving. It scratched that itch. Satiated that hunger. It was big, beautiful, familiar and fresh. This isn’t a formal review, but I want to get some of my thoughts down, so there will be some spoilers. First, I want to say that, as with DQ VIII, I was consistently impressed with the graphics. Both games are obviously highly stylized, with VIII using the then-fairly-new cel shading approach. That was a good choice, as it allowed Square Enix to create what looked like an anime or a comic book in a 3D space, which was charming and surprisingly immersive. The graphics in DQ XI are more refined and advanced, of course, but they are similarly successful in using crisp black outlines to make the game look like a really good cartoon realized in 3D. They used the Unreal Engine, which I guess explains some of the realistic lighting and water effects, which adds an interesting element and makes the world feel a bit richer and more real. Technical stuff aside, the art style, colors, shadows, enemy animations, environments and more were gorgeous and I found myself in awe of one scene or another all the way to the 200 hour point, which is when I stopped playing.

There have been some complaints about the soundtrack, since the orchestral versions of many tracks that were already recorded were not used. I can understand and agree with this to some extent, but contributors to two different popular podcasts used words like “atrocious” and “terrible” and “horrible” to describe the existing digital recordings, which I think is ridiculously overstated and hyperbolic. They aren’t as good as the orchestral versions used in DQ VIII, true, and maybe the composer is a raging, closed-minded asshole, but the tracks themselves are as solid and classic as they always have been. It seems odd to retroactively evaluate them because they aren’t the better versions.

I had my doubts about the cast going into the game. Though I successfully avoided most discussion of the game, I had heard from one person that this was the best cast in the series. Being so fond of the cast from VIII, of course, I was unsure how anyone could top them. And looking at the designs of these new characters did little to alleviate that concern. But, once again, I was taught the valuable lesson that you have to experience something fully in order to appreciate it, for better or worse. In this case, it was for better. Between each character’s backstory and their excellent voice acting, I quickly fell in love with this cast. They may look like fairly typical anime types on paper, but the game’s writing and performances elevate them, as is the case with many an admirable anime or video game. I’ll talk more about some of the characters later, but whether it was the lustful old nobleman, the stoic and loyal-to-a-fault knight, or the sassy little witch, I adored my friends and travel companions.

In a blog post I wrote for 1UP.com ages ago, one of the things I talked about was how fun the combat was in DQ VIII, despite its old-school design and the usually-annoying random battles. Well, even though I was okay with random battles in VIII, they got rid of them in XI while maintaining the straightforward yet still strategic turn-based combat, which just means that it was that much more rewarding. I found myself actively seeking out new enemies to fight, just to see how they looked and fought on the combat screen. I also liked that you could see your characters, and though I didn’t use it, the option to move around the combat field (or revert to classic, first-person mode) was also nice. And the fact that you could team up with teammates to do combined attacks was pretty cool, and reminded me of a certain other game that pioneered these kinds of attacks in RPGs: Chrono Trigger.

DRAGON QUEST XI: Echoes of an Elusive Age_20190623172148 — M-Magus’ castle? No, but…

It’s no surprise that these games share design elements. It’s in their DNA. Chrono Trigger was the product of a collaboration between some key designers of the Final Fantasy and Dragon Quest games, including artist Akira Toriyama and writer/designer Yuji Hori, who created the DQ series. So I’ve seen some familiar strands in all of the DQ games that I’ve played, but this game was by far the most Chrono Trigger-esque of them all. Some of what they shared: Silent protagonist. Character who sacrifices their life to save their friends, only to be saved by breaking a time egg/sphere and travelling back in time. The aforementioned double/triple(/quadruple, now) techs. The need to upgrade your air “ship” to break through the final enemy’s outer layer/shield. Floating islands inhabited by ancient beings. A monarch who is corrupted by the final boss. The main character being thrown in jail (by a different corrupt monarch in CT), only to escape (I should note that you fight a dragon tank to escape in Chrono Trigger and there is a dragon in the caverns beneath the prison in DQ XI that chases you as you escape). The daughter of the corrupted monarch is a tom-boyish princess who shuns the normal trappings of royalty, and in both cases there is a scene where they share a moment of understanding and open up to their father, who returns the sentiment. The main character is fatherless. There’s a scene in a dark wizard’s castle where a doppelganger of a familiar character asks you to die for them. There is a mythical sword that you need special, ancient material to transform into a weapon that can pierce a major boss’ defense. And aside from the standard design elements that you’d expect from Toriyama (spiked hair, earrings everywhere, etc.), there are a few specific artifacts that seemed far more Chrono than the other elements. Namely, the places out of time in the two games:

