Theory: What would the plot of Chrono 3 be?

[Wolf Kanno]

Some of us oldbie fanboys keep clamoring for another entry in Chrono series but I am curious to know what everyone thinks the new entry would even be about. So what nagging questions do you feel still need to be explained or what other avenues of the Chrono universe need to be addressed?

[Freya]

I just want another time travelling adventure. I don't care how it works in the lore. I just want to adventure!

[Gamblet]

I would like to see what happened between Trigger and Cross. 20 years is a long time or was it 10?

[Del Murder]

It would be interesting to see where Lavos came from in the first place. Perhaps a game where you travel through time and space to visit distant worlds and distant eras. That would cool.

I also want to see more of the 1999AD future without the Lavos incident.

[VeloZer0]

I don't think that I have any faith in someone to pull off another Chrono title in the same universe without making a mess of it. Even Chrono Cross I felt was a stretch.

I would much rather go with a Chrono inspired sequel, much in the way that FF series games work.

[NeoCracker]

Yeah, I'd rather just give us a fresh story. It's been long enough that newcomers may not know enough about continuity of the other games, and even more so the story is pretty damn complete. Don't really see if they could do anything else with it.

[Teek]

Although I see your point, NeoCracker, I think that they could create a feasibly interesting story while sticking to the continuity.

I think that the direction they took with Cross was an excellent idea, but failed miserably. I'd like to see a more focused intent on Magus and Schala's relationship, perhaps linking them somehow to Serge/Kid and Crono/Marle.

Also, that would allow time travel in a very easy way. Think of FFXIII-2's implementation: I think that would work best.

[qwertysaur]

Link together Chrono trigger and Chrono Cross properly. What happened to Chrono and Marle? How did Dalton take control of Porre? Is Leah related to Ayla? So many unanswered questions. :p

[Yar]

What happened to Chrono and Marle?

You can find this out in Chrono Trigger actually. Just time travel to the next time period and you can see that they all died. :bigsmile:


My idea: I wonder if they could somehow create a story around time going backwards? Like some evil evilness is reversing time for some evil reason and it needs to be fixed by the heroes.

[Skyblade]

Personally, I think they need to ignore Cross altogether, and either write a new sequel to Trigger that makes sense, or right a sequel that shares themes and mechanics, yet isn't directly tied to the game storywise.

[Rostum]

Something that can tie Trigger and Cross together more, and expand on the Chrono universe. I don't know what kind of direction they could really go with, but as long as Trigger and Cross are tied up better then I'm happy.

[edczxcvbnm]

Everyone has to go back in time and prevent Frog from porking a bunch of women and creating a race of hideously deformed Frog people. Thanks to the events of Chrono Cross, Frog went insane when he never got his revenge on Magus and started drinking and sleeping around. This race evolves to devour people in 2300 AD: The Day of Lavos Frog...-os!

Travel back to the primordial ooze and beyond time by shattering The End of Time. Uncover the deeper mysteries of the Frog people and learn that what evil Frog has planned. It will be the Froggiest!

[Sephex]

Everyone has to go back in time and prevent Frog from porking a bunch of women and creating a race of hideously deformed Frog people. Thanks to the events of Chrono Cross, Frog went insane when he never got his revenge on Magus and started drinking and sleeping around. This race evolves to devour people in 2300 AD: The Day of Lavos Frog...-os!

Travel back to the primordial ooze and beyond time by shattering The End of Time. Uncover the deeper mysteries of the Frog people and learn that what evil Frog has planned. It will be the Froggiest!

Gives a whole new meaning to Slurp Attack.

[Cecil Leonhart]

I agree that it should fill in between Trig and Cross. There are so many holes and questions left unanswered, and I really wonder if that was because they had intended on filling that with Chrono Break since it was announced not too long after Cross came out. I remember back in 2002 or around there Square saying that they were in the planning stages for it before production, and then it just sort of died.:cry:

[DMKA]

I've never finished Trigger (the farthest I've got was to when you meet up with the frog in that castle) but I played the entirety of Cross. Does it have anything to do with Trigger? I couldn't see any connection other than the time traveling theme.

Never played Radical Dreamers either, but I know that's where Serge and Kid originally came from; does that connect the games at all?

[McLovin']

I've never finished Trigger (the farthest I've got was to when you meet up with the frog in that castle) but I played the entirety of Cross. Does it have anything to do with Trigger? I couldn't see any connection other than the time traveling theme.

