61 Frames Per Second : chrono trigger

8-Bit Love: The Ten Greatest Vintage Game Songs to Have Sex To, part 2

John Constantine — Thu, 16 Apr 2009 21:00:00 GMT

Cyriaque Lamar is a New York-based writer with a New Jersey-bred weltanschauung. He’s had original work published at Cracked.com and performed at The New York International Fringe Festival. Cyriaque is thrilled to contribute to 61FPS, as it brings him one step closer to his childhood dream of living on the set of Nick Arcade.

5.) Final Fight CD – “Walk In the Park (Bay Area)”

System: Sega CD (1993)
Sounds Like: A sweaty nooner with Don Johnson.
I always loved the premise of Final Fight. The idea of a city’s mayor stripping down to his underjohns and beating the shit out of unemployed people in order to stimulate job growth was really ahead of its time. Wait? Mike Haggar was actually fighting to save his daughter from an evil street gang? And here I thought the game was some kind of radical Objectivist propaganda. This Bay Area theme is classic whatever console you play Final Fight on, but the Sega CD version pushes it to the limit with gale-force porno guitars. Seriously, these riffs are like an F4 on the Fujita Scale. In my mind’s eye, the person who would get the most out of this track wears a ton of sea foam green and frequents Fort Lauderdale whorehouses. Sometimes, you just gotta be that person. When it comes to the Sega CD, the only thing sleazier is Night Trap.

4.) Chrono Trigger – Schala’s Theme

System: Super Nintendo (1995)
Sounds Like: Ravi Shankar, Level 12 Bard.
Another track from wunderkind Yasunori Mitsuda? Man, I should just wear my Chrono Trigger fanboyism on a t-shirt. Or a hat! Yes, a big fucking sombrero like those worn by morbidly obese stockbrokers at Jimmy Buffet concerts. My sombrero will depict the final battle against Lavos, with Robo, Lucca and Magus executing the Omega Flare triple tech. After I conceive my first-born son wearing this sombrero, I will store it in the broom closet until his first day of middle school, at which point I will place my abomination of a hat on his head and send him on his way. When he inevitably comes home tearful and bruised, his Chrono Sombrero torn asunder, I will embrace him and say, “Today you learned what it is to be a man. We’re ordering pizza tonight.”

3.) Streets of Rage 2 – S.O.R. Super Mix

System: Sega Genesis (1992)
Sounds Like: The Madchester music scene mashed into a Mega Drive cartridge.
I lived in Baltimore a few years ago. My neighborhood was more Pink Flamingos than The Wire, mostly pleasant with pockets of dicey urbanity. This track by the great Yuzo Kushiro (Actraiser) syncs up with that time in my life rather aptly. I had the streets and I had the rage. I also had the sick piano breakdown at 1:36. That emotional miasma and sweet key work made for a heady love making combo. Still does. It was a weird time in my life, but not Streets of Rage 2 weird. Game’s about a twelve-year-old in rollerblades who dismantles a heavily-armed crime syndicate. Go figure.

2.) The Last Ninja 2 – “The Mansion”

System: Commodore 64 (1988)
Sounds Like: Coming home from work, only to discover John Carpenter banging your wife.
Matt Gray’s soundtrack to The Last Ninja 2 is one of the better things in life, and “The Mansion” is one of its most memorable tracks. Its utility goes far beyond the bedroom. Sure, you and a buddy can thrust away to this instrumental’s nearly eight minutes of analog acrobatics, but why not use it for a more grand occasion? “The Mansion” is a more than adequate proxy for Pachelbel. It’ll make your nuptials more like the wedding scene from Big Trouble in Little China.

1.) Tetris – “A-Type”

System: Game Boy (1989)
Sounds Like: Tetris. Duh.
There’s nothing inherently sexy about the Tetris theme. Thing is, everyone knows “A-Type”, and if you blast it in the sack, you will be your partner’s most memorable lover ever. Period. It doesn’t even matter how good or bad the sex is. Every time this pops into an ex-lover’s head, he or she’ll have no choice but to sigh, “[Your Name Here] balled me to the Tetris theme.” Decades may pass, but once they recall those opening Bolshevik bleep-bloops, a mnemonic trigger will kick in and your shining nudity will be all they have ever known.

Part 1

Previous Top Tens:

The Ten Greatest Ice Levels in Gaming History
The Ten Greatest Classic Mega Man Levels
The Ten Videogames That Should Have Been Controversial
The Ten Greatest Opening Levels in Gaming History
The Ten Most Adventurous Sequels in Gaming History
The Ten Greatest Fire Levels in Gaming History

8-Bit Love: The Ten Greatest Vintage Game Songs to Have Sex To, part 1

John Constantine — Thu, 16 Apr 2009 20:00:00 GMT

Cyriaque Lamar is a New York-based writer with a New Jersey-bred weltanschauung. He’s had original work published at Cracked.com and performed at The New York International Fringe Festival. Cyriaque is thrilled to contribute to 61FPS, as it brings him one step closer to his childhood dream of living on the set of Nick Arcade.

There are three reasons this list exists. First, I felt obliged to highlight 61FPS’s distinction as the gaming apparatchik of an internet sex publication. Second, I wished to showcase the unsung virtuosos of yesteryear who made masterworks using a limited palette of sounds. Finally, I intend to rebut those critics who still dismiss video games as low culture. Using the below examples, I intend to reclaim the carnal legacy of video games by evincing how early console music illustrated the gamut of human sexuality, from atavistic, heteronormative modes of eroticism to polymorphous perversity as delineated by Freud.

Plus, the thought of people sticking penises into vaginas to Nintendo music is funny.

10.) Radical Dreamers – “The Girl Who Stole the Stars”

System: Super Famicom Satellaview (1996)
Sounds Like: Koyaanisqatsi composed on Mario Paint.
Since roughly 95% of all human lovemaking involves someone with a XX chromosome pairing, I thought it necessary to seek out my female associates’ thoughts on which game music best applies to amore. The suggestions I received were few yet incisive — responses ranged from “the Kid Icarus theme” to “Who the eff effs to video games?” Ultimately though, I deferred to my own instincts and picked this pan-pipe jam from the Japan-exclusive, text-based sequel to Chrono Trigger. Composed by the legendary Yasunori Mitsuda, “The Girl Who Stole the Stars” is easily the most romantic theme on our list.

9.) Pole Position – Background noise

System: Atari 65XE (1985)
Sounds Like: Skynet becoming sentient.
The way I see it, there are two types of lovers in this world. The first type does it to The Whispers and The O’Jays, whereas the second diddles to Autechre, Radio-Activity-era Kraftwerk and the hum of AC units. The grating 8-bit drone of this Namco racing classic, is dedicated to the latter group — those who bang to cold, robotic minimalism. It’s also worth nothing that “PREPARE TO QUALIFY” is perhaps the best pre-coital war cry I’ve ever heard, particularly when your partner has no clue what you’re yelling about. Nothing improves foreplay like car metaphors and total incoherence. Remember the make-out scene from Gone In 60 Seconds?

Editor's Note: The Nerve and 61PFS by-laws state that no mention of Pole Position may go unaccompanied by this link.

8.) Metal Gear 2: Solid Snake – “Night Fall”

System: MSX2 (1990)
Sounds Like: Passion. Yearning. Crates.
Solid Snake, Big Boss, Naked Snake. Nobody pens phallic codenames quite like Metal Gear creator Hideo Kojima. This harmonica-fueled ditty is from the Japanese version of Metal Gear 2. “Night Fall” is the only song on this list with an in-game pedigree as a sex jam — it plays when Solid Snake angles for some love during wartime. He totally strikes out, but what did you expect? With all that spying and peeping he does, I always figured Snake likes to watch.

7.) Zoda’s Revenge: StarTropics II – “Dungeon Theme #2”

System: Nintendo (1994)
Sounds Like: Vicki Sue Robinson’s “Turn the Beat Around” sung by an alcoholic Speak & Spell.
Most of the songs thus far have a “Quiet-Storm-meets-Q*Bert” vibe, so we’re going to shake it up with a certifiable club banger. When it comes to dance floor heaters about time-traveling teenagers fighting crudely-animated yetis, “Dungeon Theme #2” is impossible to trump. Play it at your next party and bookend it with some Crystal Castles and Futurecop. If some loser balks, matter-of-factly reply, “This is some old-school Japanese shit. Kanye’s totally sampling this for his next single.” You’ll only be half-lying.

6.) Donkey Kong Country 2 – “Stickerbrush Symphony”

System: Super Nintendo (1995)
Sounds Like: Massive Attack’s “Heat Miser” driven by a Casio horn section.
What the hell is this? This is a game about a pair of simians wearing Payless sneakers. It’s borderline profane to have a track this Sade-smooth in a Donkey Kong game, but consider the alternative — the DKC2 soundtrack could well have been five hours of the Donkey Kong Rap . Credit goes to Rare composer David Wise for making a bramble maze filled with bees sound downright silky. So silky, in fact, that it's perfect for exploring your partner's very own bramble maze.

Part 2

Previous Top Tens:

The Ten Greatest Ice Levels in Gaming History
The Ten Greatest Classic Mega Man Levels
The Ten Videogames That Should Have Been Controversial
The Ten Greatest Opening Levels in Gaming History
The Ten Most Adventurous Sequels in Gaming History
The Ten Greatest Fire Levels in Gaming History

Game Endings Out of Left Field: Chrono Trigger and the Dream Project

Nadia Oxford — Sat, 28 Mar 2009 03:32:00 GMT

I bought Chrono Trigger for the SNES from a game store merchant who called it “The game that never ends.” If only. There eventually came a time when I had in fact seen everything the game had to offer, and all that was left was to gnaw on its bones in a future search for Schala.

Still, the beauty thing about Chrono Trigger is its lack of a cemented beginning, middle and end. Sure, it's a fairly linear adventure the first time you play through...but after you've taken in your fill of the Moonlight Parade, you're encouraged to slip away and explore Crono's world from as many angles as possible. Even making the tiniest changes in the time stream before taking down Lavos could result in a whole new game ending. Go up against Lavos before you're scheduled to fight Magus, and Frog will fight him one-on-one. Visit the spiky bastard after unlocking the door to the Mammon Machine, and listen to Marle and Lucca make lewd comments about Men Through The Ages.

Then there's my personal favourite: finish the game before it even starts, and visit the development staff.

Discovering this ending for the first time helped me realise that my favourite games were not in fact programmed by super robots from Mars: they were written, planned and programmed by human beings with families and tight schedules. I've likewise since come to realise that the good-natured jokes about losing weight and getting grey hairs probably weren't hyperbole.

The Dream Project ending in Chrono Trigger DS differs slightly. Did Manabu Daishima always wag his finger at rented and borrowed games?

Yuji Horii says, "Wow, the years sure do fly by! This game was first released in 1995!" Square-Enix left out, "Got your money again, suckas!"

The “adjusted” credits screen still makes me laugh.

