 S-s-s-n-a-struck. Chrono Trigger is one of the biggest reasons I started this video project channel thing. I wanted to try and explain to younger generations, or just people who haven't played it, why it's worth playing today, and show that there's some substance behind the hype. Chrono Cross was another game that made me want to start this channel, but for completely different reasons, because I think your experience with this game is entirely dependent on what your expectations are going into it, and by that, I mean, if you go into Chrono Cross thinking it's a direct sequel to Chrono Trigger, you're gonna have a bad time, because it isn't. The thing is, though, it's a perfectly fine game on its own, and it's certainly one of the better PS1 role-playing games, up there among stuff like Lunar, Grandia, and Wild Arms. There's still to this day some significant aspects that make Chrono Cross stand out from the pack, one of the main ones being the combat system. Sure, there's the usual world map where you visit villages and talk to NPCs and all that, and like Chrono Trigger, there's no random battles here, you approach the enemy yourself. When you do a physical attack, though, it's similar to Xenogears, in that you have tiers here, with the percentage indicating the likelihood you'll land the attack, and if you land your first attack, the percentage goes up for all three. With each hit you connect with, that boosts the character's element power, as indicated by the number beneath the character's name. Five would indicate that they can do a level five spell. So yeah, there's no MP or anything like that here. You'll also note that stamina level at the bottom. You start out every turn with seventh stamina, but with each attack, it decreases it, and that kind of creates a risk-reward aspect here, because sure, you can hit these enemies with a stronger physical attack, or with a level five element spell in this case, but it's going to decrease your stamina, even to the point that it could go into negative numbers, and that would mean you'd miss at least one turn until you can attack again. You can get your stamina back by successfully defending, or just from actions from other people in your party. That's just a little something different than what most other games do. In addition, the game starts you off in the middle of a dungeon, with your characters all leveled up appropriately, just like Lufia and the Fortress of Doom. It allows you to mess around to get used to the combat system with little risk involved, and without the game being all annoying and holding your hand. Of course, you inevitably have to start from scratch, just like Lufia, but I just like that sneak preview the game gives you, so you know what to expect later. There's also a lot of other aspects involved in the combat system, too. The element system also affects equipment, similar to how espers work in Final Fantasy VI and how materia works in Final Fantasy VII. There's also elemental elements, like red for fire and blue for water and all the usual stuff, and each character, and there are a lot of them, has their own innate color. Everyone also has their own element grid, where you place each party member's spells and items, and yeah, there's a lot going on here, not to mention a whole bunch of other stuff, like double and triple techs, which are of course aped from Chrono Trigger. I could go on forever about the combat system here, but I won't bore you with the details. Sure, it's flawed, like having to allocate a spot in your element grid for items is annoying, but the basic mechanics here are interesting enough to be a reason to play Chrono Cross today. It's definitely something different, and I'll take that over the same old stuff you see in every RPG. The one major annoyance, though, is that every battle can take a while, because you have to let all the long tedious animations play out. That gets old pretty quickly. So yeah, the combat system can be a bit polarizing, but the story is just, well, it's a mess. Chrono Trigger, this is not, not even close. You play as Surge, a 17-year-old kid from a fishing village, and one day you get sucked into an alternate dimension, where you drowned 10 years earlier, a little similar to the kind of dynamic going on in Breath of Fire 2. You eventually meet Kid, a thief who's after the Ultimate Prize, the Frozen Flame, a piece of Lavos that broke off upon its burrowing into the Earth sometime around 65 million BC. So you go poking around for it in Viper Manor, before the mysterious Prophet of Time confronts Surge telling him that 10 years ago around Surge's death, the universe was split into two parallel worlds, but Surge only existed in one of them. Gotta say, there's some intriguing stuff here. One quick thing I gotta mention here, too, is that the game intro here to this day is exhilarating and looks freaking great. The colors, the editing, and especially the music are all incredible. It is awesome to watch, and it gets you pumped up for the game. Surge eventually gains the ability to travel between the two dimensions, and that's where things begin to fall apart. We've got a strange villain named Lynx, an anthropomorphic cat who's connected to Surge somehow, and we get body switching introduced into the mix, and character after character after character gets involved. There are 45 party members total, and that is just way too many people. Anyway, without spoiling too much, Surge is separated from Kid, who's been taken captive by Lynx, and she's led to believe that Surge is dead while Surge is banished to a kind of purgatory. He escapes, but loses his ability to switch between worlds because he was separated from his original body. So, we've got different bodies stuck in different dimensions, mixed up with almost three dozen different characters. It's just a tad bit convoluted. So after explaining all that, I'm left with one question. What the hell does any of this have to do with Chrono Trigger? It really seems like a lot of the appeal of Chrono Cross at the time was trying to figure out, as you're playing, how everything tied into the original game. But now that the cat has long been let out of the bag, and everyone knows that there's barely any story elements here tying the two games together, just superficial stuff, the story is left as just being the sprawling mess with a gazillion characters, and all with their own issues they have to deal with, culminating in a flimsy attempt to resolve everything all at once at the end. In addition to that, with all these characters here, you'd hope a few of them would at least be a little interesting, but no. Even Surge is kinda blah as a character, and Kid is just annoying most of the time. Plus the dialogue here, I got really impatient with how vague all the hints were. Just tell me where the hell to go, what is this, an NES game? Maybe the translation is to blame here. There are some links to Chrono Trigger buried deep within the game, like Kid's origin for instance. There's other smaller stuff hidden here and there. But a major reason Chrono Cross can't be considered a Chrono Trigger sequel, you know, beyond the fact that it takes place in a completely different world with completely different characters, is that it simply does not possess the overall feel and streamlined quality of the original game. More importantly though, while it does have some cool ideas and some intrigue to it, it's just a clumsily told story that seems in way over its own head, regardless if it's a sequel or not. I don't wanna crap on this game entirely though, there are some qualities here that are undeniably well done, like the soundtrack. The music here is the best connection to Chrono Trigger, in that it sounds like it's being performed by the same band, so to speak. Like it's their next album or something. There are some small, subtle nods to the original game soundtrack, both with how certain melodies are structured and the instruments that are used, but the music here is still entirely unique to Chrono Cross, and it's the best part of the game. The main theme that plays behind the intro is immediately recognizable, and is one of those tracks that became an instant classic. You can't think of Chrono Cross without thinking of that song. So yeah, I do think Chrono Cross is still worth playing today. It's got an interesting battle system that strays a bit from the norm, and that's worth trying out at least, and the music is fantastic. But just make sure you understand what you're getting into beforehand. Don't think of it as a Chrono Trigger sequel, just as its own thing. Chrono Cross is still pretty good, but it's nowhere near as good as Chrono Trigger.