Chrono Trigger Recollections

Community Recollections

A big thank you to everyone who contributed. Together, we keep the fire of the Chrono series burning!

Chrono Trigger Novel Project

http://www.chronotrigger.info

The CTNP is dedicated to novelizing Chrono Trigger and getting an official blessing from Square. SilentMartyr is a moderator of their forums.

SilentMartyr

I was subscribed to Nintendo Power way back starting around 1993. In late 94/early 95 they started doing RPG preview articles, to raise the fanbase here in America. One of the games that they focused on heavily was Chrono Trigger. After seeing thier articles on the game, and knowing that thier reccomendations were good (they previously did Earthbound), we got the game when it was released. The first thing that really grabbed me about the game was the incredible storyline, with its multiple endings and insane replay value for the time. Also there are the characters involved in the game. Each one had thier own unique flavor, and even the NPC's were very well done. The music also is incredible, Yasunori Mitsuda did a fantastic job in his debut game, arguably his best work to date. The game is just put together so well, there are barely any negative points about it.

CuteLucca.com

CuteLucca.com

CuteLucca is a profound Chrono fan who utilizes her drawing skills to make all kinds of amazing drawings and fanarts, and also is the premier collector of Chrono Trigger merchandise.

CuteLucca

As anyone who visits my site will immediately see, I am obsessed with Chrono Trigger. I was one of the very lucky kids who got it back in 1995; Christmas morning, in fact, and I spent pretty much every waking hour playing it until I finally beat it a couple days before New Year's. After that, I went through and saw all the endings; then I got the characters to level **, then I went through and, by charming, tabbed up every character to ** in every tabbable stat. I played through that game more times than I cared to admit; and when I knew it inside and out, I switched to learning about the merchandising, the development stages, the rare goodies that came with it.

To say that Chrono Trigger has influenced my life is to belittle the effect it had on me; the effect it CONTINUES to have on me, ten wonderful years later. If I hadn't spent so much time drawing Chrono Trigger characters, my art would certainly have suffered; they encouraged my anatomy, my manga skills, and later, the American/manga amalgamation that distinguishes my artwork.

So, yeah... Thanks, CT.

IcyBrian's CT Forum

http://icybrian.com/forum/index.php?showforum=2

IcyBrian is a big fanfiction repository, complete with its own brand of forum regulars.

Annie Felis

Sadly, I didn't get to play Chrono Trigger until 1998. I had never owned a SNES, only a NES, Genesis and Playstation. When I got FF7 for my Playstation, I really dug the turned-based RPG thing (I was sheltered and ignorant), and wanted to try the previous Final Fantasy. I bought a SNES for $40 at Toys R Us, and borrowed a copy of Chrono Trigger and FF6 from a friend. I loved them both so much that I obtained my own copies. I managed to find Chrono Trigger for $45 in a used game store. I consider myself damn lucky to have found it.

The RPGenius

Got it for Christmas in...1995 or 1996, can't remember. Think it was 95. I played it nonstop for a month, getting all the endings and finding every secret I possibly could, just because it was so great. I also used the time after that first month to explore every inch of 1200 BC in an attempt to find Schala. CT was the game that got me hardcore addicted to RPGs--Secret of Mana, Crystalis, and The Legend of Zelda gave me pleasant tastes, but CT was like RPG cocaine. It continued to be my favorite RPG (hell, video game in general) for the next 8 years, until finally it was barely toppled by Suikoden 2 and Grandia 2. Barely. I still consider it one of the greatest 3 games ever created. I've replayed it so many times, I'm almost sure it's close to breaking the triple-digit mark. I have all the dialogue in it memorized through just being exposed to it so often (and this was true of me BEFORE I hacked all the text, too). It has a magic that no other game has that can appeal to any age--even for an RPG.

Sequel

Hm, I can't remember what year I got CT. Anyway, after I had gotten into RPGs, I was browsing through a used game store to find something new to play. I saw two games that caught my interest; Chrono Trigger and Breath of Fire. I ultimately decided to purchase Chrono Trigger (for $60, those ripoff artists). I'm glad I did. The New Game + and multiple endings really gave the game replayability. Plus, I liked all the characters. Then I find out a few years later that they rerelease it for PSX for cheaper than I bought it. Rgh! Well, I bought that, too. Just to see the anime cutscenes. Well, for FFIV also, but mostly for Chrono Trigger.

Sunflare

I never really owned the game, but my girlfriend let me borrow it. It was back around Sept. 1998, when I fell in love with the graphics, music, and storyline of the game Chrono Trigger. I loved the fact of time travel and the prospect of changing the past for a better future. There was love, action, and great story telling throughout the whole game. Other then FF7, I can't think of a more beautifully written story.

OneUpStudios

http://www.oneupstudios.com

OneUpStudios is home to the OneUps and other great video game music arrangers and remixers. The OneUps regularly play Chrono Trigger music in their sets, and their latest album features a fantastic Schala rendition.