Related Links:

Game Endings Out Of Left Field: Pilotwings

Chrono Trigger's Box Art Still Makes My Head Buzz

Nadia Oxford — Sat, 21 Feb 2009 03:07:00 GMT

I've never been a big fan of Chrono Trigger's box art. I love the game to pieces. I love its story, its music and its character designs. “Akira Toriyama” will be the last words to burst from my mouth in a bubble of blood when Mouseketeer revolutionaries, seeking to empower western animation, unsuccessfully try to force me to renounce my love for the manga-ka.

But I just don't dig on Chrono Trigger's cover illustration. It certainly doesn't rank anywhere in Mega Man's Hall of Box Art Horrors, but it's too busy, there's an inflated sense of intensity, and it was a jarring change from the quiet RPG labels I was used to in the 16-bit era. The boxes for Final Fantasy II and Final Fantasy III on the SNES weren't as stylish as their Super Famicom counterparts, but they were recognisable. The “T” styled as a sword in the American Final FantTasy logo, though not especially creative, was iconic. Square RPGs outside of Final Fantasy still featured calm box art that carried a hint of mystery about the contents within. Secret of Mana, for instance.

Chrono Trigger's box art, on the other hand, is bold and loud. Though it's obviously a finished piece of work, it feels like a piece of concept art that was randomly selected to represent the entire game. I look at it and I'm helpless to stop my mind from wandering into Geekville.

I start thinking, “Why is Heckran on Death Peak? Why is Crono alive on Death Peak? Wait, maybe that's 12,000,000 BC? Those winter clothes are actually kind of badass, but we never see anything like them. Why would Frog even bother to look for a contact lens that's buried in two feet of snow?” (I know, I know, it's the Arc Impulse Triple Tech—for which Marle is incorrectly casting a Fire spell).

Thirteen years later, my thoughts still stumble all over one another crying “But--but--but--!”, when I see the cover for Chrono Trigger. It makes the inside of my head feel like a car crash.

Everyone on the box also looks uncharacteristically snarly. I wouldn't laugh off a threat from a giant thorn-lizard that will only succumb to magic spells (*%&$&#!!!!!), but poor gentle Crono comes off as a spiky-haired Rambo. It just ain't right.

Related Links:

The Weakest Link: Chrono Trigger and Chrono Cross
The End of Time and the Beginning of Fan Drama
WTFriday: The Chrono Trigger Anime

Roundtable Discussion: The Relevance of Japanese RPGs

Bob Mackey — Fri, 13 Feb 2009 20:00:00 GMT

Roundtable Discussion takes the intrepid 61FPS blogging team and pits it against itself in the search for deeper truth. The moderator for today is Bob Mackey.

This week’s conversation deals with the mythical and possibly endangered beast known as the Japanese RPG. The genre really seems to be suffering during this generation, for two major reasons: 1.) escalating development costs due to the new necessity of high-polygon, HD resources and 2.) developers’ inability to combat the most damning problems of the genre. Over the past few years, we’ve seen quite a few JRPGs hitting the shelves that feel half-finished at best; and even when a fully-realized JRPG comes along, I worry that the absolutely abysmal pacing the genre is infamous for will end up sucking all the fun out of what could be a fantastic game. To start us off, I have two basic questions: 1.) What does the genre need to do to become interesting again, and 2.) what do you think it will do?

On a side note, the only RPGs I’ve been interested in lately have been ports of remakes of classics. Is this a sign that the genre is becoming antiquated and only accessible to those (admittedly, quite a few at this point) with an understanding of its unique grammar?

Joe Keiser: I assume we're talking about current-gen console JRPGs here, as I feel the handheld JRPG field is perhaps the most vibrant it's ever been. To answer your questions:

1. Lots of JRPG ground has been broken on the PS2 in its twilight days. Final Fantasy XII, Valkyrie Profile: Silmeria, and the Persona series all did fascinating new things with the genre that begged to be explored further. That's why it was very strange to me to see such regressive RPG design in the likes of Lost Odyssey and its brethren. There's so much excellent recent prior work to look at! So why do some of these games look back so far?

This is not a very creative answer, but JRPG developers don't seem to be particularly bold these days and I'm trying to be realistic with my expectations.

2. Fortunately, men who are much more creative than me have been given years to come up with ways to make things interesting again. I think they will. I think the real problem developers have been running into this generation (besides the general Japanese console development malaise) is that there hasn't been a leading title to come out and show the little guys that actually, there is a market for JRPGs on Xbox 360 or Wii. All we've seen so far is supposedly "exciting" titles like Lost Odyssey meet general apathy at retail, which couldn't have been heartening to anyone holding any sort of purse strings. When the Level-5s or Square Enix internal teams of the world release something that cannot under circumstances afford to fail (does the game I'm thinking of have a large roman numeral in the title? Maybe.) I think you'll see the floodgates open again. Heck, maybe Tri-Ace will do it!

Maybe.

John Constantine: Hear, hear on the handheld JRPG scene. How’s that saying go? Where Dragon Quest goes, so goes the genre! What’s most telling about the preponderance of remakes on the DS and PSP (the lion’s share of them coming from Square-Enix) is that it indicates the birth of a brand new audience being inculcated with the genres unique grammar. These re-releases pull in both lapsed gamers as well as sell to those new gamers just getting reared on what’s available for the system. For every Final Fantasy, Tales, DQ, Star Ocean, etc rehash that hits the DS and PSP, there’s two brand new JRPGs with decidedly fresh mechanics waiting in the wings. Just look at stuff like Riz-zoawd, Atlus’ just-released My World, My Way, Yuusha no Kuse ni Namaiki da on PSP, and Yuusha 30. And how could I not mention that game we all love so dearly, The World Ends With You? Even Hironobu Sakaguchi’s DS debut, ASH, took some risks, as opposed to the stale traditionalism of his Xbox 360 games. ASH sucked, but it was different, right?

But this is the biggest Japanese genre in history, so what about the big, big systems. Given how reluctant the vast majority of Japanese developers have been to make anything for the Playstation 3 and Xbox 360 (even the Wii really), it’s none too surprising that the few JRPGs to show up on those systems have been stale as week-old bread. Especially Mistwalker’s games. The Gooch made the type of games that made him famous, games that are just about two decades old now. It’s ironic then that Lost Odyssey was co-developed by the team behind the Shadow Hearts series, some of the freshest RPGs to grace the Playstation 2. Joe’s right: close to a decade old, and the PS2 is still seeing exciting new ideas in the genre. In addition to the examples mentioned, I think the most exciting evolution of the JRPG on the PS2 is also the exact franchise that has the best chance of bringing life to the genre on current home consoles. Yakuza, baby. The Yakuza games flat-out are JRPGs, just with a different kind of battle system. They’re fast, detailed games that succeed by foregoing some of classic JRPG design’s most tiresome tropes, i.e. having to talk to every single NPC, menu-based fighting, needlessly grueling level grinds. I sincerely believe that Yakuza 3 is going to be the game that finally pushes more devs into the next-JRPG-gen.

Yakuza also does precisely what I think needs to be done to make every other JRPG interesting again. It has legitimately good writing and plotting. Not okay writing. Not good-for-a-game writing. Just good writing. For a genre that’s sold itself on affecting narrative, the vast majority of writing in JRPGs is crap. But it has to be married to faster play, like you see in Yakuza, TWEWY, and FFXII to really make JRPGs great. Lost Odyssey had good writing but the game, what you played, was sllllllllloooooooooooowwwwwwwwwwww. I genuinely think that’s what’s going to happen too. I’m an optimist. Like you said, Bob, that Final Fantasy XIII trailer, against all odds, was exciting. The old way of things will stick around too. Gotta re-release something, right?

Cole Stryker: Before I even begin I must request that everyone read this, one of the best pieces of game criticism I've ever read. JRPG fans should prepare to be offended. It contains the following money quotes:

Western CRPGs have kept evolving because there has always existed consciousness of a direction towards which to evolve; JRPGs, meanwhile, have been going round in circles ever since their inception -- Fallout is worlds away from Akalabeth; not so Rogue Galaxy from Final Fantasy.

The only kind of evolution JRPGs have undergone is of a cosmetic nature: Final Fantasy was no Ultima, and its endless sequels had to be justifed in some way -- and so they were. CG or anime-style cutscenes and countless hours' worth of voice-acting and orchestral soundtracks were the justification, piled up, stacked and shoved inside cartridges...

Now then. It's no secret that I'm not a fan of JRPG's. It seems to me that the things holding JRPG's back are the very characteristics that define the genre. So I guess this is another way of saying that the best way to make a good JRPG is to not make a JRPG.

Firstly, expensive poly counts have to go in order for this genre to mean anything to me. I'm happy to see that recent portable JRPG's have done this, though I haven't played any of them. They practically had to, with the limited graphical capabilities. It's interesting how a dearth of technology can actually amount to a better game because it allows developers to cut the fat.

Secondly, we've got to lose the cutscenes. Kierkegaard tells it like it is in an epic burn, calling Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within, "a groundbreaking JRPG comprised of a single 106-minute-long cutscene, whose only flaw was that it didn't give players the option to skip it." Oh snap, son. The cult of celebrity that JRPG composers enjoy also brings the genre down. Focus on what's under the hood, please.

In order to push the genre into new territory, JRPG's should decide whether they want to be actual role playing games or strategy games rather than a mediocre mixture of both. I'd much rather play a proper RPG like Planescape Torment or a proper strategy game like Advance Wars than a JRPG which offers an hamstrung version of each. Even my favorite JRPG franchise, Earthbound, is super guilty of this. The combat system, even the rhythm based one in Mother 3 is pretty mindless. Developers need ways to mix up the combat mechanics. Use Ice Power to kill Fire Demons. Fight Night Wraiths with the Heavenly Light Arrows. Yawn. Chrono Trigger made these weaksauce mechanics obsolete well over a decade ago.

Make them shorter. I just don't feel like investing 70+ hours on a JRPG. The last one I played was Baten Kaitos, a reasonably fun card-based RPG. I burned out halfway through and haven't played one since (except for the nostalgic Mother 3, for which I made an exception).

Now that I've covered where I think JRPG's should go, I'll talk about where they will go: Nowhere. There are too many people out there content to play bad games. The continued existence of the Final Fantasy franchise is proof enough.

Bob Mackey: Well, there you have it; another week, another great discussion. Feel free to weigh in with your own thoughts in the comments.

Related Links:

Roundtable Discussion: Where is the Handheld Version of Console Wars?
Roundtable Discussion: The Fandom Phenomenon Part 1
Roundtable Discussion: The Fandom Phenomenon Part 2
Roundtable Discussion: The Fandom Phenomenon Part 3

Dialect In Games: It Don't Come Easy

Nadia Oxford — Wed, 21 Jan 2009 03:39:00 GMT

The rules of writing are as cemented and sacred as the playbook for Calvinball. My favourite authors tend to ignore minor grammatical roadsigns like the period and the quotation mark.

Even so, there are two common pitfalls an aspiring writer should avoid:

1) Don't publish a book called “Hitler Was Awesome!”

2) Don't make your characters speak in any kind of dialect unless you know exactly what you're doing.

Mastering dialect is a like harnessing a Tyrannosaurus Rex to a caravan of tanks: you'll kill millions of you fail (and it is very easy to fail), but if you succeed, holy shit, what power.

