12 June 2008
Ferry

Chrono Trigger 2 still not happening at Square Enix due to politics

There are no known plans for Chrono Trigger 2 despite various claims from creators of the original. Although fans of 1995’s Chrono Trigger did get an indirect sequel in 2000’s Chrono Cross, it didn’t wrap up certain unfinished plot threads of the original game since it had a new cast. Let’s see how this Square drama has played out over the years.

2001: Hironobu Sakaguchi said that the developers of Chrono Cross wanted to make a new Chrono game. The same year, Square applied for a trademark for the name Chrono Break in the United States and Chrono Brake in Japan. However, the United States trademark was dropped in 2004.

2003: Director Takashi Tokita (also of Parasite Eve fame) mentioned Chrono Trigger 2 in a Japanese interview. Sadly further details are unknown (at least I can’t make any sense of the Tokita game interview translation).

2005: Supervisor Yuji Horii (of Dragon Quest creator fame) expressed no interest in returning to the Chrono franchise saying “Since everything I would like to do can be done in a Dragon Quest title, the chances of me making a sequel to Chrono Trigger are unlikely. Although as long as the title is interesting I’d definitely love to check it out and play it, even if it’s not Chrono Trigger.”

2007: Supervisor Hironobu Sakaguchi (of Final Fantasy creator fame) remarked in April that his creation Blue Dragon was an “extension of [Chrono Trigger].”

During an interview in February Square Enix’s Senior Vice President Hiromichi Tanaka said that although no sequel is currently planned, some sort of sequel is still possible if the Chrono Cross developers can be reunited. To quote: “There’s still a possibility, but since the main director is not working for Square Enix now — he’s working on other titles in a different company, Namco Bandai, it’s a bit difficult to ask him to come back and be the head of a team again. And also, Kato-san is working on the fourth game in the Mana series. So there’s still a possibility that he might think he might want to make it again…”

2008: Music composer Yasunori Mitsuda has expressed interest in scoring a new game, but warned that “there are a lot of politics involved” with the series. He stressed that Masato Kato (the Story Planner) should participate in development.

I suppose you could say fans have been Chronoroll’d!

Sources: Cubed3, 1UP, Wikipedia, EGM issue June 2007 & 1UP again

12 June 2008 14:46
J

Chrono Cross was a direct sequel of Chrono Trigger. It wrapped up everything about Trigger. All you had to do was pay attention and think. But I really want Chrono 3. Please Lord.

13 June 2008 08:08
Tk

I’ve never owned a ps1 so I couldn’t get to see anything about what happened to Chrono Cross, although i would REALLY love to see a Chrono Trigger 2.

28 November 2008 15:05
Fred

Chrono Cross wasn’t a direct sequel to Chrono Trigger. It was more of an indirect sequel/spin off. The game was cool and all, i really enjoyed it, but it wasn’t a true sequel to CT.

Chrono Cross pretty much cared nothing about the original cast, with all of them being “dead” (some really died of course) and it dealt not with time travel. Lavos seemed like an after thought.

But oh well, hopefully Square will get their shit together and create a true sequel to Chrono Trigger for the PS3 and 360.

20 April 2009 17:02
Erica

What a shame…

I loved Chrono Trigger, and my Husband loved Chrono Cross (he did not get the chance to play Chrono Trigger, I played both, liked both, but preferred the original) we would definitely buy the next Chrono - whatever, although as things stand, it would have to be released on Xbox360.