Chrono Compendium
Enhasa Halls - Chrono Series Analysis => Reality, Real-World Connections, and the Supernatural => Topic started by: Lakonthegreat on June 11, 2009, 11:47:28 am
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These time periods indicate that Christ was involved on the Earth in the Chronoverse, however there is no mention of him whatsoever in the entire game. I suppose the Cathedral in 600 AD was dedicated to him, but not really because they were worshipping Magus there. So what about it people? Should they have used different terms to mark their time periods?
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AD literally means Anno Domini, "In the year of our/the Lord" if I'm not mistaken (someone with Latin knowledge help us out here).
I think Cedric Guardia is badass enough to put the Domini in Anno Domini. That explains that as far as I'm concerned (er, assuming CE is as close to a canonical sequel as we're ever likely to see).
But I've always personally preferred AG ("Anno Guardia") and BG ("Before Guardia"). However, using a fictional timescale may have been seen as hindering the accessibility of Chrono Trigger's story to the audience. On the other hand, I would argue that it only added confusion, since the AD timescale of Chrono Trigger and Cross progresses far different in terms of technology than our own history. In 1000AD everybody's got refrigerators and plumbing in Chrono Trigger, not to mention biplanes in the alpha.
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Yeah, they were faster than us.
However, looking at our history in the last 100 years, we may have reached their speed in terms of progress, though still behind considering how 1,999 AD (CT's) looked.
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But I've always personally preferred AG ("Anno Guardia") and BG ("Before Guardia"). However, using a fictional timescale may have been seen as hindering the accessibility of Chrono Trigger's story to the audience. On the other hand, I would argue that it only added confusion, since the AD timescale of Chrono Trigger and Cross progresses far different in terms of technology than our own history. In 1000AD everybody's got refrigerators and plumbing in Chrono Trigger, not to mention biplanes in the alpha.
1000 AD might have originally been envisioned as 1999 AD (for the reasons you stated, they seem quasi-modern, and the earthquakes make me think of Lavos awakening).
They could have used CE and BCE, but most people aren't aware of those terms and would have just been confusing. While inaccurate, BC and AD are just simple.
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Wait a second. Is that why the Crimson Echoes team named the first Guardia Cedrick?
Anno Domini can also translate to Kingdom Year, Year of the King, Year of the Lord, etc. And it's called Kingdom Year at some point. That's my favorite.
But you sneaky sneaky CE peeps, you guys set it as Before Cedrick on purpose, didn't you? :)
If it was not on purpose, then "Hey everybody look what I figured out" :lol:
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Yeah, they were faster than us.
However, looking at our history in the last 100 years, we may have reached their speed in terms of progress, though still behind considering how 1,999 AD (CT's) looked.
This again is an interesting point. While they had fridges and stuff, and basically lived like in our 1940's or 50's, why did it take almost 1000 more years to develop advanced computer systems and robotics when we're dealing with things like that only 50 years later than the supposed era? Was there some kind of crash in technology, perhaps a large depression at some point between 1000 AD and 1999 AD?
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This topic was brought up before, and though we may try to rationalize out another 'domini', there's one problem that remained back when it was talked about before, and still remains: that it's in Latin. That's indisputable, and Latin comes up several times in the series, whether Miguel's 'res nullius' or the badly translated 'angelus errare.' The point is, Latin exists. And if Latin exists, barring that we assume it's just being used for 'interest's' sake, Rome had to have existed. One way of rationalizing it, which I did long ago when I wrote a fanfic, was that Rome and all that did indeed exist, but that the Chronoverse rests along a seperate time-line in which the Mystics arose, hence altering things entirely. After all, apart from that, the next oldest thing we have is Zeal, in 10,000 BC... that does not technically conflict with history, or does not do so neccessarially, especially as Zeal is considered to only be a legend even in the Chronoverse.
Of course, CE, in using Cedric, probably makes more use of the Latin being merely for interest's sake, and therefore we can take AD and BC as the same. We can't in that case say they are supposed to technically mean anything, more than they figuratively stand for something.
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Going with the C.S. Lewis concept of "if God is real, then every world would have to have a redemptive figure", perhaps there was a Christ figure in the Chronoverse? I know it's a long shot, just throwing it out there. Personally I believe it was just for simplicity (aka "gameplay mechanics").
