Chrono Trigger

Pretty much my opinion. Add in a lack of strong characterization all around due to the upteen bajillion characters (And the fact that the game had to be built around the fact that you may never recruit most of them and only 3 will ever be present at any one time and 1 of them is the personality-less Silent Protagonist).

Trigger had simple, yes, but well developed characters and the smaller cast allowed for more meaningful interactions between them and the plot - heck, every character is in some way tied to the main plot. Which can't be said of Cross. Good characterization can go miles to improve a weaker narrative.

And a oet peeve of mine (well, technically two, but related) most of Cross characters stop being developped the moment they become playable, and some of the most interesting characters (who are, frankly, too few) outright vanish from the game the moment you learn what their deal is. Like Harle. When you finally learn what she is... She pretty much vanishes from the game never to bee seen again.

edited 8th Nov '12 6:02:26 PM by Ghilz

Killing off Crono, Lucca, and Marle alone is enough reason for me to hate Cross.

Way to shit on the fans that wanted the sequel in the first place, Square.

edited 8th Nov '12 6:00:47 PM by Zennistrad

That too. Though for me its the idea that the events of Trigger made things worst. The game implies that Crono and Cie's killing of Lavos allowed him to merge with Schala and become more powerful as the time devourer. In short: You inTrigger made things worst.

...No. Fuck you Square. I reject that. I despite the idea that Cross has the galls to invalidate all you did. Dropping a bridge on the cast is salting the wound on top of that. (Oh, and bringing Robo back only so he can get killed in the very same scene... classy.)

edited 8th Nov '12 6:10:19 PM by Ghilz

And this is why I will never play Cross. I refuse to play a sequel that ruins the previous game.

I never really thought Chrono Trigger had all that great characterization. It was okay, but when people say it's more developed than in Chrono Cross, I just don't see it.

I loved the huge cast of characters in Chrono Cross because of the fun of recruiting all of them and getting their lvl. 7 techs. Well developed? All I know is that there were plenty of people who I cared a great deal about. Especially Nikki and Fargo's subplot, one of my favorite parts of the game. The main reason I liked this large cast over the smaller one in Chrono Trigger was experimenting with the many characters and their different stats, abilities, and methods of attack.

I do not recall Chrono and Marle getting killed. Lucca, yes (in the original timeline, at least), and Robo's death was suitably heartwrenching, but not Chrono and Marle. Then again, those child ghost scenes were weird and I still have no idea what was going on.

Again, I figure that SNES Trigger leads to Cross, but DS Trigger doesn't (because of Dalton telling them his plans like an idiot in the Bonus Dungeon).

The alternate Magus in the Dream Devourer fight is from the SNES version.

I can't argue against that, Gameplay wise, Cross isn't half bad. And the music and art direction are excellent. But you couldn't make me appreciate its story even at gunpoint. Doubly so with its cavalier treatment of Trigger. And ultimately, for me the reason I play JRPG is for the story.

That said, if you love Cross, that's cool. You got your money's worth out of it.

Meh. I never really found Cross to have really good characterization, either. Too much navel-contemplation from most of them. The most developed character in the cast was probably Harle, and that got thrown out of the window at the end.

In fact, all of it did, since the ending basically hits the cosmic Reset Button.

I also had problems with its gameplay—particularly endgame where Glenn and Serge were pretty much all that ever mattered. The moment Serge has Masamune and Glenn has Einhander, the game was effectively over.

Chrono Cross had a surprising amount of nihilists in its main cast. That is, more than one.

Coz it has 45 characters and half of them have cardboard cut out generic personalities. Heck, "Cutesy Happy Childish Team Pet" is surprisingly numerous a character type, with 3 I can remember offhand, and I haven't touched the game in 10 years.

You can skip getting Glenn though IRC. Heck, assuming my memory doesn't fail me, the story branch that decides between "Glenn/No Glenn" doesn't even involve him.

My only real gripe with gameplay is that the need to hit with melee to charge up and use elements severely cripple characters who are stated to be casters (with high magic attributes and poor physical ones) since they tend to have trouble landing the necessary hits to unlock their magics, and said hits do as much damage as a paper cut. And the game has a TON of characters whose stats make them victim to this.

edited 8th Nov '12 7:42:30 PM by Ghilz

It seems that Linear Warriors, Quadratic Wizards and its inverse (in this case) are nearly impossible for role-playing games to avoid. Then again, I got a lot of milage out of Guile and Razzly, as I felt their magic power more than made up for their weak physical attacks. Still nothing near Glenn with Dual Einlanzers.