Tenseiga

I heard some people really liked it and how it was "better than FFVI" so I wanted to defy their beliefs and gave it a shot. This was in like 2001 or so, and I did not have a SNES. Therefore, on emulation, I played through it like a madman and.....got destroyed by Lavos. I gave it another shot a few weeks ago and my save got killed by the emulation itself. Now....I've restarted it and have just met Glenn again. Damn, will I ever stop playing this game?

AlmasyMarquis

As the leading representative of AlmasyMarquis.com on this board, I give you this sentence: I read about it in Nintendo Power and immediately went out and bought it.

Joe Cam

Joe Cam is a longtime fan and associate of OUS, and recently displayed his lyrical talents by teaming up with remixers from the video game community to make his own album. At $7.00, it's a steal on his site!

http://www.joecam.net

Joe Cam

I don't remember how exactly I first heard of Chrono Trigger, except I might not have even known about the game until I bought it. I remember it was Christmas time and I had me some hella bling from the giftage and while at the mall, I knew I wanted to pick up Final Fantasy III for the SNES. While in the store, I saw another game RIGHT NEXT to Final Fantasy III called "Chrono Trigger" that was from the same company! I figured, I like Final Fantasy games and the other Squaresoft games I've played, I might as well get it. After dropping a good $150 for the two games (Remember $70 SNES games? Gah....) I took it home and played Chrono Trigger first (I had previously rented FFIII, so I was in no real rush to find out what it was like). I was blown away. For how deep and soul consuming the game was, I thanked the video game gods that it existed. I've been a Chrono Trigger mark ever since and I still consider it the best game to ever have been released. Interestingly enough, I just found my old skool original Nintendo Power players guide for it the other day. Sure, it looks like hell and some pages are coming loose, but damn did the memories come flowing back. Time to boot up the SNES emulator on the ole Xbox and play that bitch again.

Overclocked Remix

http://www.ocremix.org

OCR is a video game music remixing community sporting huge forums and a bevy of talented remixers.

Dark_T_Zeratul

Back in the sixth grade, one of my friends was telling me about this awesome game called Chrono Trigger. He was telling me about all the cool characters, and the dual techs, and ESPECIALLY about Magus. Back then, I had never even heard of an RPG, let alone seen one, so I was imagining an action-adventure side-scroller a la Final Fight. Boy was I in for a shock when I rented it the next day. I absolutely loved the game, not only because of the great story but because of how huge the world was and how much you could DO in it. The dual techs probably didn't impress me as much as they would have had I been familiar with other RPGs, but the idea of combining different abilities to make a new one was still really cool. I was never able to beat it on a rental, though, so I had to wait until I got it for Christmas to finally slay Lavos. And when I did, the New Game + feature and multiple endings kept me hooked for years to come.

Lacour

OMG don't get me started on this. This games has the most memories out of any console that i've ever come in contact with. I rented it sometime around september of 1996 and I didn't really get into it until the second time I rented it (only because of school work and basketball) Anywayz this is the only game in which i'd get up at 3am everyday to play down in my basement. I slept there the entire time I was playing this, it was so awesome I didn't wnat to go back to sleeping in my normal room. I ended up beating the game in march of 1997 right before I went to Florida for spring break, which was my 6th grade year (also the year I got epilepsy which coincidentally happened exactly a week after I beat CT) I have always had this game as #1 for me and the music is the most why I love it. The most difficult part of the game for me had to be the fight against Queen Zeal when she becomes big (proally the toughest fight along with the chameleon from KH and Zeromus from FF IV) Back to the game again, the storyline was the best i've seen in a long time for an RPG since FF IV. The characters that you run into along the way get pretty annoying after a while only because they look the same. Overall I gave this a 10/10, controversially the best video game ever! thank you for reading this.

TheBoxOfDeath

Man, I must have only been about 9 years old, but I had just started playing rpg's. At the rental store I was looking for any rpg's they had. The first thing I saw was the box art, I've always loved that cover. I had already played FF6 and enjoyed the experience, so seeing it was by square I imediatly picked it up. When I started playing I was completly blown away by the story. After five minutes I couldn't stop. Despite the fact that I didn't really understand all of the numbers and stats(I was young and never read the instruction manual), the story kept me going.In fact I rented it several times to finish it, then bought it, and have been hooked on rpg's ever since.

Back_Lit

I remember when CT came out...it was at "Incredible Universe" a huge electronics store in Indianapolis and I had seen it in magazines for weeks but I actually got to play a few minutes of it. I remember picking it up, fiddling with the controls and then promptly putting it down and leaving to play Virtua Fighter (I think it was out then O_o). I didn't understand the controls or what an RPG was when CT was released. It wasn't until my sophomore year of HS that I actually downloaded the ROM and beat it and I can't imagine a more perfect game. I swore that I would get a copy of the game if I could and oddly enough...I did. It cost me $5.00 I've seen the game go for FAR more than that on Ebay, and some of the bids go for as high as $75. I've played the cart only a few times because I don't bust out the SNES so much anymore, but when I do...thats the next game I will replay.

