(CHRONO SYMPHONIC + ADDED Tracks linked below in the list, with my recommended order for the ultimate Chrono experience!)

WARNING: Brace for full geek impact!

Looking at my background here on Tumblr, it’s no secret that I love “Chrono Trigger”. I mean, it’s seriously one of my favorite games of ALL TIME. Great story, fun battle system, colorful characters, unique worlds… But above all, it was the music.

For those that know me well, it’s also no secret that I like listening to orchestrated versions of video game music when I draw. So imagine my excitement when stumbling across Chrono Symphonic (FREE for download), a reimagined musical telling of the “Chrono Trigger” soundtrack as if it were the soundtrack of a full-length motion picture.

I have to be honest though, guys. My first listen was not the most pleasant one.

As a die-hard fan of the game whose personal pillow talk includes quoting the lines “mountains’re nice” and “this is the life,” to give you a clue, I was shocked that a game about restoring the very fabric of time was painfully not in CHRONO-logical order (lol).

In this artist’s opinion, it was an utterly fantastic collaborative effort that merely suffered from bad arrangement and an altered, fan-fictionalized plot (which you can even download the script for to get the whole movie effect).

However, after listening to each track individually, letting the movements sweep over me, the leitmotifs and subtle reprisals tickle my imagination, I realized the soul of the game was still in there.

So, with respect to the contributing artists, I set out to rearrange each of these truly beautiful tracks, and adding other new symphony tracks, into a soundtrack even my ultimate Chrono-Fan husband would approve of.

The trickiest part of the rearrangement was not only restoring chronological order while maintaining a flow from one track to the next, but what to do about the holes in the musical plot. There was no mention of 65,000,000BC or the post-apocalyptic 2300AD. The Black Omen (one of your final destinations) was only halfway through the soundtrack.

**My suggested arrangement, with plot notes and track origin are as follows (THAR BE SPOILERS!!!):

1) “Inciting Incident” –by sephire (original CS track)
^{(The game’s heart-pounding opening theme.)}

2) “Morning Sunlight” –by sephire & SirRus (original CS track)
^{(Crono awakens to his mother’s voice and greets the morning, before heading out to town.)}

3) “Blue Skies Over Guardia” –by DarkeSword (original CS track)
^{(*One of my favs. Truly conveys the childish excitement and spectacle of The Millennial Fair)}

4) “To Lands Unknown” –by Sleepy Emp (original CS track)
^{(Something’s not right at the fair when Lucca’s telepod sends Marle elsewhere and Crono courageously follows.)}

5) “Denadoro Climb” –by PLBenjaminZ (original CS track)
^{(The title would suggest the later pursuit of the Masamune, but here Crono finds himself in a strange land of winds and whispers of fiendish mystics.)}

6) “Hymn of Valor” –by Red Omen (original CS track)
^{(A familiar castle holds a surprisingly familiar queen.)}

7) “Lucca’s Arrival” –by Zas (original CS track)
^{(Crono and Marle are reuinited only before something goes wrong and Marle disappears for real. Lucca arrives to explain the time paradox.)}

8) “Frog’s Intervention” –by ellywu2 (original CS track)
^{(Upon their search for the true queen, Crono and Lucca find themselves surrounded by fiends when saved by a strange amphibian warrior.)}

9) “Revelation of Fire” –by Claado Shou (original CS track)
^{(Crono and the gang return to the present, where Crono faces charges of princess-napping in a trial that’s more circus than justice.)}

10) “Darkness Dueling” –by LunarHeart (original CS track)
^{(Crono with Lucca in tow defeat the wicked Chancellor’s Dragon Tank before grabbing Marle and making their daring escape into a time gate.)}

11) “The Ruined World (Eternal Derelict)” –by Children of The Monkey Machine (*ADDED!)
^{(The gang discover themselves in a future destroyed by Lavos and in desperate need of saving. The theme of hope faintly hums at the end.)}

12) “Door to The End of Time” –by Blake Perdue (original CS track)
^{(The gang with Robo come to a place where all things meet at the end of time. Could Fiendlord Magus be the summoner of Lavos?)}

13) “The Masamune” –by ellywu2 (original CS track)
^{(The sword of legend is re-forged and Frog accepts his destiny as he slices the mountainside concealing the path to Magus.)}

14) “Confronting the Mystic” –by sephire (original CS track)
^{(Frog and the gang battle Magus only to discover Lavos’s true origin as their error sucks them into a rip in time.)}

15) “The Bells” –by Matthew Valente (*ADDED!)
^{(From the re-mastered soundtrack of the long- dead Crono Resurrection project.)}

