http://www.classicgaming.com/castlevania/chrono/interv.htm

With that out of the way- Chono Cross' "moral standpoint" is fine. It never shoves itself down one's throat, and during the last boss fight, it lets you do something about it and actually beat the game non-violently. It's not a perfectly developed theme, but it is a hell of a lot closer than most games get. A step in the right direction, if you will.

-Davon

Chrono Cross, in the final analysis, bored the crap out of me. It was not challenging in the slightest (zero control of character advancement may be good for dummies, but typically makes for a really easy game). I might have been moved to actually care what happened if more than one of the 40ish characters was even remotely interesting, or if the one interesting character (Harle), had more than one worthwhile scene (the brief conversation with Starky).

And I'm supposed to keep playing through, stopping occasionally to beat up Lavos, just to be rewarded with a few more minutes of lame "Kid goes on a power trip" or "Serge lives happily ever with female character 'x'" footage? No... that wouldn't be Sisyphian. Not at all.

All I want out of a game is a mild challenge and characters that inspire some feeling. Any feeling. Chrono Cross did not deliver.

DarkLao, who thinks Serge's but a walking shadow, a poor player that struts and frets his hour upon the stage and then is heard no more; and Chrono Cross is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.

1. In Radical Dreamers, Chrono and Marle are dead, but the circumstances of their deaths are not given. Toward the end of the game, Kid tells Serge that her "big sister" (revealed in the following scene to be Lucca) told her to take the Frozen Flame and bury it near the graves of some "childhood friends" and that the Flame, according to Lucca, "should be allowed to rest with them." Chrono and Marle are not mentioned by name, but it's heavily implied that they are the ones Lucca spoke of. (Magus, Schala, Lucca, Frog, Chrono, and Marle all appear or are discussed in the game, but Lucca is the only one whose name is given.)

2. Actually, Radical Dreamers fits in with Chrono Trigger's story fairly well because the plot is kept much simpler than in Chrono Cross. The game takes place in a single night in Lynx's mansion, and the storyline focuses entirely on Kid (who *is* Schala, not a clone, and has a sort of split personality). Unlike CC, RD doesn't attempt to continue CT's main story - it just ties up the loose end about Magus and Schala.

Tavila

I believe that Serge is a descendent of Magus. When Serge was attacked by the panther demon, his screams of pain went out across the flow of time and reached Schala, who's heart was touched or whatever, and that's when the whole thing with Kid/Harle being created started. (Some points could be wrong, I haven't played the game for a few weeks.)

With Serge just being some random kid, I don't see how Schala would've gotten his "message" and gone through so much to save him. If he was Magus, on the otherhand, I could see why she'd want to save him. And also, when Kid reads the letter from Lucca, and Lucca says something like, "And maybe he's right there with you now, and if so, hello Janus!", I thought she might've been referring to Serge, but now that I've heard that the letter was in Radical Dreamers too, an was probably just thrown in for continuities sake, that theory doesn't make any sense. Oh well.

In any case, this is what I think. Sound reasonable?

Now, the worlds didn't split into two until 4 years later when Serge drowns on the beach in his home village. That's why there are two Lynx. One died with the Dragoons in his search for the Frozen Flame (if memory serves you can make out his body at the one part in the game when you see the transparent Dragoons in Chronopolis), and the Another world version persued Serge. Hope that helps!

Chris Mishima

lunatic soul

Even though Grandia became tedious and boring somewhere around disk 2, I am looking forward to Grandia 2 in a major way...

--Brad G.

Personally, I found Chrono Cross to excel in all the ways an epic RPG should, and I thought it did a great job of remaining faithful to Chrono Trigger. No the game was not perfect, but the good FAR outweighs the bad.

That having been said, I do have one gripe about the ending and I'm quite sure that I'm in the minority on this. Square seems to have this penchant recently for creating trite romance between two (or more) characters who, in all honesty, do not seem to have a substantial basis for their "love". The whole "I will find you, somehow" bit between Kid and Serge at the end implied that they had, to whatever degree, romantic feelings for one another. I did not see any basis for this in the game. Yes, Serge seemed deeply affected by meeting Kid. He seemed genuinely angry when she was stabbed by Lynx, and he seemed sad after she tried to attack him on Hermit's hideaway. However, these feelings seemed to be those of concern for a friend, and do not convince me that he had romantic feelings for her. While the fact that Schala was touched by Serge's cries of agony could have been a good basis for a convincing development of a romantic relationship, Kid did not succeed in taking sympathy for Serge to love for Serge. In fact, I thought Harle showed more of a romantic affection for Serge than Kid did. Thus, that aspect of the ending seemed really pretentious to me.

Perhaps this bothered me so much because the ludicrously shallow romantic relationships of FF7 and FF8 still give me nightmares. While the ending of CC did not detract from my overall respect for the game, it just pushed one of my buttons, and consequently left a bad taste in my mouth.