Bahamut

I remember when my brother got all hyped up for this game from Nintendo Power a half an year before it came out, and I disliked that greatly (anti-fanboyism). I gave it a shot though, since the game was his birthday present (I remember it costing near $90 too), and I got hooked to the game pretty quickly, as little as I liked to admit it. I ended up playing the game more than him, going through it and wanting to beat the game and get all of the endings as well. Eventually, my brother and I ended up teaming up for getting all the endings, which was a fun task. The whole atmosphere and story that the game put forth was just entrancingly touching for children.

LegendarySword

Chrono Trigger is still my favorite game to this day. I remember the first time I heard about it (EGM #63, which I still own). Something displace the mighty Final Fantasy II/IV? Never! The only reason I got to play this within a reasonable amount of time is because I had a friend who bought it (didn't get to play it on the first day, but still in the first month). One thing I actually did was get the best equipment set for all the characters via multiple playthroughs (a "friend" erased my fucking file!). I love the racing minigame against Johnny as well. I had another friend that eventually got the game. He knew how much I wanted the game, so he sold it to me for a good price. We've been best friends for over 12 years, and he has done a lot for me, but the CT selling was the best thing by far.

NuGeo

Chrono Trigger was a game I had never heard of. My younger brother some how found out about it shortly after it was released (probably read about it in a magazine) and he rented it. I was never into RPG's like he was, so I just watched him play. He mostly just spent hours at the Millennial Fair rather than playing the actual game. That's because he was stuck and kept losing to the Dragon Tank. I distinctly remember thinking how dumb this game was, because my 8-year-old bro was extatic about it and all I saw him do was play the minigames at the fair. Before we took the game back, I decided to give it a shot with my brother helping me through. This was my first RPG so a lot of the concepts were brand new to me. Long story short, I showed up my bro and beat the Dragon Tank. I became absolutely HOOKED. It's all I would ever talk about with my friends at school. I'd tell the story and reenact scenes at lunch and recess. I was only 10 years old and in 4th grade, but I also absolutely loved the music to Chrono Trigger as well. I'd record it off the TV speaker onto my TalkBoy and play it back to my friends to show them all the characters' themes. So needless to say, rather than renting the game again my brother and I had put all our money together and blew all of our allowance on that $80 cartridge.

sarcastically delicious

Ahh.. CT. It came out when I was about 6.. but I have fond memories of it then. I have 2 brothers, who were game NUTS, so I would watch them play it everyday. it just caught me in it's grasp, so I wanted to play it bad. I think I did for a bit, but I wasn't that great at it, being only 6... So later in life I downloaded the rom... and I just love this game. the music, the story, and all the possible endings/sidequests.. it's just wonderful. when I tell my gamer friends that it's my fav game.. EVER.. they just laugh.. they prefere newer games.. I like older ones, 2nd place for me is Final Fantasy VI which I started on a rom too.

ashb56v2

I can hardly remember how old I was when I first played the game, but the year 1998 sticks out for me as my first time. This game is absolute magic. I believe at that time, Chrono Trigger was one of the gaming community's nobodies. I had hardly heard of it, but I decided to play it because I heard that Akira Toriyama did the artwork for it. I was a fan of the man, so I had to give this game a spin. Little did I know that I was about to play my favorite game of all time. To this date, I've played the game through eight times as well as Chrono Cross six times. I know many people dislike Chrono Cross (SIMPLY BECAUSE IT'S NOT CT, BY THE WAY) and refuse to accept that it's a sequel, but I consider CT and CC to be one, large, EPIC game. The overall story is the best one I've ever seen about time travel. Every single time I go back to play one of the games, I realize something new about the story because it's large, it has many allusions, and it's just got some inexplicable quality that makes special for me. I like CT so much that I even prefer when an RPG has graphics like it rather than new 3D renders. The music is still especially incredible.

Why did I have to grow up? I'll never get to play Chrono Trigger for the first time ever again.

Silens

Chrono Trigger is the only video game I've played in my life that actually sparked a bit of emotion in me. It's just such a beautifully woven and delicately written storyline...I loved this game, pure and simple (and this is coming from one who dislikes RPGs). It's the only game to have pulled me into its deep, rich story, and I highly doubt any other game will have that same effect on me. The New Game + is amazing. This is one of the few games I know of where I can play though it four or five times and not get bored.

Jam Stunna

I hadn't even heard of Chrono Trigger until about three years ago. My younger brother introduced it to me. He'd downloaded the ROM thinking that it would be a shooting game. When I asked him about it, he told me it was an RPG and that he liked it. From that alone I knew that it had to be a very good game, because my brother usually hates RPGs. So I started playing it in 2002, but gave up after I got to 2300 AD. I was getting hammered by that robot that did the Tri-attack or whatever, so I just said forget it.