Dialect has been slipping into more and more games writing, and results have been mixed at best. A good game localisation—indeed, good writing in general—does not require a bunch of funny voices to laugh at, which points at the main problem with employing dialect: many games writers and localisers treat it as a cheap means of adding depth to a character.

At the same time, a genuine, studied effort can make all the difference in how a hero or villain is remembered. Ted Woolsey's medieval rendition of Frog from the original SNES version of Chrono Trigger wasn't always spot-on accurate, but to this day I remember most of his script because it was fun to sound out in my head (“'Tis a feisty crowd. But they are of thine kin, and 'tis of consequence”).

Recent Dragon Quest titles take a shot at writing characters in dialect. Dragon Quest IV: Chapters of the Chosen is a particularly curious journey. The protagonists in the first leg of the game all come from different corners of the world, and Square-Enix attempts to reflect their diversity through their accents. Swordsman Ragnar McRyan and adorable arms merchant Torneko Taloon come through the ordeal all right with fun, purposefully over-the-top Scottish and Irish accents respectively. Everyone else (Russians, the French, and I'm presuming Indians in the case of Oojam the apprentice) has to settle for schoolyard stereotypes.

Dragon Quest IV was localised in the UK, so it's no wonder why Ragnar goes beyond just talking like Scrooge McDuck, or why Taloon doesn't just slide by with dialogue cribbed from Lucky the leprechaun after he's been worked into a hyper spaz about his cereal. It's just too bad the same effort isn't extended to every member of the cast, because I got a kick out of Taloon's disgruntled employer (“Oh aye, 'tis a grand salesman you'll make standin' there. Get on this side of the counter, ye eejit!”).

The very same happened in Dragon Quest VIII as well: Eight's party featured a wonderful range of British accents that reflected each member's class (or lack thereof in Yangus' case), but once the game took them to far-off lands, there was an influx of French girls who would administer, 'ow you say, ze puff-puff. Resorting to the “Sacre Bleu!” level of dialect isn't especially harmful, but it's cheap-sounding next to the main characters' thought-out dialogue.

Unfortunately, a halfway attempt isn't quite enough with dialect in games and literature. Preview screenshots indicate Dragon Quest V for the DS eases up on the “foreign” tones, which is a little sad, but at the same time it'll be nice to just read the story without having to decode it. I still want writers to work on character dialect, though they should probably stick to notepads and paper bags until they're sure they have it right.

Related Links:

The 61FPS Review: Dragon Quest IV: Chapters of the Chosen
Anticipation Time: Dragon Quest IV
Trailer Review: Dragon Quest IX

Crono: My First Aeris Gainsborough

Nadia Oxford — Thu, 08 Jan 2009 05:01:00 GMT

You remember Aeris' death in Final Fantasy VII, right? Sephiroth dropped from the sky, brandishing his very big sword, and he spit Aeris like a piece of sacrificial lamb on a shishkabob. Cloud broke out the pitas, Cid stirred up the hummus and—no, wait, that didn't happen. Aeris died in Cloud's arms and it was very sad. There, that's what happened.

Aeris's death, though curiously dry (not a drop of blood was spilled—what kind of impotent Jesus stand-in was she?), was a stunning event for the gaming world. Until the moment Sephiroth fell on her as neatly as a dart flying to a pub's board, it seemed unfathomable that a game character could die. Forever. No take-backs.

Unfathomable for some. Not so much for others.

I'd been there a couple years prior. Crono from Chrono Trigger was my first Aeris.

“But you can bring Crono back to life! His death's wasn't traumatic, you big attention whore!”

But reviving Crono isn't as easy as sprinkling him with phoenix down. It's actually an emotional investment, and when I played Chrono Trigger on the DS, I was surprised at how powerfully it still hit me.

Aeris got a sword through her gut, and admittedly that's a pretty bad way to go. But at least her body was laid to rest. Crono, on the other hand, throws himself at the deadly light Lavos generates and his body simply...dissolves. One second he's a boy on a quest; the next falls apart in a smear, like a stick of charcoal left in the rain.

After the party bumbles around lost for a while, they're given the opportunity to climb Death Peak and revive Crono using a special item that's also the game's namesake. Death Peak is a pretty unique locale, as far as Chrono Trigger goes. The snow-covered mountain lords over the far-flung future, but it has a sinisterly ancient feel to it; it was thrown up when Lavos erupted from the ground in 1999. Journeying through the future usually means visiting factories and crumbling ruins, but Death Peak feels like it's encased in a bubble that's separate from the rest of time.

It's on Death Peak we get an unsettling glimpse of his Lavos' spawn, a quiet prophesy of what's to come. A perpetual, gentle snowfall makes the mountain eerily peaceful. And at the top of the mountain...well, that's a special experience.

The teamwork Crono's friends use to bring him back to life strengthens their bonds and speaks of their characters. Crono's death would also have been an easy opportunity to give “depth” to the cast through mourning: “A-bloo-bloo-bloo, our hero is gone, Zeal will pay,” and whatnot.

When Crono first dies, Marle is confident he's alive. It's a little saddening to see her so adamant about an impossibility, but her resolve makes it hard to resist the Crono-Jesus sub-quest. You are part of the experience, not just an outsider viewing a cutscene.

Related Links:

The Weakest Link: Chrono Trigger and Chrono Cross
WTFriday: The Chrono Trigger Anime
China Trigger

Chrono Trigger Musical: A Lovelorn Frog

Nadia Oxford — Fri, 19 Dec 2008 03:44:00 GMT

It's not easy being green, amigos. Especially when you're valiant Mr Frog from Chrono Trigger, and you don't want to risk offending your beloved Queen Leanne with suggestions of romantic bogs and external fertilization.

What do frogs naturally do when they're troubled and/or horny? They sing, of course. They sing their hearts out. They lament their fate (“Oh God, so slippery!”). In this animated Chrono Trigger musical, Frog does just that. He doesn't expand his throat though, so don't get too excited.

This video suggests that songs for the rest of Chrono Trigger's cast might follow. We're all holding out for Crono's heart-rending ballad, “....”.

Related Links:

The Weakest Link: Chrono Trigger and Chrono Cross
WTFriday: The Chrono Trigger Anime
China Trigger

Picking Chrono Trigger Clean

Nadia Oxford — Sat, 06 Dec 2008 01:00:00 GMT

Mackey just reminded me of something. Well, Mackey reminds me of a lot of things, primarily of when I was a sexy leopardess who drove across Canada, solving cold murder cases. Let's keep this in the context of games, though. Mackey's post reminded me of a different age of gaming, when we used to pull apart games like so much shredded pork in hopes of squeezing just ten more minutes of gameplay from the battered cartridge.

Oh, to find one more secret. Oh, to tie up that loose end.

The Internet in 1995 was polluted with gaming "secrets" like the exact rain dance you needed to perform in order to resurrect General Leo in Final Fantasy VI. And Schala could be revived in Chrono Trigger, of course. All you had to do was the hokey pokey while waving a chicken over your head.

I performed a lot of these crazy rituals. I was desperate to find Schala. I thought the key lay in the Last Village--more specifically, in Janus' chatty purple cat, Alfador. I thought Alfador could lead me to the answers. He didn't, and I was very sad.

Why were we so desperate to make these connections back then? Granted, the race to find Schala in Chrono Trigger could partially be blamed on a mistranslated line that made it seem as if she was alive and suffering in the bowels of the Mammon Machine. Which, in turn, lay in the bowels of the ocean (I'll grab any excuse to write the word 'bowels').

Even so, it should have quickly become obvious that Schala would not re-appear until Chrono Cross. What else drove us to do crazy in-game shit?

I think part of our insanity could be credited to the infrequent release of Square's games back then. Chrono Trigger and Final Fantasy VI were, for many of us, early instances of quality storytelling in games. For some reason, we could accept loopholes and unanswered questions in books, but we refused to accept as much in video games until we licked every last pixel for clues.

Price may have been a factor as well. I remember dishing out near a hundred bucks each for Final Fantasy VI and Chrono Trigger. I needed to get everything out of them, partially because a quality RPG experience was such a rarity in those days and partially because I refused to believe a that a hundred dollar game like Chrono Trigger would dare leave such an important plot point unresolved.

Well, now it looks as if Chrono Trigger DS has tied up that loose end. Now all that remains is to go back in time and tell my fifteen year-old-self to chill out.

Related Links:

The Best Chrono Trigger Ending
The Weakest Link: Chrono Trigger and Chrono Cross
WTFriday: The Chrono Trigger Anime

OST: The Great Mitsuda Music Heist

Bob Mackey — Fri, 05 Dec 2008 22:00:00 GMT

Charles Caleb Colton once said "Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery," but it's important to remember that he coined this aphorism far before the invention of modern copyright laws and Japanese RPGs. That being said, Breath of Fire III composers Akari Kaida and Yoshino Aoki must've had Chrono Trigger composer Yasunori Mistuda dead in the sights of their flattery gun (it shoots flattery, you see) while composing at least one of the tracks of Capcom's long-running RPG franchise; the similarity between the piece in question and one of Mitsuda's own is unmistakable.

If you're wondering why I've kept this news to myself for over a decade, here are some answers: A.) Chrono Trigger DS is out, so this is semi-relevant, and B.) The existence of YouTube means it's finally easy for the lazy (i.e., me) to easily provide such a comparison. Square-Enix, when the lawsuit is over, I'll gladly take a generous "legal consultant fee."

Anyway, here are the songs in question:

"Secret of the Forest," composed in 1995:

"Forest Theme," composed in 1997:

Shocking, I know. When I first played Breath of Fire III in 1998, I picked up on the similarity between the two songs, too. But back then there wasn't anyone around me nerdy enough to care. Thanks for making my dreams come true.

Related Links:

Your Way: Chrono Trigger and The Glory of Options
The Chrono Trigger Port: Are You Excited or Disappointed?
Where is Yasunori Mitsuda?

The Best Chrono Trigger Ending

Bob Mackey — Thu, 04 Dec 2008 18:30:00 GMT

In case you didn't know, the new DS port of Chrono Trigger has a brand spankin' new ending; but, as is the case with most of the game's endings, it isn't too much to get excited about. This new ending does kinda tie up the whole Magus-Schala thread, but after Chrono Cross, we learned that this plot wasn't necessarily worth tying up--at least, not in the terms of Cross' convoluted story. Once I tried reading an FAQ to figure out just what the hell happened, and the entire left side of my body shut down for a few days.

It may seem like sacrilege to diss the endings of Trigger, but most of them are essentially little goofy puppet show vignettes; though my opinion could be coming from the fact that I suffered through the PSX port to view most of them. However, there are a few I genuinely like. And my favorite is the sickest one of all:

Yes, we have inter-species love far before Sonic 2006, and also the revelation that Queene Leene is into some sick, sick shit. I wonder, what happened on their wedding night when the unholy union between man and beast took place? Need to consult some fan-fiction. Be back in a jiffy.

