What up my chrono triggers
Oh, come on, Jesus Christ, what's wrong?
Not much, dude, what's up with you?
Not much, just time traveling and shit, you know, same shit, different day.
Yes.
Do you think we can use that?
Yeah, I mean, they can't demonetize us.
Yeah, I know, but I just, I don't know, it seems just like a dangerous thing.
Yeah, I would say you're skirting a line.
Yeah, it really feels like a line, especially to the start of an episode.
Yeah, dude, for two white boys living in the country, yeah, it seems a little...
Okay, so I didn't beat the game.
Do we know what a chrono trigger is?
Is that like an actual thing?
So I'm going to assume that I've got, I don't know if I'm using this based off of information.
I do have buried in my brain from playing this game back.
So I played this game in high school and then this is the first time I've played it since.
Oh, really?
Yeah. And it's funny how much I thought I remembered it.
And then playing it, I'm just like every step I'm like, oh, oh, oh, like a blast.
I was just like, I forgot, I forget.
So I'm just like, I don't remember any of this game at all.
Anyways, your question about what is a chrono trigger?
I want to say that what it's going to get to being it's a time travel game.
Yeah, spoiler alert, by the way.
Chrono is the trigger to all of the like...
Oh, like the catalyst.
Because I'm instantly getting the feeling that like,
because there you have this whole thing of like, oh, we need to save our kingdom.
Right.
Because in the future it turns into this bad shit.
Shit's fucked.
But I've imagined the moment that you go back in time and do that,
the moment that these kids get involved in time travel,
they're messing up everything, right?
As far as like the flow of time goes.
And I bet that's going to be what creates the bad guy's ability.
Like he is the trigger.
Because chrono is your main character.
I did know that.
Yeah, I did.
I did.
Any guesses?
Link.
Yeah, his name is Link.
Yeah.
Chrono.
I should chrono trigger.
Chrono trigger.
Okay.
Well, the mystery is slowly demystified.
We'll see though.
I don't know.
I don't know either.
Yeah, so this is Pocket Cast.
NDS related Pocket Cast with Fletcher and I.
And we talk about games.
And he is Ed.
Yeah, I am Ed, of course.
And this time was Chrono Trigger.
Chrono Trigger.
Dude, this game fucking rocks, dude.
This is 1995, bro.
Is when this game first came out.
Really?
On the SNES?
SNES, yeah.
Yeah, I have the SNES copy.
Dude, insane.
Yeah.
Holy shit.
This game is fucking pimpin', dude.
It is beautiful.
And this is just a port.
You know, there's not really like any touch ups or anything.
This is how this looks.
It looks incredible.
So good.
Dude, oh my fucking God.
You had said early on to me something about a Final Fantasy comparison.
Yeah, one and two.
And justifiably, did you do any research on this game?
A small.
Did you do enough to find out that this was the dream team that worked on?
No, that went into making this game?
Yeah.
Yeah, this is like everyone.
You have the creator of Final Fantasy.
You have the character designer for Dragon Quest.
Someone else, I think, from Dragon Quest was involved with it.
And then they had a writer from another game that I don't think I knew.
But it was these three big fucking names coming together.
Yeah, dude, this was some cool shit.
I felt the elements from all of these other games.
Not Dragon Quest because I haven't played Dragon Quest.
Now when we go on to play Dragon Quest game, you're going to be like,
oh shit, this is like Grandia Chronotrigga, like the dinosaurs so much so.
Well, I mean, you've ever seen Dragon Ball?
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
I felt like the dinosaurs, when you see them, they look a lot like.
Like Shenlong or Shenron or either one.
You're talking about like the Dragon Balls that are summoned or the dragons that are summoned.
No, no, no, no, no, I just mean in Dragon Ball, like you just see like dinosaurs around like reptile type things.
Yeah, yeah.
The reptilians, I think is what they call them in Chrono Trigger.
But yeah, so like there's a lot of things that you see where like, oh man, that guy's art is.
It's retarded, dude.
Amazing.
It's so.
Holy shit.
It's itself.
And what I love is that he's like, I'll kind of change my characters from game to game and between my shows.
But they're all like the same.
Yeah, and I have no problems with that.
Me neither.
Dude, OK, so Final Fantasy one and Final Fantasy two were my first introduction into Square, I think in general.
I'm pretty sure that's a that's straight up fact.
I had a Game Boy SP and I got one and two because I think they came on the same cart.
Yeah, I looked at all because you had talked about you compared the graphics from Final Fantasy one to Chrono Trigger and I could not wrap my head around it until having that realization.
Yeah.
That there was a remake remaster thing for the GVA.
Yeah.
I want to show you some photos of what my brain pulls to mind when you say Final Fantasy one.
Hey, some of these look better.
This exact photo is what comes to mind.
This is the battle scene.
Oh, shit.
Yeah.
Oh, gee.
Final Fantasy one.
Yeah, that's rough.
Smidge dated, perhaps.
Yeah.
It's got its own nostalgic take to it.
I just don't have that.
I think being born in the 16-bit era, that's where our love and appreciation for the chip style graphics, what do you call it?
The pixel graphics.
Yeah.
16 and 32-bit.
Those are...
That's a pretty big difference.
Yeah.
Especially, I mean, your little sprites, especially your walking character is going to...
Yeah, dude.
Yeah, okay.
So that looks like NES quality, Final Fantasy one.
That looks like...
Jesus, what's the first...
Just the Legend of Zelda.
Yeah.
The 16-bit redo, that's a lot cleaner.
And if I remember correctly, I'm pretty sure Final Fantasy 2...
Is it 16 or 32?
I have no fucking idea.
I think it's 16.
So it could have been remade as well.
Yeah, they just double it, and all of a sudden it's just like...
Boop.
Which is beautiful art.
Which gives so much more detail.
But then you're also getting increased performance in your processing, et cetera, so you're going
to have better refresh rates and stuff like that.
Not that I made a huge difference back then, but a little bit.
Sure.
I mean, a prime example in Chrono Trigger is the...
There is the FX chip, I think is what it was called.
They use it in most...the prime example, you look at most Super Nintendo games, and then
you'll look at Star Fox.
N64?
No, SNES.
Okay.
If you've never seen it, it's like a 3D looking game, polygon almost looking game.
Oh, and it's just the rail shooting in space, right?
Yeah, and there's some on land, but yeah, it's just rail shooting.
Yeah, it's just straight rail shooting the whole time.
They've used this chip though to...instead of making a 3D effect, they used it in scenes
where the...I'd say even where the portal opens up when you first do your Trimed traveling
bit, there's a little blue circle that expands.
And some of your moves as well, like your ability to do those.
Yes.
I was going to say when you do that combo attack with Chrono and Luca, I think.
Yeah.
And then when it makes it like the fire spin, that looks sick as fuck, dude.
That's using that FX chip.
And that just is like...even today...
It's cool.
It's mind blowing because you're not expecting it at all.
No, it reminds me of watching Treasure Planet.
And that movie was one of the first movies to incorporate CGI so heavily because I think
it was Silver's arm specifically, like his cybernetics.
Yeah, I think we've talked about this when we were talking about other CGI things.
I'm sure you have.
I know exactly what you're talking about, but I must be through.
And it just looks so sick and it's just such a great, like a fantastic slight blending
of these two technologies and art styles.
And it looks sick and it just stands out and it just feels impactful, I guess.
It's cool.
It is.
That is a great...that and Titan AE.
Titan AE.
Oh, dude, I always forget about that one.
Yeah, I think that was a little more heavily leaned on CGI and thus it might have aged
less well because Treasure Planet has aged amazingly well.
So well, dude.
Oh, it's so good.
It looks so good.
They use it in little spots and that's what makes it so good instead of using it for the
whole thing.
Because it's like the shimmer of the gold.
You know, it has such a different shimmer than the rest of anything else.
Well, then those lines are just so perfect and yeah, it's cool.
So cool.
So good.
Yeah, I...dude, the art.
And, okay, I want to like talk about these incrementally as far as the different aspects
of the game, but they go together, dude.
The art and like the overall just design of like visual design of the game and the audio.
Like, I'm just gonna say right now, 10 out of 10 across all categories.
Like, it's insane.
Did you see, like, if you look this game up, it's just like best game ever.
There's no question of if this game is good.
It's always about like, is it the best game?
Is it like, cause it is so...it's like taking a super, like a rock and roll super group
where they take the best member from every...
Yeah.
You're like, I don't like this genre, but this is good music.
This is the best.
Yeah.
That's because it's the best.
It's the best it can be.
Yeah.
Undeniable.
Yeah.
Dude, I literally don't even know where to start.
I just like, I mean, from like just the opening sequence, like the animated cut scene before
like as you like fade into the menu and then it just keeps playing.
It's another one, beautiful display of the, I guess, rendering or display or both process,
whatever.
Just like the performance capabilities of the NDS put on display here for sure in terms
of audio and visual display like that.
The cut scenes are beautiful.
Colors are vibrant and the music pops.
Yeah.
Some people will argue with you there.
I'm doing reading into this because as I recall, I think we discussed this in the last episode
when this, or maybe it was just between you and I either way.