A year later in college, one of my friends convinced me to give it another shot. This time I played through the whole game, and absolutely loved it. It came pretty close to dethroning my favorite RPG of all time (Final Fantasy VI). I just recently beat it again using the New Game + feature. To this day, it's one of the very few RPGs that I've felt compelled to beat more than once. I think the day after I beat CT the first time, I joined these forums. Having Marle as my avatar is my tribute to the greatness that is Chrono Trigger.

While there have been a few games that have gotten an emotional response from me, Chrono Trigger is near the top of the list. The scene where Marle hugs Crono under the tree is easily one of my favorite scenes, videogame or otherwise.

Chronoshock

http://www.chronoshock.com

Chronoshock was one of the best Chrono series sites out there, and underwent several incarnations. Its final remained a good source of information on Trigger before a server crash decimated the site. Its forums are still wide awake and open, however.

Magus667

I downloaded the illegal rom back in like 98' or 99' and spent two days straight playing it until I beat it. I had to call out sick from work because I was so into playing the game. Ah, the memories...I remember it first coming out back in 95' right after I finished playing thru Secret of Mana and it caught my interest then, but I was too busy having a child and trying to keep my life from unraveling to actually get it and check it out. So I moved on with life and forgot all about it. Then, one day, God created this wonderful thing called 'emulation', and in the course of rediscovering all the lost games of my youth from the arcade and various consoles, I stumbled upon ChronoTrigger. And the rest, as they say, is history.

Of course, by that point in time, it was a difficult game to find in stores to put it lightly. So I wound up getting a copy of the Super Nes cart with the original box & instructions and all that off of eBay for like $50. Since then, I've bought a few more copies of it that I've seen being sold in used game bins at places like Gamestop for like $20 for purely senitmental collector-type reasons. But if it weren't for the advent of emulation gaming, I would of never been reminded of the existence of a truly great game.

LDC

My first experience with Chrono Trigger is still fresh in my memory. One of my babysitters (I was like 9 or 10 at the time) had bought the game, and let me have a file on it. It was awesome. At the time, I was really interested in science-fiction and fantasy novels, and I instantly recognized CT as having both types of stories all rolled into a game.

Sadly, either he or I had to move, I don't remember which. Luckily, I was able to buy the SNES cart from a neighbor, and played it alot. We didn't have many RPG's at the time and all we had was an SNES and a N64. So I played it. Again. And again. And again. Finally, I had played the game enough times that I had practically become a walking guide. However, we had to sell our SNES and most of the games (I got to keep three cartridges anyway, and guess what one of them was) in order to get a PS2 for Christmas. My first gift I opened that year was Final Fantasy Chronicles, the PSX re-release of FFIV and CT. I nearly drooled on the disc as I put it in the PS2 for the first time.

ChuChuWally

I knew someone in high school who very highly recommended this game. Not having a magazine, the internets, or any other medium by whichu to compare his opinion, he lent it to me so I gave it a shot and instantly fell in love. From the moment I popped the game inchu my SNES, I was hooked by the amazing graphics, the outstanding music, the fun gameplay, the sublime cast, and the great story. What else can one say about the 16-bit RPG masterpiece that is Chrono Trigger? It was and still is one of the 2 best games I've ever had the pleasure of playing.

Magus' Child

I really don't know what posessed me to play very far into the game, I wasn't to enthralled at the beginning on the rom. Then, years later, I found out they had a remake for playstation, and again, I don't quite understand the reasons I sought it out. However. Once I got farther into the amazing story line, I gradually drooled more and more. I had only played for a space of about five minutes on the rom. But...as soon as I found out about "Lord Magus' I was like hmm...interesting. Then Frog's line of "Forthwith I shall slay Magus" I was intrigued as to what would happen. I have to say it was the beginning of an obsession, or better yet, fettish for Magus. The rest of the characters, especially Crono and Frog, eventually found their way into my heart as well. Lol...some instinct told me in the beginning that this game was worth it. I even bought Chrono Cross too before I'd played the ps1 version I bought. Something just attracted me; called to me. I almost feel it was fate that I get the game.

Chrono Trigger Resurrection

http://www.xsorbit2.com/users/chronotrigger/index.cgi

Though it received a C&D order over a year ago, some fans still hang around its forums.

MagusRedefined

About 10 years ago, I was at my friends house, and he was tellin me about how his brother had rented a really cool game called "Chrono Trigger". So we went down into his basement to watch him play it for awhile. The game looked interesting enough and when he left we tried to play it. I was about 6 at this time so my comprehension for RPGs and their storylines was a little low. I was easily amazed and amused as well, by the gameplay; beings that was my first RPG like that I've ever played. I rented the game a few times and never really beat it. A few years later the game suddenly came back into my head, so I bought it and beat it. I've never stopped playing since then.