Related Links:

The Weakest Link: Chrono Trigger and Chrono Cross
Adding a Thirteenth to Twelve Delicious Flavors: Chrono Trigger DS’ New Ending
OST: Chrono Cross

China Trigger

Bob Mackey — Tue, 02 Dec 2008 19:45:00 GMT

Most of you out there are probably playing Chrono Trigger DS--or at least you should be. I have to admit that I'm a total hypocrite, though; if I do play through Chrono Trigger again, it's not going to be for a while. Listen, when you suffer through hours upon hours of Chrono's abysmal PSX port to unlock some pretty pedestrian bonus content, you need to take a little break. I'll be at the five year mark around springtime, so please look forward to my coverage of Chrono Trigger DS in April 2009.

Believe it or not, there are versions of Chrono far worse than the PSX port, which was like playing a beloved RPG while immersed in quicksand. Our industrious friends in China actually produced their own pirate Famicom version of the game, as they've done in the past with many other games that have no business being on an 8-bit platform. Maybe this video will show you why:

Diagnosis: adorable--in a "broken toy on a thrift store shelf" sort of way. If you can get past the horribly mangled loop of "Peaceful Days" playing in the background, that is. Unfortunately, this video doesn't consist of more than a lot of walking around, which is making me wonder just how much of Chrono Trigger this cheap knockoff copies. I'm tempted to become completely literate in Chinese just to see what an 8-bit Zeal looks like. I guess that'll give me something to do during my retirement.

Related Links:

Adding a Thirteenth to Twelve Delicious Flavors: Chrono Trigger DS’ New Ending
The Weakest Link: Chrono Trigger and Chrono Cross
OST: Chrono Cross

Your Way: Chrono Trigger and The Glory of Options

John Constantine — Tue, 02 Dec 2008 00:15:00 GMT

I spent the Thanksgiving holiday not shopping, not overeating, not doing much of anything outside of that most traditional holiday pursuit: catching up with family. Not the extended fam, just the nuclear, and even then we weren’t all around. Sometimes work and obligation gets in the way and not everyone can make it home, just the way it goes. It was just me and the parents. And Chrono Trigger, obviously. A true homecoming, really; early winter playthroughs of Chrono Trigger have been, for me, as much a tradition as seeing loved ones during the season but I’d fallen out of rhythm over the past three years. Excited as I was to play the game again, I was going in with some trepidation. Not over the two new dungeons, the new ending, or the re-written dialogue. (The script, by the way, saw far more significant changes than was previously reported. The re-write isn’t bad by any means, but some of the charm of Ted Woolsey’s original is lost.) No, I was worried about the incorporation of the PS1 version’s animated cutscenes. I skipped the earlier re-release because the thought of slowdown in Chrono Trigger is nauseating, but getting to avoid the cutscenes was an added bonus. Nothing against the anime stuff, it’s fine that it exists, but the game’s story simply doesn’t need those scenes. Not to mention how they break the game’s seamless presentation.

So it was a nice surprise when I saw this screen:

Much like the original SNES version, Chrono Trigger DS offers you a choice before the game even starts. In addition to letting you choose if you want battles to play in the Horii-standard turn-based fighting or the mid-‘90s-Sakaguchified active mode, CTDS asks if you want to use the new touch screen interface and if you want to turn off the anime cinemas. Not only that, but you can change the settings you choose whenever you want throughout the game, in a menu that is literally overflowing with customization options. Four pages of them in fact, letting you toggle everything from the anachronistic run button, menu cursor memory, even tutorial messages. You name it. And all of your current settings are listed on a single page on the DS’ top screen while you change them on the bottom. It is one of the most considerate features I have ever seen included in a game.

There is a lot to be said for a game being unchangeable by the time it reaches a player’s hands. This is what the creators wanted you to play and experience, so why should you be able to alter that? But I can’t tell you how much more I would enjoy Super Mario Galaxy if I could turn off Mario’s constant grunting and yelping, Resistance 2 if I could turn off the NPC-ally chatter, if I could just re-map the damn buttons in Mega Man Anniversary Collection on Gamecube. Think how much more enjoyable all of the 3D Zeldas would be if you could turn off tutorials? These might not seem like deal breakers, but sometimes it’s the niggling annoyances in a game that stick with you more than the story or actual gameplay. In letting you tune your experience, a game’s designer can not only ensure you get the most out of your time with their creation, but also let you glean an even greater appreciation for the work that went into making it. A perfect example is the ability to switch out the HD sprites for the originals in the recently released Street Fighter II Turbo HD Remix. Trust me, you don’t appreciate just how gorgeous the new characters are until you’ve seen the overgrown, pixilated classics hopping about in widescreen.

I enjoyed Persona 3 more because it let me turn off the voiceovers. I enjoyed Resistance: Fall of Man more because it let me completely remap the controls. And I enjoyed Chrono Trigger DS even more because of its truly generous options. What do you think, readers? How far should game designers let you tweak their games to ensure you play the best game you can?

Related links:

The Death Of Awesome Pack-In Material
Populous: Text Based Tutorials Need to Die In A Fire
This Week in Shrieking Annoyances
RPGs: Turn Based VS. Real Time - FIGHT!
TVTropes' "Woolseyisms"

Your JRPG Narrative is Bad and You Should Feel Bad

Bob Mackey — Wed, 26 Nov 2008 21:00:00 GMT

I recently gave up on Tales of Symphonia: Dawn of the New World a scant four hours into my experience for one reason alone: the game was literally stabbing me in the brain with its narrative. It's not that DotNW's story was exceptionally bad; actually, it was delightfully mediocre, which is really all I can ask for from a JRPG these days. The biggest problem, you see, is that DotNW's stopped to show me its accursed story about every 5 seconds, like an attention-starved child waving a macaroni art project in my face.

"Yes, I see. Very nice. Daddy's trying to play his game now."

Listen up, JRPG developers: the stories you're trying to tell? They aren't necessarily worth telling. In fact, I can really only name two RPGs in the past decade that've had stories which ranked far above "serviceable:" Final Fantasy XII, and Mother 3--note that the latter of these two was written by an actual writer. I may come off as kind of snobbish with this post, though I think that just comes with age; there was a point in my life when I thought RPG plots were totally tubular, but that was back when I was in high school. Turning into a cranky old man has given me the benefit of perspective; through experiencing a number of excellent narratives (across various media), I've obtained standards that I can't quite drop. (Also, I need some way to justify my expensive BA.)

The problem of lousy narrative is a pretty big hurdle for JRPG developers, but I've taken the liberty of coming up with some easy-to-follow and unsolicited solutions:

- Keep it simple. This involves recognizing your own limitations. You're not the next Tolkien, so don't try to be. Some of the most fun and charming RPGs--like Chrono Trigger--had simple, storybook tales that steered clear from pretention. Do your neologisms number in the dozens? Have you name-dropped at least two German philosophers? Then you've gone too far and must be stopped.

- Showing us your story means we're not playing your game. We want to play your game; that's why we bought it. Could something in a proposed story scene actually be played by us? Then let us play!

- Your story is not as good as you think it is. Seriously. Odds are, you've just assembled a collection of stereotypes from the popcorn entertainment you've been immersed in for your entire life. Go to someone who can recognize quality writing. Get them to hit you, if necessary.

That wasn't so hard, was it? Now, if we could only get you guys to stop committing deicide so often, we'd have a real revolution on our hands.

Related Links:

The 61FPS Review: Dragon Quest IV – Chapters of the Chosen
Hey, RPG Hero: Go Home and Be a Family Man
Watcha Playing: Opoona

Devildom String Orchestra: Music, Masks, and Madness

Bob Mackey — Mon, 24 Nov 2008 16:00:00 GMT

The hardcore American video game fan has been known embark on some pretty wild and awesome projects, even if some of them do happen to be complete fakes. But there's just something about the industriousness of the Japanese hardcore that puts all of us to shame; just take a look at any Japanese-created levels of LittleBigPlanet, and you'll realize their devotion eclipses ours by a pretty large margin. So what, exactly, am I getting at here? Well, in researching Friday's post about the music of Mother, I stumbled upon a collection of YouTube videos that were too cool to keep to myself.

The Devildom String Orchestra (at least, that's what I think the entire group calls itself) is a collection of Japanese musicians that arrange video game and anime music into real, live instrumentations. And they do all of this while wearing extremely creepy masks. The most disturbing thing about this group, though, is that their videos really aren't getting the attention that they should. You can access all of them by going to Tuengxx's YouTube page, but I've highlighted a few of the better ones below for your convenience.

A very nice Chrono Trigger medley.

Meena and Maya's theme from Dragon Quest IV.

And a very nice version of what I believe is one of Final Fantasy V's town themes. As I said, you should probably check them all out.

Related Links:

The End of Time and the Beginning of Fan Drama
Mega Man Fan Movie Trailer
Paper Covers Rockman

Adding a Thirteenth to Twelve Delicious Flavors: Chrono Trigger DS’ New Ending

John Constantine — Tue, 11 Nov 2008 01:00:00 GMT

*Spoilers ahoy*

I’ve spent twelve years telling people that my favoritest game in the history of games is Chrono Trigger, and it’s the truth. When I scour my brain for one game, one singular work that embodies everything a game can and should be, Chrono Trigger is the one that springs to mind. The art, the music, the layout, the story, the music, the battle system, the music. Everything works in tandem, nothing is out of place. But you’ve heard this all before, from me, everyone else here at 61FPS, and every other soul typing away on the internet. It bears repeating today, though, because Famitsu announced that, alongside Chrono Trigger DS’ two new dungeons, the re-release is getting a new ending as well.

Despite my enduring love for Trigger, I never bothered to check out all twelve of its alternate endings. I went out of my way to take a look at the ending that lets you chat with the development team – even though Trigger’s relatively easy, this one’s a toughy to unlock, requiring you to beat Lavos using only Crono and Marle at the start of your New Game + - and, because its hilarious, the one where Marle and Lucca appraise the game’s male characters. But outside of those, the other endings just seemed like oddities, inessential alternatives to the game’s perfectly bittersweet main ending. The new ending, though, looks like it may be worth seeking out. These two screenshots could be interpreted as yet more evidence that the DS version is going to more explicitly link Chrono Trigger and Chrono Cross. I mean, what else could a shot of Magus in his spooky 12,000 BC hood standing before a time gate in Lavos’ void imply?

Man, I think about this game too much.

(Link: Siliconera)

Related links:

The Weakest Link: Chrono Trigger and Chrono Cross
WTFriday: The Chrono Trigger Anime
The Ten Greatest Ice Levels in Gaming History
The End of Time and the Beginning of Fan Drama
Trailer Review: The Past and Future With Mega Man 9 and Chrono Trigger DS

Kirite: The Secret Best Yasunori Mitsuda Soundtrack

Bob Mackey — Fri, 07 Nov 2008 16:00:00 GMT

I spent a long time bitching and whining about composer Yasunori Mitsuda's (Chrono Trigger, Chrono Cross, Xenogears) lack of presence in current-gen RPGs, only to find out that he's still putting out music, albeit on quite a few games that have yet to make it to the states. But there's something about his work on the DS--a system he seems pretty comfortable with these days--that feels a bit watered down to me; I eagerly await the day when he pens his next soundtrack for a system that can support the stellar work he did on titles like Chrono Cross and Xenosaga.