Maybe.
When this came out on DS, I remember this being the best way you could possibly play
Chrono Trigger.
Yeah.
Only because there was one, there's one argument there and that is frog.
His speech in the NDS version.
Yeah.
It's just straight English, right?
And the SNES version and I think the PS1 version is, it's old English.
Really?
He's like an old timey night.
Dude, that's so sick.
And so a lot of people are like, you take away so much from the story by changing that.
That is such a different, oh that's so cool.
I agree because yeah, having like, but I still like, frog is just a cool fucking character
through and through.
He is dude.
So where was I going with that?
So okay, so that is like a thing where people will make an argument of like why not to play
this version.
But beside that you get the visual cut, the cool cut scenes that you get from the PS1,
but the PS1 had really bad load times because of those cut scenes.
And so thus the NDS version is best because it's a comprehensive combining of both.
There is no, some people argue the audio isn't as good on the NDS version.
That's fair.
I don't know.
I guess I could listen to them side by side, but it sounds great.
So you said the performance of the NDS.
You're also talking the performance of the Super Nintendo.
It's wild.
Yeah, no, you're not wrong, dude.
SNES actually, like what's the other big one that just, is it linked to the past?
Was that SNES?
Right?
Also, just another incredibly vibrant and beautiful game that is just, like it looks
like a modern game that is simply emulating or impersonating a retro game, but they're
not, they're old games and they're fucking awesome.
And the ones now are trying to recreate that.
Yeah.
You know what it really is.
Because it's on, like there's just nothing that really needs improving on.
I think it's because, I'm going to sound like one of those old people that dislike technology.
Yeah, a fucker.
I know what you're saying.
So it's something to do, I think with it's more art.
And this is not true.
I'm not an artist.
I cannot, the only art that I've done is the stuff for the podcast that can be found on
Instagram at our homepage.
But because of technology, it has made me capable to create that art.
Like there's a lot of assistance there that I can use that I wouldn't otherwise be able
to create that art.
Maybe that's not true.
It would just take more practice and more paper.
I mean, the same would be said about these games for their time as well, right?
Yeah.
But it was just like, yeah, that's true.
It just felt to me though, that when you look at some of these art, the art in these games
versus art and games now and more developed game, like in more developed graphics now,
you lose a touch of the art when it becomes more about code.
But maybe that was, I'm sure that was all about code too.
No, I hear what you're saying though.
I don't know.
I'm out of my element here.
Well, and there's, I mean, let me share my perspective on the take and maybe this will
resonate with you as well, but I feel like there is a certain extra beauty in making
or doing more with less.
I think you're a hundred percent correct.
And I think these games do that.
A lot of these older, more limited in terms of like performance and specs and capabilities
games, they just, I mean, just the shit that they come up with in terms of like, how can
we tell the story with under these limitations or like, okay, we can only render these many,
you know, this many colors, whatever the case may be.
But like, Jesus.
Just look at the market, for example, right?
The fair, beautiful, beautiful.
If you get down and stare, right?
You're just looking at like blobs of like, you could really be like, oh, that's interesting
why they make it black all right here to give this a pop that makes these four lines of
red because of association look like an umbrella.
Yeah.
It's cool.
They do some insanely cool things.
Like we are.
I mean, when you start really undressing the like the landscapes or just, you know, just
the area that you're in, you don't realize how much they, I guess, maybe factor for like
what you're focusing on and how like, oh, we don't need to create the detail.
It's a Bob Ross.
Like their eyes, their brains will generate the detail for us.
Yeah.
It's watching, but it's a Bob Ross painting.
Yeah.
That's exactly.
Yeah.
It's like, oh, it's so cool.
I love it.
Like you said, you can't talk about one piece without talking about another piece because
when you talk about that, I instantly start picturing, um, Gardia forest, the forest right
below the castle.
Yeah.
That is a beautiful spot.
Yeah.
The music though is transcending.
It is the most beautiful.
I can just put that on loop and fall asleep to that.
I can just put that in my car and drive all the way down to fucking Springfield.
Yeah.
Like just be the chillest driver.
I've been jamming to the, to the set, the OST of it, like for this entire two week period.
Yeah.
And I probably still will.
It's sick.
It is.
It's every single spot because that forest is just a like boop boop.
It's the shortest little in between little, not even, it's your first somewhat maze, I
guess.
Yeah.
Or just like zone that you have to navigate through and there's baddies and you can avoid.
But the, the music, the art, the fact of like the color change when you go into the forest,
making it like you're in a dark shaded forest.
It's immersive even just being a 16 bit game.
Well, it's okay.
So you mentioned it being like one of those first just places to kind of navigate through
and something I want to touch on is that you end up having to go back and forth through
this forest, like five or six times in a pretty short span at the beginning of the game.
And almost every one of those times it's different for some reason, either because you've traveled
back in time or like the, I think the first time you do it, like you said, it's almost
like it's dark and so you get a limited view.
And then the next day, next time you go through it, it's like bright and sunny.
And then so they can see all the colors and stuff.
Well, that's based on the time too.
When you're in the past, it's darker and like has like a fog over it.
Oh, that's right.
When you're in present day, it's like sunny.
It's the fair, you know, it's a beautiful day.
Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, that's right.
But either way, it's cool.
Yeah.
They do a lot to create such, I mean, the, holy shit, what do you call it?
The way a thing feels based on how it's presented.
The vibe.
The aesthetic.
Yeah.
The vibe, the theme, the whatever.
The atmosphere.
Thank you.
Holy shit.
That's the one.
It took me a second too.
Jesus Christ.
Yeah.
It just, it's done so well.
And again, totally incorrect assumption about what this game was, as we've discussed a few
different times coming into it.
So I was very excited to find out that it is in fact like a JRPG and it's just a damn
good one.
And the writing from these motherfuckers, dude.
Holy shit.
It's so fun.
It's so light.
And like sometimes there's a lot of it, which I don't typically love for these games, but
it's paced so well.
Every fucking character is so goddamn enjoyable.
They are.
Like every single one of them.
And even like the ones that you hate, you know you're supposed to hate them and you
hate them for very good, justifiable reasons, but you still kind of like them.
While we're on this topic, I gotta pull up my notes here because I, we're talking about
the characters and just little people that you pass by and talk to and they have like
one liners, right?
Oh, it did.
There is the mayor of poor P O R R E is the name of it.
Is that in present time?
Yes, I believe so.
Okay.
Yeah.
It's like a town way below the South.
Yeah.
It's the South.
Yeah.
And you can take the boat back up to the main town, Gardia or whatever it is.
I don't know what they call that.
I don't remember where you have the festival going on your hometown.
Right.
The fuck that is.
So pallet town, when you're down, you go in and you talk to the mayor and he's like, aha,
I'm the richest man in this town.
I own this town.
Like spin around three times and act like a chicken and I'll give you 10 coins.
And then I did not talk to my course of actions.
I talked to him, go over and talk to his wife and she's like, I just don't know if like,
we're going to make it through these trying times.
And then you got to talk to the kids are in the kitchen and they're like, I fucking hate
my dad.
And then the other one goes, my dad loves money more than he loves me.
That's all that is in this house.
Jesus Christ.
I'm curious because it seems like, um, this is the best back to the future game.
I've never played it back to the future game, but I'm willing to bet this is the best back
to the future game.
I'm inclined to agree with you.
I think there's so many things like, all right, Marty, uh, be back by or not Marty.
All right, be back by dinner.
And you're like, so obviously that is a plan for, I will be back by dinner.
I guess you didn't know going into this game that it was going to be time travel.
I had no idea.
So I mean, I, I got to look at this from like a perspective of like, I kind of know where
things are going to go.
Sure.
It's watching the back to the future movies all the way through for the second time or
something.
And you're like, Oh, that's funny because like, I remember in like movies later, that
becomes a thing.
So I was more aware of it, but she says that and I'm just like, that's fun.
That's great.
That's cool.
And there's certain lines and certain things that people say where you're like, that's
going to come back somewhere along the line.
Oh yeah, dude.
I, so again, time travel, total surprise to me.
Um, I thought I had just kind of figured out what was going on because I'm like, okay,
cool.
We're like in a medieval era type thing.
Okay, cool, cool, cool, cool, cool, cool, cool.
And then I remember cause like at the fair you can earn these silver coins or whatever,
right?
And I was like, I'm going to get a shitload and I did.
I had a few hundred silver coins.
Um, and I unlocked all the things.
You get like a cat and shit and some other stuff.
Oh cool.
Pretty, pretty cool.
Um, what happens with the cat?
I'll get, I'll get to that.
So or no, there's two cats at the fair.
That's right.
Um, apparently he goes to your house, cool.
The cat that you win.
Well, it's the process of, is it like, uh, what do you, what do you do to get the cat?
So you just send you, spend your silver points to get the cat or I wish it were that simple.
That would have taken me 10 minutes.
You spend the silver points to play a game, to play a mini game and you can, so you can
burn so many points to participate in one of the games.
And I thought each game was the same with a varying degree of difficulty in cracked.
They're all three different games, which, which is a guaranteed reload.
