Reverse Design: Chrono Trigger / Edition 1 in Bloomington, MN

The
Reverse Design
series looks at all of the design decisions that went into classic video games. This is the second installment in the Reverse Design series, looking at
Chrono Trigger
. Written in a readable format, it is broken down into four sections examining some of the most important topics to the game:
Analyzes how the designers use gameplay to preserve and embellish the surprises in the plot
Explains how
is really two different games: the
Tragedy of the Entity
and the
Comedy of the Sages.
Highlights how the two games differ in terms of tone, linearity, player choice and in the pacing of their content.
Key Features
Comprehensive definitions of key concepts and terms, introducing the reader to the basic knowledge about the study of RPG design
Summary of historical context of
how it came to be, how it influenced other games, and how it manipulated players through expectations they had about the RPG genre
Extensive collections of data and data visualizations explaining how
Chrono Trigger’s
systems work and how the game’s challenges increase in complexity as the player gets deeper into the content