Secret Of Mana
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SNES - U.S.
Squaresoft 1991
By Jesse Shepherd
Another great adventure from Square, Secret of Mana
is an Action/RPG in which three heroes hailing from
different parts of the world combine their strength and
skill to defeat Thantos, the ultimate evil. Three players
can control a character at one time provided they have
the SNES Multi-tap, making for one of the many great
features in SOM. The main character is the boy, child of
the mana knight and, um, a tree. He was chosen to wield
the blade of Mana and defeat Thantos. The second character
to arrive is the girl, a young woman hailing from the
kingdom of Pandora. Her father upset her so she journeyed
with the boy. Third, the magical sprite coming from a
world most do not know about. It was caught bumming GP
from the boy and girl, but they accepted its apology and
it joined their quest. The girl and the sprite are equipped with
the skill of magic, once the esper-like creature's powers
are gained. The girl is able to cast healing spells on the
party while the sprite can use its magic to attack foes. The
boy has no magic skill, but is very powerful with any weapon.
Special items are obtained throughout the game and improve the
fun factor in the game play. Airships aren't used in SOM like most Final Fantasies. Instead, your party cruises around on a flying mana beast! Wee! If you haven't gotten this far though, you can always rely on the Cannon Travel Centers, a place where a, um, caveman dumps you in his cannon and shoots you to wherever your destination is. The attack system includes a bar at the bottom of the screen. It stays at 100%, the most powerful attack rate. When you take a swing at an enemy, it drops to 0% and will recharge back to 100% for another guaranteed good hit if you do not hit anyone else in the process. Some people do not understand this and mash the attack button constantly, resluting in attacks around a 4% attack rate, doing maybe 2 to 3 points of damage. They find it difficult even to defeat the weakest enemy.
Some other neat features include the COMBO attack system. Weapons in SOM can gain levels up to 9, making them much stronger. The character with this weapon can also gain weapon levels...only as high as the weapon itself. When this is achieved, the attack bar can be charged up many times depending on how many weapon levels you've gained. When the charge reaches maximum, your character explodes into a super combo attack doing nearly 3X the normal damage to an enemy. The magic system in this game is also pretty neat. To learn spells for the girl and the sprite, you must capture the esper-like creatures from around the world, often resulting in a boss fight. Once captured, they will give your girl and sprite their magical abilities and the spells are learned forever. MP also returns in SOM, so use your spells wisely.
SOM consists of a wide variety of songs, more masterpieces
of Square's musical artists. Some of the best include the boss
theme and the credit roll track. Graphics are mediocre, and i
felt that they could be improved just a tad. Many times i saw
texture "patterns" where the same graphic was just placed
somewhere more than once. The animation was great. It shows in
the super combos the characters can perform. The enemies have a lot of movements and actions to them, as well as the magic spells of the girl and the sprite. A must for every Square RPG fan!
My Rating: *****highest, *lowest
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Story: * * *
Difficulty: * *
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