Video Games : Legend of Mana

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from: Square Enix

: Legend of Mana
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Price: $113.99
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Binding: Video Game
Brand: Squaresoft
EAN: 0662248900063
ESRB Age Rating: Teen
Label: Square Enix
Manufacturer: Square Enix
Manufacturer Minimum Age: 156 months
Platform: PlayStation
Publisher: Square Enix
Sales Rank: 6358
Studio: Square Enix



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Editorial Review:

Editorial Review:
Though it lacks the dramatic intensity of the Final Fantasy series--the crown prince of console role-playing games--SquareSoft's Legend of Mana still satisfies with its beautiful hand-drawn sets and its innovative nonlinear gameplay.

Billed as the sequel to the Super Nintendo's Secrets of Mana, Legend of Mana's story contains more than 60 self-contained miniquests, but generally the goal is to restore the world's Mana, or life energy. Gamers won't need to be obsessive about winning all the quests, but there are some challenges that must be completed if you wish to reach the final showdown. The game begins as players choose either a male or female lead character while a map displays the new lands within the world of Fa'Diel. In each of these lands, players will find items and clues they can use in other lands. The fragmented nature of the game can be disorienting for gamers looking for quick gratification. A diary can be used to keep track of current miniquests, while an encyclopedia neatly organizes the vast amount of story players uncover. Due to the vast nature of this game's plot, you'll likely need these features to stay focused on your quests.

Anime fans will be wowed by the character design and beautifully illustrated storybook backgrounds. The game includes a Pokémon-style monster-raising element, which is surprising for a teen-rated RPG, but it works well. --Porter Hall

Pros:

Cons:



Customer Reviews
Average Rating: out of 5 stars

Rating: 5 out of 5 stars - Very charming, very cool and very great game!
One of the few games that manages to be charming and cute while still retaining an undeniable coolness! its a game that feels like reading a great fairy tale, and the best thing is that the plot is non linear so you are actually taking part in the evolving fairy tales around you. The game play is pretty interesting real time 2d side scroll battling. With monster raising, item creation and world placement features. ALSO the Soundtrack is one of the best game related OSTs ever!


Rating: 4 out of 5 stars - addicting
this game is addicting and fun, but i gave it 4 overall stars because it gets boring quick. especially the first missions. but it passes the time and it really is a fun game to play anytime.
...
the musics really pretty and cool too...


Rating: 2 out of 5 stars - An embarassment compared to Secret of Mana...
The first Mana game, Final Fantasy Adventure, was awesome. So was its remake called Sword of Mana. And Secret of Mana, for the SNES, was an amazing classic beloved by many after all these years. So what happened with Legend of Mana?

First off, this game doesnt have the free flowing world and fighting of the previous games. There is no linking areas to travel between. Each area/dungeon has its own little space and must be found by doing quests. After you have obtained the new area you can place it anywhere on the world map, for reasons not wholly known or cared for. Its a very strange concept at best.

And the battles. Oh, what a terrible system!
When you enter a battle, all of which are preset and cannot be avoided, your character moves in stutter steps. He/she moves somewhat like a fencer, a pace at a time. This makes for awkward movement. And if you want to dodge enemies you have to move up and down. Want to attack? You can only attack the left and right. This two-way dodge/attack system was totally uneccessary compared to Sword and Secret of Manas free moving combat.

And the difficulty of the game... or lack there of.
In battle you can hide in a corner and slowly replenish life. Have a teamate? Stand close to them and you will regain life about 3x faster then normal. And sometimes defeated enemies drop candy which replenish all or most of your life. Oh, and after every battle you regain ALL of your life.
There are more ways to heal your character in battle than to attack!

All in all this game is a garbled mess. Its a failed attempt of Square to make a 'unique' Mana game which strays from the original formula. I cannot believe this game came from the same company as Secret of Mana, the Chrono games, and the Final Fantasy games. Avoid at all costs.


Rating: 4 out of 5 stars - Legend of Mana (ps 1)
If any of you guys out there like games that let you become super-involved, this is the game to get. I'm a huge fan of Secret of Mana and I expected this game to be very similar, and in a way it is, but in a lot of ways it's not. I'm gonna try to break it down for you in as many categories as I can.
Graphics. The graphics are very creative, bold, colorful, and pleasing to the eyes. They have that "hand-drawn" effect, which makes you feel like you're in a fantasy world. Being a student of the arts, I really love how the maps, backgrounds, and foregrounds just make this a piece of work that's worth checking out.
Gameplay. At first, it was hard to understand the controls and how to control your character during a fight sequence. However, once you get the hang of using you're magic powers, creating combos (that don't give you that huge recovery time) and maneuvering around the map, the game starts to open up a ton. You can almost feel a difference in the weapons you use, pending their strength, range, speed, and overall effectiveness they have on a particular enemy. Overall takes some getting used to.
Concept. If any of you are fans of the Final Fantasy games, this game is for you. Even though it doesn't really have ONE HUGE plot, there are lots of little side quests that ultimately lead you to what you have to do. There lots of ingenious features to the game that are advanced for it's time, which makes it a good buy.
Overall Fun. Dude...this game kicks. Once you get the hang of it, you can't stop. I've seriously logged, like, 40 hours on this game already and I know I'm not even halfway done with it yet. There's SO MUCH stuff you can do and get. The weapons, armor, monster raising, golem building, allies, 2 player features, event-sensitive environments, amazing music and even more stunning graphics make this game a TOTAL MUST HAVE in the moderate-to-serious gamers collection. Like I said, if you like Final Fantasy, you'll love this game. It's like...fighting sequences of Secret of Mana and the gameplay of FF. I didn't know this game from Adam...I bought it on a whim (which i'm sure you're doing too) and i LOVE it. so BUY IT NOW because it'll be gone before you know it.


Rating: 1 out of 5 stars - Hate nonlinear plots... hate em hate em hate em (unless they're done right)
Despite all that, there is a right way to do them, as well as the wrong way, which they just did. If you want a plot that works, make every action depending upon your specific reaction have roughly ten possible outcomes, but then merge them later weave 20 or 30 separate plots depending on what you have done, and that can suddenly shift if you do something really odd, and make the story alter entirely. Instead Legend of Mana appeared from when I played it to be nothing more than a bunch of loosely strung together garbage- go to a town, solve the puzzle, hear a bunch of drivel that doesn't add up to anything else in your head, get the item and build a new town. The only thing that was recurring was that the faerie princess kept losing her way from what I played, but what did that have to do with anything.

This is an example of a good nonlinear plot:

You are a child in a town that gets destroyed by an evil overlord. The survivors worship you as the hero and fully expect you to right wrongs and destroy the overlord (base plot). Now as you set out, you're swinging your sword about like a fool and you kill a cat by accident. You get arrested for animal cruelty, and put in prison. So then in prison you meet a rogue girl who sets you free, and she tell you that the overlord is small potatoes, that the real problem is this organization that is supposed to be the law but is imposing too harse penalties on minor offenses, so under her tutelage, you become a career criminal. OR you continue on your way and the overlord send an assassin to poison your drink, but she has a change of heart and drug it instead. You get sent as a slave to be a gladiator, but you fight well and impress the army and instead fight in a war. OR you continue unswayed and finally reach the overlord's castle only it seems the townspeople were lying, the guy is really a paladin who saw extreme corruption in the town, and put an end to it, and he has proof. So you march right back tothe town and see that he was right.

This is nonlinear plotline, the plot can make any twist imaginable throughout the game, even sacricing the original antagonize or even the hero. Assume the hero died in the thief story, the plot might now revolve around the rogue girl, and her adventures.



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