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How is that a long shot?
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How is that a long shot?
I think he means it's a long shot to assume that they have a religion parallel to Christianity, with the whole "Jesus dying for your sins and everybody making a big deal out of it".
The Chronoverse has been compared to the Bible before, and I don't think that's what Boo's talking about.
It's a long shot because not a single person mentions religion, except maybe the cannibalistic nuns in the cathedral. Not a real, widespread, actual religion that most of the people on the planet believe in. There is the entity, but it's just that, an entity who doesn't show up or talk to anyone or physically demonstrate where they're supposed to go or what they're supposed to do.
So the chances of a Christ analog are slim, but it would help explain the BC.
I'm still sticking with my interpretation of Anno Domini, Kingdom Year. Cause Lord doesn't have to mean god. Especially in CE terms.
Personally I think there's no real meaning, other than a figurative one, like Krispy was saying. But I think that goes for a lot of things in the games people debate about.
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Nobody except Toma speaks of the Cathedral/Abbey negatively, and there's a Nun in San Dorino (and "san" means "saint" in Spanish and Italian). AD and BC were clearly chosen for simplicity's sake, but it's inaccurate to say that there's absolutely no sign of an organized Christian-like religion in the series:
(http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v167/flamestealer/cronomarlewedding.jpg)
Viper:
Hmm...
Good Lord!
Is there nothing more
to life than destroying
and defeating one
another after all...?
Viper:
Come see me should you
ever need anything!
You will make a fine
dragoon, young man.
God be with you!
There are also mentions of angels (Angelus Errare) and a "Saints" summon Element (which may or may not be summoning real angels, but the name is still indicative of something some people in the Chronoverse might believe in).
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Crosses themselves don't necessarily mean JESUS WAS HERE, it could be used as cardinal points or to symbolize the four elements. (http://www.chronocompendium.com/images/wiki/9/96/MagusLairSummon.png) They'll put stuff in that makes us feel familiar with the world, but we shouldn't assume our histories are exactly the same. Or we could think of it as a translation of sorts, obviously no one would speak French with no France.
But I guess it's worth noting that people use words like "jeez" or "sheesh" in this series.
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Look, the way I see it, some spectacular event happened that caused the world to start a new record of time, which coincidently used the abbreviations BC and AD.
I was about to make a very VERY lude unrealistic speculation about what caused this and what BC and AD meant, but I decided it was against my better knowledge to do so...
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Hmm.. BC/AD was never used by a character in game, correct? It only appears in the epoch time travel screen, message windows with the pillars, and on the overworld maps, right?
Which indicates that this is a useful tool for the players, not the characters. We may be able to no more draw meaning from AD/BC than we could from the fact that the text in game uses a sans serif font, or that the menu colors are blue.
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Look, the way I see it, some spectacular event happened that caused the world to start a new record of time, which coincidently used the abbreviations BC and AD.
I'm assuming this spectacular event was either the founding of Guardia, or the time that Guardia established itself as the most powerful existing kingdom/nation. The Millennial Fair is supposed to be the celebration of the thousandth year since the founding of Guardia. AD/BC don't really make sense with that other than being something familiar for the players, but that does seem to be the event that the calendar is based on.
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Hmm.. BC/AD was never used by a character in game, correct? It only appears in the epoch time travel screen, message windows with the pillars, and on the overworld maps, right?
Actually, BC/AD is commonly used by the characters, and in CC it is also used in the Lithosphere Investigation Report and on plaques (Nadia's Bell, Chronopolis statue, etc.).
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Actually, BC/AD is commonly used by the characters, and in CC it is also used in the Lithosphere Investigation Report and on plaques (Nadia's Bell, Chronopolis statue, etc.).
Doing a script search, AD is used in five different situations in all of CT. Once when Lucca is reading off the Day of Lavos info, again when they introduce themselves to Gaspar, in Lucca's journal, at the trial of King Guardia, and if the party actually travels to 1999 AD (and then only by Robo). Interestingly, it is never used by a non-PC. BC is never used by anyone.
Certainly not common, but at least a few characters do use it.
