Topic: The Mana (Seiken Densetsu) Fan Thread

@Tyranexx Very much so. It's absolutely dated, but it was a great game boy game for the time. Play it with context in mind and there's a lot to enjoy.

I had hoped for Legends of Mana as well, but I'll take what I can get. It's nowhere near as fondly remembered as the first 3, anyways.

Yes. It's a humble gameboy game, but it pulls of some neat Zelda-esque gameplay.

Seems alot of people enjoy Legend of Mana, makes me wonder if I missed something. I played it years ago on PS One and will admit was excited to play it since Secret is one of my favorite SNES games but I was just left with disappointment. Gameplay wise it was nothing like Secret and had this odd sim like game mode IIRC it was totally disappointed by it as I said so what am I missing?

You're not the only one. It was a very different game...and very unpolished mechanically, but so are most of Square's games. Many were disappointed, and I rarely hear good things about it. I only ever played a little. I liked the music, at least.

Huh... This is the first time I see people actually being negative of it, like between my friends and I, and ones that I meet online, we all really enjoyed Legend of Mana (even just enjoy chatting with friend as she speedrun the game to one of the endings)

Overall I would say it's quite polished, just that it's not explained well. I also love the fact that you put dungeons in the Map thing, and putting them at certain distance from the middle, as well as what's around them also affect things. Makes replaying them a bit more fun.

I also like the story, although it can end up mindboggling on how to unlock the 2nd or 3rd ending I think? My memories fuzzy, but I remember liking it.

There's also the fact that nearly every monster can also be your pet Very nice overall, and with detailed and good graphics, the game just oozes with charm imo.

@darkfenrir I've mostly just know about it from a handful of people ripping into it and pointing out things like how easy it is to miss stuff, or how repetitive the combat is, or deep dives into the gameplay mechanics that expose exploits and things that don't work like you'd expect them to...again, most Square games have a lot of problems if you know where to look.

The biggest issue is that it's a huge departure from the previous Mana games, which throws people off. Just like how Chrono Cross was either a masterpiece or complete garbage for a lot of people depending on how much they expected it to be Chrono Trigger 2, expectations are big factor in how much people enjoy things.

@CanisWolfred Ahhh, that made sense. I didn't play any of the previous Mana to have some sort of expectation, and instead went into them with the Legend of Mana expectations so it's very jarring.

While I can recommend the game on the fact it's still good, I must admit that in current age, that game needs a lot of polish. Hopefully SE will see after Trials of Mana that we love this kind of thing, perhaps.

@darkfenrir That probably why I am not big on Legend either. Going off of Secret of Mana I was expecting a similar game kind like how similar Seiken Densetsu III is and instead getting a completely different game play style. Perhaps if it was called something else I would have enjoyed it more but with it tied to the Mana series I was disappointed.

What's funny to is that for awhile I thought Legend was Seiken Densetsu III for a long time. I knew that Secret of Mana was the second game in the series and knew there was a third game but I never seen it (this was a time before the internet was big like it is now) so when Legend came out I assumed that this must be the third game, which obviously is not. That could be another reason why I don't like it.

Physical Limited run up on Square Enix site:

UK - https://store.eu.square-enix-games.com/en_GB/product/564531/c...
US - https://store.na.square-enix-games.com/en_US/product/562426/c...

You get the idea

Thanks folks. I think I'm more sold on the collection than I was. 😁 I was gonna play Secret of Mana on the SNES Classic but may hold off until I can properly dig into this collection.

@Bunkerneath Wait, the physical run is limited?

@Tyranexx From their video:

Hullo everyone!

I immediately pre-ordered the Collection. I can't wait to play Trials. I was bummed to find out it is 2 players only. I didn't know the original was 2 players only as well, it would have been nice if they upped that to 3, so that I could've played it with my two boys, but we can do that in Secret of Mana so no big loss.

This will be the fourth time I buy Secret of Mana, haha. SNES, Virtual Console, SNES Mini and now this.

As for Legends of Mana, count me among the dislikers too. I could NOT get into it. I bought it the instant it became available for import, back in the day, but I somehow got stuck relatively early on in the game and it just didn't feel like a Mana game to me, so I gave up.

@Bunkerneath I see. Thanks! The irony is that I just got an email from Square Enix confirming that it's indeed a limited run. Looks like I'll be setting up another preorder lol.

Ugh that is so rude that it is limited. I may snag that to collect but if it sales out I'll pass and wait on the remake of 3.

Alright, Seiken Densetsu fans, level with me: are Secret and Trials worth playing solo? I know you can, technically, but some games are just vastly better experience in multiplayer. My only real experience with this series is the remake of FFA.

I'm not hugely interested in going local mp with games like these, so if I got this, I'd be going for a full solo experience.

@Ralizah In my opinion, having to babysit your AI partners, who frequently tend to get stuck on objects when going from screen to screen, was too much of a hassle to bear in Secret of Mana. It also has a bunch of other oddities, many of which stem from it having originally been developed for the CD add-on Nintendo was making in collaboration with Sony that ultimately lead to the Playstation. It really hasn't aged well, IMO, and I was really hoping the remake would fix a lot of that, but I'm not sure it did.

Trials of Mana, though, is much better for solo play. I didn't play with any patches other than translation, so there were a few bugs I had to watch out for, but otherwise, combat was more fluid, allies didn't get stuck and prevent me from moving forward, and the magic system was far and away an improvement. I also think it looks gorgeous and I think it has a better story with more fleshed out characters than Secret of Mana.

@CanisWolfred Yeah, RE: Secret of Mana, that's what I was afraid of. Sounds like Trials is good time, though. Since Trials isn't being sold on its own, I'll probably just wait for the remake of Trials of Mana, then, or get the collection when it's on sale (because, honestly, I thought the remake of FFA was pretty fun, so I have to imagine the OG Game Boy title probably still holds up as well).

Thanks for your input!

@Ralizah No prob. Yeah, if the remake is anywhere as good as Adventures of Mana, it really should be the priority.

@Multifists Yeah, it's pretty faithful remake and one I greatly enjoyed. It's modern in all the right ways while still feeling like the original classic.

@CanisWolfred The Trials of Mana remake looks WAY more elaborate and modern than Adventures of Mana. I'm pretty excited for it. The visual style is beautiful, and the gameplay reminds me of something out of a modern Ys game.

@Multifists Adventures of Mana is fun, although it's VERY MUCH just a new coat of paint applied to a very old game, so it feels... well... aged. It's pretty neat, though: not unlike an older Zelda title.

@Ralizah Just FYI, Final Fantasy Adventure was called Mystic Quest in Europe. I know, very confusing.