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FF XIII Timeframe Set, FF XIV Confirmed
Square Enix announced at E3 that Final Fantasy XIII is planned for release this winter in Japan, and spring 2010 for North America. A new trailer was released as well. A separate announcement brought details about Final Fantasy XIV Online, an MMORPG due out in 2010 for Windows and the PS3. A teaser website was launched, with a trailer and some information about the developers working on the project. "Final Fantasy XIV Online is being developed with a simultaneous worldwide release in mind. The game will be initially released in English, Japanese, French, and German. The game will be produced by Hiromichi Tanaka (Final Fantasy I, II, III, and XI) and Nobuaki Komoto (Final Fantasy IX and XI) will serve as director. Longtime Final Fantasy fans will be happy to hear the Nobu Uematsu will return to provide the score."
Final Fantasy XIV Online is the official name of the much-rumored "Project Rapture", that is the new MMORPG that the Final Fantasy XI Online community had been speculating for the past three years (IIRC, a tech demo was shown at 2006's E3). Personally (as one who still occasionally plays FFXI almost six years after signing up) I'm quite happy: this gives the chance to start fresh and improve what FFXI was (despite being no WoW, it still has a reasonably stable population, even if the game mechanics are old and have evident flaws).
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It is called Chrono Cross, it was released in 1999. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chrono_Cross
Troll is not a replacement for I disagree.
http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/DisContinuity
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Final Fantasy XII is odd. I suspect most people who just play the game through normally, as you seem to have, will feel as you did. I know I felt that way after my first playthrough.
The big discovery for me with FFXII was playing it through again, with a power-gaming FAQ. With an hour or two of grinding for levels early on, you can pretty much slot yourself onto a parallel game track, where the real challenge isn't progressing through the plot (which can be done in a few minutes with your extra levels and better rewards), but rather beating the optional (and sometimes secret) challenges that are unlocked throughout the game.
If you do the more advanced hunts, simply setting up your gambits is nothing like enough to get through these harder fights. Certainly, from King Behemoth onwards, you will need to be micromanging one of your characters intensely and making frequent interventions on other characters whenever they need to do something that the gambit system just can't cover.
The gambits do feel a little odd if you just play through the game's main plot. The more you get into the optional challenges, the more you realise that they're a sensible solution for keeping the micromanagement required down to a sensible level during some pretty epic fights.
Are you sure? I couldn't get the best ending only because I got too frustrated with the last hidden boss. But you can get it on first play.
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In name, yes. The plot, however, has very little to do with the original, save for a small link to the other game that you wouldn't really notice unless you had played the other. It's not like you're going to meet Chrono in Chrono Cross or something.
I've played both. There really isn't much of a connection between the two. I sincerely wish that lawyers had not killed the fan-made sequel...