Collection of Mana part 3

Before we begin I want to apologize for how long this took to come out. Sorry but a lot of real-life stuff got in the way and I couldn't get any time to write this thing. My apologies but I'm here now to review the third and final game in the Collection of Mana, Trials of Mana.

This is a pretty big deal since it's the first time the game has been officially released in the west. Originally released in 1995 for the Super Famicom, Japanese Super Nintendo for those not in the know, and was never released outside of Japan. This was for two reasons, chief being that it was a very late release on the system with it being released the same year as the original Playstation and would have cost a fortune to translate. The other reason was technical limitations, they couldn't fit the game onto a Super Nintendo cartridge and there was a bug that would prevent the game from being certified anyway. It's a shame the game was never released but there is an unofficial fan translation that's been available for years so it's not like English speaking audiences haven't been able to play it, this is just the first time they've been able to play it in an official capacity. I'm surprised Square actually did this but I guess with the upcoming remake they felt it was time for western audiences to experience the original. Whatever the reason we have the game now and we can see what we've been missing out on for all these years.

The backstory for Trials of Mana is that centuries ago the Goddess of Mana battled against 8 god beasts called the Benevodons who threatened to destroy the world. Eventually, the Goddess won and sealed the Benevodons within 8 Mana Stones guarded by the eight elemental spirits. The battle was so taxing that the Goddess had to enter a deep slumber b turning into the Mana Tree which controls the flow of Mana into the world. But the forces of evil never rest and now plan on releasing the Benevodons from the stones and use their power to conquer the world. Trials of Mana is different from the previous two games in the series in that it has three different stories that focus on the different villain factions fighting for control over the world. There are six different characters you can pick from at the start of the game and the main one you pick determines what villain faction you fight throughout the game. The actual story doesn't change that much, you'll still go through the same plot points no matter what characters you pick but certain scenes will change depending on who you have in your team. The only significant changes are the opening sequence and what final dungeon you go through.

Other than that the story is the same no matter who you pick. A little disappointing but one thing I like about it is that you'll interact with other villain factions furthering their own plans and run into other playable characters even if they aren't part of your team. It helps make the world feel more lived in. Sadly the story itself is, predictable. It almost feels like it's quoting the other games down to it sharing basic plot points. Even the ending is almost identical. I know long-running JRPG series have reoccurring elements but this is ridiculous. The cast of playable characters are likable, with each having their own motivations and unique personalities, but their actual development is weak. Some character may not get much of any character development depending on your team. I played through this game twice and in both instances, I had two characters aligned to one villain factions and a third aligned to another. In both cases, the third character would wrap up its storyline during the epilogue. The game has other weird pacing issues like this but I'll get to those later. The main villains suck too, aside from their boss fight they're basically the same character. I wouldn't call the story outright bad, there's not really any major plot holes I noticed, but it's still not that great either.

Thankfully the game makes up for this when it comes to presentation. I said in the Secret of Mana that while the game looked decent I didn't think it was anything to write home about, at least from a visual perspective. Trials of Mana, on the other hand, is one of the best looking Super Nintendo games I've played. It has some of the most detailed sprite work on the system and the animation ain't half bad too. Some of the magic effects have been made a lot flashier and one thing I liked is that there are two different effects depending on whether or not the spells are multicast. Little touches like that can go a long way in making me like a game. Some of the backgrounds can be gorgeous too. When I was climbing the mountain area near Laurent and I saw the image of the earth beneath me I had to stop and take it in for a second. Musically the game is exceptional but I don't know if I like it more than the Secret of Mana soundtrack. Both are excellent so it's really a matter of preference as to which one is better.

Okay, let's get into the meat of this review and talk about the gameplay. The first thing you'll notice upon starting the game is that there are six different playable characters. This is the main gameplay hook for Trials of Mana as each character not only has a different story but each has radically different play styles and abilities. I can attest to this, in my first playthrough I played as Hawkeye the thief and the second time as Duran the warrior and I noticed a significant difference in how each handled. Because of this certain features from the previous games have been altered or removed. First off the weapons system from the previous games has been axed. Now each character has their own unique weapon they can equip with each now acting as another equipment piece. Equipment is the same as last time though they did reintroduce shields, even if Duran is the only one who can equip them. And by them, I mean IT because there's only one shield in the entire game, why bring them back and not do anything with them?

