Even today, almost fourteen years after its first release, the game has a strong following of original fans. Although technically it broke no new ground as a time travel story (all three installments of Back To The Future predated it, and as any reader of science-fiction will tell you, they were Johnny-come-latelies to the game themselves), it was nonetheless very well executed both as a story and as a game, with engaging gameplay, evocative and detailed settings, and compelling characters — even, or perhaps especially, the silent protagonist.
(There may just possibly be a bit of nostalgia speaking here.)
Anyway, the curious thing about Chrono Trigger is how many fan-projects there have been to make sequels, and how high-quality many of those games have been. We are not just talking about cheap ROM hacks here.
Chrono Resurrection, a fan-sequel (sadly, if understandably, cancelled by C&D letter).
In fact, never mind the games — the work put into the music alone is astonishing.
This isn't something you see done with most games, even the massively more popular ones like the Zelda series or Final Fantasy VII (Monty Oum notwithstanding).
This is probably at least partly because, unlike those latter, there have been no sequels to Chrono Trigger*; only a pair of ports for the PlayStation and DS (the latter more recently). But I wonder if there wasn't more to it than that; after all there are no (972s 25,204ch) shortage (500s 13,020h) of fans of the latter two, compared to the former (29s 729ch).
What is it about Chrono Trigger that attracted — and kept for years — the attention of programmers and artists (-yet-to-be, in some cases)? I would conjecture, but I really can't; it's been years since I played it last, and nostalgia would overwhelm objectivity anyway.
Anyone who can figure it out has a game to make. (Please.)
* Chrono Cross was a nice game and all, but it didn't really have anything to do with Chrono Trigger.
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