Prior to this month I had never really played a Mana game.
I know that’s crazy.
Me?
The RPG Know it all?
I mean it’s not like I’ve never tried Mana.
I’ve started them all up through the release of Sword on GBA to the first combat field.
But I’d never managed to make it much farther.
As fate would have it, other things just came up.
Then SquareEnix sent me a free code for Collection of Mana.
A currently digital only Switch bundle of the first three games in the series (I say
“digital only” because the physical version won’t be out until the end of August).
Anyway: I thought the best way to show off the collection would be to stream Trials of
Mana, the Super Famicom sequel to Secret of Mana which had previously never been released
in the US.
Well not officially, a fan translation was completed in 2000 – giving English speaking
square fans roughly 20 years to experience its magic.
I know I have zero excuses.
But when I booted up the game I made a very last minute decision to play the entire collection
from start to finish.
I thought why jump in the middle; wouldn’t it be more interesting to see how the series
started?
So I played Final Fantasy Adventure instead.
And I’m glad I did.
I knew that the American name Final Fantasy Adventure was a calculated marketing ploy.
It was much easier to convince established fans to purchase another tried and true Final
Fantasy “sequel” than to ask them to take a gamble on a nonexistent Mana brand.
But what I didn’t realize was just how much Final Fantasy is actually in Final Fantasy
Adventure.
I jumped in expecting a total non sequitur.
What I discovered was a spinoff dripping in 8bit Final Fantasy charm.
I wanted to choke out my controller each time my poor Boy was afflicted with Moogle – the
adorably evil status effect turns the hero into a helpless Mog
who is barred from using attacks or spells while the enemies quickly chew through his
unarmored health.
It’s a bitch of a fate that was responsible for easily half my deaths but each time it
happened I couldn’t help but think to myself: “Huh.
Moogles?
That’s a Final Fantasy thing.”
And of course it wouldn’t be a Fantasy Fantasy game without the series mascot.
Behold!
The late game Chocobot – a robotic Chocobo capable of accelerated travel over both land
and water, accompanied by a bitchin’ remix of his iconic theme melody.
Otherwise it just looks like Final Fantasy.
I blame the shifty eyed character sprites.
Of which generally I’m not a fan.
I am in love however with the visual aesthetic of the later mana titles.
The huge hair floppy footed thing that started with three and peaked with Legend.
But, again, the series would take a few iterations before going full clown mode, and with the
sprite limitations of the Gameboy it’s really tough to avoid that signature Square look
without sacrificing all brand identity.
That said I did instantly recognize the Persian-inspired innkeepers with their turbans and baggy pants
– in fact the only element of the game that I recognized as being a squarely Mana thing.
Well… ok the innkeepers, Watts the Dwarf, and the Rabbites.
I think if Final Fantasy Adventure would have failed, it would have been awkwardly remembered
as that time Square tried to make a blatant Zelda RPG.
And I mean blatant.
Like Zelda you’ll spend your time In Adventure spelunking puzzle laden dungeons built from
tidy little square rooms.
Many of which hide passages conveniently positioned in the exact middle of any given wall.
Unlike Zelda however, these are not revealed by consumable bombs but by consumable Matlocks
– I mean butttocks, I mean pickaxes.
Or by an equipable late game morningstar.
Unlike Zelda however the puzzles are kind of a pain in the butt.
Many hinge on the manipulation of switches which require you to turn enemies into snowmen.
Mess up and the enemies don’t immediately return.
You’ll have to backtrack through a few rooms to trigger a respawn in order to attempt the
puzzle again.
And there-in lies my biggest complaint with Final Fantasy Adventure.
It’s clunky.
Most enemies have inane weapon immunities.
And there’s a ton of enemy types.
So especially in late game dungeons you’ll spend a ton of time opening menus and switching
equipment trying to find that one weapon to damage that one foe.
And when you do find it you’ll almost immediately have to switch again to damage the other little
bastards in the room.
I long for Secret of Mana’s menu wheel.
And then there’s the games mostly useless companions.
Being a handheld Gameboy title Final Fantasy Adventure is the only Mana game to understandably
not support 2 player.
Instead you’ll have to rely on the comically broken AI to control your very temporary party
companions.
Usually I can’t stand it when games repeatedly hot swap my teammates; but here?
It’s more than fine.
Welcomed even.
Seriously, they- they suck.
Even when the sole target on the screen is a huge boss enemy the AI will frequently turn
and open fire on an empty wall.
It’s pathetic.
There’s only two companions in the game that don’t suck, and instead swing a total
180 and are god tier level awesome.
There’s the HP recharging healer girl and MARCIE the MP restoration robot.
As you can imagine having a companion capable of regenerating your HP and MP on command
is totally broken and as such these characters are only ever available in very short bursts
throughout the game.
The only downside to ASKing these characters for help is opening the menu and triggering
an annoyingly sluggish text box.
Admittedly a small price to pay for phenomenal cosmic power.
Most of the adventure, though, is traversed alone.
Just you, the boy, and a clunky d-pad.
To be clear, I am now talking explicitly about the Switch port as included in the Collection
of Mana bundle.
I wanted to compare my shit Switch controller to a more authentic experience and booted
up the cartridge on my GBA SP.
There was a tremendous improvement.
The best test I found was the ice spell.
On the Switch it was nearly impossible to control, and I was very angry with a specific
portion of the game that suddenly required I use it skillfully.
On the GBA?
Not an issue.
Breeze to control.
Of course this is absolutely a controller problem and those of you who have invested
in nicer controllers than I may not run into the same issue.
Collection of Mana also offers three different visual options for the game display.
You have Gameboy green, which is a bit hard to see and probably only available as a novelty.
Stark monochrome grey which I personally found way too harsh to look at.
And red toned which had the bonus effect of making all bodies of water look like ominous
pools of blood.
It’s a shame that the collection didn’t include the Gameboy Color’s algorithmic
color upgrade.
On my GBA I noticed that the character sprites were a nice tone of red which contrasted suitably
against the background’s blues and greens.
If I had my druthers this would be the version I’d like to play on a big screen.
It just looks better.
That said, my complaints are all pretty minor.
The game, while I assume probably isn’t the best of the series, is a strong beginning;
I can see why it spawned so many sequels.
Running around the world beating up on bunnies and mushrooms is fun.
And the more the hero levels up, the more fun it becomes.
When you level up you can choose precisely where to invest your stat gains.
You decide whether the boy needs more attack power, more health points, more magic points
or a faster will regen.
You see there’s a bar across the bottom the screen and as your character does nothing
it fills up.
In the beginning of the game it won’t get much use, if at all.
It just refills way too slowly and the bar restarts anytime you attack or cast magic.
But as you gain levels and especially if you invest level gains into will the bar will
fill up faster and faster.
When it’s fully charged your hero will perform a weapon specific special move upon attacking.
I personally didn’t focus on will during my play through, opting for more raw strength
gains and a larger mana store.
During late game bosses I tried to time my attacks to utilize the zoom-y sword maneuver.
It worked – in theory.
But honestly it was more fun and time efficient for me to go full berserker warrior while
popping cure spells.
I did however notice on my cartridge save, that was created by whomever owned the cart
before me, that the will regen rate was completely nuts and I could easily pull off rapid successive
specials.
If you have the discipline to level your hero to 70 I absolutely recommend it.
Because zipping around the screen like the goddamn superman is an exhilarating way to
play the game.