Very rareley to I describe a video game as timeless. It can be hard to find game nowadays that fit the bill perfectly. Along with classics like Super Metroid, Chrono Trigger and Final Fantasy 6 (3 for you americans), this is one of them. Playing Secret Of Mana is one of those rare occasions where you can immerse yourself completley into a magical world full of sadness, humor, imagination and storytelling that to this day is unrivalled. You play as a boy who pulls a sword out of a stone (very king arthur esque). Something strange occurs though - you start encountering enemy creatures along the path back to the village. Perplexed, but with no other option but to continue, the boy begins attacking in order to get home. Eventually you arrive in the village and are informed that the elders want to see you. They tell you that the strength of something called Mana had held the sword in place for many years and that by taking the sword out you have managed to upset the balance provided by Mana, and are therefore the sole cause of the destruction being caused by the enemies that have now appeared. You are promptly told to leave the village and never return again. As you dejectedly skulk out, you notice one of you 'friends' is in danger and you enter your first, rather simple, boss battle. On winning, a strange-looking man tells you to meet him in a temple not far from the village, and so begins your adventure to restore the power of Mana and the balance between good and evil. The first thing to mention is not to expect much character development. All characters have their backstorys, none of which are explored to any great depth. Many would see this as a flaw, in this particular case, its a strength. The focus here is not on our hero, its on the world around you. In turn, this means the focus is soley on the games main story and the flow of the story is not broken up into unnecessary filler to find out why our hero is who he is. By yesteryears standards, this game looks sensational. Water flows, tree's blow in the wind, the spells look great, your characters move in a convincing manner and the art direction in fantastic. In comparison to later SNES games, it isnt as good as say; Donkey Kong, but at its time of release, it was unrivalled. Sprites and enemies also deserve a mention as the diversity of characters mean you will rareley encounter duplicates. Combat takes a diffrent direction from the traditional random battles and turn based combat remenicent from the likes of Final Fantasy for example. Instead it follows the likes of Zelda: A Link to the Past, with a difference. Your attack meter works on percentages. When your battle meter is at 100% you will be attacking at full power. However when you swing your sword, your percent resets to 0. After which you will have to wait a second or so before you can attack again at full power. Your tools of destruction are plenty. From swords all the way to a boomerang, there are in total 8 weapons to choose from. You are also given 8 Elementals in which to cast magic spells from. You can also level up your weapons and magic by grinding making them more powerful, and unlocking new charge moves (similar to that of Links spin attack), and magic animations. The soundtrack is unbelievable. There is something about the music in this game that will have you humming as you play. You do not often get better music than in this game, that is a certainty. Your ears will wonder exactly what they have done to deserve such pleasure, and your brain will be unwilling to allow you to forget some of the sublime music. With a vast array of orchestrated pieces ranging from the light-hearted, playful tunes to the mysterious, dark and often spine-chilling compositions that all appear in the correct and relevant places everything fits into place perfectly and results in another Squaresoft aural masterpiece. Make no mistake - This game is amazing but its not without its flaws. The music sometimes cuts out when too many sounds are being played, and the AI of your characters are extremley dumb at times, the latter of which can be countered by playing with your friends (yes this game is multiplayer too). In Conclusion, this game is epic. A must own for any retro collecter. 9.0 Graphics Great graphics, everything looks alive. 10.0 Sound Magnificent. You'll be hard pressed to find a better soundtrack. 10.0 Gameplay Perfectly balanced combat, and paced adeptly. 10.0 Longevity A good 40 hours of gameplay to get out of this game. If you are one of those who like to get everything and max level your weapons etc; add another 10 hours onto the time. 49 OVERALL
Re: |SNES| - Secret Of Mana please can you read the review guidelines stickied in the review forum, this is a good start but it is missing a few things we require reviews to have. As a small suggestion, also consider centering your images.
Re: |SNES| - Secret Of Mana This game is epic, that's for sure. Good first review (I think it's your first but may be mistaken). Just please make sure you comply with the review rules. They are there to make the reviews look better and make them more helpful and easier to read. Otherwise any old schlep could write a four line review about a game and that wouldn't necessarily constitute a review. The more complete it is, the better. However, you did well and its nearly complete. Just include the various things you are missing as Loonylion suggested. Good game though.
Re: |SNES| - Secret Of Mana Sorted. All I was missing was the scoring? Ah well. I wrote this a while ago for IGN Reader Reviews.
Re: |SNES| - Secret Of Mana You also forgot your name in the title - just a minor problem. Nice review though, hope to see more
Re: |SNES| - Secret Of Mana Now your just being pedantic. Since when does the way I score the game matter? Surley the actual content of the review is the thing that matters, not how I score it.
Re: |SNES| - Secret Of Mana It's the reviewing rules, please follow them. Rules are on this page: https://www.romulation.org/forum/index.php/topic,4904.0.html
Re: |SNES| - Secret Of Mana It matters, because if all the games are scored using the same system it is easier to compare them.
Re: |SNES| - Secret Of Mana Well, nice first review, b00ned. I want to see more. UR TALKING TO ADMIN, D00D! But really, the rules are meant to be followed. Although I prefer the way you score it (with longevity).
Re: |SNES| - Secret Of Mana This game is epic... After playing Sword of Mana for the gba, I was all like: "Why the hell am I playing this piece of ****?" And then I remember its grandparent. epic
Re: |SNES| - Secret Of Mana I remember playing this game with friends all the time when I was younger. Awesome game that always served to keep us entertained and I didn't have to deal with the stupid AI since my friends knew how to use a controller! The magic was too easy to abuse though IMO, the magic users were invincible during the casting and the enemies couldn't move or anything when getting hit so you had some time to charge up your attacks a bit more so you could get another really nasty hit on them if they managed to survive the spammed magic attacks.
Re: |SNES| - Secret Of Mana This game is awesome, I had a lot of fun times with this. Only thing I hated was that useless girl that follows you around, it's just like "die bitch".
Re: |SNES| - Secret Of Mana Aye, the NPC AI was never good in any of the Mana series. But you can fix that by getting a friend to play with you. But seriously, it isn't be as bad as it got in Sword of Mana.
Re: |SNES| - Secret Of Mana Man, I love this game. This was actually one of the first rpgs I owned. I spent countless hours of entertainment on that masterpiece right there.
