The Radical Child

Mana World Ransom

Square-Enix’s Seiken Densetsu series, known as Mana outside Japan, began as a spinoff of the Final Fantasy franchise, the first installment for the Gameboy known to Anglophones as Final Fantasy Adventure. While North American gamers would receive its first sequel for the Super NES, Secret of Mana, its sequel, only a few years prior given the official English name Trials of Mana, remained absent outside Japan until recently. The next Mana game Anglophone players would receive after Secret was Legend of Mana, with Square-Enix in recent years breathing new life into the series with remakes and remasters, Legend among the recipients of this treatment for Windows, the Nintendo Switch, and PlayStation 4. Is the rerelease worth playing?

Legend of Mana occurs in the world of Fa’Diel, where war incinerated the Mana Tree, and all the world’s various lands and inhabitants stored in artifacts, the first of which is a mailbox that creates a home serving as the playable male or female protagonist’s home base, with the primary hero or heroine tasked with rebuilding the world to its former glory. There are plenty of well-developed mini-stories throughout the game, and many memorable characters, although the central narrative is somewhat lacking, along with the general poor direction of the overall plot and accommodating gameplay.

The translation largely remains unchanged from the PlayStation version’s, which is a good thing, as it was one of the strongest ones of the original incarnation’s era, with nary a spelling or grammar error in sight, different dialects for certain characters such as Teapo’s Cockney speak and the pirate penguins, general comprehensible dialogue, occasional humor with references to things such as “getting stoned” and “being hard,” and the like. The font choice was definitely good, as well, with only minor spots in the localization regarding certain names such as “tako bugs”. Regardless, the translation very much helps the remaster far more than hurts.

Legend features a methodical structure where the player, largely through the completion of story quests, receives artifacts they place on the overworld to rebuild a town, dungeon, or field, new adventures encountered provided they’ve conversed with the right NPCs, entered an area, or fulfilled an objective that admittedly might necessitate use of a guide to uncover. Many quests revolve around traversing open fields and dungeons and maybe defeating a boss, and after a mission’s completion, the player can converse with Li’l Cactus at their home to get him to write a brief journal entry, with opportunities for obtaining these missable should players complete another quest in the meantime.

Within fields and dungeons, the player will frequently encounter enemies, which causes the screen to lock into place, akin to a beat-em-up arcade game, the general combat mechanics taking plentiful cues from the aforementioned gaming genre. When starting a new game, the player can select the hero or heroine’s initial weapon, although they can change to other weapon types throughout the game, and in the game menus, the player can assign skills such as jumping and dodge-rolling to two buttons, whilst the other two dictate weak and strong attacks, players able to string these in combination strikes.

There are plentiful safeguards against potential frustration with the game mechanics, such as the ability outside battle, new to the remaster, to toggle enemy encounters on or off except for storyline battles necessary to advance a subplot, not to mention the protagonist and his/her two allies starting each fight at full health. The player’s companions typically consist of a character central to the storyline and either a “pet” the player can capture through certain means and raise or a golem with fixed stats, sentient allies and pets able to level alongside the protagonist.

One of the main issues with Legend’s game mechanics, however, lies in its reward system, with defeated enemies dropping either an item for instant health recovery within the battle (with there being no system of consumable items, although a character’s health will slowly restore when they stand still), an item for various uses in things that may necessitate a guide, or experience crystals and coins any of the characters can collect, although without the use of a certain accessory or an additional player to control the second character, leveling allies can be somewhat taxing, and the hero or heroine will very easily be an experience hog, and experience crystals disappear after a few seconds.

Fortunately, battles tend to be quick affairs, although they generally don’t become too complex, the protagonist occasionally getting special skills they can use when their ability gauge is full, although these tend to require a great deal of foresight, given that their execution causes them to stand still for a few seconds before ultimately unleashing the skill, with enemies having ample opportunity to get out of the way. Should the main character or one of his/her allies lose all health, they naturally remain unable to fight, although gauges gradually fill that, when full, thrust them back into action with full health, but all characters losing all hit points results in a game over.

Given the generous save system, more generous in the remaster, however, wasted playtime is minimal, and as long as the player takes advantage of things such as blacksmithing to create better weapons and equipment, they’ll have little problem making it through the central storyline. The game mechanics generally work decently, battles being optional in the remaster being a major plus, along with some nifty features such as enemies blinking before executing powerful skills, although there are issues aside from the reward system such as having to track down certain allies to get them back in the party, given that they leave whenever the player enters their home, and in the end, the gameplay is largely serviceable.