Um, to, so you're not actually spending your, your silver coins, uh, which is just, it's
not that bad.
It's just a pain in the ass, but I'm trying to remember what they were.
There was this one that was super fucking hard that I kept fucking up, but they basically
kidnapped the, or Marie, the princess and she's dangled over.
Meryl fuck off Meryl.
What?
It's not Marie.
Hmm.
99% sure.
I don't have my DS on me.
Well, I was a hundred percent sure until you checked me and now I'm also 99% sure.
Pull it up real quick.
I can edit this down.
All right, let's see what we got here.
Okay.
Princess in Grano.
Bless you.
Trigger.
Fuck.
M-A-R-L-E.
Marl.
All right.
What were you saying about Meryl?
Okay.
So it's, oh, I gotta say Marl.
Oh, I hate this.
Meryl.
M-A-R-L-E?
Meryl is how I, what's it say the pronunciation of it is?
It doesn't.
It just looks like the pronunciation of M-A-R-L-E.
Would Meryl be M-A-R-E-L?
Meryl.
Jesus Christ.
Game facts.
How do you pronounce Meryl?
There's a whole fucking forum.
Oh, I had a friend who insisted I was wrong and the official correct pronunciation was
Mar-lee.
But then the one directly above it says the E is silent and it's Marl.
Marl.
Like the M-A-R-L.
Ugh.
I hate, I honestly just with how hard Marl is to say or just stupid it sounds, I would
accept Mar-lee but I also don't, I agree that I don't think that that's correct.
Mar-lee is not correct because there should be two E's, right?
Here's one of those YouTube videos.
This is 600 A.D. or is it?
Marl.
Fuck no, stop doing that.
Marl.
God damn it.
Marl.
Princess Nadia.
Princess Nadia?
Nadia.
Why are you calling her Princess Nadia?
So Marl is the name that she goes by when she's like not the princess because you don't
know she's the princess.
Oh but Nadia is her name.
But she's Princess Nadia.
Okay.
If I remember correctly, yeah.
Yeah, okay, I like that.
So Princess Nadia, what the fuck were we talking about with this bitch?
I have no idea.
Fuck dude.
I have no clue.
You were getting silver points.
Oh yeah, I was getting silver points.
Yeah, okay, yeah, because you bump into her at the fair and then she's following you around
because she's having fun and you're like, fuck yeah bitch.
So there's like a couple of different ways that you can win silver coins.
Yep.
You can go fight the robot, which why the fuck is there a robot at like medieval times?
But okay, there's one and you can fight it.
That's sick.
But it's actual combat and so you have to find a way to regen your HP and MP.
I have something to tell you.
I just farmed the strength contest where you hit the bell with the hammer.
So but you only get one silver coin per.
You get 15 silver points from beating the robot.
Silver points and the money that you spend in the game are not the real thing.
That's the same thing.
No, I know that.
So you could go buy potions.
You can go sleep at the inn.
Oh, I didn't even think about sleeping at the inn.
Wait, where was the inn?
You just leave the...
Oh, that's where you have to go to the overworld and then just kind of circle the block.
Or do you have to go back?
No, it's just down.
It's just straight down.
That's right, because it's part of the...
It took me a while to figure that out that like...
There's a little town right below.
Well, no, I knew the town was there, but like for that type of game, I'm used to entering
the town and the town itself is the one section.
And then within town is access to all the different things.
That is different, I guess, from the rest.
That is its own.
I'm sure there are plenty of other titles where that's done.
It just caught me off guard and it took me a while before I realized that.
Yeah, it's something that...
Now that you mentioned it, I didn't think anything about it, but that it is totally different
from I feel like any RPG I can think of.
Yeah.
Yeah, usually the town itself...
Yeah, you find a town, you either enter it...
You just go into it.
You go into it, there's an inn, there's all these people that you...
And then this one, you're in the overworld, there's like maybe two different individual
houses you walk up to and you can go into one.
And you're just straight inside of one.
Into that one.
Yeah, and it's just like whatever the 2D still is of that space with maybe a couple NPCs.
Yeah.
Which is honestly still pretty cool.
Excuse me, but yeah, it definitely threw me off.
So anyways, with your silver points...
Yeah, so you can play the mini games, burn more points, played a different mini game.
There's three different ones.
They were fucked.
But basically you get something different for each.
One of them was a cat and I feel alive with me, dude.
I can't remember what the other two were.
One's a sword, isn't it?
One of them might be a sword.
All in all, disappointed.
Yeah.
Disappointed.
I did text you and tell you.
Sure I had already spent a significant amount of time at the fair, yeah.
So it's not reflected in my total play time because I was safe scumming, but I don't know
if that's good or bad.
But it probably almost doubles my play time.
Oh, I'm sure.
Either way, I'm sure it adds to your play time quite a bit.
Oh yeah.
But honestly, I was having fun actually.
Yeah, that's all that matters.
It doesn't matter how fucking far you get in the game.
I don't give a shit about that.
Yeah.
It's just that you fucking enjoyed your time in the world of Chrono Trigger.
Dude, that's sick.
It is just so...
I only got like six or seven hours in.
Yeah.
And I know that discussing a little bit before the recording, I got a little bit further
than you.
Not a whole lot, just a little bit.
It becomes...
You had talked about at one point with me that the game isn't very handholdy in where
to go.
Yeah.
It'll tell you, but then...
I don't think there was a journal or something that I can remember.
No, there's no journal.
You just have to go.
You gotta keep track kind of of what you're doing.
So without spoiling too much, you get access to being able to go to different times freely.
You kind of have control over it.
So then you're making your open world an even bigger open world.
It's a very open world RPG.
And it feels really ahead of its time in that sense as well, where most games give you a
pretty straight direction.
Because here's another thing is the story is...
I mean, it's good.
But it's one of those...
It's a good story.
And these are some of my favorite books to read.
But halfway through it, I don't really know what is going...
I can tell you the story, but it's just a lot of A to B to C to D to E to F to G kind
of things.
But I don't know necessarily what the story is.
I'm loving every moment of it.
I'm enthralled in it.
And when it gets done, I will tell you what the story is.
It's one of those kinds of...
Yeah.
No.
And the development is fun.
So time travel number one, like I said, caught me off guard.
I guess we should explain.
If you've never played Chrono Trigger, you're looking into this.
Spoiler warnings.
You've made it this far.
You go to the fair.
It's a festival day.
You're going to the fair.
You run into a chick.
She drops a pendant.
You pick it up, give it to her.
She wants to hang out with you.
Your buddy, Luca, she's got this fucking experiment, cool thing going on at the fair.
It's a teleporter.
In medieval times.
Yeah.
She's fucking ahead of the curve.
Fucking way ahead, dude.
So then you go and teleport her instantly, right?
You get Half-Life 2.
That's exactly what happens.
You're like, fuck, don't do it, dude.
Oh man.
What's going to happen?
And you're fine.
Yeah.
And then the chick wants to try it out.
And then she gets pulled into some fucking warp thing.
And it just fucking...
It blows your mind, I feel like.
I knew something bad was going to happen, but time traveling was not what I had picked.
And also just the graphically speaking.
It just, you're like, what?
The kids and everything.
I was not expecting that effect to happen when she...
Oh, that wavy when you're going through the teleporter back in time?
Yeah.
Dude, that was so...
I was like, what?
This game is how old?
And it's nothing crazy, but this kind of shit hadn't been fully conceptualized.
There were so many things about this game that were...
I was like, dude, how have I not played this before?
This has all of the things before they were things.
Time travel, just solid fucking storytelling, beautiful art, incredible sound.
Just all of it.
I do have some gripes about the combat system.
Really?
I do.
I'm so curious to hear that because...
Maybe I'm just bad at it.
Full disclaimer, I could just be dog shit at this game.
Do you have the choice of doing the...
There's two different styles of combat.
I tried them both.
Didn't really understand how they were remotely different.
Okay.
Because I didn't try the other one.
I just tried the one that you're like, originally set you with, which is where it says it's
like timed based, where instead of all three of my people go, all three of your people
go.
Right.
It's whenever my counter goes up and some people's counters are faster than other people's.
Yeah, because you have a speed stat that you can boost and wear gear for or take a potion
or whatever.
I don't remember what the two settings were, but I tried them both and both of them seemed
to be time-burm based.
What I assumed about the difference that I couldn't figure out how it was supposed to
actually be implemented or how it was supposed to work to leverage that strategically, I
guess, was I thought if...
If I had a character whose timer had lapsed and I now had a turn that I could complete,
I thought it would then, boop, pause all the timers and basically pause the game so that
I can, okay, am I going to just straight attack?
Am I going to use an ability or an item?
I did notice that if I were to go into a combo menu and select a skill from there and then
decide who to use it on, it would pause everything.
When I'm just in the primary, are you going to attack, use attack, or use an item menu?
Everything's still going.
Everything's still going, which means...
Now, positively, the other people on my team, their timers can accumulate because they need
to in order...
If I want to do a combo, then I have to have at least two players that have a combo ability
together.
They both have to have an action that they can take, but then the enemies are also just
cycling through their attacks as their timers come up too.
