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IMO, and I know there are people here who disagree with me, the best way to enjoy Chrono Cross is not to consider it as a sequel to CT, but as another game that reminds you of CT. (Kind of like sequential FF titles.) I feel the connections are weak, and it feels more like a spin-off than a continuation of the story.
I think that half of the hate that CC gets is because people go into it expecting Chrono Trigger 2, which I don't think anyone will argue it is.
Honestly, I would say give CT another playthrough as well cause part of its charm is that everything is pretty interconnected. The prevailing fan wank theory for why Grandfather Clock time travel doesn't work after the intro is that the Entity grants the party immunity to the effect afterwards because it's hoping it will save it.
The other thing I would point out about the way time travel works in this game is that it doesn't bother with the "butterfly effect" theory where even just being in the past for a moment can drastically change everything but for the most part the party really doesn't mug up the past much anyway. The Reptites and the Mystics War were all foregone conclusions so the party's involvement doesn't have much of a dramatic effect, most of the real tampering to their own timeline doesn't really affect them either like making the mayor of Porre generous, rebuilding Fiore's Woods, and saving Sir Cyrus' soul. The Rainbow Shell is probably the biggest thing they do that actually affects the party. Still the time travel in CT is pretty simple and works best if you don't try to apply complex philosophical nonsense about time travel onto it.
CC largely exists to answer two questions that CT left unanswered:
What happened to Schala?
What happens to changed timelines?
While I will agree with VeloZer0 that many CT fans hate the game for being a crummy sequel to CT and being totally different from what they were expecting, there are some valid problems with the game.
It has a large cast of which only half are any relevant and half of that cast becomes irrelevant once they join you. The battle system is like a weird combination of Xenogears combo system and VII's materia system and finds a way to suck any enjoyment from either mechanic, it's plot is a bit too "contemplating our navels" (to be fair, Masato Kato and the remains of the CT team were coming off of Xenogears and by god does it show) which often feel out of place, and for CT fans its not only a giant player punch but also ends up asking more questions than answering.
CT fans didn't have the new ending animations or DS ending to brace us for the bombshells CC dropped on all of us. It kind of came out of nowhere and the best I would describe it is that you should approach the game like it was new because whatever CT may have established is not the whole truth. You may think you understand things like Schala's pendant, the Reptites, Masemune, or Balthazar but CC will school you by showing that you really don't know anything.
It's not a bad game but I would definitely describe it as a vanity project for Masato Kato who was happy to no longer have Sakaguchi, Horii, Toriyama, Kitase or Ito blocking what he wants to do with the story or characters. In Kato's original draft for CT, there was something like ten characters, Marle was a fairy princess, Frog was just a sentient monster and I think Magus was really a demon in the concept stage. It got tones down and some of the characters were merged to make stronger characters. Since Kato got more control, CC feels more like that early concept of CT.
After you finish CC, I would advise you to play CT cause one of CC's strengths is that it does change how you view things in CT a bit so in some ways it was a great sequel because it enhanced the mythos.
I actually really liked CT's combat system. Enough to carry a series on games? No. But it is probably the most enjoyable 'one-off' RPG battle systems I have used. (But then again I really like playing with Materia)
I guess I should also say the DS ending had Magus losing his memory which is significant to CC I think? Only I'm pretty sure my nosing about CC and CT stuff looking for translated supplementary material for after i finish the games revealed Kato saying that this guy who is Magus isn't actually Magus or something like that. Like he was the amnesiac Magus in Radical Dreamers but not actually iN CC? Maybe? I dunno.Quote:
Originally Posted by Wolf Kanno
But Balthazar is going to be back? That's pretty intriguing. I thought it was a pretty bleak and understated horror show for that poor guy. Cast into a post-apocalyptic future but trying his best to hold onto hope, to hold onto sanity, in order to avert this disaster. Our heroes owe him everything yet not a one of them ever recognizes what he must have gone through.
I never really understood what was going on with Schala's Pendant anyway. I take it was a piece of Lavos or maybe part of the meteor that Lavos fell with? Was Lavos on a meteor like Jenova or did it just collide with the planet all on its own? I could sear CT just said the pendant was part of a stone that fell from the sky but even then I'm not sure if I'm remembering that right.
In Radical Dreamers, Magus actually appears in many incarnations and he's kind of a central figure to the plot besides Kid. He was removed in CC because the director wanted the players to use the rest of the cast and worried that Magus would hijack the plot and player attention. So they changed the character he was suppose to be into a different character who has little to do with the plot. Didn't stop fans from figuring it out which character it was but there is a shout out to the real Magus in the plot, though the new DS ending kind of contradicts it a bit.Quote:
Originally Posted by Forsaken Lover
I really shouldn't say more about it. I don't want to ruin it but at the same time the way the game explains it is kind of confusing.Quote:
But Balthazar is going to be back? That's pretty intriguing. I thought it was a pretty bleak and understated horror show for that poor guy. Cast into a post-apocalyptic future but trying his best to hold onto hope, to hold onto sanity, in order to avert this disaster. Our heroes owe him everything yet not a one of them ever recognizes what he must have gone through.