Chrono-Trigger-End-of-Time — The End of Time, a stone island in a sea of dark fog (source: http://www.onrpg.com/news/editorial/retro-review-chrono-trigger/)

DRAGON QUEST XI: Echoes of an Elusive Age_20190626145811 — The Realm Between Worlds, a stone island in a sea of dark fog

And the final boss in both games begins in what looks to be a space suit, and has a right arm/pod and left arm/pod that you have to destroy (and that he can revive).

Chrono Trigger Lavos1 — Lavos, inner core: large creature with an exosuit and arms that you have to attack separately in order to destroy the body

Chrono Trigger Lavos — Lavos, final form: creature with what looks like a space helmet, with two pods that you have to attack separately in order to destroy the body

DRAGON QUEST XI: Echoes of an Elusive Age_20190628201227 — Calasmos: large creature with an exosuit and space helmet, with arms that you have to attack separately in order to destroy the body

And I’m probably missing/forgetting a bunch of other parallels. Look, I’m not saying this is so close in design as to be a near perfect DNA match, but there are enough similarities that I found myself wishing Square Enix would assign this team to whatever future Chrono Trigger project they deem worthy of development. They won’t, because the DQ series is still huge in Japan and I doubt they’d even divert a notable portion of the team to something as risky as a new Chrono game, especially given that the most recent entry in that series came out twenty years ago. But, still. It was enough to stir up pleasant memories, and enough to make a fella hopeful.

One last similarity between the two games, and one that relates to another topic I want to discuss, is the female characters. While there are valid criticisms about gender representation in both games, they also both have lots of interesting, varied, and strong female characters. And because I’ve been spoiled by the romance mechanics of series like Mass Effect and Persona, I couldn’t help but find myself wondering who I would romance if I had the chance. I must not have been the only one, either, because Square Enix is adding the ability to marry characters other than Gemma (or live with, if same-sex, which is disappointing but not unexpected) to the upcoming Nintendo Switch version of the game. With that said, I will now spend an unreasonable, borderline creepy, amount of time going through some of the ladies I would date, if possible, in the Switch version of the game.

Krystalinda, the feisty ice witch of Sniflheim, is as good a place to start as any. I mean, she’s a feisty ice witch. That descriptor alone would make her a nominee for romance in an RPG that gave me the choice. She’s powerful, smart, flirty, and she seems to have a deep and interesting backstory that the game barely touches. She has crazy, cute hair, she’s curvy and sexy, and she’s a reformed bad girl but current badass. I guess there’s a chance she might freeze me or trap me in a book forever or something, but I think I might be willing to take that chance. Feisty. Ice. Witch.

Frysabel is Krystalinda’s current BFF. She is also queen of Sniflheim, and as queen she is graceful, thoughtful, and willing to make hard choices, like forgiving Krystalinda for attacking her queendom despite her people’s reluctance to trust the (feisty ice) witch. She is also impossibly cute. I have a bit of a thing for glasses, so maybe that’s it, but I couldn’t stop myself from visiting her court every now and then just to see her, with the hopes that I might be able to help her once again and see her warm smile.

DRAGON QUEST XI: Echoes of an Elusive Age_20190614051201 — I’m going to pretend she was preparing to hug me DON’T JUDGE ME OKAY I’M LONELY

You know what else I might have a thing for? Queens. Because I was also head over heels – head over tails? – for Marina, the queen of the mermaids of Nautica. I mean… come on! It’s almost unfair. She’s the queen. Of the mermaids. She has such a presence. Her people love her, she is firm and decisive, she’s powerful and wise, she looks strong as hell, and she thinks I’m cute even as a fish. If this game did have a romance mechanic, I would feel so torn and weirdly guilty for not choosing her. There’s a point in the game where it seems like it’s hinting that she might not come back from her mission to protect her queendom, and I actually felt myself starting to get misty-eyed. Yep. I know. We don’t have to say it. Let’s move on.