That was kind of annoying.
That was the experience I had in mind is that that's how I figured that's...
I assumed that the version that you played, we'll call one time flow and time stop, right?
Yeah, something like that.
I thought that yours went where your three go and then the other three go, but that's
not the way that went.
I mean, it could have, and I just didn't notice that that was what was happening, but I felt
like with both, regardless, I could have an action up and then I could still get attacked
while I'm choosing if I'm going to attack or whatever.
But maybe they can only attack you once, whereas...
That could be it too.
That could be it.
I honestly...
I didn't spend a whole lot of time figuring out.
I was just like, I feel like I'm not going to be happy either way.
So what's your grip with this system?
That's one, first and foremost.
I do like the timer system and it's something that I...
Huge correlation for me between Final Fantasy II and this game because Final Fantasy II
also had individual timers, like action timers.
Does Final Fantasy just do that from then on?
I think it's a big part.
The way it's implemented changes pretty dramatically over the games, but I mean, that's...
Because I feel like I've only played nine really and that one I remember having timers
like this game.
I haven't played...
I've played a handful of Final Fantasy games, just not all of them.
So I don't have the greatest knowledge to draw from.
I'm assuming you've played the first few and the latest few.
One and two, seven for sure.
Oh, right.
Oh, fuck.
And like, oh, tactics, of course.
And then what was that, 15?
Crystal Chronicles and I think 15.
And I think that's it, honestly.
And 15 totally changes up.
15's a totally different game.
It's not a turn-based...
No, no.
It's an open-ish world.
It's...
Action RPG?
Yeah.
Yeah, you have like cool downs and shit.
Okay.
So, and there's like a combo system.
It's definitely not a turn...
No.
Huh.
It's a fun gameplay though.
Definitely a little different.
I'm sure there's a more applicable genre that's aptly descriptive of that exact style of game.
I don't know what it is.
But fun nonetheless.
Great story too.
There's just a bunch of cool shit that I love about those games.
But I do like the timer system.
I don't know if I prefer it to traditional turn-based RPG.
Yeah, it depends on what you're in the mood for.
And if I would have tried the other mode, like where you tried, and if it was what we
thought it was, where you get to take turns basically, there's something really nice about
that.
Where if you're like watching TV while you're playing and you get distracted by a scene
in the movie...
And it's not a big deal?
...because of the proto trigger, if that happens...
You'd be dead, bro.
Yeah.
You're gonna get your shit beat the fuck up.
And that is one thing that I don't like about it because I do like to multitask like that.
Especially if I'm gonna be doing a fair bit of combat because it's not the most enthralling
thing to be doing.
Well, in the chrono trigger, it's not the biggest component.
The open world...
And that's what I was gonna say about this open world thing.
Once that story opens up a bit more, you've got more time to travel to, and you've got
to figure out for yourself, okay, the story has led me now to this point.
Now, I guess I gotta go talk to people.
You're going like a older school RPG where you're gonna talk to people to get some information
on what should I be doing next.
You can go to the wrong zone and advance yourself in.
I don't know I could be wrong, but I think I went somewhere, went as far as I could and
nothing is happening because I'm in the wrong spot.
Like I need to be somewhere else.
So within all of that, it's okay though, because in the open world, in the over world, there's
no combat, there's no random encounters, you're just walking around.
When you're in the places like the hills or wherever that you can get into fights at,
it's a very Dragon Quest, a more modern Dragon Quest thing where you can see the enemy and
choose kind of sometimes.
Yeah, for the most part, you can avoid.
They follow routines and patterns and you can just straight up avoid them.
It took me a minute to realize that because there are still yet some where it's like nah,
you have to do this fight.
But like, well shit, going through the forest at the beginning, Guardia Forest, you can
just avoid them as long as you don't bump into somebody, no problem.
When you get into the, is it the temple or the church or whatever?
Same thing.
Cathedral.
Yes, that's where I figured that that was a thing.
Yeah, because you have to do a bit of backtracking up and down.
Yeah, you have to go back and forth.
I was like, I don't think I've got enough shit to like continually fight these guys.
That and there was like a second, there was a little bit of a puzzle to it where you had
to like unlock the door at one point and I couldn't figure it out.
I kept having, it was one way trip throughout that particular level and I just kept having
to loop around through it and then I realized I can just straight up avoid these guys.
And that was honestly, I was like, holy shit.
But the game also has like choices and consequences to a certain effect that like impact gameplay
and like story progression and stuff.
I'm like, dude, what the fuck is this game, bro?
This game has like all the big ticket elements from so many other big genre busting titles
and it's just like packed into this little fucking JRPG, just SNES game.
Like what the fuck?
Well, I'm sure being in our age zone, it maybe missed us.
Maybe this was huge.
Maybe this was like huge.
That's totally fair.
You know, because with the three names involved in it, the music is just, I think that is
also something that DS has going for it that I think the music in the DS is like the first
time they had like a symphony actually kind of thing going on for it.
Yeah, I was and I did see that I wanted to, I was actually reading into this a little
bit before you got here.
But I want to say that this game came out and there was also like a three CD disc set
that you could buy that was the complete soundtrack to this game.
But then they also did like a separate like acid jazz remix release or something like
that.
I have no idea what that is, but that was like, I opened a new tab on that one.
I was like, I'm going to figure that one out later.
That sounds cool.
That is, that's really cool.
But dude, yeah.
So okay, so time travel, go back to the past and then you figure out there's a correlation
between like the rulers of the kingdom.
So the chick drops her necklace, which you assume caused the time travel.
You pick it up, go back in time.
Because you're in a thousand AD, I want to say.
I think so.
And you go back to 600 AD.
Fuck man.
I don't remember.
It's several hundred years though, at least.
I think it's 400 years in the past.
Yeah.
So you go back to 600 AD and they basically, they mistake that chick that you're with.
For the queen, yeah.
And then what happens from there?
You get with the frog.
I think you kidnapped the queen and then.
Oh, and then you go on trial.
Oh no, that's later on.
That's yeah, that's later.
The trial is later.
This fucking poor kid.
Dude, yeah, this kid's getting shaft left and right.
Which I guess I get, is he a kid?
Because he lives with his mom, right?
Yeah.
And then when you go and watch the FMV intro, that is a dude.
That's a straight man.
But I mean like.
But when you see the, and it's so hard to say, and this is something Final Fantasy is
like guilty of.
Totally on the DS, we're going to run into these.
Where all of the characters are like chibi.
Like they're full grown adults.
They're gods, they're demons, they're all these things, but they're like just the cutest
little things.
Yeah, this character could be anything but you know from like six to 10,000 years old.
Yeah.
Literally have no fucking clue.
I have no idea because they're all the same height and they're all like these tiny little
things.
Yeah, I'm not mad.
It's kind of unnecessary for the game.
I mean, I just assume that these are like late teens, early twenties-ish.
I'm sure with like Super Nintendo, Super Nintendo, GBA, even with the DS, it was about limitations.
Sure.
So that I'm kind of fine with.
But then again, I mean, you look at Glory of Hercules.
This game made me think of Glory of Hercules quite a bit.
See, it made me think of Solo 2 Robo.
Really?
Yeah.
I had no idea.
Only because of like, Solo 2 Robo is, I still think, one of the more beautiful games we've
played and just did some really cool things with creating vast space on such a little
display.
Yeah.
No, that's a fair comparison.
That trial scene you were talking about, that was sick.
And again, it's just transposed elements of a large space just perfectly placed in the
right spot.
So you get a lot of detail right here in this small section and then you have no detail,
like just black and more detail.
The black kind of comes around the crowd.
There are some people you can kind of see in the stands, but they're like, you can't
make out their faces because they put a shader over it.
Yeah, dude.
But then the faces are also blurry, but also way more detailed than any of the characters
that you get ever anywhere else.
Yeah, it is an intense, it reminded me so much of Final Fantasy at that point.
That was a part that I got to and I was like, okay, yeah, absolutely.
You were right.
This feels so much like a Final Fantasy scene right here.
Yeah.
The scene where it plays out, your consequences matter.
My mind was blown.
Because they ask, were you trying to go after her money?
Yeah, I was like, wait, what interaction did I have?
Do you remember that one?
Yeah, it was good because when you first enter the fair and you bump into Nadia or Marl,
you bump into each other, you both fall down and I think her pendant flies out.
I had to look it up because I wanted to know if you could get a not guilty verdict.
I got a not guilty.
You did?
Yeah.
You mother, you didn't eat the dude's lunch?
I didn't know you could ever eat someone's lunch.
Yeah, it's the left side of the fair if you go off screen and shifts to the next section.
Well, I think that's right next to the-
The robot.
The robot, yeah.
On that table, this dude, you even go talk to him and he's like, my wife made me the
most bussin' sandwich for lunch.
I do remember him saying that.
I was like, oh, is it this, is this what you're talking about?
And then you just straight eat it.
I was like, oh, fuck, I just ate that dude's sandwich.
And he's like, wasn't that the best sandwich you ever had?
I'm like, fuck, yeah, dude, sorry about it.