Never played Radical Dreamers either, but I know that's where Serge and Kid originally came from; does that connect the games at all?

Lucca plays a big part in Cross. Her name is mentioned a lot because of her research. She's also the one who found Kid and raised her. As Serge you go back in time and save Kid from the fire. Also the whole crew appears in the Dead Sea (Chronopolis) as well as the end. All these parts were freakin 10x more aweosme if you got that these were the damn main characters from the original! So there's tons of connections. It's really all well put together even if it isn't a direct sequel.

[Wolf Kanno]

I've never finished Trigger (the farthest I've got was to when you meet up with the frog in that castle) but I played the entirety of Cross. Does it have anything to do with Trigger? I couldn't see any connection other than the time traveling theme.

Never played Radical Dreamers either, but I know that's where Serge and Kid originally came from; does that connect the games at all?

Radical Dreamers is no longer canon, Cross was written to replace Radical Dreamers in the series continuity though Kato has remarked that RD may have happened in an alternate timeline but it doesn't affect the main series anymore like Trigger and Cross.

There are tons of elements that connect the games, the major conflict in the game is that CC's universe and the Time Devourer are direct results of the CT team meddling with time.

The "children" you speak to are apparitions of the CT team, the Masemune is connected to Frog, the Prometheus chip that prevents Fate from accessing the Frozen Flame is actually Robo from CT. The Time Crash is instigated by Balthasar one of the Three Gurus of Zeal from CT who died originally in CT in the bleak future but thanks to Crono and the gang, is now alive and well to instigate the Time Crash for the whole sake of answering the question of "what happened to Schala?" that many CT fans asked in the original games ending. It finally confirmed who was helping the party manipulate time to change the future, the whole issue of the Dragons answers the question of what would happen if the Reptites were not wiped out by the Ice Age Lavos created, and the Orphanage is Lucca's house from CT and even has a reference to the puzzle sidequest you could do in CT for her. I mean the list of connections is staggering and I really feel people lose out a lot with CC if you have not played CT because CC utilizes the lore of CT to play up the alternate timeline shenanigans with most referencing nagging questions fans had about CT. While none of the core characters really show up in their true selves in CC many of the side characters from CT do in fact play prominent roles in the games plot.

The issue CC has is that while it answers many lingering questions about CT, it opens up a whole can of worms about what happened between the two games, which is why I will agree with many here that Chrono 3 should be about the years between the two games cause I find it hard to swallow that Dalton and Fate could beat a group of people who killed an alien powerful enough to warp space and time and could easily cause mass extinction level devastation on a planet. Not to mention a better explanation to how the Masemune went from a powerful magic relic to a devastating cursed weapon, or how Dalton went from comical side villain to competent leader who led the Fall of Guardia. Also, what happened to Magus?

[NeoCracker]

The problem is that can of worms it opens is only how Dalton at Lynx managed to overcome them, which doesn't seem like much meat to the game itself. We already know Dalton basically had access to both the magic of the past and tech of the future, so there was one huge bump.

Lucca was not with Chrono and Marle, so all Lynx and Dalton needed to do was beat the two of them to take Guardia. So the only real question that game was just how dirty did they have to fight to win? And of course what exactly Lynx did to the Masamune. There doesn't seem to be enough here to really warrent an entire game.

CT on DS also partially answered the Magus Question, though that plot line isn't really connected to the events in Cross, and to top it all off the question of what happened to Schala is already answered, so I don't really know what they could even do if the game were to focus on Magus's story from here on out, though it may have more to it then the in between games would have.

[Wolf Kanno]

The problem is that can of worms it opens is only how Dalton at Lynx managed to overcome them, which doesn't seem like much meat to the game itself. We already know Dalton basically had access to both the magic of the past and tech of the future, so there was one huge bump.

The issue here is that Dalton was largely a comic relief villain and his understanding of Zeal's technology is not well defined in CT, he seems more like an overpayed security officer than someone with technical or magical prowess. I mean he defeats himself in the game's plot. So this little twist is really a leap of the imagination if you ask me.


Lucca was not with Chrono and Marle, so all Lynx and Dalton needed to do was beat the two of them to take Guardia. So the only real question that game was just how dirty did they have to fight to win? And of course what exactly Lynx did to the Masamune.