But until then, we'll always have Kirite, Mitsuda's absolutely beautiful orchestrated concept album from 2005. Square Haven gives a nice description of this amazing album:

Kirite is a combined effort between Yasunori Mitsuda and Chrono series producer/writer Masato Kato. It adds a musical illustration to the accompanying novel Kato wrote, "Five Seasons of Kirite", which tells the story of a boy named Kirite, and the girl Kotonoha. The music plays out like Mitsuda's other standalone non-game albums such as Sailing to the World, with a gentle introduction comprised mainly of explorations of the album's main theme, followed by an element of mystery and unveiling, then capped by dynamic battle-style pieces and closed off with what amounts to an ending theme. Indeed, the album progresses much like your average videogame soundtrack.

But really, you don't need to understand Japanese to get the most from Kirite; the music speaks for itself. Here's "The Market In Volfinor," which is one of my favorite songs from the album. Listening to it makes an RPG happen in your brain.

All in all, Kirite feels like a true successor to Mistuda's Chrono Cross soundtrack, and it's definitely a nice snapshot of what the composer can do. I shouldn't be spiteful about all the work he's putting out on the DS, but damn it, just listen to Kirite! This is something we need more of.

Related Links:

Where is Yasunori Mitsuda?
OST: Chrono Cross
OST: DuckTales

Our Emulation Habits

Bob Mackey — Wed, 29 Oct 2008 22:30:00 GMT

A long, long time ago (actually, it was just this past Friday) fellow blogger and 61FPS boss-man pined over his inability to emulate. I'm afraid that I'm a bit less romantic than John, even though my feelings about emulation have changed slightly over the years. But when I first started emulating--man oh man--it was like some sort of amazing technology I dreamed about but never thought would exist. As is the case with most people who caught onto emulation, I got hooked on NESticle back in 1997, and spent the copious amounts of free time I had (I was a dork in high school, after all) downloading all the games from my past I was dying to play again.

If I'm not mistaken, I think this was also the year that SNES emulators--a baffling proposition at the time--first started to support sound. I remember downloading a .wav file of the Chrono Trigger opening song as played through the soon-to-be released SNES9X and sitting there completely awestruck. Yes, even then I realized how nerdy I was.

Really, the late 90s-early 00s were a very fruitful time for emulation, and during this short span of years we saw some of the most notable translations: Final Fantasy V, Seiken Densetsu 3, and even a ROM dump of Nintendo's own aborted attempt at releasing the first Mother game. If emulation has served me any good, it's come from being able to play games I would've never been able to play otherwise. The translation scene is much quieter these days, but every once in a while there's a huge release, like the PSX version of Tales of Phantasia or Mother 3, which we can't stop blogging about.

Really, the inauthenticity of emulation really doesn't get to me, because the differences from the real hardware are--in my eyes--imperceptible; and I'd rather play something great with minor imperfections than not play anything at all. The only trap I've ever fallen into has been the dreaded "emulation fatigue," which happens when you have a lot of ROMs but not a lot of patience. It's easy to judge and dismiss a game in moments when you've got hundreds more sitting on your hard drive; most people suffering from this disorder try out games for roughly eight seconds before deciding to never play them again. But I've found that if I actually pay money for emulation, usually via the Wii's Virtual Console, this problem disappears entirely. I still have a bunch of games I've never finished sitting on my Wii, but I feel compelled to go back to them because they actually have a dollar value. Not sure if that makes me a hypocrite, but that's my typical behavior.

So I'm going to go ahead and say "Huzzah for emulation!" as long as it isn't hurting anyone. I honestly don't see the point in ethical hand-wringing over games we'll probably never see on any platform again; sure, Capcom may not see a dime from you downloading a DuckTales ROM, but the great money chain for that game was broken about 18 years ago. That doesn't make you entitled to play it, but in the end, who the hell cares?

Related Links:

Question of the Day: Why Can’t I Emulate?
THE MOTHER 3 TRANSLATION IS OUT
The End of Time and the Beginning of Fan Drama

The Weakest Link: Chrono Trigger and Chrono Cross

Nadia Oxford — Mon, 27 Oct 2008 22:42:00 GMT

Chrono Cross is the official sequel to Chrono Trigger, and I often wonder if it should have been. I really enjoyed Chono Cross: the graphics are beautiful, the music is stunning and the cast (even though it numbers in the trillions) is generally fun to hang with. As its own game, Chrono Cross is a Playstation must-have. As a sequel to Chrono Trigger, however, it's kind of off-colour. Following up Chrono Trigger with Chrono Cross is like eating a zuccini right after an ice cream cone. Both taste good, but for entirely different reasons that don't mix well.

There stands an excellent chance that Chrono Trigger DS will hammer some hasty bridges between it and Chrono Cross, and I really wish it wouldn't. The Playstation re-release of Chrono Trigger (avoid avoid avoid) already established links between the two, so I fear it's too late.

You may have noticed that I mouth off a lot about how the quality of game stories can stand to be closer to what you'd find in a book. I don't know if there has ever been an author who took over a beloved universe and promptly killed off its cast in the most half-assed manner possible in order to move in his roster, but if there is, I doubt he made any friends.

The death of Crono and his buds bothered me because there was nothing about Chrono Trigger that indicated the Kingdom of Guardia was at war with Porre. Porre never even gave any indication that it wanted to be more than a three-house town with a fuzzy monster who called himself the Piano Man. Chrono Cross puts the two at war and it was as baffling as watching a little boy play Death Army with Barbies and My Little Ponies.

It's not to say every link between the two is impotent. The trip through the Dead Sea is appropriately spine-tingling, and even though I have big problems with Chrono Cross making burnt offerings of my favourite characters to tell its own story, I can acknowledge that it is a good story.

But when I play Chrono Trigger DS this winter, there will be a great sadness in my bosom. :(

Related Links:

OST: Chrono Cross
The End of Time and the Beginning of Fan Drama
Chrono Trigger Port: Are You Excited or Disappointed?

WTFriday: The Chrono Trigger Anime

Bob Mackey — Sat, 18 Oct 2008 02:00:00 GMT

Note to readers: WTFriday is a weekly feature where I find something stupid about video games and get you to laugh until it goes away. Please try to forget this is what I normally do every day of the week.

We're all excited about Chrono Trigger again--and why shouldn't we be? This November, we'll finally have the chance to pay $40 for a game we could've plunked down $70 for back in 1995. I'm such an unabashed Trigger fan that I actually unlocked all of the bonus content on the terrible PSX port of the game. Hey, it was new, and it was Chrono Trigger, so I was all over it.

So when the Chrono Trigger anime surfaced just a handful of years ago, of course I wanted to see it. It felt like some sort of crime that an animated version of one of my favorite games could be made and hidden from the world for so long. Only after watching it did I learn that the real crime was the making of the Chrono Trigger anime.

But you don't have to take my word for it:

So, let's see... You have a video game property combining the hottest talent across various industries, and you decide to make an animated version of said video game. Will it star the characters designed by one of the most popular comic artists in Japan? No. Will it follow the same story crafted by the most successful JRPG talespinner? Of course not; no one wants to see that. Instead, we'll get to see what really happens during the Millenial Fair at night--and wait for the money to roll in, of course.

I'd really like to know the story behind this production, because I bet there's an interesting one. The whole thing feels like it's barely official; Chrono and company only show up for the last few seconds, and we only see the backs of their bodies--perhaps they were just as embarrassed, too? Whatever the case, you are now aware that the Chrono Trigger anime exists, and are much less happy as a result. I'm sorry.

Related Links:

WTFriday: Goldman's Drama Academy
WTFriday: Play it Loud
WTFriday: Frawless Victory

The Ten Greatest Ice Levels in Gaming History, part 3

John Constantine — Fri, 17 Oct 2008 00:10:00 GMT

Donkey Kong Country – Snow Barrel Blast

Donkey Kong Country isn’t the most fondly remembered SNES game out there. It was marketed to hell and back in 1994, its pre-rendered characters shoved down millions of gamers’ gullets as a final grasp at technological relevance before the dawn of 3D gaming’s rule. At heart, it’s a simplistic and fun platformer whose visuals have aged poorly. But certain stages in DKC still impress fourteen years later, thanks to a combination of inspired graphical presentation and deft sound arrangement. Snow Barrel Blast is the best DKC has to offer. An ice level that seems simple enough when Donkey and Diddy Kong emerge from an igloo at the start but soars when the sky starts to darken and the level goes from sunny winter landscape to brooding driving snow storm. It’s purely aesthetic, not informing the game’s basic platforming at all. But its beauty makes it the one thing memorable about DKC besides the hype. – JC

Super Mario Bros. 2 – World 4

Traditionally speaking, ice is the bane of platforming. As soon as you see blue ground, slightly shaded to a reflective sheen, you know that the rules you’ve been operating under up to that point are going straight out the window. You will slip, you will slide, and, so, you will miss many, many jumps. World 4 in Super Mario Bros. 2 turns icy surfaces into an exercise in speed and timing, setting up a first level that’s less about jumping across tiered platforms than it is about running as fast as possible and expertly sliding beneath/over oncoming enemies. It’s the speediest stuff in any of the original Mario trilogy. World 4 gets downright weird by the second stage: yeah, those are whales in between the ice-platforms and snowy outcroppings of rock. Why are there whales? Why not! Go spit some eggs, or something. – JC

Super Ghouls ‘N Ghosts – Ice Forest

Though it came out at the same time as Actraiser, as one of the first fantasy epics for the fledging SNES, Super Ghouls 'n' Ghosts could hardly be more different in tone. Where Actraiser is an existential epic, SG'n'G is a macabre romp; it plays as if Tim Burton and Danny Elfman designed a platformer and let the Marquis de Sade balance the difficulty. Stage 5, the Ice Forest, is a glimmering nightmare full of wolves, frozen ghost knights and spore-spitting snowdrops. In its lurid way, it's awfully pretty, but if you stand around admiring the ambiance, you will soon find yourself without your pants. – PS

Metroid Prime – Phendrana Drifts

Come on, you knew it was coming. Ice in Metroid recalls Samus’ arsenal more immediately than the series’ sprawling environments, but it also defines the most evocative and beautiful space in Prime’s Tallon IV. The Phendrana Drifts has a quality rare in Miss Aran’s adventures: it’s a tranquil place, almost soothing in its stillness. As the camera pans when you first arrive, and Kenji Yamamoto’s eerie, still score begins to play, the ice flows, icicle laden cliffs, and crumbling Chozo architecture come off as a place that’s safe to explore, free of bloodthirsty space jellyfish or insectoid pirates. It isn’t until Ridley’s shadow glides over Phendrana’s surface that you feel a literal chill and remember: Tallon IV isn’t a safe place. The frozen water kills and the ice blocks your way. Best to get bounty huntin’ before your suit freezes up. – JC

Part 1
Part 2

Previous Top Tens:

Ten Reasons Why Secret of Mana Sucks
The Five Greatest Enhanced Remakes - And Five That Weren't So Great
The Ten Greatest Classic Mega Man Levels
The Ten Videogames That Should Have Been Controversial
The Ten Greatest Opening Levels in Gaming History
The Ten Most Adventurous Sequels in Gaming History
The Ten Greatest Fire Levels in Gaming History

The Ten Greatest Ice Levels in Gaming History, part 2

John Constantine — Fri, 17 Oct 2008 00:05:00 GMT

Lost Planet – The Whole Game

Lost Planet, Keiji Inafune’s attempt to make Halo for Japan, is one of this console generation’s most underappreciated games. The shooting is tight, the levels are impeccably designed, the automated-grappling-hook platforming is neat, and the Starship Troopers-bug baddies are some of the cooler looking HD threats out there. Sure, it has some clunky parts, but the good far outweighs the bad. What’s more, the entire game is all about snow and ice. The initial stages, wandering the frozen wastes of E.D.N. III, are still jaw dropping. It isn’t even the swirling snow or the ice-bound cities; it’s the sound, the crunch, of stomping through snow drifts. My teeth grit just thinking about it. The snowy setting is also behind Lost Planet’s health system. Your health is constantly draining because of the cold, so you’re forced to constantly collect the body heat of felled foes. That is cooler than crawling inside a Taun-Taun. – JC

Actraiser – Northwall

Let other developers go the way of stock level design. Quintet was always too good for that, giving their levels in Actraiser a pre-human quality that went far beyond the usual D&D boilerplate. That sense of a vast natural world haunted by gods and demons was perfectly captured in the two Acts that take place in the frozen land of Northwall. In the first, you enter a pristine wasteland to clear it for your subjects. Despite the substantial amount of combat that takes place therein, the austerity of the snowy background and the chilly beauty of Yuzo Koshiro's score gives the whole scene a sense of peace.

