Eras:
Chrono Trigger didn't just have one world to explore - it had several. While if you merged every time period's accessible areas together they roughly would be the same of every other RPG, the fact we were going back and forward in time was enough to make our brains think we had a million worlds to explore. It worked a helluva lot better than Final Fantasy V's three completely thrown at you worlds. You begin in 1,000 AD. The time periods are in the order you visit them:
1,000 AD - Villain: none
You begin the game here. It's a bustling area with little problems. It's usually the focal point of other going-ons as there is no "Era-villain" like the others
600 AD - Villain: Magus
Welcome to the dark ages. You figure this out when you walk out of the time warp and get assaulted by imps, or goblins or whatever the hell they are. Guardia is waging war with the Mystics, the bridge is broken, and everything is pretty messed up.
2300 AD - Villain: Mother Brain
The future. Everything's kinda drab and bleak here. The wind chill sound effect Square games were known for is played throughout the overworld. This era is home to the enertron. A pretty nifty machine that gives you a full nights worth of sleep within a few seconds…but you're still gonna be hungry.
The End of Time:
It's all over here. Everything is gone save for a light post and some old fart sleeping next to it. In one corner we have the great changeling Spekio hanging out giving you guys magic and in another corner the time machine. The end of time is basically your base of operations.
64,000,000 BC - Villain: Azala
A place a few days before yesterday. The reptites and the humans are fighting for supremacy. Of course you being human, you can guess whose side you’re on.
12,000 BC-Villain: Queen Zeal
The Ice Age. The ground is home to the earthbound ones, while the upper islands are home to a bunch of people able to use magic. Queen Zeal runs the show and has constructed a machine dedicated to absorbing the awesome power of Lavos. Of course this machine ends up having her go Kefka on the world. Oops.
BOSSES
Chrono Trigger is notable for not having that many wasted boss fights. While a few slip in here and there, most every fight is memorable. With the exception of two fights, I was able to recall every boss fight in Trigger solely by memory for this article if that helps anyone, I don’t really know of any other game where I can do that. Here they are, in their great glory.
Yakkra
An annoying yellow turtle-guy. Yakkra kidnaps Queen Leene (Marle’s distant ancestor) and holds onto her for a seemingly convenient amount time before our heroes show up to put an end to the shindig. In the prior confusion concerning the abduction, Yakkra impersonates the chancellor of the Guardia Kingdom-hell he even talks to you and hangs around Guardia Castle after you leave. How he got to the cathedral for the boss battle before us is still up for debate.
Dragon Tank
After killing Yakkra, Crono and co return to Guardia and hear the Chancellor tell of how he's going to make a criminal justice system for criminals like Yakkra. What? There wasn't one in place already? When I arrived, Guardia didn’t seem like it was in a state of anarchy, but I guess I was wrong. No wonder their government was having problems. Anyways, when you return to 1,000 AD, Crono gets detained by this new judicial system. One thing leads after another and Crono is escaping from Guardia and fighting this thing. Think of it as Guardia's version of Metal Gear, but much less dangerous and with less politics involved to even exist-I mean Crono took it down with a katana, not stinger missiles. After seeing military flops like this, it’s no wonder the country got destroyed by the time Chrono Cross began.
Defense System, Bits
After arriving in 2300 AD and hearing about the people having no food…and that whoever goes to the storage room to get food doesn't return, our heroes say "screw logic" and head down to fight this thing. It just stands there shooting lightning out and uses some delta attack that beats the hell out of whoever receives it. *snore*
Sir Krawlie
Not really a boss fight. But he does disintegrate the same way the bosses do. So I guess he’s a boss then?
R-Series robots:
Robo meets his friends and proceeds to get the ever loving oil beat out of him. The robots call him a defect, and with two party members still kicking, you know you are gonna fight these guys. Oddly enough, these robots called Robo a defect...but he was like stronger than all six of them combined. Logic in the future confuses me.
Heckran:
A boss of the magic cave that uses magic. This is the monster that is on the box art of the American version of the game. He also poses with those huge flipper-claw things on occasion. Whatever.
Zombone:
A huge skeleton/alien thing that is made up of several corpses found on the Zenan bridge. A pretty cool character...really.
Masa and Mune:
Two goblin-like creatures that can use the "X strike" double tech (originally executed with Crono and Frog) and just hop around the place. They guard the Masamune, an incredibly powerful sword, and aren't that tough. That can only mean one thing…
Masamune:
Chrono Trigger’s version of an angry Samoan. When you watch Masa and Mune do a rip off of the fusion technique from DBZ, and different music plays… you know this is gonna be hard. This…thing is the two creatures joined together after each taking their steroid shot. On another note, ex-lax would make his constipation problems so much easier. Why does there have to be a constipated monster? Seriously.
