Day of Lavos

Chrono Trigger is an RPG game where an inventor girl has invented a time portal by accident.
They travelled back in time and saved a queen. Then they thought the time portal is safe to use.
But after some conflicts and a misunderstanding in an execution, you, the inventor, and a princess, escaped using a different time portal.

This time, they ended up in the future, where everything was totally destroyed. the remaining survivors had to live hopeless and hungery.
Because the future had computers, they could watch back what has happened to the future. And the cause of the destruction was Lavos. Erupting out of the core and causes lava to rain over the entire planet. An absolute devastating monster.

Their goal was to change the history, hoping they could find clues to destroy Lavos before the day of the apocalypse.
Everytime they went in a different time peroid, you get to learn more about Lavos and it's origin. Almost the entire game, it's about Lavos' history and future. How it appeared, how people have aknowledged and used it. And what for catastrophe it could cause to the world if you don't stop Lavos.

At the latter part of the game, there are 3 different ways to face the final boss. Each of them allows you to fight the boss at a different phase. And the multiple ways can lead to different endings. There are also optional choices that can lead to even more different endings as well.
While there are multiple ways to trigger the fight, the one that hits me the most is the one that you do using the time machine itself.
The Time Machine was the most useful device, allowing you to go to different timezones at will and to travel through all places of the world.

When you were travelling at the day of the apocalypse. the princess asked if it was an idea to crash the Epoch at Lavos itself. I had to laugh at that part, but they were serious about it. That moment when you see the Time Machine travelling to the day of the apocalypse, it kinda brought me in tears. At the end, the team did manage to break through the outer shell, effectively skipping a long boss phase. But at the cost of the time machine itself.

It hitted me hard, as they had sacrificed their only hope of returning to their own timeline. They took the risk to be stuck forever. I didn't even want to know what kind of ending that can involve, so I decided to fight Lavos the 'normal' way instead. (Although it did had WAY too many forms!)

It's amazing that this game gives you so much information about a single devastating entity. And that it allows you to defeat it in many different ways that can lead to different endings as well. The game is truly a masterpiece when it comes to the final boss. With it's intimidating appearance, lore, music, different ways to fight the boss and different endings.

It's certainely one of my favorite (if not the best) boss fights ever fought.