Things are different in Act 2, which finds you scaling a collosal frozen tree to rid your now-colonized land of monsters. This climactic moment finds all the forces of the arctic landscape rallied against you, with Koshiro's appropriately frantic music spurring you ever upward to destiny. – Peter Smith

Castlevania: Dawn of Sorrow – The Lost Village

Castlevania is a series about place, but its range is often limited by the requirements of its title. Each game has its unique spaces, but they’re inevitably tied to Dracula’s castle and the Transylvanian countryside surrounding it, which is why franchise entries that mix things up are the most memorable. Of all the ‘Vanias to release after Symphony of the Night’s complete genre realignment, the Soma Cruz adventures are the most distinct, their near-future setting lending much needed modernity to the usual gothic ramparts and libraries. And given Soma’s snowy appearance, it’s not surprising that his second outing, Dawn of Sorrow, is home to one of gaming’s best ice levels. The first screen of The Lost Village plain makes you want to put on a coat. Snow falls lazily on a rickety wooden fence, dense forest obscures an enormous moon, and the only sound is wind. The real star is the central room, a multi-screen series of German-styled village buildings stacked on one another, frozen and abandoned. Unforgettable moment: landing a jump on a broken-down VW bus and seeing the snow slump off onto the ground. – JC

Part 1
Part 3

Previous Top Tens:

Ten Reasons Why Secret of Mana Sucks
The Five Greatest Enhanced Remakes - And Five That Weren't So Great
The Ten Greatest Classic Mega Man Levels
The Ten Videogames That Should Have Been Controversial
The Ten Greatest Opening Levels in Gaming History
The Ten Most Adventurous Sequels in Gaming History
The Ten Greatest Fire Levels in Gaming History

The Ten Greatest Ice Levels in Gaming History, part 1

John Constantine — Fri, 17 Oct 2008 00:00:00 GMT

Autumn may only be a few weeks old, but, as it is with all seasons, you can feel its successor growing during the increasingly long nights. It’s getting cold and the chill has got us thinking about cool things, here at 61 Frames Per Second. As a result, we’re doing two things. One, we’re quoting Batman and Robin far more than we should. Two, we’re thinking about ice levels. Ice levels, like fire levels, refers to a theme more than a specific element. An ice level is more than ice. It’s freezing water, driving snow, strong wind, and grey skies. It’s gaming that makes you want to wrap up in a giant bearskin rug. Naked. Or not, to each their own. Here, we present to you, the top ten greatest ice levels in gaming history. – John Constantine

Chrono Trigger – Death Peak

*Spoilers. Big Ones.*

The snow-capped peak is not an uncommon locale in role-playing games. You’ve been there before: there’s a giant monster, typically abominable, waiting for you at the summit, and the journey to him is guaranteed to entail solving an ice block puzzle or three. You are also guaranteed to find some convenient Ice Armor or even, if you’re lucky, a Fire Sword. Chrono Trigger’s Death Peak, the lone natural environment in the Lavos-ruined 2300 AD, is different. It is, ostensibly, optional. Like everything else in Trigger’s end game following the silent hero’s death, you can skip the mountain entirely, though ascending it is fundamental in reaching the plot’s true conclusion. Death Peak is the physical embodiment of everything at stake in Trigger’s conflict, a frozen place inhabited by stray creatures, cold, and Lavos’ offspring, growing fat on decay, waiting to leave the dead planet to claim others as their own. Its challenge is both environmental and emblematic: your surviving heroes must push against snow and wind, against nature, to both save the world and also their fallen friend. No boss waits at the pinnacle, just a dreary sky and a chance to use the Chrono Trigger itself. When Crono is resurrected, the wind and snow cease, the sun emerges from the clouds and is eclipsed. If you choose to see it, it is the turning point in the game, the moment hope overcomes despair. – JC

Metal Gear Solid (1 and 4) – Shadow Moses

Most of the levels here made the list because they do two things: they are artful and the ice defines how you play through them. Shadow Moses, that forlorn little island north of Alaska where so many bad, Metal Gear-y things happened, fulfills both those criteria and then goes a step farther. Shadow Moses, and the very first post-opening-credits play sequence in MGS, defines the entire series. It sets the overdramatic tone, it bookends the franchise narrative, and it quickly establishes the stealth gameplay. It isn’t a real stunner now, but finding out that enemies would notice footprints left in the snow was exciting stuff in 1998. The return trip to Shadow Moses in Metal Gear Solid 4 is less exciting for its gameplay – it comes in MGS4’s limited-play back half – and more just artful. Approaching the base from outside, literally navigating through a white-out blizzard, provides a visually stunning moment in a game full of them. When I saw that giant bi-pedal robot lumbering through the snow, only barely visible through the torrent, I damn near threw my controller at the screen. – JC

Sonic the Hedgehog 3 – Ice Cap Zone

Okay, okay. I've never much cared for Sonic, but I will admit that its cartoony, distinctly '90s environment design is distinctive, and Ice Cap Zone probably deserves a place on this list. It's cool how you snowboard in, and it's cool how half the level breaks around you in big chaotic shards of crystal, even if the gameplay remains duller than toast. And the much-beloved music is pretty catchy, although it evokes a night of strip-mall dance clubbing more than an arctic wonderland... Okay, Sonic fans? Okay? You win this round, you hear? Now stop sending me those horrible pictures! – PS

Part 2
Part 3

Previous Top Tens:

Ten Reasons Why Secret of Mana Sucks
The Five Greatest Enhanced Remakes - And Five That Weren't So Great
The Ten Greatest Classic Mega Man Levels
The Ten Videogames That Should Have Been Controversial
The Ten Greatest Opening Levels in Gaming History
The Ten Most Adventurous Sequels in Gaming History
The Ten Greatest Fire Levels in Gaming History

Japan Scares Me: Tokyo Game Show Rising, Strangeness, and Panty-shot Beat ‘Em Ups

John Constantine — Tue, 07 Oct 2008 21:00:00 GMT

Does it ever. Japan has me trembling in my delicate booties. Typically it’s just one thing or another that gets me quaking in abject terror: a bizarre fan-made video here, a witch molestation game there. Today, Japan’s working overtime. Gaming exists, at the Japanese moment, in a state of flux. Traditional gaming appears to be dwindling – way back in June 2007, Screen Digest predicted that 89% of Japanese households would own a Nintendo DS, a number that will likely need to be increased after the DSi releases later this year – while simultaneously thriving thanks to Capcom’s Monster Hunter Portable juggernaut. Major publishers continue to consolidate while the nation’s auteur creators start crafting more and more games to suit Western tastes and flock to Western publishing houses. Hell, the Xbox 360, an American console, outsold the PS3 throughout September. Things are topsy-turvy over there. It’s enough to make a man skittish, especially with the Tokyo Game Show due to start in just forty-eight hours.

What’s to be scared of? For starters, there’s the Chrono Trigger Museum in Square-Enix’s booth. This worries me for two reasons. First, I may wake up in a Japanese prison on Saturday morning because I will have unconsciously attempted to steal everything on display. Second, it will most likely be the first time that people get hands on time with Chrono Trigger DS’ brand new scenarios, including the Dimensional Distortion. The Dimensional Distortion is a brand new story-rich dungeon/quest being supervised by Trigger writer Masato Kato, and while that’s exciting in theory, tampering with a classic in any way is extremely dangerous. The Tokyo Game Show may also, if Action Button’s Tim Rogers is correct, mark the debut of Fumito Ueda and Team Ico’s long-in-development Playstation 3 game. I’m scared it won’t be there, but I’m even more scared that it may not live up to the astronomically high expectations set by Ico and Shadow of the Colossus.

So, yes, terror abounds. But I take comfort in the little things, like Japan’s pervading constancy. I can sleep soundly knowing that, one way or another, Japan will find a way to make even the simplest videogame pervy as hell. Look no further than the just-released Ikkitousen: Eloquent Fist. Ikkitousen is a sidescrolling beat ‘em up for the PSP made in the classic mold of Final Fight and Double Dragon, sporting gigantic and beautifully animated sprites. Those sprites also happen to be teenage Japanese girls who, after taking enough damage, find their already revealing attire (maid and schoolgirl outfits, natch,) completely destroyed, leaving them very, very naked. Almost all of the game's "4000 animated cutscenes with full voice" focus entirely on the protagonist's breasts. I’m sure you get the idea, but you should enjoy this trailer just to let it sink in.

Nothing mollifies neurosis quite like some good ol’fashioned portable hentai.

On a final note, Sam Kennedy’s blog over at 1up revealed to me that Japanese record stores do not have rap or hip-hop sections in them. No, they have “Black” music sections. See for yourself.

Japan? You scare the fucking bejesus out of me.

Related links:

Japan Scares Me: To Love-Ru - Exciting Outdoor School Version
Japan Scares Me Follow Up: To Love-Ru Makes Japan Even Scarier Than Previously Thought
Japan Scares Me: Mario and The Western Show
Ne, Rokkuman! Yaranaika?: The World of Hayadain

The End of Time and the Beginning of Fan Drama

Nadia Oxford — Fri, 12 Sep 2008 23:48:00 GMT

Recent videos of Chrono Trigger DS reveal the same game we aspired to marry thirteen years ago (has it been thirteen years? Holy crap, I could've done something useful like rear a thankless teenager) but the sharp among us have noticed...ch-ch-changes. Specifically, it looks like the in-game text has been altered a bit.

This means it's possible Chrono Trigger DS will be receiving the Final Fantasy VI Advance treatment. This treatment, by definition, aspires to keep the charm of Ted Woolsey's original translation, but will still fill out text that had to be cut because of space issues or censorship.

Personally, I'm not even sure what can be restored. The blossoming shitstorm has fanned my fascination for The Chrono Trigger Re-Translation Project, a project that's considered about as useless as using an umbrella to deflect a falling piano.