We're still talking about two people who fought a physical god and lived to tell about it, and considering Dalton was beaten down twice by said group, and Lynx got taken down by a boy from a fishing village, I find it really hard to believe these guys could have actually won a real fight or even a ruse. To me the, only logical scenario would be to say the group wasn't there to face the bad guys, that Crono, Marle, and even Lucca went MIA before any of the major events went down because its just a serious leap of the imagination to believe a CPU and a walking joke could somehow stop a group of people who toppled the Reptites, the Kingdom of Zeal, the Mystic Army, a Robot army, and a planet consuming alien with godlike powers. I'm not buying the sneaking poison in their tea kind of scenario some fans believe, it wouldn't explain why the CT team was talking to Serge in their kid forms, to me there is more going on here.


There doesn't seem to be enough here to really warrant an entire game.

I disagree, we still have no real evidence about the fate of most of the CT group, the Dalton/Porre scenario needs heavy explanation to make it logically function, we still don't know the full details of what happned to the Masemune, between Frog having it, the sword being taken, and how it became corrupt, hell we don't even get an explanantion as to why the blade does corrupt people other than the twins being asleep but that just opens up more questions than answers. What happened to Robo where he is being happy with Atropos in CT's ending and next thing we know he's the A.I. security switch at Chronopolis, I mean I feel like some shit seriously happened between A and B there. Hell, the Planet is helping the CT crew stop Lavos in CT but by CC it is ready to wipe out humanity and is not pulling punches. So when did the Planet turn on humanity? I mean CC itself exists entirely in the insulated archipelago but is happening outside of it and what it the mainlands relation to the islands? There is a lot to explore and some serious


CT on DS also partially answered the Magus Question, though that plot line isn't really connected to the events in Cross, and to top it all off the question of what happened to Schala is already answered, so I don't really know what they could even do if the game were to focus on Magus's story from here on out, though it may have more to it then the in between games would have.

Well a lot of this would probably take place in the time frame between both games if it focused on Magus, we don't really know how he found out about Schala and the Dream Devourer in the extra CT events and then there is the issue that CC implies Magus is actually aware of Kid and has been watching over her, between Lucca's letter and the mysterious fourth shadow that appears in the scene where you read the letter. So even with the "amnesia (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YoCRRWdXpT4)" ploy, CC kind of hints that Magus may have his memory back.

Let's face it man, CC pulled a lot of Ass Pulls (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/AssPull) to write out the CT cast and make its Kudzu Plot (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/KudzuPlot) and there is not enough info to warrant a logical acceptance of it. Kato needs to explain in detail what happened in those ten years.

[NeoCracker]

Firstly, this 'CPU' you are talking about was made using Robo, so their villain is some one who, at the very least, should be considered on par with any one member of the party. Of course, the moment you make this concession it's no longer anywhere near the lopsided fight you seem to be implying. So this CPU could realistically have the knowledge of how to take advantage of Crono and Marle.

I think a safe assumption as well is Daltons entire contribution to this ploy, mind you, was supplying the arsenal. I mighty arsenal it may have been, but it is still Dalton. For the most part I think we can assume it's Crono and Marle Vs. Fate/Lynx.

And it's also silly to say Lynx lost to some boy from a fisher village. Not only because Crono too was just some guy, yet he managed to overcome incredible odds. And also, mind you, he got his ass smoked by Lavos in solo combat.

Next, fighting a single enemy, no matter how powerful, is an entirely different matter then fighting an army. Mind you an army armed with shit none of your troops could possibly be prepared for, and backed up by Fate itself. Take into account Crono and Marle, much in contrast to the previous fights you mentioned, didn't have to worry about other people getting killed in their battles.

Also take into account Fates control over the world, which while not absolute is something Crono not only has no way to prepare for, but is a massive advantage for team evil here.

Don't get me wrong, It would be nice to have a lot of these details fleshed out and explained, but at the same time all that game would be doing is filling out minor plot points, and not really adding anything to the overall plot and questions of Chrono Cross and triggers continuity.

Maybe a short, not full price game would serve best.

I do agree that a lot of this was pulled out of their ass, but in the end I don't think it creates as many problems as you seem to think it does. We are given plenty of reason to see just why Lynx and Fate are such formidable foes.

[McLovin']

There was a really well done fan made sequel that took place between Trigger and Cross. Crimson Echoes Playthrough Part 001 - YouTube (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YSTpkMB9kNk)

It takes all the lore from the games and creates a really interesting interquel for the series. Take a look if you got the time. It's like a movie tbh.