Chrono Trigger Remake Project

http://invisionfree.com/forums/Spectral_Wars_Gaya/index.php

The other 3D remake to get a C&D order back in May, CTRP still boasts forums with regulars who are currently assisting with the CTR petition.

Knives

Back when I was about 8 years old, I originally read about Chrono Trigger in Nintendo Power. I thought it sounded like a great game, so me and a friend rented it. Neither of us understood it, really, as it was our first RPG; needless to say we found it fun to just wander around the Millennial Fair and do random things. About 5 years later I thought about the game again and decided to buy it off of eBay in the Final Fantasy Chronicles package. To this day I still haven't managed to beat it (confound you Lavos Core!) but I did work on CTRP until its demise. I really love the game's premise of time-travelling and such, and the battle system and music are top-notch. It definitely deserves a spot in my top 10.

Wiesty

Back When I was only 5 or 6, my brother was into this game we all know as "Chrono Trigger." I use to watch him all day playing it and, just loved reading the text and seeing how it progressed. A bit later he sat me down and taught me how to play it. From there on, I rented Chrono Trigger from the local Rogers Video, every weekend, only being able to get up to about Magus' Castle. I was the only one who ever rented that game and they knew me every time I came in. I finally beat Magus, and then I was stuck from there, but still I rented it every weekend, until the game was taken off the shelves. Years later, a friend of mine happened to have the game and I borrowed it from him until I beat it. It has changed the ways in how i see video games, and to this day, no other game has brought me more enjoyment.

BrownMan

When I was eight, my best friend bought a brand new game for his newly bought super nintendo entertaintment system. It was Chrono Trigger. The moment he put in the cartridge, I fell in love with the game. Mostly he would play it, while I would watch. I would visit his house everyday, and we'd load it up. A few weeks past by, and there I saw him facing the last boss, numerous times. All the memories I remember are through my best friends. At times he'd be stuck in a place, and I would know exactly what to do. One day he told me that he was moving to another country. It was a country in the Arabic side (United Arab Emirates). As a present and token of friendship, he gave me his SNES, along with the beloved Chrono Trigger cartridge (box and all). I was really happy to recieve this, and have not since forgotten my friend. After he moved, I beat Chrono Trigger three times. Later on I found out that there were 10-11 different endings. Using walkthroughs, I witnessed them all and was awed by the game, Chrono Trigger.

Fxar99

Three years ago, a Greek PC games magazine released a DVD with the title "Emulators' Festival", which included thousands of games from different platforms and many emulators.

A friend of mine had this DVD too. One day, I saw him opening the Chrono Trigger ROM (he was in "The Queen is Gone", Marle was in the party but he didn't know what to do after). He wandered a little in the overworld and then closed it.

It was one of the few games that looked interesting. I opened it when I got home and started playing. It was, indeed, very interesting. When I finished "The Queen is Gone" chapter, I thought the game was over tongue.gif then I saw "The Trial" - at first, I thought the court and the verdict were fixed (I was innocent with difference of 1 member against guilty). When I defeated that Dragon Tank, I thought again that THIS was the end of the game... Then, I was forced to go to the Future. Again, I thought that after doing a quest in the future, the game would be over. I stayed there for too long, because I hadn't noticed I could walk on those paths under the Dome after Lab 16. Soon, the game became more interesting, but when I reached the battle with Nizbel, I wasn't strong enough to win, so I stopped playing, after days trying. When I played the game again (writing notes of what exactly I had to do - something like a walktrought), I defeated Nizbel easily, then I defeated Magus. I was so excited, but the best was yet to come. When I first saw Zeal and listened to the Corridors of Time, I felt like I wasn't in this world, anymore. It is something that hasn't happened to me with any other game. The rest of the game was really magic.

And the end of the story was something fantastic... I'm very touched by this game, I always consider it as the best game ever.

Stoney

Waaaaaay back when, in the prehistoric age of the mid-1990's, I was but a lowly Nintendo fan playing the heck out of my copy of Final Fantasy 3 (FFVI in Japan). It was a time of great joy for me, a time when I knew that the vast field of my imagination, assisted by Square's remarkable games, was slowly realizing its full potential. But then something monumentous happened. Something I'll never forget.

A cousin of mine happened to be as big a video-game nut as I was. He, too, had obtained a Super Nintendo. But he also had something I did not; he had Chrono Trigger. My first glimpse into CT was confusing and bizarre. I had not seen the first half of the game at the time, and was merely watching my cousin play through the second half. Because of this, nothing I saw made sense to me. I frequently asked my cousin for explanations to certain events ("This thing that's eating the Earth from the inside is called what?"), but I was not able to fully grasp the concepts he described. Nonetheless, I was intrigued by its characters and by what little of the story I saw, and as I watched my cousin do battle with Spekkio for the tenth time in one hour, I thought to myself, Y'know...I wouldn't mind owning a game like this.