It's not so much its origin as much as what it can do.Quote:
I never really understood what was going on with Schala's Pendant anyway. I take it was a piece of Lavos or maybe part of the meteor that Lavos fell with? Was Lavos on a meteor like Jenova or did it just collide with the planet all on its own? I could sear CT just said the pendant was part of a stone that fell from the sky but even then I'm not sure if I'm remembering that right.
The game is vague about details of Lavos arrival but most fans feel he was traveling in a meteor shell and he was the bulk of it. There is some confusion in the scripts concerning whether the shell was actually made of Dreamstone and thus explain why it seems to have a symbiotic relation with his power or whether it was just plain old ice and rock. Neither game gives a satisfactory answer. The nature of the Frozen Flame doesn't help any.
So it is actually Magus? As Guile or Gil or whatever? I guess chalk that up as another spoiler I know going into the game.
As for Schala's Pendant, I never gave it much thought. I twas just this thing that opened chests and doors for me. I guess it had a bit more plot significance than I realized. Is the pendant Marle has the same one then or just made from the same material? Well I guess it couldn't be the exact same pendant since you get Schala's Pendant from Magus if you kill him but I dunno.
So many questions and I haven't even started CC yet. lol
I've also learned there is a "Fake Ending" and a "Real Ending" to Cross where I have to use Elements (in the right order) and the Chrono Cross on the final boss in order to unlock it.
Also if we go with the multiple timelines thing, we never actually saved Lucca's Mother. Oh we saved Timeline 2 Lucca's Mother but OUR Lucca's mom is still crippled.
Exactly. Because that is how things work. You cannot do the opposite and make her legs suddenly reappear just as you cannot go back in time to just destroy something that was the reason for you to go back in time. And it does not matter how insignificant it is for a person because every stone on every place was a part of the reality he came from. Chrono's friends knew how these things work. That is why they used a Chrono Clone Doll in the first place. Thinking Chrono died was the reason for them to go. They used a Clone Doll and replaced it with Chrono so people would see the Doll "dying" and therefore would go back to save Chrono by replacing him with the Doll. Whatever happened, happened. Except on another timeline.Quote:
Originally Posted by Forsaken Lover
This has been spoken about here over 10 years ago already, by the way. This debate is not about "It's a game, let's just enjoy it" because I do. It is about what is meant and it is meant like that. And even if it is just meant like that after being retconned, it is still meant like that.
Yeah, it's Guile, he's pretty badass too.Quote:
Originally Posted by Forsaken Lover
Basically its the True ending and the "you screwed up so here's the credits and if you want the real ending then beat the boss the way we vaguely told you to do" Ending.Quote:
I've also learned there is a "Fake Ending" and a "Real Ending" to Cross where I have to use Elements (in the right order) and the Chrono Cross on the final boss in order to unlock it.
More like OUR Lucca's Mom has been blinked out of existence at the End of Time. The original timeline gets the short end of the stick according to CC. Not that it doesn't stop things from the original timeline to come back and haunt the new timeline. :shifty:Quote:
Also if we go with the multiple timelines thing, we never actually saved Lucca's Mother. Oh we saved Timeline 2 Lucca's Mother but OUR Lucca's mom is still crippled.
Yeah I had heard that last bit about the original timeline and its inhabitants all getting shafted elsewhere. Ironically it was also about our Lucca's mother too:
Here's the post. I only skimmed it in an effort to avoid spoilers.
Does anything I know about Cross weaken its storyline like me knowing about Lavos and where it came from weakened CT's story somewhat? If nothing else, CC sounds like it's a bit less straightforward so knowing one huge fact doesn't kinda blow the whole thing wide open. And I don't even think i know one big fact.
Then you pretty much know it already anyway, together with more of its illogical stuff - just like in Final Fantasy XIII-2 as I mentioned. Though Magus' DS explanation is better as it is more logical with the possibilities instead of just replacing.Quote:
Originally Posted by Forsaken Lover
Well my thinking is "it's time travel. You can do whatever you want with it." It's like how God can be a giant computer, Morgan Freeman or that little...thing from South Park. It's a concept we have no real objective basis for so you can make up whatever you want and it's all plausible.
In fiction you can do whatever you want, that is true.Quote:
Originally Posted by Forsaken Lover
So wait, Guile isn't Magus just like I said. He was intended to be but what I've read on that other site I linked to says that this idea was scrapped later on and now he's just a wizard dude.
Precisely.
So WK what do you think of Masato Kato? There was a time I tried to recommend Baten Kaitos (the first one anyway) to people by pointing out "it was written by Masato Kato of Chrono fame." However my recent exposure to copious amounts of the Chrono fandom has shown me that this is actually a potential deterrent more than anything.
There was that thread on the other forum I linked to of course but also the sheer vitriol in the comment section of the Trigger DS ending.
Quote:
I don't know why can't they leave this game alone.
Because Kato is still bitter about not getting to what he wanted to for Trigger
Admittedly YouTube comments are not the best places to search for opinions but I get the feeling you and other Chrono fans might not care for him much.Quote:
ChaoticDarkShadow
No it wasn't! There was NEVER supposed to be a sequel to Trigger! Kato came in VERY late into production and wanted to do stupid trout with the story that THANKFULLY Hironobu and Yuji said no, Kato made Cross the PSX and DS versions of Trigger as way of saying "smurf you" smurf Cross it's a stupid smurfing sequel and a awful game