Crono

Lore & Background

Crono's initial design was created by Chrono Trigger's story planner, Masato Kato, and finalized by Akira Toriyama. His crimson hair is a symbol for his blazing courage. The concept behind Crono was that his adventure begins when he goes to save a girl who was sucked into a time warp created by a teleportation device. Despite the simplicity of such a quest, it gradually reveals itself as you travel through time to each different era. Crono's most developed parts are his Japanese blade, which gives a hint of the Orient. In the initial design sketches, Crono was a 'bad kid' wearing goggles and a cape. While he was called Chrono in the Japanese version, this was changed in the North American version. Chrono had six letters, while five appeared to be the limit. Masato Kato and Yuji Horii initially proposed Crono's death, though they intended for him to stay dead; the party would have retrieved an earlier, living version of him to complete the quest. Square deemed the scenario too depressing and asked that Crono be brought back to life later in the story.

In Their Own Story

Crono is the spiky-haired, silent protagonist of Chrono Trigger. He originates from the year 1000 A.D., where he lives in the village of Truce with his mother. While attending the Millennial Fair, he meets a young girl named Marle, and the two go see a teleporter created by Crono's friend Lucca. As Marle tries the teleporter, it reacts with her pendant and creates a time gate, leading Crono to travel back in time 400 years to rescue Marle. This begins a series of time-traveling adventures where Crono and his friends discover that Lavos, an extraterrestrial monster who crashed on Earth in pre-historic times, is set to awaken in 1999 A.D. and destroy civilization. Crono is tried and arrested on charges of kidnapping Marle, and sentenced to death by the current chancellor of Guardia. Lucca and Marle help Crono escape prison, haphazardly using another time portal to evade their pursuers. This portal lands them in 2300 A.D., where they learn that an advanced civilization has been wiped out by a giant creature known as Lavos that appeared in 1999 A.D., and find the last remnants of humanity living in undergrowth domes subsisting off of machine energy in place of food. The three vow to find a way to prevent the future destruction of their world. After meeting and repairing Robo, Crono and his friends find Gaspar, an old sage residing in an atemporal space known as the End of Time, who offers them the ability to travel through time by way of several pillars of light. The ruined Ocean Palace then rises into the air as the Black Omen, Queen Zeal's floating fortress. The group turns to Gaspar for help, and he gives them a 'Chrono Trigger', a device that allows the group to replace Crono just before the moment of death with an identical doppelgänger. The party then gathers power by helping people across time with Gaspar's instructions. Their journeys involve defeating the remnants of the Mystics, stopping Robo's maniacal AI creator, giving Frog closure for Cyrus's death, locating and charging up the mythical Sun Stone, retrieving the legendary Rainbow Shell, unmasking Guardia's Chancellor as a saboteur, and restoring a forest destroyed by a desert monster. If Crono is resurrected before defeating Lavos, his sentence for kidnapping Marle is revoked by her father, King Guardia XXXIII, thanks to testimonies from Marle's ancestors and descendants, whom Crono had helped during his journey. Crono's mother accidentally enters the time gate at the Millennial Fair before it closes, prompting Crono to set out in the Epoch to find her. If Crono is not resurrected, Gaspar knows how to resurrect Crono; If resurrected, Crono jumps on to help the group. Chrono Trigger DS adds a scenario in which Crono and his friends can help a 'lost sanctum' of Reptites. The second scenario adds ties to Trigger's sequel, Chrono Cross where they have a limited role as ghosts. The group can explore several temporal distortions to combat shadow versions of Crono, Marle, and Lucca and to fight Dalton, who promises in defeat to raise an army in the town of Porre to destroy the Kingdom of Guardia.

Reader's Guide

Crono is a silent protagonist who uses facial expressions to communicate; this is never addressed by any characters in the games he appears in. His design was meant to be highly notable in order to make fights more entertaining. Crono was the first written character to star as a young male, resulting in Square balancing it by adding female characters as well as non-human characters to balance it and make the party more entertaining. Crono's death scene is considered one of gaming's most memorable moments by critics. IGN called it 'unforgettable' and felt that killing off the main character of a video game was both 'brave and rare.' They added that anyone who experienced this felt a 'sting in their heart' when they thought about it. In a special Chrono Trigger Cross Review, Famicom Tsūshin scored Crono a 30 out of 40. GamesRadar's staff ranked Crono as the 21st best hero in video games; they claimed that while he seemed like a typical hero from a role-playing game, he makes a large impact on the characters around him. Crono has also been called a likable 'everyman' by IGN's Jesse Schedeen and GamesRadar's Matt Bradford. Bradford claimed that while Crono did have some advantages, he took on the role of a hero without them. Crono has been referenced by a character in the NBC TV show Heroes. The character Hiro Nakamura compared himself to Crono due to his newly acquired time-travel ability.

Did You Know?

• Crono's name originally had six letters ('Chrono') but lost the 'h' because five letters appeared to be the limit.
• In initial design sketches, Crono was a 'bad kid' wearing goggles and a cape.
• Masato Kato and Yuji Horii initially proposed Crono's death and intended for him to stay dead, but Square deemed it too depressing.
• Crono has been referenced by the character Hiro Nakamura in the NBC TV show Heroes, who compared himself to Crono due to time-travel ability.
• In a special Chrono Trigger Cross Review, Famicom Tsūshin scored Crono a 30 out of 40.