Actually if you, I don't know if it's at Saves or what, but that sandwich reloads.
I ate his sandwich like 20 times, bro.
I'm not going to lie to you.
If you're at the market and when you get done buying stuff at the market, he says that pendant's
beautiful.
Would you, can you get her to sell it to me?
Oh yeah, it would be.
Yeah, see if she'll sell it.
So I think that's where they're asking about the greedy thing.
Were you ever interested in her money or anything like that?
Yeah, there's-
Were you ever aware she was the queen?
There's multiple things that bring out-
There's so many different, there's five or six different random interactions that you
have that you don't really think of.
No, not at all.
You're just going through it like whatever.
Yeah.
And then like anyone who's a gamer is going to have explored, as long as they discovered
them will likely explore those options to see what happens.
And then the game later on is like, oh, you're a bastard.
You're a fucking dick, huh?
Yeah, and you're like, well, I didn't, I wasn't trying to be.
Like a true RPG classic RPG, it doesn't matter.
No, because you still go to jail.
They're like, well, you're still going to get locked up for like a day for kidnapping
and then on the way to being locked up, the guy's like, get the guillotine ready.
We're fucking killing this guy.
Yeah, we're killing this idiot.
What?
And then does someone break in or do you break out?
So I don't know.
Again, like there's so many, like I never expected a game like this to have replayability
to just explore options.
I did do a lot of backtracking and stuff like that to go back and try to hit like secret
places or whatever.
But even still, like there's just like, I want to redo the fair sequence so I can get
a not guilty verdict even knowing that it doesn't fucking matter.
But I noticed when I was in the jail cell, I figured it would just be like, okay, I'll
sit here for 10 seconds and then something will happen and I can bust out.
And then that didn't happen.
But then it was like days remaining until execution.
And then the number goes down.
I was like, oh, well, maybe I have to wait until that day and then something happens.
I'm going to try to figure something out.
And then I ended up just like interacting with the gate like five times in a row.
And then the guards were like, all right, man, we told you to shut the fuck up.
You're not listening.
We're going to kick your ass.
And then you fucking you're like, I had a sword the whole time.
And then I was like, oh, well, yeah, that works.
That's so funny.
I don't remember my way of getting out.
But that wasn't it.
What?
I don't think so.
That's why I want to go back and check it out.
Yeah, it's it is crazy.
Yeah, it's it's dude again.
So many like not things I think of when I think of these older retro games.
And it's got fucking all of them in there, dude.
What?
Ninety five.
Dude, I know.
And like just even the dialogue like like you mentioned earlier, going and checking
out that mayor's house and like you just get like such a tight nugget of lore from maybe
someone that matters, maybe somebody that doesn't know.
See, you get a neatly compact little story in like five individual lines of dialogue.
Yeah.
And it's just I was like, I'm so glad I walked all the way down here now.
Like this was like it was entertaining.
Yeah, it was the funniest thing.
There's there are multiple things like that where you go and talk to just random people
and they say something where you're just like, what?
That was worth it.
That was so worth going and talking to every person.
I mean, obviously, like I said later on, the story becomes very dependent on you doing
your work and talking to people and figuring out where to go.
But so it's nice that it also rewards you.
And that's what it feels like.
The game is always they thought so much about payoff and, you know, well, we're going to
make you have to go around a lot of places, but don't worry, there's no random encounters.
Like and when you realize that there's certain things, there's an area you'll get to for
myself at least.
I didn't know two of these wooded areas were places that you could get into.
I just thought that they were just like block off kind of things.
And then all of a sudden walking past it and someone had said something about a forest
in that direction.
I was like, I could have sworn you couldn't get in there.
And there was like a little dent in that boom boom.
That's where you're going to just that's your entrance.
Yeah.
And I was like, oh, cool.
And now you're going to go backtracking to the beginning to go see could I have gotten
onto those mountains that I didn't think about or like this, like all these things that I
didn't think I could get to.
Now I am checking all these spots and it pays off sometimes.
Some of them don't have anything to it.
And then you're thinking, okay, what's this going to be either in the future or in the
past because you're jumping between both time zones because you get back.
So when you're in that trial, you like get back from rescuing the princess.
I don't even know if you found out she's the princess yet or not.
And then get the very end you do.
You figure out she's the princess and then get back into town and your ass is going to
trial.
Yeah.
They're like, you kidnapped the princess and she's like, no, he did.
No, shut the fuck up princess.
Yes, he did.
That's what you're doing because the chancellor eased up on some rules or something like that
in the past.
And that led to this whole issue.
And so now the chancellor in the future is strict as fuck because it's become a rule
of the kingdom that law is very strict.
It's cool to see that carry over.
You expect it from more modern games where this type of gameplay has been a little bit
more thoroughly refined.
Hell yeah.
And yeah, just to see it raw and honestly, like all of these things put together don't
clash.
Like it's all beautiful.
And it blends such a traditional RPG style game with some of these newer concepts, like
the kind of the more action-y timer-based, still kind of turn-based RPG, but it's a step
forward in a different direction.
Not to mention, like, well this was my other big gripe about the combat sequences.
The characters just mill about the screen and you, as far as I could tell, have no fucking
way to control where they're moving.
But like some of your abilities are AOEs.
And so you can just sit there and wait and hopefully these fucking idiots will go stand
in a group or maybe they won't.
Sometimes there is a rhyme to the reason.
Okay, okay.
So some creatures won't attack you until they are attacked.
I did notice some odd behavior.
Like, okay, so the sentries in the jail, like after you bust out, they look like they're
just shields and like you can't really hit them at all.
But then they'll just randomly like peek out from behind and then you just one-shot them.
And like so the second time I ran into them, I just didn't attack until one of them peeked
out and then they both peeked out.
And then from then on I could repeat that as long as I didn't attack one when the shield
was still up.
It feels very Final Fantasy, like how you use the cure on zombies to cause damage, that
kind of thing.
Like that reminds me.
Just like a more, like just a thinking man's game, if you will.
Sure, yeah.
This game is for smart people.
It's not, but it's again, it's just taking these things a step further.
You can run in and just hit shit.
So eventually you do go to like prehistoric times.
Oh, you do?
Yeah.
And I thought it was just the three time zones.
No time zones.
I mean, yeah, yeah.
So in prehistoric times there are these like giant monkey, I think flying monkeys or maybe
they're just regular monkeys.
I don't fucking remember.
They're giant though.
And they will pick up these rocks and throw them at you.
Damn.
The rocks are also enemies.
What the fuck?
Dude.
You have to be like, okay, if I attack the rocks before I attack the monkey, the monkey
is like, he is less aggressive, but the moment you hit him, he eggs.
And he's gonna just fucking repeat, throw these rocks at you and it's gonna fuck your
HP up so bad.
Holy shit.
Okay.
So you have to go and attack the stones first because they have lower health than this fucking
flying monkey batch.
Jesus Christ.
And then he's easier to take down because he doesn't have his strongest attack.
Sure.
There's a lot of different like, and you can't just run in on some of these, especially if
you do what I did where I don't think I was supposed to go to prehistoric time yet.
And you're just like, yeah, nah, nah.
I'm kind of getting my ass kicked a little bit, but I'm in it.
You know, like I'm just like grinding, fucking healing, and then we're leveling and leveling.
So yeah.
It pays off so much.
I do like that aspect.
And so now that we're talking through this a little bit, I'm wondering if I maybe rushed
the fight that I'm currently trying to get through.
So I had just made it to the future.
Because again, time travel, I thought I had explored all of the gimmicks this game had
to offer after the first time travel episode where you go to the past and then you come
back to the present.
I was like, oh, that's cool.
This is going to be like a, it's like a link to the past.
That's kind of cool.
That'll be fun.
And then I'm like, okay, we got to go through another portal and like back to the past again.
And it's, nope, you're in the future wastelands.
That the thing fucks up?
Is that what happens?
What happens?
No, okay.
So, so they, so you get back to the present after saving the day and everyone actually
thinks you're the villain again.
And so they're like, we're going to kill him.
They incarcerate you.
You bust out, you get out.
Busting out and battling the fucking dragon.
The dragon tank.
Tank is so cool.
It looks so good.
It's just.
So you get to the end of, like you bust out of prison and then like that final guard dude
drops like a note or something and then you can go read it and it tells you like the affinities
like it's, you know, these are sensitive documents that you've discovered and it basically tells
you, okay, when you fight the tank, don't use fire or lightning on its head.
Hit it with the sword.
Like, and it gives you the weakness.
Which I was like, oh, that's crazy.
A dragon tank.
And I legit in my head thought like a tank to hold things for a dragon.
I was like, holy shit, they have dragons in a tank.
But then why is the tank dragon shaped?
Why is the head of the tank?
I was so confused.
And then this thing starts rolling up and I'm like, it's a tank shaped like a dragon.
With missiles to boot.
Pretty plain as day.
Yeah, pretty.
Yes.
I felt a little foolish, but also still cool.
And then you kill the tank and it explodes because like the chancellor comes out with
his cronies and they're like, we got you bitch.
And then you kill the tank and they're like, oh no, the tank.
