Beat Final Fantasy Adventure aka Mystic Quest for GB (thank you, Square, to make so much confusion since there's also the actual FF Mystic Quest for SNES).

Secret of Mana is a classic I've played before, knew what to expect and is still a banger.

But the best part of the collection is having the original officially localized Trials of Mana. Amazing since they released the remake alongside it.

Final Fantasy Adventure: Mystic Question
Complete playthrough. Despite the name, Final Fantasy Adventure is actually the predecessor to Secret of Mana rather than the Final Fantasy series. While clearly primitive nowadays given its original Gameboy origins, for its time this is an incredibly impressive game, with a large world to explore, enjoyable combat and a story with a few interesting twists, alongside a thoroughly excellent soundtrack. I'd have liked there to little more guidance to the world exploration - at times it feels like it's relying on trial-and-error, especially given the very limited information on the in-game map - but we do at least have a good number of guides and walkthroughs about the remedy that. I now really ought to find some time to play Secret of Mana properly at some point, especially given that this was from the excellently put-together Collection of Mana compilation - which for this game, sees the inclusion of the European, US and Japanese versions, as well as the Super Gameboy recolouring.

Collection of Mana is probably the best way to get into the Mana series without paying for their respective consoles if you don't have them or emulating them (although emulating will probably grant you the same results, if not better) and see what all the hype is if you've never grew up with the franchise or even heard of it until the Collection came out, which would be both for me.

I was very surprised to find out Square Enix had a whole franchise born from Final Fantasy after finding out about the Collection -although in retrospect not as surprised seeing as Square rarely acknowledges their older titles rip- and I immediately wanted to check them out seeing as I love the Final Fantasy series, Kingdom Hearts series, and Dragon Quest XI (I don't consider DQ games before VIII belonging to SE seeing as that was Enix's creation before their merge w Square). After finishing all three games, I can confidently say that these games are VERY much worth trying out at the least.

Seiken Densetsu (Final Fantasy Adventure) is probably the most surprising game for me out of all three games from the Collection. I expected a very poorly aged and frustrating game to play, but it would be the exact opposite for me! The combat is very simple and straight forward! Just hack and slash your way through enemies! The world is probably the least impressive, but seeing it as it was a GameBoy game originally I'll give them some slack. The story for this game however? It's a very big part as to why I was surprised by this game. I was anticipating a very bare bones, simple and dated story since the game is only like three decades old, but instead what I got was a very emotionally moving and engaging experience. There were multiple instances from the game's story that were very memorable stuck with me to this day like finding out that one of the inns you stay at to recover ends up being hosted by a nefarious individual who kidnaps your partner away from you, to getting a freaking chocobo companion to help you get around quicker!!! to having a robot companion go through hell and back with you
(SPOILER) (SPOILER) (SPOILER) only for them to sacrifice their life for you to survive. That scene absolutely made me shed a few tears that I would never expect from a GameBoy game! And then after beating the end game boss you find out your partner is part of an ethereal lineage that is sworn to protect the world by sacrificing themselves to protect the mana tree and your character promising them to guard the tree for all their life. Its stuff like that while cliche feels very different and heartwarming when Seiken Densetsu does it (END OF SPOILER). Seiken Densetsu's story is probably the absolute best of the trilogy (IMO) which reassured me that we would be off to a great start.

Seiken Densetsu II (Secret of Mana) I actually do remember hearing about back in like 2016, but I didn't really correlate the game with the Mana series till the Collection of Mana release. I'll be honest, I didn't have all that great of a time with this game. Its not a bad game, but I can tell it was trying to reinvent the wheel with its combat and menu system and... its not a good reinvention. I appreciate any and all experimentation done in video games as I think artistic expression and practices should be experimented with just for the sake of it, but I personally think it has not aged all that well after all these years. I'm glad it happened, but I'm glad it never caught on with other games. Combat also just feels a bit clumsy. Having to navigate through a menu to use items or spell just gets tedious and disrupts the flow of the gameplay. I'd understand if this was due to technical limitations of the GameBoy, but Seiken Densetsu was on a home console! I just think again they got caught up with reinventing the wheel and I don't blame them for it, but I just did not have a great time with it. It wasn't game breaking though thankfully! I still managed to beat the boss with little to no fuss after getting use to the awkward controls and combat. The story though is honestly not as memorable as Seiken Densetsu (Final Fantasy Adventure). I really cannot remember anything about it other than the beginning and the end. I wouldn't say its a bad thing though just because not all stories need to be memorable, but I will say I did leave feeling satisfied with the story. I know I didn't hate it, I just didn't feel impressed with it nor with their characters.