[Wolf Kanno]

Firstly, this 'CPU' you are talking about was made using Robo, so their villain is some one who, at the very least, should be considered on par with any one member of the party. Of course, the moment you make this concession it's no longer anywhere near the lopsided fight you seem to be implying. So this CPU could realistically have the knowledge of how to take advantage of Crono and Marle.

Well no, Robo is only the Prometheus Circuit which FATE wasn't even aware existed until the Arbiter Lock was activated. The game instead suggests that FATE is actually the Good Futures version of Mother Brain (http://chronocompendium.com/Term/Mother_Brain.html) from Robo's original 2300 A.D. This would largely mean that FATE would not have any real insider info on the party. So that theory can be proven wrong.



I think a safe assumption as well is Daltons entire contribution to this ploy, mind you, was supplying the arsenal. I mighty arsenal it may have been, but it is still Dalton. For the most part I think we can assume it's Crono and Marle Vs. Fate/Lynx.

Except even if Dalton's power and knowledge of tech may be impressive in Crono's time period, but I seriously doubt Dalton could recreate actual Zeal level technology and Arcane ability. I would be enough to topple Guardia but not enough to topple Crono and Marle who fought toe to toe with Zeal's best as well as the advanced science of Robo's original time period so I find it hard to swallow that somehow an incompetent military officer could recreate Guru-grade inventions, but it is plausible he could create enough to give Porre and edge, just not one I believe would beat Crono and Marle.

As for FATE, it wasn't interested in Crono and Marle, it only wanted Lucca because she was partially responsible for the Prometheus Circuit in the first place, so it had Lynx try to abduct her to get her to remove the lock, Since Lynx is still after Serge five years later, its safe to assume it didn't work out. So FATE really had no reason to even bother with Crono and Marle so that means it was just Dalton and Porre dealing with them.


And it's also silly to say Lynx lost to some boy from a fisher village. Not only because Crono too was just some guy, yet he managed to overcome incredible odds. And also, mind you, he got his ass smoked by Lavos in solo combat.

It's true Crono came from common roots but its also stated Crono practices swordplay for fun and considering what he goes through in CT, I feel its safe to assume he is the more experienced fighter between him and Serge. Serge tended to think his way out of problems as opposed to direct ass kicking. As for Lavos beating his ass, we know Lavos didn't really kill him, instead the party in the body snatched him instead, the real Crono beat Lavos with two other allies, not to mention the other uber powerful beings he helped topple.

The other thing I would point out is that FATE is trapped in Chronopolis, Lynx is simply a gentically altered and brain washed human working as Fate's avatar outside its base of operations. Lynx himself gets his ass kicked by Serge and company a few times before Dark Serge merges with the real FATE for the final battle with Serge meaning that Lynx is not all powerful and is in fact rather vulnerable compared to the real deal. To me that means Lucca or even Crono and Marle could have bested Lynx if they had to fight.


Next, fighting a single enemy, no matter how powerful, is an entirely different matter then fighting an army. Mind you an army armed with trout none of your troops could possibly be prepared for, and backed up by Fate itself. Take into account Crono and Marle, much in contrast to the previous fights you mentioned, didn't have to worry about other people getting killed in their battles.

Well first off, FATE didn't help Porre, nor did Lynx. It was all Dalton because Lynx and Harle's only target was Lucca and that was just so they could both get to the Frozen Flame, they also attacked the orphanage ten years after Guardia falls, meaning Lucca would have been there to fight Dalton and the Porre army. So now its just Crono, Marle, and Lucca versus Dalton and his army. Crono who fought off the Guardia army of the present time, Magus' Mystic army and even helped best Magus himself, fought off the Reptites and their honest to god pet dinosaurs, fought off an army of killer robots and mutants in the future and busted their way into the most heavily fortified fortress in Zeal. Not only are they all experienced with fighting armies, I would like to point out that CT even gives an in-game reason for why you could only travel in groups of three, meaning that Crono and Co are just that strong. Crono and company even fought with the Guardia army of 600 A.D. so while the issue of lives being at stake is relevant, I don't necessarily feel its absolute proof of a weakness because both of them are experienced with witnessing mass death and comrades dying. Certainly it being their home would be a factor but it could also go the other way and may have been used as a driving force for all of them to go all out to minimize casualties.