The next day, I took a quick trip up to the nearest Toys 'R' Us store. And that night, I experienced CT fully for the first time. My poor copy of Final Fantasy 3 was quickly forgotten as I suddenly and quite unexpectedly became a Chrono Trigger addict. I played it nonstop for nearly a week before I was finally able to tear myself away for any length of time. I came away from the experience not only with a new appreciation for the incredible skill employed by Squaresoft, but also with an imagination that had ceased to slowly open up and had instead exploded into full blossom. My love of the game has lasted ever since.

GalaxyFalcon

It wasn't very dramatic but...one of the few times I went over to a friends house (I've only had a few friends) They were playing thier Emulaters (Final Fantasy on one, the other was playing another...more dynamic game) The game looked intresting, I was suprised by its graphics (This was like 98` or so) And that I had never heard of somthing so good on the Snes before. Well, my friends connected me about a week later with a File and a Zsnes .988 or thereabouts (It was one of Zsnes first releases, so if that was in 98` or not I cant remember)

Coicidentally, I didnt remember the time at the Blockbuster when I was a kid looking for games to play on the Super Nintendo, when one of the store kids bubbled, holding up a catridge with a spikey-haird kid. "This is an excellent game!" He expressed, urging us to try it out. Well, I didnt try it out, instead I rented something like Double Dragon or battletoads or somthing. So, I am shamed to admit that I missed out on the early years if CT. However... When I began playing the game, me and WolfPack were both captivated with it-from the moment the Gate opened. The graphics, music, the story. it was all great, it was all super-for the super nintento.

I think we also thought the game was over around 2300 AD (I cant remember) But to my suprise and utter delight, the game continued to go on and on. There were so many unique and intreguing plot-twists in the game, I mean, who didnt nearlly wet thier undies when Magus offered to join up with you? The story was so unique, and the charecter development showcased was suprisingly good for back then-and even some games now. So ever since I first loaded up and figured out how to navigate Zsnes, the game stuck, and I've been tagging it along ever since.

Knives101

Well not sure of the year anymore but I think I was about 12 or 13 at the time. I got the game from a friend of the family. At first I just let it sit for a few weeks..was into Illusion of Gaia at the time. Eventually I got bored and stuck it in and let the intro sequence play...and my jaw dropped... I played up until I got to the future the first day, then my eager sister(the loveable Pain in the ass she was) wanted to play so I let her have at it.. come back in a bit to find out that she had saved over my save..(I was a little distraught at the time, but luckly no one got hurt and nothing was broken).. I let it sit for a day or so morning all the effort gone to waste... then it hit me.. dammit I won't let this get me... so I started over again just kept playing from then on.

Chronicles

http://www.rpgplanet.com/chrono

Chronicles remains a great Chrono series site, with a lot of information and an exceptional collection of official art.

Legend of the Past

So, how I got into Chrono Trigger?

Well, my friend recommended it to me. I got my hands on it, and started playing. At first, I was a bit shocked that those were SNES graphics and that was the music, but none the less enjoyed my first playthrough. I then played it again, to understand the story a bit better...After the third and fourth playthroughs, I decided the time has come for me to discuss the game with other people. That's when I joined Chronicles, and learned of Chrono Cross and Radical Dreamers. Once I got Radical Dreamers and finished, my sights were placed on Cross. After a long awaited time, it happaned. I got it.

Why I like the game?

A few reasons. First and foremost, the story: Deep science and sci-fi combined with fantasy, holding in it's center the human will and the world's will to survive. It's just a tale that gets to you, and dosen't let go. CT, RD and CC are just pieces of art, with an engrossing story, wonderful music and fantastic characters. Secondly, like I mentioned before, the music. Almost every tune in the game is pleasing to the ears, wonderfully composed and fitting to the character\situation.

Thirdly, the gameplay. Seeing your actions in the past effect the future, and using the changes in the future to effect the past further... It just gives you a very powerful feeling. Like you truly are a master of time, an hero of time. In the end, when you finally defeat Lavos and save the future, you find you actually managed to care about the future! That's how deep the gameplay gets you into the feeling of the story. CC, when it had character development, it had good character development. The game has a touching theme and an, although slightly weird, more touching ending! The music, the themes, the story... All those get to you in the end. Which is why I liked CC.

The Lonely Mage

How I got playing Chrono Trigger:

I bought Chrono Trigger the day it came out, on August 22, 1995. We were living on a military base then, so it was hard to find, but we managed to find it at the PX (kinda like a military Wal-mart). I have been playing it ever since, and have beaten it, in all honesty, at least 100 times.