Nizbel:
Whoops, spoke too soon. First Masamune then this. What does Square feed its critters that makes them look like they have to take a shit? I'm not too sure on what Nizbel was supposed to be. A triceratops? That's my guess, but apparently Azala realized his boys needed to look that 'extra' strong and put him on the juice. Nizbel runs around ramming into you until you give him enough electricity so he can go into roid rage releasing all that stored up energy. Man, give this guy the Heavyweight Championship.
Slash:
One of Magus's generals. Frog and him have some mutual respect in the Japanese version, in the American version Frog just calls him "Sir Slush". He’s still playing the comedian.
Flea:
Apparently Flea is a man, but he appears as a woman here because power is beautiful or something. You know what I think they were going for? A rip off of Vega from Street Fighter II. Seriously.
Ozzie:
Ozzie smacks his lips together and laughs his ass off. When he's not summoning demons or taunting you, he encases himself in this ice thing. When you attack the ice thing, he counterattacks with a damaging flare spell. So attack the pulley chains in the background. Wow, that wouldn't be hard to figure out, there’s no way that’s an advertisement for a strategy guide. *rolls eyes*
Magus:
Magus is so cool. So cool that you have to fight him before he joins hours later. You start limited to just magic attacks, but once half his energy is gone, the gloves are off and everyone goes balls to the wall beating the tar out of each other. Magus was a very interesting boss fight, cool music, cool attacks, and you knew things were going insane during the whole thing.
Nizbel II:
Another constipated, steroid consuming, triceratops. Unlike the first Nizbel, this one wanted to be in TNA. He has the X division title in his sights and if he can get just one more shot...hey he may be able to overcome the opposition and show the Main Event Mafia who’s boss. He was going to go to the WWE, but their drug testing policy was way too strict for the testosterone he’s on.
Fun Fact: The English localization somehow makes it out that this is a second Nizbel, like there are two of them. The Japanese version however makes it clear that this Nizbel and the one you fought earlier are one in the same. I think the Japanese one makes more sense. How many dinos are dumb enough to take steroids AND not take something for their defecation problems?
Azala w/T-rex
This boss was memorable because the damn thing took up the WHOLE SCREEN. Look at that thing! Azala is just...there. The T-rex starts chomping characters, blowing shit up, and defeating any logic that Ayla’s bare fists can make a dent in it.
Golem:
The Golem copies whatever attacks you do and uses them against you. Cast lightning and he uses lightning. Luckily his attacks may be damaging but he's pretty simple to kill just because he doesn't have much HP. I hope you have enough hp left over to survive the massive belch he does.
Giga Gaia:
A GWAR groupie made it into Chrono Trigger as one of the hardest bosses in the game. Giga Gaia takes up the whole screen and uses his hands to pound you away. When that doesn't work, he casts a couple magic spells to kill you. The cool thing about GG was that he gave facial expressions to whatever way you kicked his ass. Hope you brought Ayla along, Falcon Hit is pretty useful here.
Dalton:
Poor Dalton. Zeal’s captain of the guard is stuck on…guard duty? That’s like having a the garbage man hop in the back of a truck and take all the bags of shit and expired meat away to grab the thing jammed in the truck. Yeah, Dalton had to do his FUCKING job. Do him a favor and kick his ass.
Golem Twins:
Dalton, still pissed that you killed his last beast a few game hours ago, decides to make you fight Mary-Kate and Ashley Olson. As if one wasn’t bad enough, two is just as easy-that is if you remember to wear an elemental vest like the Ruby vest and cast fire on those two. Doing so has you absorbing any and all fire attacks they throw at you.
Lavos:
Not really a boss fight, but since he kicks your ass, I may as well mention it. If it's your first playthrough, enjoy 30 seconds of selecting attacks, and then watch him pound you into submission.
Golem Boss:
He's afraid of heights. This guy is even more of a pussy than Dalton
Dalton:
About fucking time! I was getting sick of all these Golem guys fighting me. Let me fight Dalton, I'm sick of his gloating. Dalton actually was somewhat challenging. But that isn't saying much when you compare him to his Golems.
Magus?:
This fight is optional. You have to go see the guy, but if you fight him, it's either Frog vs. Magus (if he's in the party) or everyone vs. Magus. Either way, killing him changes your ending. So you could fight him, or choose not to and get him as a character. Magus rocks as a party member, and he will pull his weight-but he did turn Glenn into a frog. I guess that makes Magus the Steve Stiffler of Chrono Trigger.