And while we’re revealing patterns, maybe I also have a thing for mermaids, because one of my favorite quests in the game centers around Michelle, a pink-haired, love-struck mermaid. Like the other mermaids, she spoke in rhyme, and she did so with an adorable accent. And pink is my favorite color, so she is extra visually appealing to me. Her tale is tragic, but I can’t help but admire how absolutely unshakable is her dedication to Kai, the sailor she saved. Because of that dedication, I doubt she’d be a possible dating choice, even if the game allowed it, but she would totally be on my list otherwise.

Grand Master Pang is the head of Angri-La, training grounds of the most disciplined and skilled martial artists in the world. And who trained and disciplined them? That’s right. Grand Master Pang, the baddest of asses. Nothing seems to phase her, even death, and she is a master of all of the moves that even the legendary Luminary has yet to learn. She’s strong but never seems to break a sweat, she is gorgeous, witty, and supremely wise. In fact, she might be the most intimidating of any character in the game to romance, if she were ever even an option. But would that stop me from trying? No. Even if it meant a few whacks from the discipline stick. Heck, maybe because it meant a few whacks from the discipline stick, ho ho, ha ha, okay moving on.

Miko. The hottie from Hotto. She is yet another badass warrior, though I wish they’d done more to actually show that side of her. We do see her being a firm and commanding leader of her village, and making an incredibly tough decision, but we only hear of the ferocious battles from her past. We do see her as a mother willing to sacrifice everything, including her life, for the chance to save her son, though, and I took the fiery heat beneath Hotto to be a metaphor for Miko’s passion, so she has plenty to offer as a romantic partner. Plus, again: hottie.

So far the list has been in no particular order, but these last two are in categories of their own because they are party members, so I spent a lot of time with them and learned much more about their personalities and histories. At first glance, I wouldn’t have expected to be into Serena. Her beauty isn’t as explosive or apparent as the other women I’ve mentioned. She comes off as fairly timid, soft-spoken, pretty, and… safe? But I really loved her backstory, and I especially dug her metamorphosis after Veronica’s funeral. She doesn’t maintain the attitude, powers, or look once you go back in time, but I understood that transformation to mean that she had those underlying traits within her. Even with those aside, she is selfless, compassionate, sweet, charming, and often surprisingly funny. If I had to make a split decision about who I was going to date, I might have chosen her in the scene where she cuts her hair short. She went from vulnerable and defeated, to determined and resolute. And that accent. *swoon*

But, ultimately, who would I probably end up pursuing at all cost? Who would I peek at a guide or an FAQ to make sure I wasn’t messing up my chances with? The answer, of course, is Jade, but I never would have expected it, myself. With her huge boobs and long ponytail, she seemed in danger of being a stereotypical sexpot character. At least that’s what I thought when looking at the game art, before playing the game. But her introduction in the game, as a seriously kickass martial artist who takes no shit and has a kind of jaded mystery about her, made me rethink my assumptions in short order. She was almost always the first to attack the most powerful foes. When Hendrik showed up and tried to cut me down, she leapt into action, literally, relieving him of his horse and riding off with me on the back. When Jasper arrived at the Tree of Life, she again jump-kicked right at him with no fear. She always had my back no matter what, she is brave, fierce, and intelligent, and she can even transform into a dark and somewhat more risqué, sexier version of herself. She was my most powerful ally, too, so she never left my side in battle. So, yeah. If I ever find another 200 hours to sink into the Switch version, which I am definitely buying, my first choice for a romantic partner will be the supremely divine Jade.

