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freshfeelingI have a weird history and relationship with this game. I guess it's called Trials of Mana now, although that's the same name as its recent remake, other people might have reason to call it Seiken Densetsu 3 or Secret of Mana 2 (which it's never actually been called).
For me, I've mostly known it as SD3, because it was like a holy grail of unlocalized games among my peers in mid-90s IRC channels. There were tales abound about how to get imports, how to remove the plastic region blocking pins from your US Super NES, and maybe learn some basic Japanese. All I could really know about it for a long time was its music, passed around as MIDI and then MP3s. Perhaps partly because of the mystique I thought it would be a wonderous game to play.
Over the years, I've tried playing it by various means like emulation (which wasn't very good for a long time), and then the Collection of Mana which I got on the cheap for my Switch a few years ago. For some reason every time I play, I go in with the best of intentions, I make like a whole spreadsheet planning out how I'll pick my characters and classes to meet needs, maybe over a few playthroughs, I get to the first class change... and then I totally lose interest and don't pick it up for a few years.
I really thought this game was something special for decades, but I've come to realize that it just isn't my cup of tea. The combat is very, very mashy, especially at the beginning. The music has nice instrumentation but a lot of the composition has jarring timing and even out-of-key elements; about half of it is good. The graphics are very nice with excellent sprite work and some of the finest, most unique tile-based environments you'll see, though the graphics are often flickery in practice. The main game flow is "go to eight spots twice". There's no treasure to be found so the exploration is really just a matter of not getting lost, and the equipment system is incredibly bland. It has good and bad but really doesn't keep my attention; perhaps that's a me problem.
Anyway... I've started playthroughs on at least three prior occasions and never beaten the game. Luckily, RevenantKioku started another event which is a nice way to force me to do things. Given that I finished what I wanted to do in Final Fantasy Tactics: The Ivalice Chronicles and my Final Fantasy Monster Party playthrough requires playing at my computer with some designated time, I wanted something I could do on-the-portable... so this seemed like a nice choice.
I guess this event is called "Let's Play Trials of Secret of Mana 2: Seiken Densetsu 3 Edition".
I happened to draw characters as Duran in his Dark-Light class, Angela in her Dark-Dark class, and Charlotte in her Dawk-Wight class. *shrug*
I started play on a train trip on November 18th, and played a bit more on November 23rd and 24th.
It feels a bit stupid discussing this for posting screenshots because the early game is so, so samey. There's a lot of running back and forth and talking to a specific random villager. But the team is different, at least. I chose Angela as my main.
I chose Duran as my second.
And Charlotte as my third. I did this because I recall really specifically getting advice about this in like 1996 that if Charlotte is chosen as the third character, she joins quite a bit earlier, before the first boss fight.
We fought that boss. It was great. I pressed A a lot of times.
Then we walked a bit more and found some Kilroys or Machine Golems. I really cornered one and pounded it with attacks and magic and that made this easy.
Then we walked back and forth between the only two destinations we can get to and got to the third boss, a mole fella called Jewel Eater. I actually used all of my casters' MP and had to just throw items by the end. Angela died at one point, but a Cup of Wishes restores MP in this game so that was sort of a happy accident.
Going to Valsena just to get told to find Sylphid is dumb. It is a long and unfun trip with holes.
We went up to Laurent (which I guess is how this is translated now, sure). I got turned around a bit on the mountain, which is probably expected, and that means we gained a level or two which is nice. A few levels make a pretty critical difference in this game, I think. Gnome's spell was great here.
Next, fetch quest. Leave the mountain, go to a town, find a tiny guy, go back to the mountain. Sure.
Then we need to get Sylphid. This part was okay, although I remembered it being tough and sort of wished it was easier to get into fights in this area. It didn't end up mattering because I moved a mind-boosting item and an attack-boosting item into our inventory. I gave the mind-boosting thing to Angela and the attack-boosting thing to Duran, and the next boss was surprisingly easy. We didn't even run out of MP.
Next, we went back to the flowery field and entered Laurent. I believe the next boss is a door-looking thing? And it sort of sucked so I'm actually tempted to wander back and forth killing things a bit.