Why I like Chrono Trigger:

I like pretty much everything about the game, from the characters, to the storyline, to the enemies and locales, and especially, the countless theories and debates that CT's time-traveling has produced. It is rather cool to hear all sorts of different takes on certain subjects within the game, such as who the Entity is, is Lavos really evil, and about the parallel timelines and such, to name a few. Although I love almost all the characters (Flea still kind of weirds me out), I would ahve to say that my all-time favorite character is Magus. He's just so cool; from his looks, to his past, and to his search for his sister, Schala, which still touches my heart after all these years. I would have to say that my favorite locale has to be the Kingdom of Zeal, because it is really beautiful, as well as being the most advanced technological civilization ever. It's just so darn pretty...There are a few places where the story may drag a bit, perhaps in the beginning when you have to rescue Marle from the Cathedral in 600 AD, but after that, the game is grade-A awesome. If I could rate this game, I would give it a 99.99999999/100. And that is only because there is no such thing as a perfect game. But this comes pretty darn close.

Demonic Cloud

Well it was many years ago, i was at my friends house and he wanted me to come with him to the local EB (electronics boutique) so he could trade in some old games to get a new one. His brothers friend, who happens to be the greatest RPG player i have ever met, recommended he purchase Chrono Cross, saying it was really good. So my friend decided to check it out, as he had never been mislead before. We go back to his house and he pops it in. We are blown away by the opening video, and as i watched him play, we both got into the game. I went back to his house later that week and he had gotten further. He mentioned that the game had a prequel for the SNES called Chrono Trigger. We also noticed how Lynx called Serge the Chrono Trigger. So i decided i wanted to play both games, in their proper order.

Not too long after, Square announced Final Fantasy Chronicles, which packaged CT and FFIV together for the playstation with all new extras. I went to preorder the game at EB, and they had the commercial playing on one of their TVs. The way they mixed the anime cutscenes together, i wanted to preorder it again :P So finally the game was shipped, and i fell in love with CT. The story was fantastic, the graphics suprisingly good, the cut scenes were great, and the music was brilliant for just being on the SNES. The characters are also quite unforgettable.

I later played CC and was even more astonished as to how deep the story was.

Vulpixlb

Well, how I came into Chrono Trigger...I'll be honest, I've downloaded it as a rom (to zeality: I can say this, or can't I?) when I was youngh, a few years ago, in the summer, july, of 2001. The funny thing was, I wasn't searching for Chrono Trigger or so. I didn't even know what an RPG was. Let alone what a snes or so was. I just wanted to play Pokémon. So, I downloaded that, but their were also other roms, for a snes or something. So I looked that up, and downloaded those three roms. One I forgot what it was, if I really downloaded, the other was Zelda, a Link To The Past, but that couldn't keep me intrested, so I started playing CT. I remember how I first played it, with all those birds flying over the world, in the clouds and the wonderfull music.

And I keept playing it. Another moment I remember me quite well was the arrival of my party in Zeal. That was wonderfull. A flying city!!! of magic. Yeah, CT ment a lot for me, because ever rpg I have played after that (and not all roms, surely not), I've compared with the first real RPG I've played. And not one has won that comparison ;-). But I've never played it to the end, because I was so attached to the characters, that ending the game, would be killing them. Silly, but yeah, it means that much for me.

Chrono Compendium

Now we come to this site! Let's hear it from our forumers:

Radical_Dreamer

I remember first reading about Chrono Trigger in an issue of Nintendo Power when I was a kid. It seemed so grand, and the article promised 100 hours of game play. Unfathomable! So when the game came out, I eagerly started playing. I was not disapointed. Everything about the game is perfection. The graphics, top notch for their time, beautifully painted the once-doomed world for us; it's heroes, and it's villains. To accompany this imagery was perhaps the greatest score of the 16 bit era, with songs that actually conveyed the emotion of the scene. I still can't help but feel a rush whenever Frog's theme begins to play. It always forshadows great things for the amphibian. Speaking of which, the characters were likable and well developed, and their motivations undestandable. I still insist that there are no true villains in Chrono Trigger, as the intricate plot forces each character to strive for survival.

Amongst all of this, the defining moment of the game for me was when I first arrived in Zeal. There it was, paradise, sitting on the screen. With it's haunting melodies and beautiful visuals, Zeal is the crown jewel on this king of games. I use the map of Zeal as the background image on my computer, and sometimes I just stop and look at it, and remember the wonder from when I first arrived there. So happy 10th birthday, Chrono Trigger! I'll still be playing on your 20th!