Okay, phew. I’m all tuckered out, like I just finished a lengthy Puff Puff session. I have many more thoughts about the game, like why not just say that Sylvando is gay? Why hide it under the subtext of a carnival? What is this, the 1960s? And yes, I know Japan is behind the times a bit when it comes to LGBTQ representation, but this could have been a huge stride forward for them. He’s a great character and I think they did a fairly decent job making him well-rounded and deep, but don’t just bury his sexuality in a vague journal entry in his father’s house. They could have done it in one line. But that is one of my very few minor complaints about the game. As I did with VIII, I became obsessed with Dragon Quest XI. I hunted down and crafted all the best gear, I beat all of the post-game quests, and I took down the most difficult optional bosses. And, because of the miracle of modern console gaming, this time I got a platinum trophy for my trouble. But it wasn’t trouble. Every single minute of it was fun, and I seriously, seriously, seriously hope we don’t have to wait fifteen years for a console sequel. If Square Enix doesn’t hear my prayers and have this team work on a new Chrono game, at least let them iterate on the excellence of this game, as it itself is an iteration on all of the best parts of the games that came before it. VIII, for me, has the benefit of fuzzy, warm, magical nostalgia, but ultimately I think XI is a better game in almost every way. But I love them both. A whole heck of a lot.

E3 2018 Wishlist

When I look back at my wishlist for 2017, I’m surprised by how many items were eventually announced (after E3, but still). Some of them were givens, sure, but I was surprised that Soulcalibur VI actually became a thing, and with Geralt in the mix, no less. Anyway, as I said in that blog, I love to speculate, even if some of my hopes end up being just that. With that in mind, I’m making a new list for this year, and some of the entries will, unfortunately be the same as they were last year.

Nintendo/Switch

Virtual Console (or, well, something like it)

This was on my list last year, but Nintendo recently announced that their online service, coming this fall, will be something of a subscription model, with access to a library of games included. Great! In theory! The problem is that the release library is very small compared to the wealth of games that were available with the Virtual Console. I’m all for some multiplayer Dr. Mario action, but I am really hoping Nintendo announces a steady release schedule for this service, or some kind of agreement with third parties to release individual games for purchase, even if it’s not called the “Virtual Console.” I love the mini consoles Nintendo has been releasing, but they are limited (in game selection and availability). So I want this, Nintendo. Please.

Mother 3/ Brand new EarthBound game

I will put this on my list every year until we see one. Paula be casting Prayer all up in this.

Mother 3 small — Credit: https://kotaku.com/seriously-nintendo-its-time-for-mother-3-1796533984

New Eternal Darkness game

Another repeat offender. I rambled on for too long last year about why I thought this was plausible, and it still might be, but I’m worried that Nintendo just doesn’t feel the need to produce adult horror games anymore. The original game was in development for the N64 and then ultimately released on the GameCube, when Nintendo was still semi-competing with Sony and Microsoft. Now, Nintendo seems content to do their own thing, which means a game like Eternal Darkness makes less and less sense as time goes on. But I still think it would be a great showcase for some of the Switch’s unique tech, like the HD rumble and infrared sensors. Oh well. I’ll keep my hopes high and expectations low for this one.

New Smash Bros. characters

So it seems an absolute given that the new Smash game will be the highlight of Nintendo’s E3 video, but what about the roster? Given that each game is fundamentally the same in terms of gameplay and design, the roster is what I’m most curious about. Sure, I want a robust single player experience outside of the multiplayer brawling action (return of Subspace Emissary, plz), but when that iconic siren goes off and “A New Challenger Appears”? Hype. They will almost certainly play on that in their E3 video, but who beyond the Inklings from Splatoon will they announce? With previous characters like Snake, Bayonetta, Cloud, and Ryu, I don’t feel like anyone is outside the realm of possibility. So, aside from every dang previous character returning, who do I want to see? For one, Crash Bandicoot. I get a weird surge of nostalgic joy when rival mascots show up in Nintendo games, and it’s not totally ridiculous, given that the Crash trilogy will be making its way to the Switch in July. Halo‘s Master Chief also sounds like a stretch until you consider the cache it would give Microsoft with Nintendo and Smash fans, a potentially useful thing to have considering how far behind Sony they are in sales. I would also love to see Lara Croft, who also has a new game coming out in the fall. Two last mentions that would be incredible but are probably impossible: Mickey Mouse and Rey (Star Wars). Rey because, well, she is awesome. But Mickey Mouse strictly because it would be another iconic character that no one thought was possible to get for the game. Both of these are owned by Disney, though, and they are famously stingy with their characters, so I have no hope for those last two.

