Eh, Chrono Trigger is overrated IMO. Let me explain. It's a great game with great themes, but people put in on a pedal waaay too much. I played it and enjoyed it to be sure, a 16-bit classic, but some people treat it like God Himself bestowed it upon we mere mortals. It deserves a lot of its praises, but I do think people go overboard and go on to claim it was the zenith of JRPGs. It was the zenith of its era, sure, but I can think of a few other games that surpass it for me (Valkyrie Profile, Lunar Legend, Earthbound, etc).
I feel the same way about ALttP in regards to Zelda. It's an okay game, but I think nostalgia tends to cloud a lot of judgements for the 16-bit era. ALttP probably gets a lot of attention because of the jump from Zelda 1 and 2; it simply did so much that was new. But for me it was just another 2D Zelda game. Although, you can't argue that XC1 did something right to reach the critical acclaim it did (92% on metacritic is not something that just happens out of luck). A lot of critics agreed that it revived what many saw as a stagnant JRPG market (who remembers talk around 2009-2010 about JRPGs being a dead genre?).
Anyway, to answer your question, XC2 is probably not a must have. If you're a JRPG maniac like myself, sure, go for it. It's not terrible, just has flawed edges. I forgot to mention, but it's pretty short in comparison to XC1 regarding the actual story. Most of my time in XC2 was grinding (like 60%) the rest was a mix of exploration plus doing actual story stuff. I didn't fiddle much with quests. It's not essential for most though. Maybe if they come out with a collector's edition that combines XC2 + the new Torna prequel.
Regardless, I'm turning my attentions to Octopath Traveler. That's mainly the reason I picked up XC2 again after all these months. Don't like to start one RPG without finishing another first.
I feel the same way about ALttP in regards to Zelda. It's an okay game, but I think nostalgia tends to cloud a lot of judgements for the 16-bit era. ALttP probably gets a lot of attention because of the jump from Zelda 1 and 2; it simply did so much that was new. But for me it was just another 2D Zelda game. Although, you can't argue that XC1 did something right to reach the critical acclaim it did (92% on metacritic is not something that just happens out of luck). A lot of critics agreed that it revived what many saw as a stagnant JRPG market (who remembers talk around 2009-2010 about JRPGs being a dead genre?).
Anyway, to answer your question, XC2 is probably not a must have. If you're a JRPG maniac like myself, sure, go for it. It's not terrible, just has flawed edges. I forgot to mention, but it's pretty short in comparison to XC1 regarding the actual story. Most of my time in XC2 was grinding (like 60%) the rest was a mix of exploration plus doing actual story stuff. I didn't fiddle much with quests. It's not essential for most though. Maybe if they come out with a collector's edition that combines XC2 + the new Torna prequel.
Regardless, I'm turning my attentions to Octopath Traveler. That's mainly the reason I picked up XC2 again after all these months. Don't like to start one RPG without finishing another first.