Very true. I suppose that that must be considered as well, that drastic climate shifts often cause rebound the other direction, before returning to a median.
Now, something I had not mentioned. From when I first played CT, I figured that parts of it were loosely based on our world. In this regard, it is almost undeniably provable: 65 million BC is no coincidence. I think most of us knew at once that the creators were alluding to the great metor impact that destroyed the dinosaurs (in some theories, that is; I am well aware that not all are in favour of a drastic extinction, but that, it seems, is what CT maintains.) Now, seeing that, I assume the safest model for the Chrono world would indeed be our own, particularly the behaviour after the 65 million mark. The only uncertainty is this: how versed were they in that history? Did they know that that ice age was not the same as ended 12,000 years ago? It almost seems as though they strung those together. Zeal stands at the brink of human agricultural development in our own world, and the end of our most recent ice age. The time periods, thus, seem to imply that those making the game considered the two ice-ages one in the same. The question then is: do we assume the game-makers ignorance, and hold that the ice-age in the Chrono world was unbroken for that length of time? Or do we assume that they knew full well the history of it, and the distinction in the ages, and that it was just for sake of the story that they set one time upon the start of an ice-age, and another at an end?
The former has some strength in that the game-makers seem rather unconcerned with history. After all, humanity did most certainly not by any theories (unless there are some strange people out there) begin in 65million BC. Rather, they followed the old convention of the cave-people fighting the dinosaurs, so romantisized in old film and the like. As such, this disregard for true-world time could imply that the ice age was a single one.
However, concerning the latter, Chrono Cross is what gives it strength. It seems that whatever scientific errors existed (or seemed to) in Trigger were made good on in Cross. Whilst Trigger places intelligent humanity at 65million BC, Cross speaks of humanity only arising from primeaval states around 3 million BC, so as to better align with evolutionary theory. Thus, the transition from Trigger to Cross represents a step from the fantastical to the scientific. If that is the case, then it might be thought that the game-makers, though originally being dismissive of such things as the ice ages, would come to consider the real-world theories regarding them proper in the end, as they did with matters concerning humanity.
As such, I would recommend the latter. It is less simplistic, of course, but it allows for more accurate assumptions regarding the Chrono world. It also more cohesive with what seem to be the latter views of the story-writers.
Comments?