Lavos Spawn:
So Chrono dies fighting Zeal. I think this was the first time a main character in an RPG went missing halfway through and was unavailable. Of course there is a way to bring him back. Somewhere in the whole path of doing so, you climb some mountain with Belthasar’s help and meet Lavos’s offspring at the top. They aren't that tough, their shells can be used as a platform, and they are weak spawns. But everyone needs to do their part in the Lavos war. This includes killing his kids!
The following fights occur in whatever order you decide to. Since there is no set order, it may be different with your decisions.
Zombore rip-off:
A pallet swap of the cool Zombore lurks in 600 AD, and is a helluva lot tougher. Other than that, uh, there he is.
Cyrus:
Guardia’s knight captain from 600 AD shows up in 1000 AD to cause some trouble. It isn’t really a fight, you can’t damage him. but if the boss music starts up, I gotta mention him. Just sit and let him kick your ass for a few minutes, then Frog will notice something.
Rusty Tyrano:
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They imply this is the same one you fought ages ago (literally). Well he's underground in 600 BC. A lot tougher, but didn't he explode? Not to mention we watched the equivalent of a 16-bit mushroom cloud erupt over where we fought him when Lavos touched down to say “Hi”. Laws of physics would say otherwise...but this is Chrono Trigger, apparently he can reconnect his mass
Atropos:
Robos...uh...girlfriend. This is signaled by the video game cliché of her having a bow. If the robot has a bow-it must be a girl.
Mother Brain:
This is the computer that made Terminator's Skynet green with envy. It basically takes over the world after Lavos destroys it and attempts to make a world for robots. Megaman X and Zero are sadly nowhere to be found. While it's a simple boss fight here, Motherbrain and everything else in her lab become much more important in Chrono Cross.
Son of Sun:
I don't know where this freak came from. But this fight has you focusing on one of the five flames surrounding him. After you hit the correct one, he shuffles them all and you get to hit one of them again. The fight is pretty annoying, but innovative at the same time.
Yakkra XIII:
Yakkra is back to terrorize the world. Unfortunately things are near as easy this time. He does the same crap but fires away projectiles that can knock someone out quick. Other than that, he's harder than the first Yakkra, but still pretty simple to kill.
Ozzie, Flea, and Slash:
Ugh, as if one wasn't enough. You get to treat yourself to all three of these morons at once. The fight initially is tough as nails thanks in part to their annoying triple tech counter attack…that they do to everything. The counter is a bitch, but killing one makes the fight go back to being a cakewalk.
Ozzie...again:
Since Magus is a prick and all, if you have him in the party, he’ll admit he was just in it for power and Ozzie can go fuck himself. This is the exact same fight as in Magus’s castle. I dunno if it was supposed to be a joke, but finishing this Jenny Craig reject off is mandatory.
Black Omen Mutants:
You fight like, three or four of these things in the Black Omen. None of them are that different, but slightly more difficult. They just roam around the room inflicting status ailments.
Lavos Spawn:
Is this a joke? This is the same fucking Lavos Spawn I fought on Death Peak like 10 game hours ago! The only thing challenging was not to accidentally kill him before I took his screenshot.
Queen Zeal:
It's time to show this prehistoric bitch how we do things down town! Despite having a spell that reduces everyone’s hp to 1, bitch-slapping Zeal is pretty simple. Then she throws you in with:
Mammon Machine:
A machine used to give people power of Lavos and at the same time possess their minds. I thought "Destroying" it was going to happen but I never thought I'd have to fight it. Well, here it is. Take the damn thing out quickly, cuz it's nasty. I sure hope you got Magus as a party member for the next battle, because cool stuff happens if he's around.
Queen Zeal again:
Zeal, after watching everything she had get destroyed by you, decides to take the gloves off and spank you like the babies you are. She turns into a huge head with two hands...uh-oh
Lavos: Round 1 (optional depending on how you kill him)
You actually have a chance this time around. Lavos takes the attack mode of a bunch of bosses you fought each time, including their hp totals, and makes you fight a “Lavos Version” of it. Think of it as a JRPG’s version of fighting all the bosses in the game over again like Megaman games.
Lavos Round 2: (possibly round 1 if you went by epoch)
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Going by Epoch gets you here instantly, meaning at any time after getting the time machine’s fly mode you can fight the last guy. Have fun with him. He'll be happy to show you how powerful he is by opening up his breasts and frying you while he lactates. Of course if you kill him, you got one more fight and that's-
Yellow Thingy:
Lavos's true form core or whatever. I think Yellow Thingy suits it best. Kill this thing to win the game. Oddly enough, we all thought to go for the center dude. Killing him did nothing but get him revived. It's the right bit, the right bit that you need to kill.
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