i like the music, graphics, variety of enemies/bosses, and multiplayer.
the "Days of Mana" special Nintendo Power ran got me pumped to play it, and is a great companion.
but combat is a little rough and usually degenerates to spamming magic.
also, the fixed-width text doesn't help with the bare-bones story.
overall it's flawed, but holds a special place in my heart.
maybe give SD3 a try. it's different, but a lot better and more challenging.
basically this. the music and visuals are good, but the actual gameplay and story are preeeettttyyy weak.
if I hear the music, I get excited, but if I have to play it I get bored.
it was the first JRPG I ever played and I remember feeling like it was incredible at the time - I had no concept of games being anything more than sidescrolling platformers and this felt like an epic adventure.
I don't blame you. It sucks. Fine graphics and a co-op function and a great cover illustration is all it has going for it. Everything else blows. If you aren't liking it, it's not going to get better further in, so you can just drop this now.
It's very, very rough
My first playthrough of it I kinda hated it and played like an idiot. You need magic, you absolutely need it for the bosses at the very least. They're too fast and there's too many misses
Can you even believe I got to the last part of the game without upgrading my magic and with missing the stupid misplaced Neko piece of shit on the floating island? No seriously, the damn piece of shit is on the other side of the map where there's nothing and you have to really go out of your way to get there, and the equipment is important so you don't get 1-2 hit KO on the new map, it's terrible. The monsters there has rare new equipment drops however and I almost managed that way before I lost my save file...
But no, actually do grind your magic and the game gets better that way. I replayed it in the Mana Collection and found a new appreciation of it, but the game is still and will always be rough as frick
>I can't get into this game.
whats the matter? dont like standing there for literally 12 seconds doing nothing like a moron to charge a pointless melee attack when you can just spam magic over and over by reopening that moronic wheel menu because the devs were too stupid to add shortcuts? the only people who like this game are small children and people with terminal autism
It's the clunky menu, the annoying illegible text box, the moronic party members and the camera. I've tried 2 time to get back into this game, but each time I stop right as the blonde-haird girl joins the party.
It's a barren beat 'em up with barebones substance and nice graphics. Horrible camera and unbalanced quasi-RPG mechanics. Probably one of the most overhyped game of the 16-bit generation.
its really obvious this game was a lot more refined before the cancellation of the addon ended up gutting the whole thing. i wonder what it looked like originally.
I'm right there with you, I think Secret of Mana is vastly overrated. In terms of its gameplay, it's just not very fun. It's got great art and the story seems okay, but the combat just feels awful.
The combat isn't all that deep but it's smooth enough and it feels very satisfying to hit and kill stuff. It's just held back by having to wait for your stamina between each hit/wait for enemies to get back up after being hit, and the long-ass higher level charge attacks. And the fact that spamming magic with the game basically on pause is the optimum strategy.
I guess the difference is that I just don't actually find hitting things to be satisfying, even when I wait for the meter to refill. The sound design is fine, but all the actual visuals of the enemy reactions to the hits are very stiff and delayed and don't give smooth feedback. Same for when enemies hit me, everything just feels stiff and delayed and unresponsive.
In combat you gotta get into a rythm. Instead of just standing there and slashing, i stab, walk away, keep moving while the gauge is filling up to avoid enemies, then approach and stab again. It's a lot more dynamic. And that's just the sword, there are other weapons and none of them is useless.
The bosses mostly suck though. You just bombard them magic and hope for the best.
Try the sequel Seiken Densetsu 3. I don’t like Secret of Mana, and have pushed myself to beat it, it’s not great, but the sequel improves on just about everything.
Life must be a bummer when you have poor taste
well at least you'd get to enjoy Secret of Mana that way
gottem
How so?
Yeah it's shit
As an ARPG predecessor it's not as good as Crystalis
Action RPGs are straight garbage.
It's definitely not Zelda
i like the music, graphics, variety of enemies/bosses, and multiplayer.
the "Days of Mana" special Nintendo Power ran got me pumped to play it, and is a great companion.
but combat is a little rough and usually degenerates to spamming magic.
also, the fixed-width text doesn't help with the bare-bones story.
overall it's flawed, but holds a special place in my heart.
maybe give SD3 a try. it's different, but a lot better and more challenging.
basically this. the music and visuals are good, but the actual gameplay and story are preeeettttyyy weak.
if I hear the music, I get excited, but if I have to play it I get bored.
it was the first JRPG I ever played and I remember feeling like it was incredible at the time - I had no concept of games being anything more than sidescrolling platformers and this felt like an epic adventure.