16) “Crono’s Dream” –by Darkesword (original CS track)
^{(Crono dreams of a possible future with Marle, but all is not right.)}

17) “JESUS CHRIST IT’S A DINOSAUR GET IN THE EPOCH” –by DrumUltimA (*ADDED!)
^{(Ayla finds Crono and crew at the bottom of a mountain before they later awaken to a past where Reptites reign supreme.)}

18) “Tyrannosaurus (Tyran Castle)” –by Mazedude (*ADDED!)
^{(Crono and Alya journey to the Reptite lair to confront Azala, reclaim the gate key, and decide the fate of humanity.)}

19) “The Dark Before the Dawn” –by Will Buck (*ADDED!)
^{(Azala mourns as Lavos, The Red Star, spirals through space and plummets to the earth, staining the world red and issuing forth a new ice age.)}

20) “Manifest Destiny” –by SirRus (original CS track)
^{(Many millennia later, a mysterious world of technology, magic, and the power of dreams floats above the icy world below.)}

21) “Schala and The Queen” –by ellywu2 and pixietricks (original CS track)
^{(As Schala echoes the hope of her people and the prayers of the gurus, she is overpowered by her mother’s tyranny who, with a mysterious prophet, banishes the gang from The Kingdom of Zeal.)}

22) “Beneath the Surface” –by Rellik (original CS track)
^{(The gang journeys to The Undersea Palace, where Queen Zeal uses the Mamon Machine to draw the power of Lavos.)}

23) “The Rising” –by Rellik (original CS track)
^{(The prophet reveals himself to be Magus and fails in defeating Lavos before Crono sacrifices himself. As his body disintegrates to ash, The Undersea Palace rises to the sky casting a black omen on the earth below.)}

24) “Lost Fragments of The Past” –by Oceanfire (*ADDED!)
^{(In the wake of Crono’s death, Schala uses the last of her powers to save the gang from being swallowed by time.)}

25) “The Third Guru” –by Claado Shou (original CS track)
^{(The gang discovers the identity of The Guru of Time and sets out in search of The Guru of Reason, keeper of the The Chrono Trigger, the one thing that could bring Crono back.)}

26) “The Chrono Trigger” –by Russell Cox (original CS track)
^{(The Time Egg weaves its magic as Marle cries out in the darkness, her soul searching for the soul of Crono, until their spirits are rejoined and Crono returns to fulfill his destiny and save the world.)}

27) “The Darkest Omen” –by mv (original CS track)
^{(Crono and the gang head to The Black Omen to confront the immortal queen and defeat Lavos for good.)}

28) “A Parting of Ways” –by Rellik (original CS track)
^{(Magus alongside Crono battles his evil mother and avenges Schala, his beloved sister lost to time.)}

29) “The Last Stand” –by RoeTaKa (original CS track)
^{(The path gives way to the decisive battle of Lavos, who continues to drain power from the earth.)}

30) “The Final Battle” –by PLBenjaminZ (original CS track)
^{(As the dust settles, it’s clear the fight is not over. Crono leads the way into the depths of Lavos’s shell to discover a true enemy of unworldly origin.)}

31) “The New Begninning” –by Sleepy Emp (original CS track)
^{(The threat of Lavos is over, the future is saved, and time is restored. The gang meet for a final time at The Moonlight Parade before returning to their own eras and bidding farewell.)}

32) “To Far Away Times” –by Reuben Kee and pixietricks (original CS track)
^{(Crono and Marle share a private moment above the clouds as this lovely vocal track brings the story to a sweet close.)}

33) “Sleepy Yay” –by Matthew Valente (*ADDED!)
^{(Wait! I’m not done yet! From the re-mastered soundtrack of the long- dead Crono Resurrection project. A cute little music box plays after the rolling of the credits, segueing perfectly into…)}

34) “Far Away Memories” –by Neil Benjamin (*ADDED!)
^{(An instrumental and more traditional version of the last track that captures the uplifting nature of the finale and was stuck in to appease my hubby as it’s his favorite part of the original soundtrack.)}
I don’t expect anyone would actually read through all this, but as a tribute to the game that has brought be countless hours of enjoyment and the music that has and will continue to inspire me, I wanted to post my sheer enjoyment of it openly and honestly, with the hope that those who love this game as much as I do might find it useful and maybe even assemble the arrangement from the Chrono Symphonic and other tracks for their own enjoyment.

Sorry for the excessive nerding. I go now!  BACK TO WORK!  TT-TT