And they're like, quick repair it.
But then it explodes.
It blows a hole in the bridge.
And then these guys are like fucking loony tunes, like holding onto each other to complete
the bridge so they don't fall and then you just walk on top of them to cross back over.
Bro, I'm dude, I'm holding my sides in dude.
I was like, dude, this is insane.
Anyway, I got sidetracked because that shit was so fucking funny.
It was.
Yeah, sorry.
We're talking about how do you get to the future?
Yeah.
So you make it out of the you make it out of the castle, but then you get stopped yet
again by the chancellor, like right as you're exiting the castle.
And then the princess shows up again and she's like, you know, fuck this place, dad, you
suck ass chancellor.
You suck ass.
We're out of here.
And then like the three of you bail.
Cherry bomb plays in the background.
Yeah, it's so good.
But then like all of these dudes are just chasing you and like they're literally just
blocking you.
And it's you have to like outrun them because otherwise it's a pain in the fucking ass because
there's like you can't clip through these guys and it's fucking gay shit.
But then you go back through the forest and they kind of like corral you into this secret
grove that I discovered previously and but there was nothing there, like no point, maybe
a little chest or something.
And then sure as shit, there's like a little just a portal chilling on the ground.
Yeah.
Like we have to go fuck these guys.
We're out of here.
Yeah.
And you just jump and go, you jump and go.
And I straight up thought I was like, oh, back to the past.
That's so sick.
Let's see what's going on in the past again.
And then it's like, no, you're in a desert wasteland.
Actually, no, you teleport into like this temple maybe.
Like it's just an eerie, dark, clearly enclosed space with some like weird architecture, not
consistent with the past or the present.
And then you exit and it's like straight up like Mad Max, the overworld.
And it's just like blowing sandstorms.
All the cities look like they've been completely decimated maybe by nuclear war.
I don't fucking know.
It does very like post nuclear war.
Yeah, dude.
And I'm like, what?
And I didn't make it too much farther.
I'm like in like the first big space.
Oh man.
In the future.
But I'm out, dude, shitting bricks.
Dude, I cannot wait.
You need to, despite this being over, despite having another game, you need to go forward
a bit more because there's a part that's going to blow your fucking mind of like.
Oh my God.
Yeah.
Like you're not story wise, gameplay wise.
Oh shit.
You're just going to be like, what, like that's fucking wild.
I am.
Like this is one of the most surprising games I've ever played in my life period.
Like for like all of the reasons we've just described, but it just.
I'm just so like, I couldn't imagine playing this game in 1995.
Right?
Like, I remember playing like PGA.
Well, it was like a 98.
I think like the PGA tour 98 game.
I remember that was so sick.
Yeah, it was just a golfing game.
Okay.
It was 98.
Um, but it like had like some animations and like physics because golf.
Um, and it was decent that I haven't seen a lick of this game in the last 25 years.
Um, I think I had this game too.
Brother, I have probably, I mean, he's been around forever.
So probably we're going to look this up.
So I'm pretty sure that I kind of wanted to.
Yeah, honestly.
Like that, like to me, that was a big thing in like, and that was 98 ish in that time.
And I could not like playing that caliber of a game in night.
Oh, I literally can't fathom it.
It blows my mind.
Yeah, it is like, and in comparison to it's so hard.
You can't compare this game to other games because it's not fair as far as it's not fair
to get a mind.
You do have some Final Fantasy games that came out on the super Nintendo that are like
the amazing graphics.
Um, the one where you're in the mechs, I always forget that the six, I think is what it is.
I don't fucking remember.
And that was when I had one that I've always wanted to play because of the art.
And it reminds me like looking at them, these two local similar.
Sure.
Um, they were really onto something with the, they had honed the art for the super Nintendo
and RPGs square was on on the shit.
Yeah.
But I can't think of anything because even like you're saying now and half life is one
of my favorite games and I do remember that blowing me the fuck away.
Yeah, that's up there.
But this game does so many more things for its genre.
Oh, oh, it's insane.
I was reading online that this game has anywhere from like 26 to nearly a hundred hours of
gameplay depending on your level of thoroughness and just, you know, pacing, but like on average
26 hours to complete.
If you're not like completionist thing, there's like whatever that is for this game or something
like that.
Yeah.
Multiple.
Yeah, dude, it's insane.
I, yeah, fuck dude.
This game, I'm almost glad I haven't played this game until now because it would throw
me into a spiraling depression.
Honestly, once it was over, dude.
Oh my God.
It gives me the Tales of Symphonia feeling that I had.
Tales of Symphonia is the first and one of probably the, one of the few RPGs that I have
played through from beginning to end.
JRPGs, if you, I think it's a JRPG, it's an action RPG, but it's in that like story style
of like where it's like, you have to play 120 hours in.
Yeah.
Lose a significant, yeah.
And they give, it gives me that same vibe and just like how, like you said, how much
emotion you end up having invested in it because only being six, seven hours in talking about
the beginning of the game is kind of hard because it's like, that feels so long ago,
but in the story it's not that, it's just, that's how good the storytelling is.
It moves itself along so well.
Yeah.
Like fully, like fully invested, like just jumping, but like one, I have a massive love
boner for games of this type that deal specifically in like that future, like doomsday-y, but
like just unexplored future tech, whatever that could be.
And I love it from this retro perspective where like, oh, it's probably mechs and guns
and bombs and you know, that's fair.
But like, it's just so cool.
It has almost for me.
The future you're in is like 1999, I think, or something like that.
Yeah.
It's like a past future at this point, which is great.
And I love that.
What's, oh God, what's the anime that's, it's cult classic.
It's not actually that good.
Kids get into mechs and the mechs are kind of alive and God.
The Neo-
Neon Genesis Evangelion.
I'm getting that kind of vibe where it's like we're in the future, but it's kind of juxtaposed
against kind of a not super seemingly futuristic setting, but there's also maybe a hint of
supernatural in the form of magic or energy, whatever that juxtaposition between the two
is, is I really enjoy that.
Well, it's cool to see steampunk and dystopian future.
Yeah.
Like all together.
Yeah.
Oh, it's, yeah, it's, it's cool.
And you have to get the feeling too of like, Ooh, my characters must do something.
Right.
Because like this technology and Lucas technology, not the same now, but there must be, it's
gotta be, yeah, there should be something or something.
And cause you're quite a ways in the future.
Yeah.
Oh, way ahead.
Like generations.
Yeah.
Generations.
And, and I love that there's still carryovers between the, like the, uh, the storylines
or the timelines, timelines.
That's the one.
The repetition.
Yeah.
There's just like, there's holdovers between that link them either through specific characters
or references between them.
Like locations.
Oh, speaking of funny dialogue.
And maybe it's, maybe this becomes more important or there's more to it later.
I don't know.
But one of the first things that I caught onto in the future, the dystopian future,
like you make it into this dome and, um, clearly we're in the future.
Everyone is in shambles though.
And they're like in these domes that are dilapidated and food is scarce.
And you talk to this one dude and he's like, Oh, this it's a, it's a eternal rest machine
or whatever the fuck they call it.
Um, it'll make you like in two seconds, it'll make you feel like you slept all day.
Uh, but it won't do anything about your hunger.
And like there is no hunger mechanic in the game, but then you can use it.
And it restores your MP and your HP for you and the party.
And then, and then it gives you an added additional line of dialogue that says you're still hungry
as fuck.
You know, or did nothing to assuage your hunger.
Whatever.
And they're like, that's, that was hilarious.
Like there's no need for that because there's no hunger mechanic.
But now I know that my characters are hungry.
Yeah.
It just doesn't matter at all.
And I was just like, what a great fucking thing.
I remember things that have the exact same thought process reading that.
I mean like that is hilarious to like have in there because there is no,
Yeah.
What is like, why develop this aspect of the plot?
Just because.
To give them an ability to heal you, I guess, but they could have just given you a bed,
right?
So then it gives me the idea.
Could just give you a bed, a restore point.
How are they alive?
In the jail cell, if you drink the mug in your jail cell also replenishes your HP and
MP.
I don't know if you caught that one.
I didn't do that one, but there's another place where you can drink something that.
Oh really?
Yeah.
But I think, cause I did think about that.
It sat with me in the same way.
Their food, they don't have any food, right?
How would they still all be alive if they don't have food?
Cannibalism.
And the healing thing.
Oh yeah, sure.
Cause any damage that your body might take from not eating.
Oh yeah, I guess it'll keep you alive, but it just keeps you hungry.
Cause you're still starving.
You can live forever, but you're starving.
Oh yeah, that's fucked up.
That's what I think that is.
I didn't even think about that, but yeah, I mean, regardless, it's just like the little
details.
I think it's the most recent Star Wars game.
The souls like one.
Jedi survivor.
Because there's Jedi, the fallen order, right?
That's the first one.
I think so.
Yeah.
I think it's the second one.
Yeah.
But I think that's the right title.
Have you seen Rick the technician, the boss?
No.
So it was big when the game came out and everyone was talking about it because it was really
funny.
But your character's running around and you come across this dude down the end of a long
corridor and he kind of gets out and he starts walking towards you.