On the subject of saving, Legend of Mana still has golden sprite statues where the player can record their progress, but most of the time outside combat, they can save anywhere, somewhat making said idols superfluous. The menus are generally easy to get a handle of, with an auto-equip function for the protagonist and no need to worry about the equipment of allies, although there exist major issues with regards to the field and dungeon designs, which can be convoluted, the total absence of in-game maps not helping. There’s also the difficulty of finding out how to advance the game without consulting a guide, and in the end, the remastery team could have made some effort to increase user-friendliness.

Yoko Shimomura’s soundtrack is one of the game’s highlights, with plenty beautiful town themes such as in Domina and Gato, and epic field and dungeon themes, the player able to choose between orchestrated or original instrumentation, and listen to any track within the game. The sound effects are somewhat generic and lack diversity, but otherwise, the remaster is a definite aural treat.

One could possibly say the same about Legend of Mana being eye candy, given plentiful positives such as the superb character and enemy designs and gorgeous environments scaled to contemporary widescreen televisions, along with a new, nice anime introduction before the title screen. However, the pixilation of the animate character and enemy sprites is very noticeable, and there are some reskins and recycled environments as well, and while the graphics rise above average, they don’t reach excellence.

Finally, the game can take as little as twelve hours to beat with a straightforward playthrough, up to twenty-four if the player decides to partake in every available quest, with a New Game+ theoretically adding replayability, although the weak control and ability to do every quest in a single playthrough (some are, however, missable), may deter players from wanting to go through again.

Overall, Legend of Mana is a bit of an odd duck, undoubtedly a polarizing game, given some of the unrefined aspects such as its game mechanics (which are otherwise decent), its control, the general absence of a strong overarching storyline, the unpolished parts of the visuals, and the average lasting appeal. However, it does have many astounding aspects, particularly its engaging mini-stories, the solid localization, and the beautiful soundtrack. Much like the Final Fantasy franchise from which the Mana series derives, the game, like many before and after it, dared to be different, and for the most part did a decent job in that respect, warranting a look, if nothing more.

This review is based on a playthrough of the PlayStation 4 version digitally downloaded by the reviewer.

The Good:
+Serviceable game mechanics.
+Interesting subplots.
+Excellent translation.
+Superb soundtrack.
+Good art direction.

The Bad:
-Guide necessary to get most of game.
-Dungeons and fields need maps badly.
-Weak overarching storyline with poor direction.
-Some rough spots in remastered graphics.
-Can be slightly tedious to go through again.

The Bottom Line:
Not the best Mana game, but still a decent remaster.

Score Breakdown:
Platform: PlayStation 4
Game Mechanics: 6.5/10
Controls: 5.0/10
Story: 8.5/10
Localization: 9.5/10
Music/Sound: 9.5/10
Graphics: 6.5/10
Lasting Appeal: 5.0/10
Difficulty: Moderate
Playing Time: 12-24 Hours

Overall: 7.5/10

Trials with Class

While critics and fans largely regard Secret of Mana on the Super NES to be one of the greatest games of all time, its remake for the PlayStation 4 and Vita attracted significant criticism, especially from those who consider the original game infallible (which I don’t). Thus, there was naturally some trepidation at the announcement that Square-Enix was giving similar treatment to the long-untranslated Seiken Densetsu 3, given the official English name Trials of Mana, although expectations were more cautiously-optimistic given the original version’s beloved disposition in the fan translation world, with the remake meeting said anticipation.

Trials follows six different protagonists: the swordsman Duran, the beastman Kevin, the amazon Riesz, the thief Hawkeye, the sorceress Angela, and the healer Charlotte. Upon starting a new game, the player chooses one of these characters to be the main one, with two allies selectable among the bunch. Each character has different prologues before meeting their companions (with players able to play through those of the chosen protagonist’s allies once encountered), and afterward, it’s off to save the power of Mana from exploitation by dark forces. The story has plenty positive elements, such as a well-developed cast, political and religious themes, and the like, but there are little to no links to other Mana games, and one big plot twist in Duran’s quest has been done to death.

The localization is perhaps the remake’s weak point. While the dialogue certainly is legible, lips mostly sync with voices during voiced cutscenes, and the menus are clean, there is a lot of unnatural battle dialogue, with the convention of characters shouting the names of their attacks not translating well to the Anglophone world, and the script makes some questionable decisions such as referring to the Mana Faerie who joins the chosen characters early on as “Faerie” instead of “the Faerie,” which accounts for some awkward dialogue. In the end, Square-Enix does from time to time produce its share of translation turkeys, with Trials among them.