Seiken Densetsu III (Trials of Mana) I think is the second best of the Collection overall. Its story is far more memorable and engaging than previous and the combat is fine tuned a bit more w the gameplay feeling not as disruptive. I like that this game allows you to not only pick out your main character and party but their classes as well! I think thats the best thing about the game is the variety and accessibility of play style! It also does a good job at not causing the "fear of missing out" if you can't decide on a party as any characters left out will still show up throughout the entire game. I know for sure this game has a lot of replay value just from that alone. I'd say the stories this game has are about as memorable as Seiken Densetsu II, but not for the same reasons this time. Seiken Densetsu III has a lot of events that take place between main character, party, and extras so its a lot to take in just from one playthrough. I'm sure if one were to play it multiple times with a different party per playthrough the stories will become more memorable and interesting since everyone's story intertwines in one way or another. I guess you could say its like Octopath Traveler before Octopath Traveler was a thing!

After the many hours devoted to this Collection, I really am glad I got to experience it as a JRPG fan and video game preservation enthusiast. Even though I came out of this not really being a big fan of the Mana series I can say I still appreciate its presence in JRPG history and that I will for sure play its other titles just to see where the Mana series goes.

I'd recommend it for the following:
-Avid JRPG fans
-'90s video game enthusiasts
-looking for a fantastical story that's outside of the Final Fantasy and Dragon Quest universe despite this series being a spin-off of FF

(This is specifically for Trials of Mana in this collection)



I played the Trials of Mana remake closer to when it came out, I think sometime in 2020. I liked that game a lot, but the presentation was a bit lacking, especially for the remake of a game oft touted as the “best looking SNES game”. The overhauled combat was fun, if a bit simple, and the dub/cutscenes were.. kinda bad actually. At the time, I switched the game to the Japanese dub (mildly better but not great) and wrote the story off as a kinda goofy not-too-serious game.

At the same time I’d picked up the Collection of Mana, the first three Mana games but on switch, and played the first two. I’d loved the first one, Final Fantasy Adventure, which is still one of my fav Gameboy games, and mildly disliked its incredibly popular sequel, Secret of Mana. For some reason, I waited until now to play the original Trials of Mana, and god damn I wish I hadn’t waited so long.

Guys



Guys this game is so damn good



There’s parts of it that are obviously good, stuff like the art (it is, indeed, probably the most gorgeous and spectacular SNES game, FF6 eat your heart out), the music (just stunning), and the cool pacing/story structure. Basically, there’s six playable characters, all with their own interweaving stories, and you choose one as the main character and two as sidekick-type computer (or friend!) controlled characters. Mix this tapestry-style storytelling with the incredible world building, which has been even more expanded upon from the other Mana games, and you get an experience that’s just plain stunning.



The SNES version’s presentation also (imo) greatly enhances the gravity of the story. There’s no goofy VA or overly plucky animations spoiling the serious scenes. Instead you get a gorgeous pixelart scene and somewhat moody OST setting the tone for what end up feeling like serious monologues and dramatic twists. It’s not all dark and edgy or anything, but there’s a range of emotions confidently displayed here. 



What I wasn’t expecting was to like many parts of the game that are, uh, more on the infamous side of things. In particular, the combat is… weird? I don’t even know how to describe it honestly. It kinda feels like a rtwp or ffxii-style system but done on hardware that can’t quite handle it. Now, I had my share of frustrations with this system, stuff like “oh apparently while this character is in this stage of an attack animation she cannot be told to cast a spell” or “wow the enemy just cast two spells immediately after each other, really wish I could cast something while he was charging up that second one”, but broadly I liked the system. It was fun and fast during dungeons, and had a good bit of weirdo complexity and hidden numbers in the back half to give it some depth.

I definitely preferred it to Secret of Mana’s combat, which is more responsive, but (like a lot of SNES games for me) has very touchy hitboxes and that weird goofy meter at the bottom that discourages attacking when it’s not full. Honestly I thought everything people love secret for this game does better, from the music to the art. I guess it doesn’t have three player support without a mod, so that’s a point in secret’s favor, but this one’s fun by yourself so HA.

Obviously I recommend this game, whether you play a fan-translation or the official release it’s still a great time. You can feel it pushing the SNES to its limits, but as usual for me that’s kinda cool (and only noticeable in the menus really). Play it whether you like or dislike Secret, play it if you want a weird but also modern-feeling SNES RPG, play it if you’re in the mood for RPG comfort food that pushes your boundaries more than you would think. Just give it a shot, and see if you vibe.



Collection of Mana contains classic action RPGs Final Fantasy Adventure, Secret of Mana and Trials of Mana. All 3 games are fun adventures with charming stories, great music and some interesting mechanics. Sadly, all 3 are held back by annoying quirks, grindy systems and sometimes tedious dungeons.

Something curious about the collection is seeing how the games "evolved", turning from straight up Zelda-like action in FFA to an almost turn-based system in ToM. For example, in FFA spells must be aimed against enemies, you can't just select a spell and expect it to hit. Similarly, you can dodge basically all enemy attacks. In SoM and ToM, spells are now automatically targeted like a turn-based RPG and you can't avoid that many enemy attacks, effectively removing a lot of the appeal of the "action" part of the genre. They're still fun games but I wonder how things would've been with a different focus.

Anyway, this a nice collection, containing 3 classic games that are, at the very least, interesting to play for fans of old RPGs.