Animal Crossing for Switch

My thoughts haven’t changed much on this. I was worried that the mobile AC game might give Nintendo an excuse to delay a proper console version, and with Smash Bros. being their big release for later this year, I’m still kind of worried that an Animal Crossing game won’t come anytime soon. Still, it would be nice to see an announcement at E3.

Persona 5

Yes, I’ve already put well over 300 hours into the PS4 version, but I would buy a Switch port on day one, especially if they finally lift the restriction on taking screenshots. I’ve romanced Ann, Futaba, and Kawakami, but I’m keen to give a relationship with Makoto a shot. And Haru. And Tae. And Hif-okay, I can hear myself and I sound a little desperate, so let’s just move on.

And that’s about it for Nintendo. I’m sure they’ll show more from the new Yoshi game, Metroid Prime 4, and maybe even the Pokémon game, but I’m only passively interested in those at this point. I’d like to see some fun new colors for the Joy-Cons, too, I guess. And an N64 Classic (though they might do the GameBoy first).

Sony/PS4

Most of what I’m looking forward to from Sony and third parties has already been announced, but it will be nice to see more from The Last of Us 2, Shadow of the Tomb Raider, Days Gone, Spider-man, and maybe Soulcalibur VI and Anthem. So what’s left in the way of surprises? Well I’d love to see…

Final Fantasy VII

They announced this a while ago, but there has been some behind-the-scenes drama (uh, of course, it’s Square) followed by nothing but silence, so I would be pretty hyped if they showed an extensive trailer and announced that the first episode was going to drop this fall. True, the original game is not among my favorites in the series, but they will likely address much of that game’s clunkiness with this remake. And it would be one of those “oh snap it actually happened” moments in game history, so I have my fingers crossed that we’ll finally see something.

Until Dawn 2

This is a holdover from last year’s list, but it seems perhaps more likely this year, given that Supermassive Games has released a bunch of the other games that they had in the works. Those games were hit or miss, which I can’t deny makes me worry about a potential Until Dawn sequel, but who am I kidding? I would be super excited to see it announced at E3 and I would definitely buy it at release, especially if it had an optional VR mode.

Chrono Trigger/Cross sequel

I know this is a one-in-a-million shot. I know. Last year I left it as a footnote because it’s probably an impossible dream. But! I want it so bad. So I’m going to put it here in an attempt to will it into existence. Let’s do it.

chrono cross small — Credit: https://www.goombastomp.com/looking-back-chrono-cross-divisive-impressive-successor/

Microsoft/Xbox One

I didn’t have a section dedicated to Microsoft last year, because their exclusives just haven’t really been all that exciting for me. But unless they’re late in the stages of working on their next-gen hardware, which I doubt because of the XB1 X, they need to come out with some cool and exciting games to make some ground in their battle with Sony. They can’t win this generation, but at this point in the cycle more people begin buying second consoles, so if they’ve haven’t gotten a Switch or upgraded to a PS4 Pro, there are plenty of people who would snag an XB1 if the right group of games enticed them. Games like…

Fable 4

Sure, Lionhead Studios closed down, but rumors have been swirling about a possible fourth game for, well, years. With Sony snagging many of the big RPG mainstays, it would be a smart move for MS to drop a big, beautiful RPG of their own. Hell, the original Knights of the Old Republic was one of the main reasons I bought an original Xbox in the first place. I didn’t really want one. I didn’t feel like I needed it, and it was expensive. But when I heard about an RPG set in the Star Wars universe, where I could choose to be Dark Side or Light Side, and I could romance characters… well, I was sold. And the Fable games have always been fun, colorful, and whimsical, so I welcome another.

