When Final Fantasy 4 released in 1991 in Japan, it marked the beginning of one of the most influential periods in the JRPG genre and signaled one of Square Enix’s – or SquareSoft as it was then – most successful periods ever. Not only with FF4, but with 1994’s Final Fantasy 6 and 1995’s Chrono Trigger. Now, nearly 30 years on since it began, that successful trifecta of games will influence an upcoming JRPG with massive promise. The kicker? It’s coming from a small indie team in South America.

Cris Tales, announced last summer at E3, is a homage to some of the most famous JRPGs of all time. You play as Crisbell, a heroine who’s had recently awakened time powers and must save the world with her fellow companions Cristopher and, wait for it, Matias the frog. Seriously. But the big twist isn’t within the game, but outside it. Cris Tales is not your usual JRPG. This is not being made in Japan, but rather in South America. Specifically, Colombia. It’s an odd mix when you think about it, but it’s definitely different and unique.

Executive producer Derek Neal describes how those games help bring together a fusing of Columbian and Japanese cultures.

“You know, my favorite games from history are things like Final Fantasy 4 and 6, Chrono Trigger, Secret of Mana, these kind of SNES classics from my childhood. Again, I basically had played all of the same games and had a very strong passion for them. And they really wanted one of the things that we both sort of feel is that modern RPGs have strayed very far from those roots. Like there’s been lots of interesting evolutions and changes to the genre over time.

"But we were nostalgic just for the experience that we had back when we were kids working on those games. And so, [studio head of developer Dreams Unincorporated] Carlos [Rocha Silva] really wanted to bring that to people, the RPG fans of today and kind of create something that was, you know, a more direct evolution of those formative experiences from our childhoods.”