I don’t know about you, but I was a Secret of Mana fan back in the day. There was something about that world, that combat, that music, that just spoke to me. It was clear, even to my teenage brain, that this was something special. Fast forward… lord, like 25 years, and here we are today. Mana as a series is one that I’ve been aware of, but not one I’ve actively played. I know it’s had its ups and downs, Trials of Mana being in the former category, and maybe something like Dawn of Mana falling in the latter, at least according to popular online opinion. But outside of my teenage foray into Secret of Mana, I haven’t gone back to the series. Until now. And this is probably the most solid re-entry point for a JRPG series I’ve ever encountered.
The world of Visions of Mana is as bright and colorful as I remember Secret of Mana’s being, but it’s tinged with a darkness I found pretty surprising. See, in this world, representatives from each of the major elemental regions must travel to the Mana Tree and essentially sacrifice themselves, giving up their souls, so that their people can survive. At first, I was almost taken aback. Like, this felt like a very heavy story for a Mana game. But honestly, I just wasn’t remembering the story of Secret of Mana very well, because that game definitely carried with it its own sort of darkness. It just kept it hidden until much later on. But Visions of Mana gives us the state of the world right up front, and interestingly, for the most part, everyone’s fine with it. In fact, it’s considered an honor to be chosen as the “alm,” the person who gets to go and sacrifice their soul to the Mana Tree.
This brings us to one of the game’s most important parts, namely the characters. Our main protagonist is Val, who has been training his whole life to become a Soul Guard. The Soul Guard is the person who travels with the alms on their journey to the Mana Tree in order to keep them safe. Val is all prepared to go, even though it means he has to leave his girlfriend Hinna behind. But wouldn’t you know it, Hinna gets chosen to be the Alm of Fire! Lucky day! Now they get to travel together, and Val has the privilege of delivering her… to her… death. Hmm. So, it’s pretty complicated. But you wouldn’t be able to tell from how happy both Val and Hinna are about this whole state of affairs. One thing I want to point out about our male and female leads is that they are just so freaking adorable together. It’s really nice to have a story where the hero and heroine already have great chemistry with each other. Just the cutest couple. Anyway.
Along the way, they meet up with the Alms from other regions, like Careena the Alm of Wind who speaks with an inexplicable Southern accent despite neither her parents nor anyone else in her village having a similar accent. Not sure where she would have picked that up. TikTok, maybe? Do kids pick up things from TikTok? I don’t know, I’m 100. Regardless, she’s great, she’s got this prickly personality that serves as a great foil to Val and Hinna’s relentless optimism. And then there’s Morley, the cat man who’s great with swords. And Palamena, the queen of Illystana who has more than her fair share of political intrigue to deal with. And Julei, the plant kid. Like, he’s a little plant boy. He photosynthesizes. This cast is such a joy to journey with. Maybe I’ve just spent too much time in dour and dark JRPG worlds, but these characters in this world… it’s a breath of fresh air.
I’ll admit, I find some of the designs a LITTLE odd. Like, everyone has SO MUCH HAIR. Are there any bald people in this world? Everyone just has hair for days. But over time, even the slightly odd designs grew on me. It’s just so charming, even if you want to fight it, it won’t let you.
Speaking of fighting, let’s talk battles. This is an action RPG through and through, and if you’re coming in with no Mana experience, or maybe only having played Secret of Mana like five hundred years ago, then let me give you a sense of what to expect. This is fast and furious combat that feels nice and hefty and just so darn GOOD. At its simplest, you have normal and heavy or special attacks, as well as the ability to jump, dash, and dash in mid-air. You also have access to the series’s classic ring menu system, where you can pull up a circle of items or magic spells to use at any time. This feels like a big improvement over the OG Secret of Mana, because the number of rings is much smaller than in that game, and it’s much easier to get to the ring you want. As you encounter spirits throughout the game, you’ll gain access to new classes. Equipping a spirit will bestow each character with a unique class, which brings with it its own equipment and skills. And on the skill front, you’ve got quite a few at your disposal, and they’re locked behind skill points that you acquire throughout the game. Along with class skills, you get these ultra-powerful class moves that you can unleash when your meter’s full, and these are some supremely flashy attacks. The sheer variety of classes, each of which gives the characters an all-new design, is pretty remarkable. They could have kept each character in their standard form the whole way through and I wouldn’t have complained. They could have even foregone classes altogether and I probably wouldn’t have thought less of it. But instead, they layered on so many fun and thoughtful systems that enhance the experience so much.
