The story of Chrono Cross (and some other ramblings)

[Vagrant]

Hi, I'm new here. I've been a fan of Chrono Trigger for ages and have frequented the Compendium many a time throughout the years, I've enjoyed reading a lot of the articles and I'd call myself a fan of the place.
Weird thing is I've never played Chrono Cross. I basically just used the Compendium to roughly get the story of the game. Never could get emulation to work either.

Anyway, with all the new stuff coming from CT:DS, it motivated me to watch Chrono Cross on YouTube. (I'm a student with a lot of time to kill)

For the record I quite like the music (though some tracks are just annoying and I imagine no one who played the game would ever want to hear the battle theme again) and agree that it couldn't be called objectively bad.
Again, I don't know about the gameplay. I can only presume it's very good for the game to have this much of a fanbase.
I don't fall into some kind of category of hating the game because I couldn't play as Crono or Magus or whatever. And I know the game wasn't "loosely" linked to CT or whatever and that CT set everything in this game up. (though I do consider it a minor flaw that only Lucca and Schala are directly linked to CC)

But I'm sorry, I think that it is one of the most poorly written stories. Ever.
(yes, I realise this isn't going to make me any friends here)

My biggest problem is best illustrated with these examples:
The Dragon Tear (when placed in the top of the Dragonian Tower and surrounded by the dragon statue things) lets the bad guy swap bodies with you and it lets you get a new version of your old body.
And the shards of the two Dragon Tears when placed on those things in that place in the middle of nowhere makes a Chrono Cross that abstractly unifies time and people and stuff.

The vagueness, the strangeness, the needless complexity, the complete lack of logic and the blatant Deus Ex Machina just really sums up the entire plot.
It's not just a case of suspension of disbelief, it's the unecessary specificity of it all.

The French Jester is a secret dragon and was created by the plasmic quasi existential entity of the Dragon God who is a natural machine from an alternate future (who was also apparently consumed by Lavos years ago) and was divided into six weaker Dragon Gods and sort of sealed away across two universes by an evil AI trying to protect humanity and somehow the Dragon Gods knew and created this secret Dragon during an electric storm when the AI was knocked offline?
And the electric storm was created by Schala reaching out to Serge hearing him crying from the Darkness Beyond Time before she started fusing with Lavos who was also there for some reason in an attempt to survive and become the Time Devourer?!

The Frozen Flame literally just disappears after all of that?

Terra Tower magically rising out of the sea and then it's strange transformation?

The Dead Sea in general? I've read the analysis on it, but there's so much conjecture and ambiguity it's ridiculous.

Not to mention the ending with Schala's little equally nonsensical essay on humanity and further ambiguity leaving the fans scrambling to figure out what happened with the main characters.

Then there's thing the Compendium did actually complain about, like the scenes having no emotional impact first time through because you don't know what the hell people are talking about, coumpunded by Serge being the most annoyingly mute character since Half-Life 2 and his not asking anyone. Instead of asking anyone in Arni about his death or his mum about what happened all those years ago he decides to just follow the villains for no real reason?
About 40% of the main plot and all of motivation behind the entire story is revealed literally seconds before the final boss fight. Including that Belthasar engineered all of this incredibly convoluted nonsensical bull so you'd be strong enough to fight the last boss? "Oh and remember that bad guy from disc 1 who had the head of a cat? He was your dad!"

Then there's the many useless characters that can join you. "Well, I've got nothing better to do, so I'll help you save the world BY RISKING MY LIFE AGAINST FOUR BILLION MONSTERS WHILE I'M ARMED WITH A BOOMERANG!"
There's even further illogical nonsense with some of them. Mushroom man? An idol that comes to life? An alien that actually features in the main story but has no links to say...Lavos.

And so many boss fights caused because of a misunderstanding or to "test you" and then after the fight they're all "You're alright. I trust you now."
(The "testing you" boss fight should really only ever be used once per video game)

Not only is it bad storytelling, but it's a bad story in general. I'll say that there are some good ideas, the the dead timelines and humanity versus nature, evolution, etc. But I don't think any of these things were explored properly.

I just wanted to put this out here because I haven't really ever seen this expressed by other people that have criticised Chrono Cross. And I'm interested to hear from the people who like it, especially those that think the story is a strength of the game.

[maggiekarp]

The gameplay in Cross is pretty good, and if you actually play it the world is very good at establishing atmosphere, but I agree 100% on the plot. It reminds me a lot of what a friend of mine says about Cross.

Listen here's the thing. Chrono Cross is just terrible storywise. Like, listen, if you think that story is good, you have problems. It's like Finnegan's Wake without the brilliance. It is pointlessly incoherent for nothing. It's not as if it balances that clumsiness with some revelation on the human conditon, it's just like, "Dear Chrono Cross, eat shit, curl up and die like a bug."
But seriously, there's no way you can justify a narrative as fucked as CC's unless it's in the service of some fantastic story. Not "The blue haired chick budded off an australian polyp to save some drownfag from a panther that became his dad."

[Dark Serge]

Tell your friend for me that he's an generalizing ass

[maggiekarp]

That's just one quote. The dude doesn't even like Chrono Trigger that much but the spiels he can go on about Cross are always gold to me.

[chrono eric]

My biggest problem is best illustrated with these examples:
The Dragon Tear (when placed in the top of the Dragonian Tower and surrounded by the dragon statue things) lets the bad guy swap bodies with you and it lets you get a new version of your old body.
And the shards of the two Dragon Tears when placed on those things in that place in the middle of nowhere makes a Chrono Cross that abstractly unifies time and people and stuff.