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World map, Epoch Dial Panel
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World map, Epoch Dial Panel
Hmm.. BC/AD was never used by a character in game, correct? It only appears in the epoch time travel screen, message windows with the pillars, and on the overworld maps, right?
Which indicates that this is a useful tool for the players, not the characters. We may be able to no more draw meaning from AD/BC than we could from the fact that the text in game uses a sans serif font, or that the menu colors are blue.
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Sorry, I didn't see that.
Doing a script search, AD is used in five different situations in all of CT. Once when Lucca is reading off the Day of Lavos info, again when they introduce themselves to Gaspar, in Lucca's journal, at the trial of King Guardia, and if the party actually travels to 1999 AD (and then only by Robo). Interestingly, it is never used by a non-PC.
So they are mostly in morden era?
In CT, Toma's tombstone uses "Kingdom Calendar" or "Kingdom Year" (see the retranslation script).
In CC, epigraph on Nadia's Bell also uses "Kingdom Year".
But those messages from the Dead Sea or Chronopolis use "year", or "A.D."
~~~~ A.D. 1000 ~~~~
~~~~Nadia's Bell~~~~
May our prayers for peace
~ ring on for eternity...
It seems the NA script doesn't follow that rule.
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Well it makes sense that they abandoned the use of "Kingdom Year" after the Fall of Guardia, even though they didn't create a new calendar.
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Yeah, so AD and BC means after and before the foundation of Kingdom Guardia.
Maybe seriously, during the Guardia period, people didn't use AD or BC. :?
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the calendar is based on the founding of guardia (1000 AD is the 1000th year of guardia). also, it makes allusions to the real world easier - 1999ad referenced the y2k/apocalypse theories around during the 90s.. also, 12000 bc is around the time that the mythical civilization Atlantis was said to exist.. and 65 million bc was around the time of the great impact event that killed the dinosaurs.
other than that, using the real world dating system would make things less confusing.
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I found it rather nice for the game to use the BC/AD calender system.
I was able to relate the periods in history based on what year I was exploring and having adventures in. Aside from the context of the Anno Domini and its relation to the Chronoverse, I really don't see the inconvenience it brings.
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I know I am coming into this topic rather late, but I would like to add that as an RPG Chrono Trigger uses abstractions such as the lack of cities on a continent or the size of a sprite in relation to the size of a house maptile.
Therefore the presence of Latin, AD, and BC could simply be an abstraction representing the "nearest equivalent" in relation to their world.
The development team, rather than devise new terms and language, likely used which ones they felt would quickly and easily represent their intended meaning. So a literal analysis may not be necessarily possible. Generally history is divided up by each new epoch. The Victorian Era began with the coronation of the Queen Victoria. The Inter-War Period began with the end of World War I.
In Chrono Trigger the timelines seem to be focused on the transition from one epoch to another. For instance in Prehistory you see the fall of Lavos and the end of the Reptites. This could easily signify the end of the epoch into a new one. In Antiquity you see the fall of Zeal...again the transition from one epoch to another.
AD 600, the end of the War of the Mystics...again the end of an epoch.
AD 1000 is within an epoch, but apparently does not end until Porre destroys it. This may or may not be the end of the epoch, thought if AD is an abstract term literally referencing Guardia, then it likely would be. However, as AD 1999 and AD 2300 are recorded as they are, it could mean that the calender system in reference to the founding of Guardia was not dismissed. At least by Gaspar.
AD 1999 is the end of recorded history. A new epoch, the last epoch, begins.
AD 2300 is a time within the last epoch, where there is no possibility for history to continue.
It is likely, however, that the robots under mother brain, providing they one-day achieve global domination, would put in place their own calender, which may or may not even have significant relevance to the Gregorian one as robots would see little purpose in emulating a human system.
Now, I cannot recall if anyone in the game script uses the term AD or if it is just for when using the Epoch. Regardless, I believe that if you want to explain it via plot it likely would be a method of recording history from the viewpoint of Gaspar using the 1000th year of Guardia as a starting reference point.
That is my two-cents.
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Were the terms BC and AD used in the Japanese version of the game, or only the English translation?
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BC and AD are used in both languages, but the Japanese version sometimes uses "Kingdom Year"/"Kingdom Calendar" (or using Kwhazit's current translation on his site, "Royal Year") in dialog instead of A.D.