Going back to the weapons system, because weapons are now determined by character the weapon levelling system has been removed as well as the magic levelling system, now magic strength is determined by the Intelligence stats. The levelling system has gone back to how it was in Final Fantasy Adventure, every time you level up you can choose which stats to increase. I like that this is back but there are two problems. First, every stats has a cap on it so you can only increase it to a certain point. The game tries to hide this by having it so you can't increase a stats twice in a row but even then I still maxed out certain stats, there is a way to increase the cap but I'll get to that later. The second problem is that some of the stats don't even work properly. Both the Dexterity and Luck stats are supposed to help you with accuracy and critical hits respectively but due to a programming error, they do nothing. Luck at least affects Item drops and improves the chances of traps not going off but Dexterity, unless your Hawkeye, does nothing at all.

The most substantial change is the combat. The power bar has been overhauled completely, it no longer determines the power of attacks now when you hit an enemy your character will stagger for a little bit and when they re-enter their battle stance they can hit them again. This helps to make battles a lot faster, and more chaotic. It's easy to lose track of what's going on when there's a lot of enemies on screen and that can lead to death. It's still best to take your time and think things through rather than going in guns blazing. The power bar this time acts more like a super meter. As you attack enemies the bar will build up and when it reaches a certain point you press the B button to perform a special attack. There are three levels of meter with the higher levels being more powerful and some even attack multiple enemies at once. You only start with level 1 at first with the others being unlocked as you progress. You can't store these for further use. This is because of the new battle mode the game introduces. Instead of having your weapon drawn at all times now you'll only draw your weapon when near an enemy and enter what the game calls battle mode. I don't mind this change because it makes it easier to target enemies though I wish you could store special moves for later battles. Though that would admittedly break the game. Magic works like it did before but chain casting has been removed, which makes sense as it was one of the more broken mechanics in the last game. Magic feels way more powerful in this game than it did before. In other RPGs, there's usually a significant difference in damage when multi-casting magic on a group of enemies but in Trials of Mana the difference is almost negligible. You combine that with the higher MP that most characters have and the golden Goddess statues that will refill both MP and HP and I ended up using magic far more than in Secret of Mana. When I had magic to use that is.

One of the key advantages you had in Secret of Mana was having access to every magic spell in the game. But in Trials of Mana that may not be the case. The six different playable characters each have their own unique abilities and magic spells they can learn and there may be an instance where your team make up has no attack or healing spells. This happened to me in my first playthrough as I had no healing spells at all and had to rely solely on items. This wasn't as bad as you think as you can hold up to nine of any given item. You can still only hold about ten different items but being able to have nine honey elixirs means that even if you don't have healing magic you should still be able to handle what the game throws at you. You combine that with the new item storage that holds any excess items you pick up and you have a much better item inventory system that makes it easier to keep your items stocked without having The item selection has been greatly expanded to include thrown items and even items that can perform magic spells. I like that the game is designed in a way so that no matter what your team, you are never at a disadvantage. The game can be challenging but it's never unfair. Except in those instances where enemies spam special attacks and kill you instantly then it can rot in hell. This happened to me a lot in the latter half of the game and it frustrated the hell out of me. It also forced me to do the one thing I never had to do in the other games, level grinding. Now early on the game does a good job of keeping you close to the level you need to be at but by the time you get to the halfway point you have to start level grinding to keep up. This is because the second half of the game is more open-ended and you have to do a series of seven dungeons. Every time you finish a dungeon and defeat the boss the enemies of the other dungeons get stronger by about two or three levels. When you get to this point of the game you basically need to start leveling up by at least two levels just to stand a chance dragging the pacing down significantly. Despite this, the combat in Trials is arguably the best we've seen so far. The games lack of overworld puzzles is disappointing but the series was going away from that idea anyway so it's not that big a deal. The main focus is on the combat and it manages to keep combat engaging.