Crono and Marle aren't stated to be dead, but there's certainly no evidence of them having survived the Porre Invasion in one manner or another (it's been several years since said invasion and there's been no mention of either of them in that time). Lucca is implied to be dead as well, though the game does not state this outright.

On the other hand, it's implied that Guardia is still an independent country. They must have fought back against Porre at some point. I do think Lucca was stated to be dead, though.

But again, there's no evidence of them having been around for that, either, which is what some people talk about when they think that those characters were killed. That said, it's been 15 years, and Crono and Marle, as the heirs to the throne, are hardly spoken of. Whether this is because they are involved in rebuilding Guardia, or prisoners of Porre, escaped elsewhere, or whatever, it doesn't speak much for how they were treated by the script.

I'm still impressed at the amount of energy spent on the theories that explain why the Ghost Children are not actually the ghosts of CT's Power Trio - they're shades from another timeline, they're Living Memories that are just taking the form of the previous protagonists for some reason, The Planet did it... while for me, I saw transparent cast members and was like "oh, they must've died. Crap." Guess I don't have much of an imagination.

But really, the development team that produced and killed Robo in the space of fifteen seconds is going to spare Marle and Crono? After all the talk about Porre defeating Guardia? And the "no longer exist in this timeline" stuff? And burning down Lucca's orphanage? And killing Gato? And including Johnny as a cameo slash corpse? Sometimes I think the only reason Frog and Ayla were spared was because they had no reason to appear in the story (though Leah was a near miss).

My first thought on meeting them was, Why are they children? Shouldn't they be older than they were in the previous game? Something must be going on." I still don't know what that was. For all of this game's storyline strengths, it explains some things less than satsfactorily.

You may as well wonder why Anakin Skywalker appears as Hayden Christensen rather than the forty-something man he would have become. Maybe that's how Serge's mind could comprehend them. Maybe the ghosts wanted to look like that. Maybe it's symbolic of their childlike purity. Maybe it's symbolic of their childish naivety that dared hope filthy, polluting humans could change the future in a positive way. Maybe there were leftover Chrono Babies designs from the first game that they never found a place for until the second.

I think by that point in the story I'd just started accepting whatever Chrono Cross threw at me instead of thinking too hard about it.

edited 9th Nov '12 12:11:21 AM by Tacitus

I was in an argument a few years ago and the other person said that magic was extremely powerful in Cross. so then I Started a new game plus and went to the first dungeon. I used a fighter with the opposite alignment of the weakest mook and then chose a magic user that had the same and had them both attack at the same time. I specifically chose an enemy that had low phys and mag def for each. Not only was magic only marginally better IF you used the strongest elements against the weakest enemy, But it should only be used a few times while melee could be done every single round.

In the end, magic was just woefully inadequate.

Pretty much. Or use a Jack of All Stats who can hit decently and melee and do magic well. And hell, even the weaker casters still end up advantaged, coz you can load them up with healing elements. Meaning with their ability to reliably hit enemies, they can dish out frequent and plentiful healing.

Though I guess it's a kudos to the game that you don't really NEED magic to fight most tough fights.

All of Spekkio's forms are palette swaps of enemies you fight during Chrono Trigger. Chances are those forms were created form the memories of the party(which explains why he appears as a blue Masa & Mune or a pink Nu)Which combined with his name being the italian word for mirror and him changing forms when you level up at certain points makes Spekkio a case of Fridge Brilliance.

Hey, when you place a second trap in Chrono Cross, does that first trap stop functioning?

Um... er... gee, I don't think I've ever tried to use two traps in the same battle. I usually either had a good idea of what I was looking for and was waiting for the stupid green dragon to cast Giant Venus Flytrap, or else those ghosts in the Dead Sea were nice enough to tell me whether they had Black Hole or not.

If I had to guess, I'd say "only the newest element trap remains in effect." It just feels like how the game would handle it.

It's also a good idea to use HolyLight (Trap) on Miguel.

I'm nearly done with Chrono Cross. I just need to conquer Terra Tower and The Final Battle. Miguel was hard, but I didn't die on him.

Miguel was probably my favourite boss fight in that game. Or any game.

Finishing him off with a Glide Hook when Serge was my only remaining character with 2HP will forever be a fond memory.