Fable small — Credit: https://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2018-01-17-sources-microsoft-plots-fable-return

New Perfect Dark game

These last couple of years have seen some strides, finally, for female video game, movie, and comic book characters. There are plenty of FPSs out there, but how many of them star a badass lady-spy like Joanna Dark? Rare and Microsoft flubbed Joanna’s star potential with Perfect Dark Zero, but if there was a time to redeem themselves and make a character that lived up to her original potential, it’s now.

perfect dark small — Credit: http://bbs.a9vg.com/thread-1051770-1-1.html

Don’t Speak: Silent Protagonists

I’m using video games as illustrative texts in the first year composition course I’m teaching this semester, and we’re focusing a lot of our attention on identity. It’s a topic I think about a lot, particularly when I’m playing narrative-heavy games or games that are meant to be especially immersive. I wouldn’t say I actively or consciously think about it, though. It just kind of buzzes around my head when I’m creating a new character or interacting with people in RPGs. “Would I have really said that?” I might wonder as my character says something particularly barbarous to a party member who I actually kind of like. Moments like this, in games like Mass Effect, or Fallout, or Final Fantasy make me think of the days when the silent protagonist was the default lead character in RPGs. While they’re still around, they’ve mostly been replaced by protagonists that do speak, even if prompted by specific user input. Were they better at creating immersive narratives?

Well I’m not here to answer that, but I wanted to sort of work my thoughts out about it. I don’t remember thinking about the fact that my character was ‘silent’ in NES games like Faxandau or The Legend of Zelda. It was just how things were. ‘You’ were Link, or Mega Man, or the countless and nameless other lead characters of many classic games. But when I made the move to RPGs like Chrono Trigger, Final Fantasy III, and EarthBound (a console generation later) I found myself thinking about my character, or ‘me’ more, likely due to how much dialogue there is in games like these and the fact that you actually interact with characters and make decisions that affect the story.

I had some things in common with Crono. We were both teenagers who lived at home and had a particularly hard time waking up in the morning. But he had pretty bulky biceps for a ‘kid,’ spiky red hair, and he ended up being pretty fierce with a katana. I had pretty average biceps, a shaved head, and was only fierce with an SNES controller. I knew I wasn’t Crono, but I named him ‘Joey’ anyway, because I wanted to pretend that I was him for the adventure I was about to embark on. In fact, Chrono Trigger was the first game I remember having a party of characters who I could name, and it is where I began the tradition of naming the main character for myself and my supporting cast for my friends and/or celebrities. It didn’t really matter if I matched up very well with the main character; I was the one playing so I was the character who would make the most difference in how the story played out. It makes sense, given that as a child I wanted to be the main character whenever I played, whether it be something with a clear main character (as with Batman action figures) or with an ensemble (like make-believe Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles). It makes me wonder about roles and identity in play outside of gaming, but I’ll have to dig into that in a later blog. I’m rambling enough as it is.

James Paul Gee talks about the idea of identity in narrative games, with there being three distinct identities at play: the player, the character (a reflection of the developer’s own identities), and the character with the player’s identity projected onto it. The player brings their own identity to a game: they are, let’s say, adventurous but cautious. The character is written in a way that might be somewhat different than the player: maybe they are adventurous but brash and not very cautious. So the player projects their identity onto the character, reading those moments where the character does something brash as momentary lapses in judgement on their own (fictional) behalf. The player does not become brash in real life, and they can only make the character be cautious some of them time (because the developers choose points in the game where the character must act brashly to develop the plot how they want to).

With silent protagonists, it seems like developers are careful and very conscious of this interplay of identity. They want players to feel like they are in charge of the character’s actions and motivations, but not so much so that they mess up the game’s plot. Even in more recent RPGs, that have speaking protagonists but offer many choices for how your character interacts with other characters, you usually can’t do things that would spoil the main story of the game. You can’t simply leave the Capital Wasteland in Fallout 3, searching for a better life. You can’t build a little house on a remote planet in Mass Effect 3 and live out the rest of your days with Tali. The games give you many choices, sure, but it’s never really you in the role. You can make all of the choices that your character might make, but not all the choices that you might make if you truly had the options.