Fortunately, the gameplay largely compensates, with the remake taking more chances in this department than its predecessor’s updated rerelease, visible enemies encountered on fields and in dungeons between towns, and the battlefield limited to a certain area from which the player can escape by running towards the yellow border for a few seconds. However, combat is entertaining enough so to the point where most players likely won’t want to evacuate, and the adjustable difficulty accommodates players of different skill levels. The player manually controls one character, although they can switch control to the others any time during combat.

The controlled character the player can have string a series of combination attacks with the circle and triangle buttons, and even jump to attack aerial enemies. Some foes have a barrier the player needs to eradicate by attacking with a charged triangle button attack, breaking the monotony of battle at times. AI controls the character’s allies, the player having a number of options to adjust it in the game menus, dictating things such as how much of their MP they’ll use before conserving, and the option to use consumable items, nine of each the player can have at one time in battle in the franchise’s trademark item ring (which also has a limit to how many different item types players can have in combat).

One neat feature of combat is that before foes execute special skills, the game shows a “danger zone” that the controlled character can safely evade. Defeating all enemies in a battle nets experience for all characters, which occasional level-ups providing the leveling characters one or more training point the player can invest into five different stats so that they can learn occasional passive and active abilities, the protagonist and their allies initially able to equip up to two of the former, although this limit increases to four and six with respective class changes. When a character reaches level eighteen, the player can change their class in a light or dark direction at a Mana Stone, which unlocks more powerful training abilities. The next class change is possible at level thirty-eight with the addition of a special item gained from planting ??? Seeds, adding further abilities.

In addition to being able to rest and recover at inns, the player can also plant different item seeds to obtain various items, which in turn gradually levels up the item planter, with higher levels meaning better items. The game mechanics generally work well, aside from the tough decision of which classes to which to change the player’s characters and occasional idiocy of the AI in areas such as allies attacking shielded foes with normal attacks and not caring about enemy danger zones, but with the choice of characters and the class system itself, there’s plenty of diversity in playstyles, and the endgames for each character aren’t terribly drawn out.

Trials also interfaces well with players, with an easy menu system that’s light-years better than in the original version as well as explicit direction on where to go next to advance the narrative. Moreover, virtually all voiced dialogue is skippable, even in many instances actions occurring in between the delivery of lines, and maps help players with their journey. The only issues are the lack of a suspend save, given the occasional iffy placement of save points (gold ones fully restoring the party, silver statues allowing saving only), and the lengthy load times, but control is another high in the remake.

Composer Hiroki Kikuta returns from Secret to compose its sequel’s soundtrack, with players able to select between the remixed version in the remake or the original Super Famicom version, as well as select between English and Japanese voices. The main theme is superb, and there are plenty other standout tracks such as the various town themes, field tracks, and dungeon themes, although places such as the Windhall lack music. The voice performances are also of mixed quality, especially with the unnatural battle dialogue, but the sound effects are good, and the remake is overall easy on the ears.

The Trials remake uses a cel-shaded anime visual style that looks pleasant for the most part, with good character and enemy models, the former having moving lips during voiced cutscenes, although many of the latter consist of reskins. While the environs largely look pretty and colorful, there is noticeable environmental popup of distant elements and noticeable dithering at times, alongside blurry, pixilated texturing when the player views scenery up-close. The rerelease is definitely more than artistically competent, but has some kinks the developers could have worked out.

Finally, the remake is fairly short, with players potentially able to blaze through in at least twelve hours, and while the choice of characters when starting a new game and PlayStation Trophies make for nice lasting appeal, there isn’t much side content otherwise.

Ultimately, Trials of Mana, regardless of which platform players choose to experience it on, shows that Square-Enix’s Mana series yet has life, given the solid redesigned mechanics, excellent control, different choice of playable characters, great soundtrack, good visuals, and plenty reason to come back. Granted, it does have issues regarding its derivative story elements and spotty localization, although to date it remains one of the strongest entries of the Seiken Densetsu franchise, certain to please most gamers, most likely those that didn’t care much for the Secret of Mana remake.

This review is based on a single playthrough with Duran, Angela, and Charlotte on Beginner difficulty.

The Good:
+Great redesigned combat system.
+Solid control.
+Different party setups and playstyles.
+Excellent soundtrack.
+Nice visuals.
+Plentiful lasting appeal.

The Bad:
-Some derivative story elements.
-Spotty localization.
-A few weak voice performances.

The Bottom Line:
An ideal remake.

Score Breakdown:
Platform: PlayStation 4
Game Mechanics: 9.0/10
Controls: 9.0/10
Story: 6.5/10
Localization: 4.0/10
Music/Sound: 8.5/10
Graphics: 7.5/10
Lasting Appeal: 9.5/10
Difficulty: Adjustable
Playing Time: 12-15+ Hours

Overall: 8.0/10