mDuo13

I've finally finished Chrono Trigger DS (including the bonus dungeons and the special ending, but not all of the original endings). It was a special experience revisiting this game - one I've placed among my 2 all-time favorites (with only Super Metroid as company), but have not played in almost a decade. The DS version sure packs a lot of bonus material, none of which detracts from the game, but none of which is really, ultimately, necessary.

Now, my memory of playing the original game is a little hazy by this point, but as far as I can tell, the changes are as follows:

• The translation has been slightly revised. For better or for worse, the names of things remain more or less unchanged from the earlier US release. (For example, the Japanese-version's "Grandleon" is still called the "Masamune" despite being a broadsword, as LastElixir likes to point out. On that point, the "Last Elixir" item is still called a "Megalixir" in English.)
• There's an Extras menu which serves as sort of an in-game guide. As you encounter monsters, learn techs, and get endings, they'll appear in the menus, with various informative details. The best part of this is the built-in Sound Test feature. It also includes all the cutscenes from the PlayStation version (which are also optionally integrated into gameplay).
• There's a bonus village/dungeon-series thing split across two time periods - 600 A.D. and 65,000,000 B.C. This area is probably my least favorite change, as it works kind of like an MMO - you accept villagers' requests for help, run around fetching items or beating bosses, and occasionally get useful rewards out of it. But it's horribly designed: you end up going back and forth through the same massive areas with the same inescapable enemies innumerable times. Not only that, but it probably contributes some of the most implausible time-travel antics yet, considering how the two areas are separated by millions of years including the near-apocalyptic ice age, but several things including a vine ladder you create manage to stay in place! At least once, I got story-teleported back to the village after finishing one quest, only to find out that the next quest in the chain started from pretty much exactly where I had just been. The worst part is, it doesn't really contribute to the plot of the game... at all.
• There's a Pokemon-like monster-training/battling minigame, with multiplayer. I spent a little bit of time on it and didn't really find it rewarding. My monster never even evolved.
• There's another series of dungeons that opens up after you beat the game; these appear in the time periods that the previously-mentioned village did not except of course 1999 A.D. After beating all three dungeons, each of which ends with a doppleganger of one of the party members, you unlock a harder, more-final boss battle that is relevant to Chrono Cross. I think it's a somewhat unsatisfying end, though. Serves it right for being associated with Chrono Cross.
• There are touchscreen controls, including a mode where the top screen is cleared of menus while the bottom screen contains all your commands. This is kind of nifty, but also makes it hard to keep track of what's going on in battles, sometimes. The area maps on the bottom screen are nice, though.

More important than all these features, to me, was the original game, ported more or less exactly, to a console I can carry with me and play in the car, in class, or at a friend's house, and suspend with the flip of a lid. (Though, the game did freeze on me coming out of sleep mode once very early on.) They managed to add a lot of features and make it portable while preserving the soul of the old game - an RPG that, to me, defines the genre now and forever. Part of it is the classic sprites and the SNES-soundchip music, which sounds as good now as it ever did. Part of it is the characters, with that archetypal charm that Akira Toriyama managed to imbue upon them (even if I don't think his art is particularly attractive). And part of it is the story, which has the perfect balance of whimsy, serious epic business, and cliche RPG goodheartedness. I love how many small things the party makes better throughout the course of the game. I love the plot twists, which are often unusual and powerful. I love how many endings there are, how early on you can confront the final boss if you feel so bold. I really love doing learning new combo attacks and using them. And I love how there are still interesting things to notice in the soundtrack, like the brief moment of "The Last Day of the World" in Lavos's theme proper. Most of all, I love how none of it ever gets old.

So, while the new content is imperfect, but still kinda nice (I especially liked how one of the extra dungeons finds a place for the previously-unused track "Singing Mountain") the end verdict is that the original game, as it stands, is my favorite RPG of all time, and one of my two favorite games overall, and that's all I needed.