The same could be said about your interactions with characters in these games. The BioWare RPGs are especially known for giving the player a host of dialogue choices and relationship options when it comes to your party members, but again, you can’t truly say whatever you want. If you’re trying to woo Dragon Age’s Morrigan, who is easily offended and put off (but worth the effort, because holy crap, I mean, come on), and you say something that angers her, the game doesn’t let you immediately apologize or try and smooth things over. Usually, you’ve blown your chance to advance your relationship with her and have to wait for the next opportunity to try again.

I’m not trying to make a point about limitations and reality, because I understand that for every player action, the developers have to code for a reaction, and coding for enough reactions to cover the breadth of human creative input is impossible. I’m just thinking about how these choices impact the player’s sense of projected identity. Games that allow you to choose how you interact with the game’s social world and shape your relationships with party members almost certainly make for a more immersive identity experience, even if it means that the character will say and do things that the player doesn’t necessarily want them to. Silent protagonists allow the player to fill in the blanks, imagining what the character would say to party members or how they would react to plot events. This may allow for a different kind of immersion, but it seems difficult to argue that it would be more effective than the characters that you create and use to carry out conversations with party members.

I’m also a little curious about why they’ve fallen from popularity, especially in western RPGs. They were, at one point, a bit of a punchline (as many tropes end up), but I don’t recall hearing many complaints about their use in games like Dragon Age: Origins, Knights of the Old Republic or The Elder Scrolls: Skyrim. It will be interesting to see if their use declines further, and even more interesting to see if they make it to the (eventual) virtual reality RPGs. With language detection becoming more widely used, I can easily imagine an RPG that shows you your dialog choices and gives you the option of saying them out loud. Anyway, I’m rambling again. I’m not so silent about this topic (see what I did there?), and I could go on and on, but I just wanted to work some of my thoughts out for later use.

Gaming Memories: Death Peak

One of the reasons I started this site was to archive some of my personal memories with video games. Memory is a fleeting thing, so it brings me pleasure to not only relive choice gaming experiences, but also to record them in some way. This, my first entry, will be about my favorite game of all time, Chrono Trigger. My memory of receiving it as a gift is under my Top 20 page, but there are plenty more to go around.

chrono3

The weather here in Illinois has been unseasonably warm lately, but when I left class earlier tonight it finally felt like November. Every year, around this time, I have flashbacks to my first time with Chrono Trigger. I got it as a gift 21 years ago today, actually. It’s hard to believe it’s been so long.

chrono+trigger-+trial

As the weather got colder that year, I was grateful to have something so engrossing to entertain me while I kept toasty inside. The snow fell early and hard, and I remember it coinciding with my arrival at Death Peak in the game. Death Peak is a large, snow-capped mountain with ravaging winds that you must traverse with the game’s supporting characters in your quest to revive Crono, the main character (or yourself, if he is an avatar for the player). The constantly falling snow whips in every direction, and the frequent gusts will blow you off the mountain if you don’t take cover behind a tree or outcropping. I’ve always had an active imagination, so I fully embraced this mini-game, mentally huffing and puffing as I made my way from frigid shelter to frigid shelter.

I first truly realized I was in love with the game as I trundled home from school the day after starting up Death Peak. In a coincidence cooked up by serendipity, there were two or three feet of fresh snow on the ground and gusty winds pelted my face with newly falling flakes. I took the city bus home at the time, so I had about a mile to walk to get to the stop. The sidewalks were unshoveled, so I decided to cut across the long, broad fields of a local high school. The wind bit my cheeks and my eyes welled with tears as I dragged my snow-crusted legs through the drifts. I remember feeling like I was on Death Peak. There were no trees to hide behind, but my imagination conjured up the swooshy wind sounds and the epic soundtrack as I squinted against the blinding storm. I wasn’t on my way to rescue anyone, only to return to the warm, dry shelter of my living room, where I could huddle under a blanket and return to my quest to save myself (as Crono) from death. It was all I could think about, and all that I wanted to do.

It’s a simple memory. There’s not much to it, really. But it lives on vividly in my mind, and I treasure it deeply. I’m playing Chrono Trigger again right now, actually, and the warm places in my heart are being rekindled all over again. I’m sure the snow will be falling again soon, in real life. Bring it on.