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By “surprise” I assume you mean a capital-friendly, poorly implemented solution that does not solve the underlying problem. All of your examples illustrate this.
The first black president was a war criminal who enacted a right wing agenda.
Gay marriage is likely to be overturned by our billionaire-owned, unaccountable Supreme Court.
Legal marijuana is a patchwork- the best states have inefficient and nonsensical cannabis regulations, and the worst states still have inhumane, draconian punishment.
Despite the small amount of forgiveness, the total amount of student loans owed is rising. Currently we are at a record high of $1.75 trillion in debt.
And as for universal healthcare, the number of uninsured and underinsured keeps rising. The number of deaths due to lack of access keeps rising. And there are many people, like myself, who have had their lives destroyed by medical bankruptcy. The entire system is designed to maximize profit, patient health is a secondary concern.
Chrono Trigger has all the elements done right- 10/10 music, 10/10 art style, RPG and battle systems that were innovative for the time and are still fun to play today.
But I think what sets the game apart as a timeless classic, a masterpiece, is its deep themes of existentialism. Marle has has a fake persona and a mistaken identity, yet we can still see her real self. Crono, as an avatar for the player, is sentenced to death and spared in the last moments. Robo, after being freed from his original programming, asks “Is this what it is like… to die?”
And that’s all just in the first act.
The ideas of Sartre, of Nietzsche, and perhaps most of all “Being and Time” by Heidegger were presented in a way that my 10-year-old self could comprehend and enjoy. But it’s not dumbed down for children, my 30-year-old self can still find deep meaning in the narrative and themes.
Plus, time travel is cool.