All of your party members are AI-controlled when you aren’t controlling them yourself, though you can jump to any character at any time, even mid-attack. One thing I found myself marveling at was how actually useful your party members are in combat. Like, they’re not just limping around and throwing the occasional, half-hearted punch. They’re SUPER engaged in the fight, and they actually HELP. I feel like, for whatever reason, this is pretty rare in action RPGs. You love to see it. But even with their help, you can still find yourself getting STOMPED, even by non-boss characters. The regular mobs might not pose the biggest threat – though I’d be lying if I said I didn’t die a few times from regular mobs – but there are enemies called Nemeses that are like super powered-up versions of normal monsters, and THOSE guys can be a problem. Fighting them, dying to them over and over, and then finally, FINALLY being able to beat them, was so freaking satisfying.
I played on Normal difficulty because I am the Platonic Ideal of the True Gamer. With that in mind, I wouldn’t say the game is overly hard, though you can definitely bump the difficulty up if you want. One thing I learned the hard way, though, is that the game is definitely NOT autosaving after every little battle. Once or twice I got a little too confident for my own good and got myself STOMPED by some higher-level enemies, only to find I hadn’t saved in quite some time. Fortunately, I never lost too much MEANINGFUL progress, but still, I wanted to issue you that warning: save your game.
Outside of battles, exploration is pretty darn addicting. The game isn’t a true open world like I was sort of hoping. Each area is sectioned off with load screens in between, but the zones you get to explore ARE pretty big, and there’s definitely an abundance of things to find in them. From ruins filled with super high-level enemies to spirit fountains that offer combat challenges to a ridiculous amount of collectible honey to grab and feed to the dudbears in exchange for items, there is just SO much to do. The way the game entices you to explore is really cool. They’ll show you some glowing items that seem completely out of reach, but you definitely CAN reach them. You have a double jump and a super generous air dash that you can use from the very beginning of the game, and these moves let you get to places that genuinely don’t look like places the game would allow you to go. This makes exploration feel, I don’t know… sort of deviant in a way. Like I’m doing something the developers don’t want me to. But they clearly do, because there’s loot up there. Dungeons, I will say, start out feeling a bit basic, to the point that I was kind of worried they would be a letdown. But trust me, after the first couple of dungeons, they really start to expand, not just getting bigger but incorporating more interesting traversal and puzzles. They’re a lot of fun to explore.
There are a decent number of side quests, but they’re nothing to write home about. Your basic fetch and kill-the-monsters quests. That being said, it’s a good idea to grab at least a few in each region. Money can be a bit hard to come by, especially with a full party that you want to keep outfitted with the latest gear, and side quests are a pretty quick and easy way to keep the coffers full.
From a graphical perspective, this is one pretty game. The art direction is off-the-charts gorgeous, and like I said, even though I found some of the character designs initially off-putting, the characters themselves grew on me over time. This is helped by the excellent voicework throughout. Strong performances and solid direction make for an elevated story. The story was a huge surprise to me; the amount of character interaction and fully voiced and animated scenes is huge. Despite loving Secret of Mana, I always felt like the storyline was sort of de-emphasized compared to a lot of other Square games on the Super Nintendo. But not here. There’s a ton of drama and twists and honestly, I was incredibly engaged from beginning to end. I should mention, I played on the PS5, so I can’t speak to the technical side of things on other platforms.
The in-game graphics and presentation are strong throughout, though on occasion, it seems like the production values slip a bit. It will look absolutely beautiful, and then something weird will happen, like, the characters’ feet will look like they’re not touching the ground as they walk, or a character’s idle animation will look janky and odd. Some minor characters’ mouths are barely animated, which does distract from the otherwise AAA feel of some scenes. Sometimes, using an item in battle won’t “work,” like telling the character to use the item will get canceled by something that’s just not clear – an issue that I believe I remember happening in Secret of Mana way back in the day, too.
Look, if it feels like I’m reaching for nitpicks, I kind of am. I just really loved playing this game, but I don’t want to leave you with the sense that it’s absolutely perfect. No game is, and Visions of Mana is not an exception. These very minor quibbles aside, man… I love this game, ya’ll.
If this is what the future of the Mana series looks like, I’m more than optimistic. I’m straight-up hyped. The production values, the gameplay, the music, everything just WORKED for me. It’s a moving story AND a blast to play. It doesn’t get much better than that.