I'll agree that Chrono Trigger possessed some potential that was never expounded upon.
For example, take the town scenes. You entered a house straight from a map, without actually having to walk down a street scene! If they given each town street scenes, like they actually did for Chrono Cross, it would've provided more detail into things, and a better look at that time period.
And then, there were the world maps. In my opinion, the world map system should have been more similar to Seiken Densetsu 2 (Secret of Mana in the U.S.), and interconnected each location to each other somehow. That would've added a good amount of depth and length.
The way Chrono Trigger was designed, you covered half of the planet in just a few minutes, from say, going south from Gaurdia to Porre! And that entirely negated the purpose of using the steamboat to travel between Guardia and Porre, especially when you don't even encounter enemies by traveling on the map.
And then, for the Epoch, they should've had dramatic camera angles, along with being able to rotate the view of the map while you're flying over it, much like when you had Flammie the dragon, also from Seiken Densetsu 2!
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The fact that Squaresoft didn't do things like this for Chrono Trigger made it a REALLY short game, especially when you can walk around quickly, and battles are very quick, as well. Even if they'd added the "in-between" scenes, you'd still be able to get around quickly!
I'm able to finish a fresh new game in about between 12 and 18 hours, and that's even after completing every last sidequest, and getting each characters' ultimate weapons, and every last one of their techniques, dual techniques, and triple techniques, along with many secret accessories, like the colored Rocks.
Chrono Trigger was a nice game, but they still could've put more into it!