This game is funny. It is really very pretty and it has nice elements. I'm deciding as I play whether I like it or not.
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For me, I've mostly known it as SD3, because it was like a holy grail of unlocalized games among my peers in mid-90s IRC channels. There were tales abound about how to get imports, how to remove the plastic region blocking pins from your US Super NES, and maybe learn some basic Japanese. All I could really know about it for a long time was its music, passed around as MIDI and then MP3s. Perhaps partly because of the mystique I thought it would be a wonderous game to play.
Over the years, I've tried playing it by various means like emulation (which wasn't very good for a long time), and then the Collection of Mana which I got on the cheap for my Switch a few years ago. For some reason every time I play, I go in with the best of intentions, I make like a whole spreadsheet planning out how I'll pick my characters and classes to meet needs, maybe over a few playthroughs, I get to the first class change... and then I totally lose interest and don't pick it up for a few years.
I really thought this game was something special for decades, but I've come to realize that it just isn't my cup of tea. The combat is very, very mashy, especially at the beginning. The music has nice instrumentation but a lot of the composition has jarring timing and even out-of-key elements; about half of it is good. The graphics are very nice with excellent sprite work and some of the finest, most unique tile-based environments you'll see, though the graphics are often flickery in practice. The main game flow is "go to eight spots twice". There's no treasure to be found so the exploration is really just a matter of not getting lost, and the equipment system is incredibly bland. It has good and bad but really doesn't keep my attention; perhaps that's a me problem.
Anyway... I've started playthroughs on at least three prior occasions and never beaten the game. Luckily, RevenantKioku started another event which is a nice way to force me to do things. Given that I finished what I wanted to do in Final Fantasy Tactics: The Ivalice Chronicles and my Final Fantasy Monster Party playthrough requires playing at my computer with some designated time, I wanted something I could do on-the-portable... so this seemed like a nice choice.
I guess this event is called "Let's Play Trials of Secret of Mana 2: Seiken Densetsu 3 Edition".
I happened to draw characters as Duran in his Dark-Light class, Angela in her Dark-Dark class, and Charlotte in her Dawk-Wight class. *shrug*
I started play on a train trip on November 18th, and played a bit more on November 23rd and 24th.
It feels a bit stupid discussing this for posting screenshots because the early game is so, so samey. There's a lot of running back and forth and talking to a specific random villager. But the team is different, at least. I chose Angela as my main.
I chose Duran as my second.
And Charlotte as my third. I did this because I recall really specifically getting advice about this in like 1996 that if Charlotte is chosen as the third character, she joins quite a bit earlier, before the first boss fight.
We fought that boss. It was great. I pressed A a lot of times.
Then we walked a bit more and found some Kilroys or Machine Golems. I really cornered one and pounded it with attacks and magic and that made this easy.
Then we walked back and forth between the only two destinations we can get to and got to the third boss, a mole fella called Jewel Eater. I actually used all of my casters' MP and had to just throw items by the end. Angela died at one point, but a Cup of Wishes restores MP in this game so that was sort of a happy accident.
Going to Valsena just to get told to find Sylphid is dumb. It is a long and unfun trip with holes.
We went up to Laurent (which I guess is how this is translated now, sure). I got turned around a bit on the mountain, which is probably expected, and that means we gained a level or two which is nice. A few levels make a pretty critical difference in this game, I think. Gnome's spell was great here.
Next, fetch quest. Leave the mountain, go to a town, find a tiny guy, go back to the mountain. Sure.
Then we need to get Sylphid. This part was okay, although I remembered it being tough and sort of wished it was easier to get into fights in this area. It didn't end up mattering because I moved a mind-boosting item and an attack-boosting item into our inventory. I gave the mind-boosting thing to Angela and the attack-boosting thing to Duran, and the next boss was surprisingly easy. We didn't even run out of MP.
Next, we went back to the flowery field and entered Laurent. I believe the next boss is a door-looking thing? And it sort of sucked so I'm actually tempted to wander back and forth killing things a bit.
This game is funny. It is really very pretty and it has nice elements. I'm deciding as I play whether I like it or not.
Index | Next >