The other issue here is that we are also talking about a group of people whose bag of tricks for solving problems is Time Travel, so it is very possible that if the war goes bad, they would simply escape and try to alter time. So depending on which ending is canon, they could jump into the Epoch and alter the issue. Lucca herself is working on Time Eggs according to CC and could probably had figured out time travel in case the Epoch was gone, hell CC even hints that Lucca helped build Chronopolis with Balthasar, so its not like the party wasn't still time traveling. The orphanage children drew pictures of Frog, Alya, and Robo so its most likely that the party had access to a means of time travel either Epoch or some device Lucca made. There are just too many variables for the Guardia campaign to fail for Porre with Crono and Co being in the picture. Of anything, I would consider Balthasar and his Project Kid is a bigger contributing factor to what may have happened to Crono and Co.


Also take into account Fates control over the world, which while not absolute is something Crono not only has no way to prepare for, but is a massive advantage for team evil here.

Except FATE only had control over El Nido, not the world, and all FATE did was follow the orders of Project Kid which was to populate the islands and let Serge be born so he could access the string of events to become the Arbiter and then have Kid save his life later to cause the split timeline, which would eventually lead to the destruction of the Time Devourer and Schala's freedom. As stated before, Guardia fell before Lynx ever came to the mainland and that just to capture Lucca.


Don't get me wrong, It would be nice to have a lot of these details fleshed out and explained, but at the same time all that game would be doing is filling out minor plot points, and not really adding anything to the overall plot and questions of Chrono Cross and triggers continuity.

Maybe a short, not full price game would serve best.

I disagree because I feel that Crono, Marle and Lucca are still alive, and I feel that all we have are footnotes that need proper expansions about what happened between both games. It wouldn't have to just be avout the Crono's group, it could expand to touch on the rest of the CT gang as well s properly tell the stories of Dario, Radius, Fargo, and the Acacia Dragoons if need be. Hell make an interequal that sets up a proper sequel to CC. There are enough side characters at this point to tell an intertwining story, and that's always been one of Kato's strong points as a writer. Hell Magus' new ending in the DS version only makes more questions appear, so I wouldn't be surprised if he could be casted as the new lead. He is a fan favorite.


I do agree that a lot of this was pulled out of their ass, but in the end I don't think it creates as many problems as you seem to think it does. We are given plenty of reason to see just why Lynx and Fate are such formidable foes.

I've shown that FATE was largely a no-show and is not a factor in most of the CT's party's fate, and in truth I'm pretty sure Kato's honest answer to the issues that happened between the two games and the CT cast's fate is that he simply half-assed wrote them out of the story so they would be a non-factor in CC, cause it would have diminished the new cast. He said as much when he decided to write Magus out of the CC script because he felt he would overshadow most of the CC cast and he wanted players to like the new characters and use them. I still feel that Kato wrote himself into a corner and I would love to see him try to write himself out of it without getting lynched. ;)

[NeoCracker]

I distinctly remember Cross's events happening differently then. I have a file I can breeze through the game soon enough though to check some of this shit out. :p

[Roogle]

Chrono Trigger: Crimson Echoes felt like a proper sequel to Chrono Trigger to me. It was a fan developed ROM hack of the original Chrono Trigger and it was made by the fans at Chrono Compendium. You might have heard of it because it received a Cease and Desist.

I watched a proper playthrough of it on YouTube a year or two ago and it was definitely worth the time. It felt a bit like fan fiction sometimes, but the fact that it uses the original game really helps its case. If that game had come out much closer to the release of the original game, I think it would be as liked as the original.

[Skyblade]

I think a safe assumption as well is Daltons entire contribution to this ploy, mind you, was supplying the arsenal. I mighty arsenal it may have been, but it is still Dalton. For the most part I think we can assume it's Crono and Marle Vs. Fate/Lynx.

Except even if Dalton's power and knowledge of tech may be impressive in Crono's time period, but I seriously doubt Dalton could recreate actual Zeal level technology and Arcane ability. I would be enough to topple Guardia but not enough to topple Crono and Marle who fought toe to toe with Zeal's best as well as the advanced science of Robo's original time period so I find it hard to swallow that somehow an incompetent military officer could recreate Guru-grade inventions, but it is plausible he could create enough to give Porre and edge, just not one I believe would beat Crono and Marle.

Don't forget, Dalton can't recreate Zeal technology. Zeal technology was all driven and powered by Lavos. Without the Ocean Palace and the Mammon Machine, Dalton would have no way to tap into that power source. The earlier Zeal tech, based off of solar power and the sunstone, was all sealed away, and Dalton doesn't have Schala's Pendant to open it. Not to mention, I think it's even less likely that he have knowledge of the old tech.