Actually I think that the function of the Chrono Cross is much less abstract than you might think and directly related to the function of the Dragon Tears. It was mentioned in Chronopolis (taken from an interpretation of quantum physics), that it is different observers actualizing potential phenomena that cause there to be separate dimensions. The Chrono Cross unifies the consciousnesses of people, as explained by Crono in Terra Tower, thus unifying the dimensions. This function is directly related to the original function of the Dragon Tear of transferring consciousness/memories between individuals.

I wrote a thread about it along with a simpler explanation for Cross' ending but no one seems to give a damn. I personally think it's much better than the Compendium's ending analysis. :

http://www.chronocompendium.com/Forums/index.php?topic=6439.0

The ending to Chrono Cross no doubt could have been written better, along with the delivery in most of the story, but the complexity of the story itself and the mysticism of it is what attracts many (including myself) to Cross.

[The Entity]

I love CC, but cannot understand its plot. At all.

[Vagrant]

maggiekarp, I definitely agree with your friend on it being "pointlessly incoherent for nothing". It just seemed to be weird and complicated for the sake of being weird and complicated.

My biggest problem is best illustrated with these examples:
The Dragon Tear (when placed in the top of the Dragonian Tower and surrounded by the dragon statue things) lets the bad guy swap bodies with you and it lets you get a new version of your old body.
And the shards of the two Dragon Tears when placed on those things in that place in the middle of nowhere makes a Chrono Cross that abstractly unifies time and people and stuff.

Actually I think that the function of the Chrono Cross is much less abstract than you might think and directly related to the function of the Dragon Tears. It was mentioned in Chronopolis (taken from an interpretation of quantum physics), that it is different observers actualizing potential phenomena that cause there to be separate dimensions. The Chrono Cross unifies the consciousnesses of people, as explained by Crono in Terra Tower, thus unifying the dimensions. This function is directly related to the original function of the Dragon Tear of transferring consciousness/memories between individuals.

I wrote a thread about it along with a simpler explanation for Cross' ending but no one seems to give a damn. I personally think it's much better than the Compendium's ending analysis. :

http://www.chronocompendium.com/Forums/index.php?topic=6439.0

The Dragon Tear didn't just transfer consciousness/memories between people though, did it? I mean it gave Serge a new body and let Lynx keep his old one. It comes off more like a generic magical plot device to me.

I think you could be on to something with the function of the Chrono Cross in the ending there, but the story has so little closure I find it hard to commit to any of the theories particularly. :\

The ending to Chrono Cross no doubt could have been written better, along with the delivery in most of the story, but the complexity of the story itself and the mysticism of it is what attracts many (including myself) to Cross.

That's interesting. Personally, I'm all for a game that encourages some discussion, but I kind of think Chrono Cross takes the piss.

[Vehek]

MK: The system composed of the Dragon Tear and Fort Dragonia's ceremonial hall didn't just have the function of switching peoples' minds; it also had the ability to reconstruct a person's body by recombining his body cells.

[chrono eric]

The Dragon Tear didn't just transfer consciousness/memories between people though, did it? I mean it gave Serge a new body and let Lynx keep his old one. It comes off more like a generic magical plot device to me.

Perhaps so, but I thought that it added a nice twist to the game to play as Lynx. I suppose it's a matter of personal preference.

I think you could be on to something with the function of the Chrono Cross in the ending there, but the story has so little closure I find it hard to commit to any of the theories particularly. :\

Well, I deliberately left my ending theory extremely simple for just that reason. I think that one can do enough logical deduction about the nature of the ideal timeline from hints given in the game, and what would be possible based on the obvious way that time/dimensional travel works in the chronoverse. My main point was that the Compendium uses an over-complicated Time Bastard explanation to account for Serge's recollection of the adventure, when I believe that the game script actually probably explained why he remembered it and it was hugely overlooked for some reason.

I will agree with you that the ending was ambiguous and deliberately left a lot open to interpretation. I can relate to many people who say it felt like a slap in the face to get an ending like that after devoting so much time to the game. I personally enjoy figuring things out though, so it didn't bother me that much. To each his own I guess.

[ZeaLitY]

I love CC, but cannot understand its plot. At all.

Welcome to the Chrono Compendium.

http://www.chronocompendium.com/Term/Chrono_Cross_Condensed_Plot_Summary.html

[The Entity]

Welcome to the Chrono Compendium.

http://www.chronocompendium.com/Term/Chrono_Cross_Condensed_Plot_Summary.html

Awesome, ZeaLitY. Thanks a lot!

[Xenterex]

Perhaps so, but I thought that it added a nice twist to the game to play as Lynx

Actually, most of the game is based entirely around quirks or twists that make the game 'nice' to play.  Its a large scale gimmick similar to ones used by advertisers to make their product enticing, sexy, etc  when all they have is a gilded piece of crap that gives you cancer in one way or another.  The average consumer then says "Even if it is a gilded crud piece of biological doom, I'll buy it anyway because it is shiny!" 

It like having the "Shawshank redemption", but without the set-up and pay offs in its writing and cinematography that make it a great movie; yet people go and see it anyway because it has been recast with Tom Cruise, Brad Pitt and Hanna Montana.

[chrono eric]

Actually, most of the game is based entirely around quirks or twists that make the game 'nice' to play. 

Isn't that better than having most of the game based entirely around quirks or twists that make it incredibly annoying and shitty to play? I can list a multitude of RPG's that fall victim to that.