Now let's talk about the characters and what they can do. Duran is the warrior with strong physical attacks but low speed, Kevin is the martial artist with decent attack, speed and multiple special moves he can pull off for each level, Hawkeye is a thief with high luck and speed but weaker defense, Angela is the black mage with weak physical attack but very strong magic attacks, Charlotte is the cleric who emphasizes healing and support magic and finally Riesz is the Amazon with balanced stats and access to buff or de-buff spells depending on her job class. Yes, I said job class. Each character can undergo a class change by reaching level 18 and going to one of the eight Mana stones. Each character has two different jobs from either the light or dark path with light being more defensive in nature while dark is more offensive. Not only does each job have its own unique abilities but class change also increases the maximum level of each stats, as well as bringing each stats to its maximum level, and unlocks a new level of the power bar. You can also do a second class change with each class having its own branching paths meaning each character has a total of 7 different jobs they can turn into. This, in combination with the different storylines, gives the game an insane amount of replay value. And this isn't a short game either, both playthroughs took me around 20 hours to complete so in terms of content this is the meatiest game on the collection. That being said the class system does have one problem, unlocking the second class change is a pain the ass.

When you finish a battle sometimes a chest may spawn containing an item. Some of these items are seeds that can be planted in inns to get extra items. One particular seed item is the ??? seeds, planting these will spawn an item that allows your character to undergo their second class change. Sounds simple right? Wrong! First off the ??? seeds will only drop from specific enemies, most of which only spawn in one of the last 3 dungeons and by that point, you're likely over the level you need to be at to undergo a class change and you won't be able to take full advantage of any level ups gained. The earliest you can get the seeds is in shimmering ruins by battling Papa Potos, which only spawn from Mama Potos. The catch to this is that you can only get one item drop per battle and what items spawn is determined by the last enemy killed. So you not only need to fight Mama Potos so they spawn Papa Potos you need to make sure you kill Papa Potos and pray they not only spawn an item but the right item you need. But let's say you manage to get 3 of the seeds you need, then you need to pray that they grow the right item you need because each of the secondary classes has their own items required to perform a class change and it's random what items it will spawn. Now, fortunately, there is a way the cheese the game to get what you want.

Step 1: get 3 ??? seeds.

Step 2: go to an inn, anyone it doesn't matter which, and save the game.

Step 3: plant a seed. If you get what you want Save the game. If not follow the next steps.

Step 4: plant another seed. If you don't get what you want, reload the game.

Step 5: once the game reloads head out of town and battle a few enemies.

Step 6: return to the inn, save the game and reload again.

Step 7: once you reload plant the seed again. If you don't get what you want then repeat the previous steps. If you do move on to the next seed and repeat the process.

There I just saved you hours of tedious item grinding. Don't get me wrong it's still tedious but it should only take you about half an hour to get what you want. You can also do this with gear seeds to get the best equipment in the game too but I never really did that since the more powerful equipment felt more like a bonus, unlike the class change which is almost mandatory for the latter half of the game. It feels like there's way too much you have to do when simply getting to the required level, level 36 just so you know, would have been enough.

That's all the major changes that were added but there are some other minor changes I should mention. The new day and night mechanic is an impressive new addition for its time and it adds some extra depth to some towns. It also affects Kevin a great deal since he turns into a wolf-man at night which greatly increases his strength. The last thing I'll mention is the new menu system. The ring menu returns but it's been streamlined to only feature magic and items. Everything else is done in a more traditional menu system but it does follow the same philosophy of using symbols over text. You'll mostly be using this to change equipment but you can also change partner AI patterns. Your options are more limited this time around but the AI is also a lot better with it not getting stuck on walls nearly as often.

So that's Trials of Mana, what did I think about it. I loved it. Not only is it arguably the best game in this collection it might be the best action RPG on the SNES. I say arguably because there are still areas where Secret of Mana is superior like the story and the unique weapon system but there are just as many areas where Trials is clearly better like the combat and presentation. I suppose it's mostly down to preference but I say Trials is overall the better game. It's a shame we never got this until now but I'm glad we finally got it. Playing it just makes me more excited about the upcoming remake.

So here's the real question, is the Collection of Mana worth it? Well each game in it is excellent in their own right and it comes with nice extras like a music player and extra display options so it seems worth it on the surface, what might put you off is the price. £29.99 is a lot of money for 3 games, especially when other compilations offer much more for less. You can get both Megaman legacy collections for around the same price and they offer more games and extras. I personally got my money's worth out of it but if your more monetarily conscience you may want to wait for a sale. But if you're a fan of Action RPGs or if these reviews have made you interested then I say it's worth the price of admission. I'm not sure what the future holds for this series but hopefully, it's a bright one. Just try to come up with a more original story next time.