A modern-day indie successor to the classic JRPG, Chrono Trigger, has been announced for Xbox and PC

What you need to know

• During the Xbox Tokyo Game Show 2024 livestream event, a new JRPG developed by Riyo Inc. and published by Humble Bundle was announced for Xbox and PC titled Threads of Time.
• This game is a turn-based JRPG inspired by legendary titles in the genre such as Chrono Trigger and Final Fantasy, where the player embarks on a time-traveling adventure to various eras of history to protect the timeline from being destroyed by evil forces.
• Threads of Time currently has no release date but is scheduled to launch on Xbox Series X|S and PC via Steam.

Amongst the many news announcements made during Microsoft's Tokyo Game Show 2024 presentation, an intriguing, original JRPG made its debut titled Threads of Time, developed by indie studio Riyo Inc. and published by Humble Games. 

This game is a turn-based JRPG inspired by the classic titles in the genre, such as Square Enix's Chrono Trigger and early Final Fantasy games. In Threads of Time, you take control of a band of heroes recruited from various periods of history and embark on a time-traveling adventure to save the world from evil.

Here is everything you need to know about Threads of Time.

Threads of Time | Official Announce Trailer | TGS 2024 - YouTube

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As stated before, Threads of Time is a JRPG where you will embark on an epic journey through the past, present, and future to save the world from evil forces looking to destroy it. 

Your journey will take you through imaginative landscapes lovingly presented in an HD-2D art style, where gorgeously 2D pixel-art characters interact with an equally beautiful 3D background made in the Unreal 5 Engine. Along the way meet a host of colorful and powerful heroes who will join you on your journey, ranging from pre-historic warriors, modern-day swordsmen and mages, ancient wizards, mech-riding technicians from the future, and more.

However, the forces of evil will not sit idly as you attempt to unravel their plans to control time, for they will send horrific beasts and mindless killing machines to stop you. To combat these threats, you will need to engage them in turn-based battles where you will need to use your party's powers to weather incoming attacks, use the power of time to weaken your foes, and combine certain party members' abilities to perform powerful combo attacks that will wipe the floor with almost any boss that dares stand in your way.

Color me intrigued in this wild time-traveling JRPG

When I saw the trailer for this during the presentation, I was amazed by its breathtaking presentation, from its charming retro-inspired HD-2D aesthetic to the meticulously detailed and fluid animation. While the trailer doesn't show exactly how the gameplay will pan out as there's no User-interface to speak, I'm curious to see how inspiration it takes from Chrono Trigger's combat system as that title featured similar mechanics of using multiple party members to perform team attacks.

If anything, it reminds me of Sea of Stars, another Chrono Trigger-inspired JRPG that I reviewed last year but with a much bigger budget. I loved Sea of Stars and if Threads of Time ends up just as or even more fun that game, this upcoming Xbox JRPG could have a chance of becoming one of my new favorite Xbox JRPGs. 

However, it's still early days to tell if it can reach such heights as we have only seen one trailer of the game thus far, and we don't even have a release date for it. So, we will have to wait for more gameplay details to see if Threads of Time has the potential to become one of the best Xbox titles and best PC titles of the indie JRPG scene when it eventually launches for Xbox Series X|S and PC via Windows and Steam.

Threads of Time

Wield the power to travel through time and space, and embark on an epic adventure to save the past, present, and future from being rewritten by evil hands in Threads of Time.

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