Unlike most fan translations, the Chrono Trigger Retranslation Project website doesn't open up with an animated .gif of Woolsey burning at the stake. Regardless, its existence rubs me the wrong way because it's so unnecessary. The Internet is a toilet bowl brimming with Useless, but this little turnpike on the Information Highway really just gets to me. Even though the project managers acknowledge that Woolsey did an okay job translating Chrono Trigger under the circumstances, this bit of smugness gets under my fingernails:

[S]ome essence of the game was lost or altered, given Nintendo of America's censorship standards and the inability of the game to hold all the original text when translated to English.

SNES-era RPGs were so gosh darn playable, but I think they also owe some of their longevity to great translation. Final Fantasy VI was dark and brooding and despite Woolsey's best efforts, I sometimes felt like I was out of the loop--and there were instances where the censorship dusted the in-game content as carelessly as kitty litter covers...you know.

But Chrono Trigger is a shonen game. A boy versus a great evil. Great story, to be sure, but lacking in depth. And that was okay because the game wasn't trying to be deep.

In other words, and this may be a tremendous shock, so make sure you're sitting down and clutching something, the Re-Translation project adds nothing to the original experience. Play the ROM or read the script. Woolsey didn't alter the game's "essence." It's like saying the dub of Dragon Ball Z changes the deep message behind the series.

(Hint: Please don't make yourself look the fool by saying the dub of Dragon Ball Z changes the deep message behind the series.)

There's very little in the new script that adds to the story like the translators claim. Who really cares if Magus(-sama) makes reference to the Black Wind, the Reaper, the Devil or Black Sabbath? It all kind of stews in the same pit of Hell. It'd be different if Magus' original English text suggested that he was opening a candy store instead of trying to summon Lavos, but that's not the case.

In fact, I think there's no question that Woolsey improved the script. Frog, for example, was supposedly turned into a "buffoon" by his "mangled" Olde English, which didn't exist in Japan. Instead, he was blunt and straightforward, going as far as to use insults from time to time. Oh good, games and anime need another forgettable swordsman who cares only for his own fate.

Admittedly, Woolsey did make a couple of grand blunders. The most famous one was the Guru of Time telling the player that someone close to the party was in trouble and to "Find this person...fast." When Chrono Trigger was released, we nerds were finding our first legs on the Internet and message boards filled up with speculation over who this lost person might be. I personally thought it was somehow connected to Alphador in the Last Village. Oh, wait...the Remaining Village. As it happens , it was just a severe case of the Oopsies on Woolsey's part.

So that sucked, but when you think about it, it's kind of an elegant blunder. It made the fandom talk and speculate; how many games manage that? Nobody's going to debate anything about Final Fantasy VII's "This guy are sick" line, except maybe to wonder aloud how much alcohol was involved in the translation process.

Woolsey admitted in an interview that he had to cut out story bits, but like your mom says, the proof is in the pudding. What's gone affects very little of the game. It's nothing against the translators; they had a project and they should be commended for sticking through to it 'til the end. But I personally don't get any use out of it, so I shall go play with my yo-yo and cup-and-ball now.

As for what was cut, it looks like we missed Ayla commenting on Marle's small boobs, adding generic anime humour to what was otherwise a pretty emotional event (the Rainbow Shell sidequest). I never would have expected Toriyama to crack a boob joke. My Chrono Trigger experience is officially unfulfilled.

Related Links:

The Chrono Trigger Port: Are You Excited or Disappointed?
OST: Chrono Cross
TVTropes' "Woolseyisms"

Ten Reasons Why Secret of Mana Sucks

John Constantine — Fri, 12 Sep 2008 18:00:00 GMT

Caution: Humor and Satire Within.

I want to make two things abundantly clear. I love Super Nintendo-era Squaresoft. I love those games with a ferocious passion that transcends nostalgia. I am not being cute or silly when I say that Chrono Trigger changed my life. It did. Had I not played that game for the first time in December of 1996, I would have never kept writing, would have never been listening to the soundtrack which led to my getting up the courage to making a move on my first serious girlfriend, and a number of other causal ripples coming out of that formative experience. I also want to make it abundantly clear that I have very little time for baseless hating on anything, whether it be a human being, a flavor of lollipop, a book, or videogame.

That said, Secret of Mana sucks and I hate it. I have tried. Lord knows I have tried to play, to beat, and to love that game. I have tried so damn hard. But the truth is inescapable. It sucks and it will always suck. Here’s why!

1) Santa? Fuck you!
2) Stupid rabbites… think you’re so damn cute… whyioughta…
3) Takes forever to play.
4) Feels even longer because of stupid mechanics.
5) Multiplayer isn't fun when everyone gets stuck on a mushroom every two seconds.
6) If I swing a sword at a giant bee, it should fucking hit a giant bee.
7) Terrible soundtrack.
8) Just kidding, that soundtrack's amazing.
9) Protagonist is shitty bootleg version of Crono.
10) Plot makes about as much sense as the ending of Matrix: Reloaded.

I’m just sayin’!

*Now, before y’all go racing to the comments section, I want to make it abundantly clear that this list is for eliciting mirth and humorous reactions. I am not being serious. Well, a little serious. Watching this footage of the recent Virtual Console release of Secret of Mana just got me thinking about the game’s tireless fan-following and how I’m consistently mystified by it. The game is, love it or hate it, simply not up to the sterling standard set by Squaresoft’s other games of the 16-bit era. It has none of the refinement than any of the legendary publisher’s other titles. Frankly, when people talk about how far the series has fallen in the last decade, plagued by shoddy controls and boring environment design, I’m mystified. It’s always been that way.

(Link: NeoGAF)

Related links:

The Dividing RPG: Secret of Mana
TVTropes' "Woolseyisms"
Flying Gay Men Invade Virtual Console!

Kenichi Nishi and Kenji Eno’s Newtonica Brings iPhone Gaming Into the Realm of Awesome

John Constantine — Tue, 26 Aug 2008 19:00:00 GMT

I have been, in general, pretty resistant to the iPhone mania that’s overtaken many hundreds of thousands of folks. They’re attractive little devices but, well, them things are expensive. Plus, it remains to be seen whether or not it will come into its own as a gaming platform. The version of Spore Maxis has cooked up looks like a neat diversion but not many other games seem particularly interesting. For example, a friend of mine downloaded Super Monkey Ball and told me that when the game wasn’t crashing his iPhone, it was a chore to actually control anything. Newtonica, a new game from the ever fertile mind of Kenichi Nishi, now has me chomping at the bit to actually hand over some cashey money to Steve Jobs. Why? For starters, Nishi was the field designer on Super Mario RPG and Chrono Trigger, the founder of Love-De-Lic, and the designer of Skip’s Chibi-Robo. That’s what you call a pedigree right there. Also? Newtonica’s soundtrack is by Kenji Eno. As I recently discovered, Kenji Eno rules. Looks like the actually gameplay, not dissimilar to the Bit Generations title Orbital which Nishi also had a hand in, will be a hoot too.

Core Gamers has an interview with Nishi that’s worth a read so go check it out already.

As always, much love to Eegra’s Patrick Alexander who alerted me to Newtonica’s awesome existence. That said, damn you for making me want an iPhone, Patrick.

Related links:

Kenji Eno is A Mule of Epic Proportions
Trailer Review - Captain Rainbow
Alternate Soundtrack: Orbital vs. The Notwist
Many Colors in the Hardcore Rainbow
WiiWare: Nintendo, Babe, It Just Isn’t Working Out

Where is Yasunori Mitsuda?

Bob Mackey — Wed, 20 Aug 2008 15:30:00 GMT

Chrono Trigger is coming to the DS this holiday season, and we should all be happy. If it were any other game, Square-Enix would be lambasted for bringing such a quick-and-dirty full-priced port (plus the typical five-dollar "Square tax") to its brainwashed fans, but this is Chrono Trigger. Since the game has basically been out of print for 13 years, and available only as a gimped PS1 port for seven of those years, it's a treat to finally get a legal, playable version of Chrono Trigger without a dead save battery and sans loading times. I don't know what pushed me through the Final Fantasy Chronicles version of the game, but I'm going to go ahead and blame September 11th.

One of the nicer bits of news about Chrono Trigger DS is that the soundtrack--one of the best out there, technically and musically--has actually survived the transition to Nintendo's handheld console; this is no small feat, what with Square-Enix's GBA remakes sounding disappointingly tinny and crunchy. You can credit the greatness of Chrono Trigger's soundtrack to the SNES sound chip--which certainly was a great tool--but Yasunori Mitsuda deserves most of the acclaim for putting together one hell of a soundtrack. And it was his first!

But in the past few years, it seems like Mitsuda has been slumming by working exclusively on forgettable DS RPGs. This is something the needs to change.

Mitsuda's early career with Square resulted in some of the best soundtracks to ever come out of the medium, even if the quality of the games themselves were suspect. After composing the music for Trigger, he worked on three high-profile projects, and perfected a style that went beyond your bog-standard "epic" RPG music. First came his work on Xenogears, which introduced the Celtic overtones his compositions would soon be known for; Mitsuda's Chrono Cross soundtrack followed a few years later, and is considered by most to be some of the greatest video game music of all time--and it's a crime against humanity that Cross never got an arrange album. His work on 2002's Xenosaga: Episode I is not as immediately Mitsuda-y as you'd expect, but it does show a composer breaking out of his safe zone and using the high budget of a failed franchise to really see what he can do with a live orchestra.

Really, I can't do justice to Mitsuda's music by explanation alone, so you should just find your favorite outlet for listening to video game soundtracks and I'm sure my awkward descriptions will begin to make sense.

And now for an award-winning segue: what doesn't make sense is Mitsuda's relative obscurity since working on Xenosaga. Don't get me wrong, he's still put out some great stuff since then; Mitsuda's original album Kirite is right up there with Chrono Cross in the "best things he's ever done" category. But I get the feeling that--if he's not burned out--Mitsuda is just a victim of Japanese video game composers not being as big of a deal as they used to be. The 90s and early 2000s featured big bad composers doing big bad things, but today, while there are quite a few good soundtracks being pumped out, the Monsters of Video Game Music don't seem to be around anymore. I think Japan's got some 'splaining to do.

Related Links

OST: Chrono Cross
The Chrono Trigger Port: Are You Excited or Disappointed?

The Super Street Fighter II Turbo HD Remix Soundtrack - An Inside Look

Peter Smith — Fri, 15 Aug 2008 17:00:00 GMT

In this exclusive follow-up to our interview with Super Street Fighter II Turbo HD Remix soundtrack producers David "djpretzel" Lloyd and Larry "Liontamer" Oji, djpretzel himself gives us a breakdown of four tracks from the game:

E. Honda 'Dosu-Koi'
djpretzel

"This was the track that I set my sights on early in the process. McVaffe has had an excellent mix of this track on OCR for a long while, modeled after Madonna's song 'Music,' but Capcom weren't feeling it for in-game usage, so I decided to take a shot. My initial version was way too aggressive, and got the hundred-hand slapdown itself, but I went back to the drawing board and did something mellower, with more of an emphasis on Asian instrumentation. There's shamisen, koto, shakuhachi, AND taiko in there, so it's got the 'big four' of Japanese instruments (more or less) and is more appropriate to the sumo bath house setting."

