Top 10 Best Retro Games

2) Chrono Trigger (Super Nintendo)

Chrono Trigger is one of the greatest Japanese RPGs ever made. Just look at the people who worked on it and it's easy to see why. The game was designed by Hironobu Sakaguchi, the creator of the Final Fantasy series. Yuji Horii, the creator of the Dragon Quest series, was one of Chrono Trigger's writers. Famous composer Nobuo Uematsu worked on the game's music. Akira Toriyama, famous for creating the anime/manga Dragon Ball, was Chrono Trigger's lead artist. No wonder this game was awesome!

One way that Chrono Trigger differs from a lot of RPGs of the time is that there are no random encounters. You can actually see the enemies on the map and, if cautious, can sometimes avoid them. The storyline of Chrono Trigger is arguably its best feature. It includes time travel so the theme of the RPG actually changes depending on what time period you're in. Sometimes Chrono Trigger is a sci-fi RPG and other times it's a medieval fantasy RPG.

Mechanically speaking, the game is simple and yet deceivingly complex. The stats remain relatively low compared to other RPGs like Final Fantasy. 999 is the max hit points your characters can have and Square were careful to make other stats not get out of hand either. For example, a piece of equipment that increases a stat by +10 is considered godly.

Perhaps the most important part of any roleplaying game is the characters. There needs to be characters you actually care about otherwise the game is going to become uninteresting no matter how well it plays. Chrono Trigger accomplishes this by fleshing out the back story of each character and making everybody seem very important. This is further accomplished with the game's tech system. Characters can perform powerful dual or sometimes even triple techniques depending on who all is in your party at that given moment. This also adds replayability to the game because your available techniques and thus overall battle strategy will be completely different depending on which characters you're using.

Chrono Trigger was originally released in 1995 for SNES but later got a PlayStation release in 2001 that had added anime cutscenes drawn by Toriyama.

1) Final Fantasy VII

I debated between Final Fantasy VII and Chrono Trigger for the top game on this list because both are amazing RPGs. I ultimately settled on FF7 due solely to the fact that it's my favorite game so why shouldn't it be first? It's my list, after all. Final Fantasy VII came out in 1997 and in my opinion was, and still is, the epitome of what a roleplaying game should be. Here are some of the reasons why:

It was long – you could milk nearly 100 hours out of a single playthrough if you did absolutely everything the game had to offer. Even if you ignored side quests you were still looking at 30 to 50 hours minimum. Now that's getting your money's worth.

It had some of the most memorable characters in gaming – Sephiroth and Cloud are the obvious ones but even ancillary characters like Heidegger and Bugenhagen were awesome.

It had cool places to go like the Gold Saucer and Junon. Midgar alone was almost as large as the entire world on some other RPGs.

It had mini-games that were actually FUN like chocobo racing and the Battles of Fort Condor.

It had an enthralling storyline that you actually cared about, including many of the side quests. I legitimately fretted over whether or not I could stop the train from crashing into North Corel!

The gameplay mechanics were perfect. There was a wide variety of spells, equipment, and summons. The materia system was unique and fit into the game's overall storyline as an explanation for magic.

It had an all-around amazing soundtrack and truly impressive FMV cutscenes.

It had a lot of replayability because you actually wanted to go through the game and use other characters. Every playable character had a rich background that made you care about them.

Gamers have been begging Sony to release a high definition remake for PlayStation 3 for years. Considering how dreadful many modern day RPGs for consoles end up being, however, perhaps Final Fantasy VII is best left in the retro era where people have square blocks for hands and our nostalgia can safely remain intact.

So, there you have it, my list of Top 10 Retro Games, with so many to pick from I'm sure there will be a lot of games that our readers thing should have been in this top 10 list, and we would love to know your thoughts and suggestions, you can do this in the comments section below.