Lastly, although I am not a proponent of the "Guile is Magus" argument, I must say that I wouldn't mind if he were to make an appearance in a future Chrono title. I do agree that he falls under the painfully stereotypical "long-haired badass" category. However, to his credit, he became obsessed with finding his sister, rather than becoming obsessed with "mummy" like certain other long-haired characters. Mother-fixation in male characters SEVERELY disturbs me.

OK, I'll shut up now.

Take it easy

Lacryma

Of these four examples, Lain is the only one with real depth. For Chrono Cross specifically, I liked it early on, but as soon as it got into the Bizarre Plot Twist Zone, it got awkward and pretentious.

And those who say these stories have deeper meaning need to think about what the deeper meaning really is. Evangelion for example. The deeper meaning is 'You have to take the good with the bad'. Sure, it's true, but you could have learned that from Sailor Moon just as easily. (And had more fun. And still heard the voices of Megumi Ogata and Kotono Mitsuishi.)

But the ultimate failure of CC, in my mind, is the lack of a good villain. Lynx was cool but he was just the generic bad guy. It was never explained why he was evil. So he was a computer, sort of. So he was your father, sort of. So what? Lame character. Harle was far more interesting, but she was pretty much thrown away. CC:"She's a dragon." Me:"And?" CC:"....."

Good game, though. ;)

-Sanagi

PS Was Kid's accent supposed to be Australian or Cockney? It's the combination of "Oi!" and "Bugger!" that particularly baffles me.

1- The last battle was a letdown. The Time Devourer's animation was limited to a little sway and occasional flapping of its rear appendages, and it had no unique attacks. The field was was ugly. Worst of all, it was pretty much silent. No end boss music. Rrgh. Is this avant garde? Meaningful? Traditionally, end boss music has been some of the best in Square's games. To not have any at all didn't work for me.

2- The "good" ending. We can inseminate our own worlds? Inseminate? I don't like those connotations. Aside from that, I get the idea that I'm supposed to believe that the game is real now. We see Schala in a lot of here-and-now situations, including her holding the astral amulet in a Japanese crosswalk. This game is fantasy. To tack on a "By the way, it's all REAL!!!" there at the end is hokey.

Ryan

For all of you saying the story wasn't structured right, or that you're in the dark about major plot points until way late in the game, remember just this one tiny thing. It's just a video game people! Not that I'm trying to get into that whole "video game = art" debate but I think most of us would agree that rpgs are still not at the level of most novels or published works in the ways of storytelling or even grammer. So why down play a game so much for doing what only very few games (MGS, Xenogears, and maybe Vagrant Story are the ones I can think of) have pulled off?

Granted, that doesn't mean you shouldn't complain about it. I had the feeling ever since Chronopolis that the story, though I could make sence of it all on some level, just wasn't crafted well enough. But than again FF1 - FF8, Chrono Trigger, Wild Arms, Suikoden, the Phantasy Star series, and countless others had something wrong with them in the ways of plot and character devlopment in some way or another. So what I'm saying is, yes, the game has a fault in the story telling department. But should we shun such a great game for that? No! On one level you have to realize that the game is very complex, dealing with time and dimention travel. On the other hand, this is still just a video game, not War and Peace.

~Dr. Uzuki, who's a little miffed that I wrote one big long letter regarding many different plot points and was never printed. So watch, he prints this tiny letter...

There are three reactions you have at an RPG's climax in plot:

1) What the hell??!

2) Aaaaaah....I get it.

3) I wonder if......?

Chrono Cross was definitely a #1. The climax of the game was handled very poorly, they reveal Lynx's true identity and talk about Schala without dropping any hints earlier in the game. These things just "happen" without proper foreshadowing. If you want a complex plot, you need that stuff in spades. A good example of a well-executed #2 reaction would be everyone's favorite, Xenogears. The point when the player realized ON HIS/HER OWN just what the heck the opening cinema had to do with the rest of the game. FF7 would be #3.

If someone else uses that idiotic "Read a book instead" excuse for a bad plot, I think my head will explode. Why are we belittling our hobby? Is it too much to ask for a team of skilled/well-paid writers to come up with a plot that is fun and entertaining? At this point, Square has raised the bar to a height where nothing less than perfection will do. So I want perfection, or at least something very close. Not only has Square cheated me out of 50% of the reason why I buy their games in the first place, they've also disappointed me by denying what they've given since FF7. A good, well thought-out, and entertaining storyline. CC simply does not measure up.

-Red Raven, who then ran to the nearest fire extinguisher

And all this complaining about Chrono Cross is really getting me down. I think the gameplay innovations and the obvious mastery of what the Playstation can do (did you _ever_ notice loading times in this game? I didn't) far outweighed any plot problems. The whole silent hero routine was pulled off much better than in Chrono Trigger. Serge says things all the time, they're just not put in text boxes. Crono did the same, but it was much less obvious (which made me dislike Crono).

I can say without question that Crono Cross is the best RPG I've played on the Playstation game console, just as I can say without question that Final Fantasy 4 is the best RPG I've played on the SNES game console and Destiny of an Emperor is the best RPG I've played on the NES game console. Of course, Final Fantasy 9 hasn't made it my way yet...

-- Nick Ware