Guile 'Combat and Service'
Big Giant Circles, Justin R. Coleman

"Jimmy Hinson, alias Big Giant Circles, put together a really kicking take on Guile's theme, which is definitely one of the classics off the soundtrack. Capcom generally dug what he was doing, but were iffy on the lead synthesizer sound, and wanted something different. Jimmy got Justin to lay down an electric guitar lead that added some rock edge to the more electronic backdrop, achieving a good blend that Capcom gave the green light."

Ken / Online Menu 'Clamato Fever'
AE, Prozax

"While Sixto Sounds did the version of Ken's stage that's actually used in the game, Capcom wanted something special just for the online menus and the title screen, since users spend a good amount of time setting up matches, checking rankings, and tweaking options. Alex Esquivel (AE) and Dan Orosz (Prozax) put together an alternate take on the Ken theme that works perfectly for this context. The first time I fired up the beta and heard it, I just smiled — they nailed it! As an interesting side note, AE learned about the game through other channels and contacted Capcom directly, and was a little surprised to be redirected to Shael, Malcos and I to coordinate his involvement. Everything worked out, though, and I'm glad Alex and Dan were included in the long lineup of OC ReMix artists."

Zangief 'Red Cyclone'
The Grammar Club

"Shael Riley's been mixing humor, VGM, rock, and anything else he cares to throw in for a long time now, and his latest project is The Grammar Club, a band that's been making waves with their album Bremelanotide. The fellows put together a rock arrangement of Zangief's theme that's unique on the soundtrack for being a little less refined and more in-your-face, New York garage style. When I think Zangief, I certainly don't think 'refined,' so this ballsier type of production worked really well."

61FPS Q&A: David Lloyd and Larry Oji of OC ReMix on the Super Street Fighter II Turbo HD Remix Soundtrack (Part 2)

Peter Smith — Thu, 14 Aug 2008 14:00:00 GMT

What are some of your favorite game soundtracks? Favorite composers?
djpretzel: Yuzo Koshiro, Dave Wise, Yasunori Mitsuda, Tokuhiko Uwabo, and Koji Kondo are all amazing... Super Castlevania IV, Revenge of Shinobi, Lunar (Sega CD version!!), Chrono Trigger, Xenogears, Final Fantasy VI , Mega Man II, and Super Mario Galaxy are my favorite game scores at the moment.

Larry Oji: Favorite soundtracks and composers tend to go hand in hand. I'm a big fan of Koji Kondo's work on the Super Mario series, Masato Nakamura's on the Sonic the Hedgehog series (Sonic 3 & Knuckles, though not his, was excellent too), Alph Lyra for the Street Fighter II series, David Wise for Donkey Kong Country and Battletoads, Kazunaka Yamane for the Double Dragon series, and Yuzo Koshiro for the Streets of Rage series. That covers a lot of the games I played as a kid. Since learning more about the history of game music, I love so much stuff now, I can't even rattle it off. But my second-favorite composer, little known in the States, is Yasuhisa "Yack" Watanabe. His stuff is a lot more known in Japan, including as a member of Taito's Zuntata group, but almost no one tries to arrange his material; it's pretty far out there, so I can understand why. Sometimes his stuff doesn't resonate with me, but he's put out some incredible compositions. Then my personal favorite is British composer Tim Follin, whose nearly two-decade career composing for games was unparalleled, as far as what I've personally enjoyed. Check out his compositions for Ghouls 'n Ghosts, Solstice, Spider-Man and the X-Men: Arcade's Revenge and Silver Surfer. He always strove for creative techniques and cool textures with his chiptunes. Plus, his modern soundtracks like Ecco the Dolphin: Defender of the Future and Lemmings for the PSP were equally impressive. I've been slowly plugging away at a small OC ReMix album project paying tribute to his work, so before the end of this year, Dirge for the Follin should finally be out there, lamenting the fact that he retired from the industry.

Do you prefer the old-school chiptune style, or are you more into the CD-audio present?
djpretzel: I prefer the melodies and compositional approach of the 8-bit and 16-bit eras coupled with more modern production aesthetics; in other words, I like slick production, but only when it's paired up with a great melody. Which is not to say that game composers of today aren't writing great melodies, just that the limitations of earlier consoles meant that almost every piece needed to survive on compositional strength as opposed to production values.

Larry Oji: I've got no major preference. The only bias I have is that I grew up with chiptunes, so there's going to be some nostalgia pushing me to those. But modern stuff holds up a lot better to active listening. Either way. [pauses] Was that a cop out? ... All right, let's go with modern stuff. I actually prefer the melodies that were written in the chiptune days. But modern music has the potential for great writing as well, combined with higher quality sounds. Some fans feel there's an inherent compositional quality trade-off in newer videogame music compared to the older stuff, but I believe the best of the modern stuff is simply more elusive. Besides, people tend to gloss over the fact that not every chiptune was amazing back then either.

What do you think of the recent trend towards contextual music? In old Zelda, you'd just have a melody looping for the whole time you were in a dungeon. Now, you often just have ambient effects and then an "action" motif when you approach an enemy.
djpretzel: Well, I think most good game music, even very old stuff, is still contextual on some level — it still makes sense for the environment. But more recently the focus/buzz has been on making that contextuality of a more real-time, responsive nature, as opposed to the loops you mention. In essence, this makes the experience more cinematic, with the score reacting to players' actions just like a well-cued Hollywood soundtrack would. For FMV sequences in games, obviously, this is nothing new and has been the standard for years. The challenge is in maintaining that very polished interactivity once a user's actions become unpredictable. There are different ways of accomplishing this, including triggered motifs like you mention. I think it's all very interesting and exciting, but I also think we need to take a step back once in awhile and remember that games are a different medium from movies, and that emulating them is an option, but not the only option. Who's to say that looped melodies a la Zelda and older 8-bit titles don't make complete sense for certain games or genres? Game creators are creating interactive worlds... those worlds can resemble a film experience, and if that's the goal, then responsive, interactive scores are perfect. But the true art of game creation, to me, is remembering that there aren't any limits, that conventions of all other mediums can and should be bent or broken, and thus I think too much emphasis on targeting a cinematic experience could be dangerous. In essence, I think this trend is very positive, so long as it expands the arsenal of approaches to music in games, rather than narrows it.

How about the shift from short melodies to more expanded or moodier compositions? The difference between, y'know, Zelda II's Palace theme and Ocarina of Time's Forest Temple theme?
djpretzel: This is totally natural; audio and music have progressed alongside graphics and other technical aspects of console hardware and gaming, and more ornate and varied compositions flow from those progressions. With Ocarina, you've no longer got a limited palette of bright colors on screen, you've got a fully 3D world, and it'd be odd if the music didn't match. This sometimes means the number of "hummable" tracks on a game soundtrack is reduced in favor of more ambient, atmospheric fare, but it's usually right for the game, and composers like Koji Kondo in particular can almost always hit a balance between "song" or theme tracks and more environmental, BGM stuff.

How did you meet up with Capcom on Super Street Fighter II Turbo HD Remix?
djpretzel: OCR is mostly about individual mixes, but every once in awhile we release album projects, where artists get together and focus on a specific game, composer, etc. We've released albums for Chrono Trigger, Donkey Kong Country and most notably Final Fantasy VII with our Voices of the Lifestream album in 2007. Shael Riley and Stephen Malcom-Howell (a.k.a. Malcos), two veteran OC ReMixers, put together an album of Super Street Fighter II Turbo mixes called Blood on the Asphalt back in 2006. Capcom found the album online and contacted Shael, who in turn referred them to me. At first we were actually suspicious of being Punk'd or something, since it was such an amazing opportunity, but once we confirmed it was legit, we obviously jumped at the chance.

The HD Remix soundtrack is based on Blood on the Asphalt, but it's not exactly the same. What are some of the changes?
Larry Oji: Firstly, I definitely need to stress that the remixers didn't do any mere drag-and-drop jobs on these. A lot of the pre-existing arrangements selected for inclusion on HD Remix were full-on, four-to-five-minute arrangements with original sections, solos and so forth, which doesn't fly in Street Fighter II. So everything's been edited down to a more standard sixty-to-ninety seconds and looped, focusing on the core of each theme to work like the old-school themes did. Dave had to handle relaying all of the desired modifications handed down by Capcom to the artists and got a variety of requests. This is where he gets music-nerdy!

djpretzel: In addition to length and formatting requirements, Capcom had some very specific feedback, and some comments that were more general in nature. In certain instances they wanted individual instruments changed out, tempo increased by a few beats per minute, or other modifications to production that were very easy for artists to implement. Other times, they were looking more for a different feel, or more subjective changes to texture, which were more challenging. We were blessed with a pretty long development cycle, so we had a lot of time to present different versions/permutations of each track and go through an iterative process.

Where are you getting the themes that aren't originally from the album? Are these all new remixes?
Larry Oji: Along with eight edits of mixes from Blood on the Asphalt, three of the seventeen character themes are modified versions of other OC ReMixes. That left six themes with all-new takes, as well as nearly all new material for the fast versions of all the character themes, character endings and other assorted themes, with everything provided by our crew of remixers. Gotta give props to José E. Felix (a.k.a. José the Bronx Rican) for coming through in a big way with nearly every ending theme besides providing both the Dee Jay and Vega themes!

What've your production duties been like on the soundtrack?
Larry Oji: I'm a detail-oriented person, more behind the scenes. Dave functioned as the lead producer and director for the soundtrack, serving as the point of contact with game producer Rey Jimenez and Capcom to keep things streamlined on the communications side. He handled the legal stuff, as well as ensuring Capcom had all of the remixers' latest work as things progressed. I handled contacting remixers that were difficult to get a hold of in order to secure some pre-existing tracks, recruited and provided critique for some of the new music, and helped keep track of smaller details with all of our personnel. Even stuff like preparing our credits list for the game and getting new track titles for all of the remixed themes, I enjoy making sure the finer things are in place at the ground level, while Dave works with the big picture. If you had told me back when I played Street Fighter II in my friend's basement that I'd be in the credits of a game in the series nearly two decades later, I wouldn't believe it. It's an honor to help coordinate something that will always be a part of a historic franchise, especially Street Fighter, the one that truly pulled me into game music beyond being a casual fan.

djpretzel: Working with Capcom was truly awesome. We brought our fandom — the way we express ourselves through mixing/arrangement — full circle, right back to a commercial product that is itself a remix of an absolutely classic game... it's very meta, when you think about it. I think it's something that could only have happened in a post-internet environment, with a company that was groovy enough to realize their fans could play a meaningful role. Mods, user-generated content, etc. have been around awhile, but I think there's often an artificial wall — "this is the official content, this is the fan stuff" — that segregates things. This project tears down that wall, at least for game music, and integrates the two, without emphasizing the distinction. I think that's a fantastic precedent to be setting, and I'm proud OverClocked ReMix was involved!

Click here for Part 1! And check back tomorrow for a detailed look at the four all-new themes on the SSF2THD soundtrack!