Agree the sequel is better though
That pic gives me major prog rock vibes.
That's a shame, it's one of the greatest games ever made.
It only gets worse
I don't blame you. It sucks. Fine graphics and a co-op function and a great cover illustration is all it has going for it. Everything else blows. If you aren't liking it, it's not going to get better further in, so you can just drop this now.
>Fine graphics and a co-op function and a great cover illustration is all it has going for it. Everything else blows.
>Doesn't even mention the music
Try using one of the romhacks that speed things up and fix the camera
https://cdromance.com/snes-rom/secret-of-mana-turbo-hack/
Some people might call it heresy but it the only other option is quitting bc you don't like it then it literally can't hurt
best thing about is the banging penultimate boss theme
It's very, very rough
My first playthrough of it I kinda hated it and played like an idiot. You need magic, you absolutely need it for the bosses at the very least. They're too fast and there's too many misses
Can you even believe I got to the last part of the game without upgrading my magic and with missing the stupid misplaced Neko piece of shit on the floating island? No seriously, the damn piece of shit is on the other side of the map where there's nothing and you have to really go out of your way to get there, and the equipment is important so you don't get 1-2 hit KO on the new map, it's terrible. The monsters there has rare new equipment drops however and I almost managed that way before I lost my save file...
But no, actually do grind your magic and the game gets better that way. I replayed it in the Mana Collection and found a new appreciation of it, but the game is still and will always be rough as frick
>I can't get into this game.
whats the matter? dont like standing there for literally 12 seconds doing nothing like a moron to charge a pointless melee attack when you can just spam magic over and over by reopening that moronic wheel menu because the devs were too stupid to add shortcuts? the only people who like this game are small children and people with terminal autism
>and people with terminal autism
'It's perfect then.
It's the clunky menu, the annoying illegible text box, the moronic party members and the camera. I've tried 2 time to get back into this game, but each time I stop right as the blonde-haird girl joins the party.
It's a barren beat 'em up with barebones substance and nice graphics. Horrible camera and unbalanced quasi-RPG mechanics. Probably one of the most overhyped game of the 16-bit generation.
Unironically a 10/10 game. Probably replayed this more than anything on the SNES save for ALTTP.
You have to bash your head harder against the monitor.
a game that in theory should be great but heavily brought down by its combat system
It's no Secret of Evermore.
It's short. Keep going till you beat it then form an opinion. Flawed as it is, i like it.
its really obvious this game was a lot more refined before the cancellation of the addon ended up gutting the whole thing. i wonder what it looked like originally.
Play till Flammie, then stop. Dev work stopped there, so I did too.
It's only for people with advanced autism.
Only low functioning Chris Chan tier autism where they get affixed to pretty colors and music
You simply gotta time travel back to 1993 or to when you were at an impressionable enough age.
I'm right there with you, I think Secret of Mana is vastly overrated. In terms of its gameplay, it's just not very fun. It's got great art and the story seems okay, but the combat just feels awful.
The combat isn't all that deep but it's smooth enough and it feels very satisfying to hit and kill stuff. It's just held back by having to wait for your stamina between each hit/wait for enemies to get back up after being hit, and the long-ass higher level charge attacks. And the fact that spamming magic with the game basically on pause is the optimum strategy.
I guess the difference is that I just don't actually find hitting things to be satisfying, even when I wait for the meter to refill. The sound design is fine, but all the actual visuals of the enemy reactions to the hits are very stiff and delayed and don't give smooth feedback. Same for when enemies hit me, everything just feels stiff and delayed and unresponsive.
In combat you gotta get into a rythm. Instead of just standing there and slashing, i stab, walk away, keep moving while the gauge is filling up to avoid enemies, then approach and stab again. It's a lot more dynamic. And that's just the sword, there are other weapons and none of them is useless.
The bosses mostly suck though. You just bombard them magic and hope for the best.
Subjective score: 9.9/10
Objective as I can be score: Maybe 6.5/10?
I love it but I can't deny it's flawed, and is unfinished too.
Try the sequel Seiken Densetsu 3. I don’t like Secret of Mana, and have pushed myself to beat it, it’s not great, but the sequel improves on just about everything.
Is it weird the sequel annoys me with the enforced pauses between hits, but waiting for recovery in the original doesn't?
If you're there you're already past the good part of the game anyway
Makes sense. It's not a good game.
Bigot.
Ok moron trashheap.
Just ignore it and play the only game that matters in this awful series: sword of mana, aka sword of KINO
>the inferior FFA
Worst contrarian shitpost in this thread.