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 Legend of Mana

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Grungie
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PostSubject: Legend of Mana Legend of Mana I_icon_minitimeFri Nov 22, 2013 2:35 am

Legend of Mana Legend%20of%20Mana%20%5BU%5D%20%5BSLUS-01013%5D-front

Released in 1999 as Seiken Densetsu: Legend of Mana and released the following year in the US as Legend of Mana, it's the fourth game in the Final Fantasy spinoff series, the Mana series. Or if you're a hardcore fan, the Seiken Densetsu series (Legend of the Sacred Sword). Even though it's the fourth game in the series, it's the third one to make its release in the US. Despite the SNES being a sort of "golden age" for RPG's, it was the dark ages for non-Japanese fans because companies like Square and Enix released games whenever they felt like it. Because they thought Americans would never sit through a 30 hour game, and fuck PAL regions, they got the even shorter end of the rope, as they got a fraction of the games the US got.

So while we got the first two games, Final Fantasy Adventure (Seiken Densetsu: Final Fantasy Gaiden), and the highly influential Secret of Mana (Seiken Densetsu 2), they skipped out of localizing Seiken Densetsu 3. They claim it's because they had technical difficulties translating it, and it wouldn't fit in the American cartridges. Rumors are flying around that we also didn't get it because we were getting a different Square game, the Secret of Evermore instead. Whether it's true or not is left to speculation, but we're getting off track here.

Gameplay
The gameplay is a bit sandbox style, which was a pretty drastic compared to most other JRPG's, especially for its time. A big aspect of the game is the "land make" system. The world map is a blank slate, and throughout the game you collect items called artifacts. If you place an artifact on a spot on the map, it turns into a land region. So your first artifact contains the area where your home is, and then you collect later artifacts that can create the town of Domina, mines, etc. This is a great feature for those who find enjoyment in creating the layout of their world. With 36 artifacts to collect, there's an endless possibility of customizing your world.

Legend of Mana 3-PSD3D062

Along with creating your own world, you also get to focus on things you can do at your house. There's an extensive crafting guide to forge your own weapons and armor, or enhance the ones you have. There's also an orchard garden to grow your own fruits. These fruits go and help out with the monster corral which serve as your partners. You can raise various different creatures in the corral to assist you in battle.

The battle system is a bit like an action RPG, you fight on a horizontal plane, and you run around smacking your enemies with the sword in real time. In the early parts of the game, there isn't much strategy, just mash the X button until the enemy dies. As the game goes along, you learn special moves, but to use them, you must build up your meter by attacking enough times. It's almost like a limit break. Outside of boss battles, the battles themselves aren't very difficult as you heal after every battle.

Story:
Unlike most JRPG's, there isn't an overarching story, it's mostly consisting of just a bunch of random quests, about 67 total quests in total for the game, though you don't even have to do all 67 to complete the game. There is some story in the game, and it consists of 3 different branches, but it'll be a few hours before you even access the story, especially if you spend your time forging weapons and the like. Some quests have prerequisite quests to accomplish to even access them, but many of them can be started in any order.

Though this is where the game gets a bit tricky. There's much of the game that pretty much requires you to need a guide. While some NPC's that start the various quests give you a basic rundown for what to do for the quest, some of them can be either very vague, or just don't tell you anything. Talking to an NPC that says "I can't find my friend" will activate the quest, and there's times where that's all that is said. Tvtropes sums it up pretty well with how the guide is pretty much a requirement:

Spoiler:


Have fun pulling out your hair if you're one of those who are big on not using a guide to play their games. Seeing as many quests themselves give you incredibly vague descriptions on what to do, or worse, are incredibly vague to activate. So unless you're a completionist, it's not highly recommended to do everything in the game without a guide.

A big aspect of the game for keeping track of your quests is the Cactus Diaries. You have a cactus growing in your room, and you must talk to it after you complete a quest. If you miss your opportunity to talk to it, you'll miss out forever until you do a New Game Plus. Tvtropes also talks about how silly this gets:

Spoiler:


Visuals
Unlike Square's other RPG's that went for 3D polygons on a 2D prerendered background, Legend of Mana uses 2D sprites instead on the same prerendered backgrounds. The characters and backgrounds almost look like they were hand drawn, which gives this a feeling of a children's fantasy book you've probably read as a child. Even down to the colors, it looks almost like a pastel drawing. So whether or not you find the story to be a bitch to get through, you'll at least be pleased with scenery porn with it's beautifully drawn characters and scenery.

Legend of Mana Legend-of-Mana-This-Tues

Legend of Mana Legend_of_mana_001

Legend of Mana 64-PSD3D064

Music:
The music is also really good in this game. While some music matches other JRPG's in sound, there's diversity in there to make it stand out from the rest of the pack. So when you're getting annoyed at where the hell you're supposed to go, you'll at least be looking at a nice background and hearing wonderful music. Just ignore the annoying ass theme song sung in Swedish.







Verdict:
Legend of Mana is a pretty decent game, with its gorgeous hand drawn graphics and awesome scenery, the in depth crafting guide, there's plenty to enjoy in this game. It'll probably turn off many for its large lack of a story, and many quests being vague. One of the biggest downfalls of the game is how much of the quests leave you very lost, or have very tricky ways of activating them. The pretty much required use of a guide makes this game much more of a pain than it really needs to be. While handholding can make a game feel watered down, making it too vague is also a problem. If only there was a certain midway for this, the game could have been executed much better.

Music: 7/10.
Visuals (Or Graphics): 8/10.
Story: 6/10.
Content: 7/10.

Conclusion: 7/10
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Anorak
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PostSubject: Re: Legend of Mana Legend of Mana I_icon_minitimeFri Nov 22, 2013 3:41 am

That game looks really, really nice Grungie, along with your excellent review. Very informative, long, descriptive and fun. Very Happy

This was a really good read, thanks.

Would you like to be a reviewer?
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Grungie
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PostSubject: Re: Legend of Mana Legend of Mana I_icon_minitimeFri Nov 22, 2013 9:55 pm

I don't think I post enough to be a stable staff member
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Anorak
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PostSubject: Re: Legend of Mana Legend of Mana I_icon_minitimeFri Nov 22, 2013 10:00 pm

Okay, that is s understandable!
Your reviews are pretty good, can't wait to see more from you Smile
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Tapta
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PostSubject: Re: Legend of Mana Legend of Mana I_icon_minitimeMon Dec 02, 2013 8:04 am

This is an awesome review.
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