And then his name, Rick the technician, and a big old health bar pops up and he starts
running towards you.
And then he just goes down with one hit because he's just a technician.
And just the funniest shit ever, right?
Everybody's getting a good laugh out of this.
And like just those little subtle things that are unnecessary, but just because, because
and yeah, I love that shit, dude.
Yeah.
It's quite obvious that this was like the best of the best.
And there's a sequel to this game.
What?
It's called Chrono Cross.
Oh, I know.
I have heard of that.
PlayStation one.
Okay.
When I first moved out here, I had like a PS one and a game cube.
Oh, fuck yeah.
Game cube.
I was at the, there was a used game store here back in the day.
No shit.
It was a used game store as well as a fish store.
That surprises me.
None.
So I ended up getting Chrono Cross.
I think I must've at that point kind of known of Chrono Trigger.
I maybe, I think I knew of Square Enix.
I had a friend that had gotten me a Final Fantasy game.
Like I'm trying to like find an RPG, something to get into for the summer of not knowing
anybody in this town.
Sure.
Like I'm going to play this game.
No?
Not good.
And I'm not good.
Oh, not good.
Not good.
Oh, not a good game.
And I'm not the only person that feels that way.
I think that there's kind of been a resurgence of people now saying like, was it, maybe it
is a good game and maybe I'm wrong.
Maybe I just don't like it's much more of PS one Final Fantasy game.
Okay.
And so, you know, now just think about that.
You went from the charm of Chrono Trigger to Chrono Cross.
I didn't have that experience.
I just am picking up Chrono Cross.
Yeah.
And it just did not hit with me.
The random encounters killed me.
I just couldn't stand it.
So I'm curious to if that game is any good or not.
I do want to...
Email us at pocketcastpodcast.gmail.com.
Let us know if that game is good or not.
If we need to check it out.
But it's not, I don't think it's related.
Like I'm sure it's related, but you're not Chrono.
You're not...
Oh, really?
Yeah.
It's like a continuation.
Oh, sure.
You know, I think it might be similar.
Same universe, but the other story could go fuck itself.
Yep.
That one's over.
It's done.
Yeah.
You know, we'll reference it.
Now these guys need a bunch of crystals.
Yeah, it's their turn.
New people.
That guy is the same guy, different name.
I saw this thing about Final Fantasy one and the creating of it.
The writer was like a freelance writer.
Oh, really?
And I'm sure he becomes part of the team.
Sure.
I don't know, I didn't dig that deep.
But he was given like ideas, right?
This like storyboard basically.
And then was given kind of like write us the script.
Sure.
He's the one.
He's the reason why crystals are a thing.
Really?
He just really liked the crystals.
I fucking love crystals.
He's the one that really like emphasized it.
And then from there on, it just carried on.
That is fantastic.
I feel like I was actually exposed.
I think earlier I said that one and two Final Fantasy, those were my first.
But I think it actually was seven because I very explicitly remember Beers.
I don't know.
I'm not a fan of Final Fantasy yet.
Oh, David Beers.
David Beers.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
The person we know.
Sorry, I'll believe it.
Sorry.
I need some context there.
But was seven PS2 or PS1?
So you can play on PS2 though.
Sure.
Whichever the original platform was.
So PS1.
And I remember like actually getting to play it on a PS1 like in the basement, just going
over it like the course of a summer.
And I was like, dude, Final Fantasy slaps.
And I think that's where I got into it and started going back and playing random games
I could get my hands on.
Right.
Yeah, man, crystals.
Fucking hell.
I played Final Fantasy 7 on the PC.
And we had a recent remake or?
No, no, no.
This is like back in the day.
It was the version you played.
Sure.
But we had like a trial of it.
I don't know if I.
So we used to get like PC gamer magazines or something like that.
Oh, yeah, dude.
Things on it.
Those are so awesome.
Yeah.
One of them was for Final Fantasy 7 on the computer.
Yeah, I remember really enjoying like the like art mainly of the attacks, like the special
attacks, like the way that they look.
The colors are really like attractive.
I always remember that.
Yeah, I don't I no longer have the patience for those drawn out like animated.
Yeah.
Like I love them.
And it's still so very cool.
But like, was it you that sent me that GIF or clip from a game?
And it was like Meteor, Blazer Blast, Shower or something, whatever, who gives a fuck?
But then it was like a 30 second cut scene and then it just misses on all of them.
Yeah, yeah.
It looks like a god laser from space.
Miss.
Yeah.
Yeah, I usually will leave those on in games for a while and then I'll turn them off.
Yeah.
I remember like Digimon, I remember I left them on until being like, OK, these are I've
seen.
Yeah.
I think it has to offer.
But yeah, I'm with you most time.
If I'm there, I'm usually there to grind.
Well, and like some of those games, especially like I remember Final Fantasy, especially
the Chrono Trigger has not yet for me been grindy.
How would that that said, I feel like I am going to have to go grind a level or two out
for the boss that I'm stuck on right now because he is pushing my shit.
As I recall for the SNES, the copy that I have, I like I don't at the time I thought
I soft locked myself.
I'd be curious to go back and see.
But I need to go grind more.
I should have grinded more.
Sure.
I'm stuck in a room or something.
I can't get past this boss, but I can't leave to go back and grind.
I don't think I think they would have designed it better than that.
Sure.
But I don't have Super Nintendo anymore.
Yeah, that's fair.
It's a point.
But I yeah, I didn't I didn't always love that aspect.
But like I remember when I was younger, I did just seeing those numbers go up, baby.
Fuck yeah.
I might be failing all my classes, but I'm absolutely whopping the shit out of some cactuars.
This world.
Oh, man.
There was a part of me that really wanted to this game is for people who don't like
RPGs.
And I would accept that actually.
Yeah, really makes me want to play another RPG.
Kind of.
I know we already made our decision.
We did.
And I have to say, this is again, one of the few episodes where I don't think we got distracted
from the game at all.
We didn't come up with a money making scheme that involved some kind of heinous off kilp
drug, street drug.
We just stayed on topic the whole time.
Yeah, I think we did.
I could I could go for another two hours.
Honestly.
Yeah.
Honestly, God.
I do feel you there.
Hit us up in the Patreon for an extended content.
Yeah, absolutely.
We discussed it.
We can do that.
Fuck yeah.
We should really get a Patreon going.
We don't even get fan mail.
We're not going to kill a fucking Patreon.
Dude, I don't want fan mail.
People are going to send us like shitty underwear and bombs.
I want the bombs.
I don't think we're allowed to have bombs.
Even I just don't think that's something we're allowed to have.
And I feel like if we got them via mail and didn't report it, I just have an inkling of
a suspicion that that's also not OK.
Either for our safety or legally.
Yeah.
Like it like the post office caught wind of it.
They'd be like, you got a bomb in the mail and you just didn't tell anyone.
Like, well, I mean, it got here.
OK.
Yeah, I was like, it's on display.
Yeah.
Yeah, it's not sure that'd be fine.
Don't send us bombs.
But if you wanted to send us Twinkies or letters of support, Twinkies, Twinkies or Twinks,
Twinkies or Twinks, baby?
Send them our way.
As you recall from like the past two episodes, at least, I've been watching Transformers
Beast Wars.
Yeah.
I'm still watching Transformers.
Still plugging away.
Yeah.
How many seasons of Beast Wars?
I had to look at it.
So the way that I'm watching it is like on YouTube.
So it's just number 50.
Whatever.
Yeah.
So like, I don't know if I'm right.
I think there's three original seasons.
OK.
Man, this show is so intriguing to watch.
Is it starting to pop off?
It pops off.
It's already been popping off.
Right.
But it just keeps doing more.
It's one of those shows.
It's like an anime where you want to see their next form.
Sure.
Yeah.
They do that in the show where it's like, oh, my God.
I thought that like everybody gets a level up and they get a new something.
There's now been a third level up.
Oh, fuck.
And I did.
And they're also with the other people getting the third level up.
The people that didn't get that second level up the first time around are now getting it.
They're finding reasons and ways to give them to.
And so that's fun.
And it's also fun to see like what excuse they get.
Like how are they going to come up with a reason?
It's super cheesy.
By season two and season three, they know like they're making fun of themselves and
show that.
Yeah.
That's great.
It's a show that I would love to watch with like a group of people.
You know what I'm saying?
Like a get drunk on a Saturday night with the homies and watch eight episodes.
Yeah.
It's like have like a like every week we watch like three episodes because it's just like
it's cheesy.
It's funny, but also it like sure you coming back for it.
Yeah.
So with me being on some of the Transformers cake, there's also a Roku TV, I think recommended
the pop up with like ads and shit.
And I don't know how they chose it, but Ryan and Morgan decided to start watching Bumblebee,
the Transformers movie.
Is there just a movie?
Yeah.
There's one just called Bumblebee.
Oh, is that new?
Ish.
Yeah.
Oh, yeah.
So good for him.
It's the first in the chronological order because as you recall, call from like the
old shadow buff movies, Megan Fox, those are in like the same
universe as Bumblebee and the most recent one, they came out with the age of the beast
or something like I think is what it's called.
