Excited About Chrono Cross Remaster

[ShugoHanasaki]

I very much am! One of my all time favorite games from one of the best rpg's of all time...Chrono Trigger. A lot of people gave the game Cross a bad review back then but even as a child I understood how complex it was and how amazing the story was. It touched on so many things despite not being a 'direct' sequel; it had many aspects that challenged the gamer intellectually imo. Time is a very interesting thing to tackle in general and many theories have been used.

The Dead Sea was one of my favorite places. Challenging Fate was pretty neat too. The fact many things from Trigger were referenced and if the gang from Trigger had no have done what they did then Cross story line would never have existed because of what they did in the original game.

Who's excited? If you're not; that's cool, but i'm looking for exciting conversations (^.^)

[DevNall]

To me, it seems more like a port with some extra features than a master.

(Radical Dreamers in English will be neat tho!)

[Alunissage]

I couldn't really warm up to the idea of Chrono Cross, but I'll probably give it another try.

[Sonic#]

I'm excited. I haven't played Chrono Cross in at least a decade, but it was one of my favorite PS1 games.

At the time I first played Chrono Cross, I had played Chrono Trigger at a friend's house but hadn't played through it. So I was close enough to the series to appreciate how it echoed Chrono Trigger (esp. its music) but distant enough to not expect Chrono Cross to follow Crono, Lucca, and Marle. So I loved what I found without getting distracted by what I expected from a sequel.

Chrono Cross was one of the first games I could analyze and find interesting results. For instance, Chrono Cross has one of the most beautiful settings. The archipelago's areas are distinct and everywhere connected to the six elements, from the yellow-blue Hydra Marshes to the calmer, airy Fossil Valley. In recent years I've found myself thinking of these areas as something like characters or personalities,  distinct from the six dragons or the dragon god. Certainly the language around the environment in the game helps that interpretation for me, as does the existence of fauna ( dwarfs, fae, the Sphinx) not reducible to a single entity. At the very least, Chrono Cross is doing something with its archipelago that I have trouble describing, but maybe now that I'm much more knowledgeable about theories of allegory, I can put what CC is doing into words.

[DevNall]

Chrono Cross tried to do "Here's a seemingly unrelated story in the same setting, which ends up being a result of the previous entry."

Kind of like Eternal Blue, actually, except I don't think CC pulled it off well.

Personally.

[Sonic#]

^ The comparison to Eternal Blue is really interesting. Certainly, I agree that Eternal Blue was a successful sequel even though it didn't immediately follow the first game. I'm not sure that Chrono Cross failed in what it was doing though.

I think many players were put off by the fact that Chrono Cross has a radically different story structure and tone. Eternal Blue is a darker story (if kidnapping girl singers isn't dark enough!), but much of what was familiar in Silver Star is still there: themes (like love and human persistence), party structure (five permanent members, each from different areas or walks of life), and pacing (visit a town or dungeon -> solve a problem there -> move on, within three major arcs). If these games were written as novels, I'd call them the same genre: coming-of-age fantasy adventure story.

I wouldn't call Chrono Trigger and Chrono Cross the same genre story-wise. Chrono Trigger is an adventure story, with big stakes and a straightforward through-line. The final antagonist is apparent early in the game. Character agency through time travel is represented in mainly positive terms; the party usually solves problems. Most characters have one major transformative moment in the story.

Chrono Cross could be an intrigue story, speculative fiction, or an epic romance [think Orlando Furioso, The Faerie Queene, or similar - narratives with high stakes and a lot of narrative changes in direction]. The game isn't straightforward beyond the medium-term goals like trying to get home or trying to get to Lynx. While the through-line is there from the beginning, the game leaves that a mystery for much of the game, leaving clues and little items before revealing the overall plot in a mystery-like exposition. Even the tone is more ambivalent; the party undoubtedly solves problems by jumping between dimensions, but the story is more devoted to showing the broader repercussions of interfering with time. Then the tone is darker and there are 40+ characters, most of whom don't have moments like Robo, Ayla, or Frog have. So the game is rewarding a different approach to play, one where the player is discovering what they're doing as they go and the main focus is on Serge / Kid / Lynx rather than the entire cast of characters.

That's a kind of story that rewards at least two kinds of players: ones who can just roll with the story without expecting signposts for where the story is going, and those who love to puzzle over stories and figure things out. That doesn't reward players who just want an adventure like Chrono Trigger's.

[ShugoHanasaki]

I absolutely loved the story. It really challenged my intellect as a 11-12 year old which led to other amazing sci-fi things. The route they took in their time travel and alternative universes was quite impressive. Even when i play in the present day i'm still amazed by the amount of detail they put in