Crystal Zeal

My older brother was the RPG nerd far before I ever was. It was because of him that I was able to get into Chrono Trigger. He had awesome SNES games -- CT, FFIV, FFVI, SMRPG, Super Mario World, Mario Paint... I started with FFIV, and I was pretty young at the time. It always took me so long, though, because I couldn't read all that well -- hence why I prefered simpler games like CT and FFIV. I never managed to beat FFIV the first time I played it, and instead picked up CT. I fell in love with the game quite quickly. I especially fell in love with Magus, which started a fan obsession that would last me quite a while. I stil love 'im, though I can assure you much of my enthusiasm has ebbed. I was also quite a Lucca fan, though I never became quite as hooked on her as I was on Magus (and Schala, too). CT was the first game that I beat, and I was damn proud of myself. As time went on and I played the game more, my knowledge of the internet grew and with it my knowledge of the game as well as my appreciation for it. I checked out fan sites and read fanfiction and looked at fanart. I even tried doing some fanart of my own. The climax of my CT obsession was probably in middle school, when I was still getting the hang of RPGs, which I loved but found kind of difficult, if only because I didn't like battling a lot. CT really helped lead me into my RPG love, with it's cool graphics, awesome story, wonderful music, and characters. It remains one of my all-time favorite games today.

teh Schala

I had seen part 1 of a two-part walkthrough feature about Chrono Trigger in Game Informer... That issue and the ones immediately before and after it were riddled with Chrono Trigger ads throughout. I thought it looked "stupid," though I liked the look of Marle's concept art. So I fell for Marle before I even got the game. (You'd never have guessed that I'd end up as a Schala fan...) By the way, even then, there were already "What happened to Schala" questions in the magazines.

I forgot about Chrono Trigger, until one day at Blockbuster when everything else I wanted was out of stock. I looked through the shelves for something to get, and of course, I ended up with Chrono Trigger. I was blown away. I rented it over and over and over, retaining much of my saved data each time. One moron who rented it finally overwrote my save data and I was hacked off when I got the game back. (Laughing)

After I figured I'd gotten EVERY ending (and I had!), I quit renting it and let it fade away like any other game...but every now and then, I'd still dream of Zeal (which left me sitting in awe when I first arrived), and still wonder about the fate of Schala. Later I got interested in it again, and almost as if on cue with my returning interest, Square announced Chrono Cross.

ZeaLitY

I must admit to using the ROM too; it might be surprising that I own hardly any Chrono merchandise at all. I found it back in 2002 on the advice of Ramsus, who gave me a list of old SNES RPGs to play in order to become more well-versed in the genre. Needless to say, I got through FF6, Breath of Fire 1 & 2 before grounding to a halt after Trigger. After discussing it with friends at OCR, we decided to make the Chrono Compendium, and the rest is history. I will say that my biggest impact from Trigger is Zeal; my username, ZeaLitY, is a sort of philosophy, representing the inherent human need to aspire and strive for that perfection -- that Zeal. The Chrono Compendium may never be perfect due to human error, but in striving for perfection, at least we're going to do something major here.

V Translanka

Unless you count those first early Zelda games on the old 8-Bit Nintendo, my first RPG experience was FFVI (then known to me as FFIII). I was immediately hooked and eventually I beat it on Christmas. On my birthday (Sept. 13) of the following year, which would have made me around ten, I got a used SNES cart from my parents. The game? None other than Chrono Trigger. When I first put it in, I was a little turned off by the graphics. It was so different from the one and only RPG I had really ever seen that it took me a while to realize that the graphics were actually better. I played it, fell in love with the characters, fell in love with the plot, beat it, and played it again and again. Never have I played a game so many times after beating it.

Eventually, four or five years later, I went out and got Chrono Cross when it came out (again, on my birthday). I was amazed by how it looked and how it played. To know that the Chrono saga was not over was something that filled me with a real sense of joy. When Radical Dreamers was translated, I realized that the potential for the series was just as, if not greater than, that of Final Fantasy. When PlayOnline had their forums, I was constantly in the Chrono forum talking about the series and helping people out. I didn't care how bad the forums looked and how you didn't have an avatar or anything, since it really was like my first forum (it was even more plain than GameFAQs!). Eventually this ended w/PlayOnline liquidating their forum section. Then I went to GameFAQs and went into their Chrono forums.

Then, as always happens w/me and GameFAQs, I grew tired of the boring conversations and endless blather about GameFAQs' newest poll...So I searched for other forums and came across FFInsider and SquareInsider, both of which I've been w/ever since. FFI went through many variations and eventually got rid of their Chrono forum (which I think is rediculous when they made a RagnarockOnline forum & KingdomHearts forum in its place...At least SI kept theirs, which kept me happy...for a while...The Chrono community in SI was limited. FFI & SI are basically sister-sites and the main community for both are FF fans. I wanted a CHRONO forum for Chrono fans. So I went to IcyBrian, and found that they don't like reviving dead threads even if you have something intelligent to add...

I actually don't remember, it was probably through another stint in GameFAQs, but I found my way into the Chrono Compendium after everyone had just set up after cutting off from the OCR thread. I've been enjoying coming and discussing the series immensely. The people here are some of the most intelligent I've ever e-known.

Here's to another ten years and another ten games!

Return to Chrono Trigger Recollections
View Remixer Recollections

Return to Features