Oh, yeah.
Yeah.
Just came out.
That's right.
Yeah.
I forgot about that.
So we've watched both of those movies.
OK.
That is a movie that I saw the ads for it and I was like, man, fuck that.
They're like kind of doing Beast Wars, but they're not.
I can tell they're not doing Beast Wars.
I'm kind of annoyed because I remember at one point, maybe it was when you first started
watching Beast Wars and I was like, oh, yeah, dude, that Beast Wars Transformers movie just
came out.
And then I was kind of looking at it.
I was like, I don't think these are the same.
They kind of are.
God damn it, dude.
Oh, dude.
It's like they kind of are.
There's a little bit of they it is not the same universe, obviously, as Beast Wars.
Right.
Sure.
So there's going to be some differences.
I'm not on the multiverse.
It pays a lot of respects.
OK.
To the story even.
Really?
Yeah.
Because they make a comment about how we're from your past because because they think
these like they find Optimus Primal and Optimus and him.
You know, they interact or whatever.
So he says to him, like, we're from your past and your future.
That is also true for the show Beast Wars.
That's weird.
Yeah, it makes they do a pretty good job of explaining.
But I do too, like a time warp and shit like that.
They are.
I'm your son.
They time travel.
Well, so they time travel from the future.
How does it fucking work?
They traveled from the past into the future and then they have to wait even longer for
the for the Autobots to wake up.
OK.
That's how it works.
And I don't know, I could be getting it wrong.
It's a weird twist.
And they do explain it pretty well.
I think it's like parallel universes, things like that.
Interesting.
Yeah.
Crazy.
It's kind of cool.
We've been watching that.
We get done with the second one and then we started.
So like we've been doing this thing where it's fun to like find just random, even not
great movies and just like sure marathon through them from like chronological or whatever.
Oh, just finding like a series or something.
Yeah.
Ripping through it.
That's fun.
Series of movies.
Yeah.
Usually.
So we put on the shallow buff one, the first shallow buff.
Oh, hell yeah.
We get through those first two, the Bumblebee one and the Beast Wars ish one.
Yeah.
Ren's getting a little scared.
Oh yeah.
And we started to realize that Ren's would have nightmares.
No.
About fucking Transformers.
Yeah, there's like big battles and explosions.
He loves it, but it also scares him.
Yeah.
And so we have shut that down now.
He'll still watch Beast Wars with me because that's like a very CGI cartoony.
Yeah.
You know, it's very-
He's okay.
Yeah.
He's fine with that one.
But-
That's fair though.
Like the Transformers movies are, they're big, they're loud and like the sounds are
big for sure.
The sounds.
Yeah.
Like imagine being on acid and watching a Transformers movie.
That actually sounds so dope.
I might enjoy those movies.
It could be, but I think that some of the noises would just be like, oh dude, I don't
fucking like that noise at all.
Oh dude, like that one's-
Yeah, that-
Dude, oh, that sound.
Dude, sober, that sound is unsettling.
Exactly.
Not sober, that sound might actually send me to hell.
That's what I'm worried about.
Like at first you're like, this is awesome.
Then you hear that noise and now you're saying just like, we got to get out of this theater.
You see the worst part is when you hear that sound after you've turned off the show and
then you're like, nope, nope, undo.
Please don't.
Please don't do this to me right now.
I could not afford you to blow it a hole through my wall.
So with all this-
What is going on?
With all this being said, our next game is going to be Transformers Decepticons.
Decepticons slash Autobots.
It's a game that came out, one of those games that came out with like two of the same game.
There's a little bit of a difference.
So I think what we're going to do-
Like Pokemans.
Is we're going to cover, each of us is going to play one.
Which one are you doing?
What do you want to do?
You're the fucking Transformers junkie.
I never even knew I was.
You've been for a while though, so-
I've been all my life because watching this show, dude, is like such a blast.
I had that toy.
I had that Transformer.
I had so many Transformers.
Interesting.
Yeah.
I have always really enjoyed Transformers.
I don't have high expectations for this game.
Yeah.
I also recall not-
I remember enjoying-ish the Michael Bay.
Is that who it is that does those movies?
I think it is Michael Bay.
At least I think the first two big blockbuster films, I think.
It's all three.
Maybe all of them.
I know it's all three.
It might even be the more recent ones.
The most recent ones I don't think are.
Yeah.
But I know-
Is it him or JJ Abrams, right?
It's not- I thought the same thing.
It's not JJ Abrams.
It's got to be- No, in fact, I'm very confident.
It's not Michael J. Fox, Jesus Christ, Michael Bay.
Michael Bay.
Wow.
That was fun.
I think it was like Aquaman, I want to say.
Maybe Lost.
Man, I don't know.
They're big dick boys in the entertainment industry.
I know that.
There we go.
Yeah.
But I remember Michael Bay Explosion.
Yeah.
It's that YouTube video.
Exactly.
I remember Transformers being heavily featured in that.
Yeah.
I remember enjoying- you could turn off your brain because at that point I was becoming
pretentious enough to be like, oh, this is a dumb Michael Bay explosion movie.
All right.
So to Beers' credit, he did help me coin the idea that it might not have been a good movie,
but it was entertaining.
It was fun.
And that is a reason enough to enjoy something that might not be great.
And that was exactly how I remember feeling about Transformers movies.
And then eventually down the line, I don't think I saw the third or fourth Transformers
movie.
This is all just a saying.
I'm like, yeah, okay.
I don't really-
You could do some more fun.
I would love to see Transformers without people.
And that's a lot of Beast Wars.
Where they're at now, they found Neanderthals.
Oh, okay.
That's kind of cool.
The Autobots are fucking- or the Maximals in this.
They're always about humans for whatever reason.
So they're protecting them now.
Sure.
I would love to see- and I've never watched it.
I've never watched the original Transformers show from the 80s.
Okay, yeah.
I'm curious if that's on Cybertron and if there's humans, but I don't think it is.
I think it's on Earth after the whole Cybertron.
They might do some back and forth.
I don't feel like there's any Transformers entertainment that actually covers the Cybertronian
war that they always talk about.
And that's the shit that I would love to see.
And I would really like to see that.
Just Transformers.
What do Transformers look like when they're not transforming into human things?
Right!
Like, is it just that they're transforming into giant blasters?
Big Death Stars.
Or like-
Just lasers.
Big lasers.
Just curious.
Yeah.
Yeah, that would be cool.
I would fuck Heavy with some shit like that.
Yeah.
Do they just- or bring it where it's like, because of this weird time travel, parallax
universe thing, can you make it where they have fucking cars, animals, a combination
of like a cheetah motorcycle?
Sick.
Yeah, dude.
Yeah, like something just like make your imagination wild.
Yeah.
Well, and it would be cool to like, because dude, I feel like Transformers, just with the
lore behind why, because I remember just from a marketing and like a toy perspective, you're
only transforming back and forth between like humanoid representation and object representation,
be it a car, a plane, a bus, you know, animal, whatever the fuck it is.
Oh, they have multi.
There are some that multi, but like full blown, just like do whatever the- like almost like
Green Lantern-y type shit.
Transform into whatever you want to.
Yeah, dude.
Transform into that's like-
Yeah, that would be-
That would be pretty fucking sick.
Yeah.
That'd be cool.
Or like, you know, you could, I mean, the fuck, I feel like I could write a plot along
that baseline.
That would be pretty intriguing.
Even if it was, it would be really fun about it too.
Dark romance.
But it's a tiny little robot.
So like, yeah, you can transform into like literally anything, but it's going to be like
the tiny version.
Just a knife.
It's like the craziest, scariest laser gun, but it just shoots out the tiniest like pew
pew.
But then like planet explodes in the background.
Oh, that's a fun idea too.
Yeah.
I love that shit.
Yeah.
No, I've never been a huge Transformers fan.
It is entertaining though, and I will give it that.
Just never really something I dove deep into, but I'm enjoying living through you vicariously
with this one.
Cool.
Hell yeah.
Someday I'll get you to watch Beast Wars with me.
Probably don't have to try that hard, honestly.
I think that just any nerdy person can appreciate that show or reboot for the fact of the early,
early CGI.
Yeah, I, I'm already like that alone has me intrigued to be honest.
Yeah.
It's so fucking interesting to watch.
So I have no idea where this game takes place in the movies.
If it's part of the movies, it looks like it is from the little, I would assume.
It looks like it was coming out around the same time it's the first big Michael Bay movie.
I'm ready to, ready to, ready to maximize.
I'm ready to roll out.
I'm going straight.
I'll do Decepticons.
You'll do Decepticons?
Hell yeah.
I'm going to maximize.
I'm going to be at the...
Maximize.
I'm going to roll out Autobot style.
Autobot style?
Fuck yeah.
Well, hopefully I win.
I don't know if that's how this works, but...
Oh man, that'd be cool.
That would be pretty sick.
Yeah, no lie.
All right.
I had the same thought.
Hell yeah.
We'll see.
Catch you later gamers.
Game on.
Have a good time.
Be safe.
Make sure that your toaster is not a Decepticon.
Reech.