And it's also silly to say Lynx lost to some boy from a fisher village. Not only because Crono too was just some guy, yet he managed to overcome incredible odds. And also, mind you, he got his ass smoked by Lavos in solo combat.

It's true Crono came from common roots but its also stated Crono practices swordplay for fun and considering what he goes through in CT, I feel its safe to assume he is the more experienced fighter between him and Serge. Serge tended to think his way out of problems as opposed to direct ass kicking. As for Lavos beating his ass, we know Lavos didn't really kill him, instead the party in the body snatched him instead, the real Crono beat Lavos with two other allies, not to mention the other uber powerful beings he helped topple.

The other thing I would point out is that FATE is trapped in Chronopolis, Lynx is simply a gentically altered and brain washed human working as Fate's avatar outside its base of operations. Lynx himself gets his ass kicked by Serge and company a few times before Dark Serge merges with the real FATE for the final battle with Serge meaning that Lynx is not all powerful and is in fact rather vulnerable compared to the real deal. To me that means Lucca or even Crono and Marle could have bested Lynx if they had to fight.

Let's not forget that Chrono only becomes more powerful after his first failure. By the end of the game, Chrono is quite capable of taking on even Lavos's uber version by himself.



Next, fighting a single enemy, no matter how powerful, is an entirely different matter then fighting an army. Mind you an army armed with trout none of your troops could possibly be prepared for, and backed up by Fate itself. Take into account Crono and Marle, much in contrast to the previous fights you mentioned, didn't have to worry about other people getting killed in their battles.

Well first off, FATE didn't help Porre, nor did Lynx. It was all Dalton because Lynx and Harle's only target was Lucca and that was just so they could both get to the Frozen Flame, they also attacked the orphanage ten years after Guardia falls, meaning Lucca would have been there to fight Dalton and the Porre army. So now its just Crono, Marle, and Lucca versus Dalton and his army. Crono who fought off the Guardia army of the present time, Magus' Mystic army and even helped best Magus himself, fought off the Reptites and their honest to god pet dinosaurs, fought off an army of killer robots and mutants in the future and busted their way into the most heavily fortified fortress in Zeal. Not only are they all experienced with fighting armies, I would like to point out that CT even gives an in-game reason for why you could only travel in groups of three, meaning that Crono and Co are just that strong. Crono and company even fought with the Guardia army of 600 A.D. so while the issue of lives being at stake is relevant, I don't necessarily feel its absolute proof of a weakness because both of them are experienced with witnessing mass death and comrades dying. Certainly it being their home would be a factor but it could also go the other way and may have been used as a driving force for all of them to go all out to minimize casualties.

Yeah, fighting armies is honestly most of what you do in Chrono Trigger. Reptite Army, Dalton's Army in Zeal (also the weakest of them), Magus's Army, Guardia's Army, and Mother Brain's Army of Robots. You fight at least one army in every time period. And slaughter them all.



I do agree that a lot of this was pulled out of their ass, but in the end I don't think it creates as many problems as you seem to think it does. We are given plenty of reason to see just why Lynx and Fate are such formidable foes.

I've shown that FATE was largely a no-show and is not a factor in most of the CT's party's fate, and in truth I'm pretty sure Kato's honest answer to the issues that happened between the two games and the CT cast's fate is that he simply half-assed wrote them out of the story so they would be a non-factor in CC, cause it would have diminished the new cast. He said as much when he decided to write Magus out of the CC script because he felt he would overshadow most of the CC cast and he wanted players to like the new characters and use them. I still feel that Kato wrote himself into a corner and I would love to see him try to write himself out of it without getting lynched. ;)

Yep. He wanted to write a new work that wasn't constantly overshadowed by the old cast. Which is kind of silly, because we all know the old cast, and they'd be in our minds for a sequel no matter what you do.

[VeloZer0]

Let's not forget that Chrono only becomes more powerful after his first failure. By the end of the game, Chrono is quite capable of taking on even Lavos's uber version by himself.
I don't know that Chrono soloing Lavos is actually canon, I think it is just something possible through a split between story and gameplay. As far as the actual events of Chrono Trigger I think it was supposed to be an all-out battle when the party is at it's strongest.

I'm totally with you on everything else you are bringing to the table though.