A lot of people are usually all about the big games when it comes to publishers and developers. Capcom has Resident Evil and Mega Man, amongst many others. EA has Mass Effect and a dozen gambling games masquerading as sports titles. Activision-Blizzard has Warcraft and Call of Duty. And then there’s Square Enix with their Final Fantasy and Dragon Quest.
However, a lot of those companies also have smaller series under their belts that usually get overshadowed by the bigger names. Series that see a lot less attention. I could name a lot of them, but for now, I’ll just go with the one I want to focus on. The Mana series by Square Enix.
The Mana series, referred to as Seiken Densetsu in Japan, is a series of games that never really took off as more than a dedicated niche, similar to Persona before Persona 5 put it on the mainstream map. So it’s a few steps below mainstream, but has a dedicated following; at least enough that Square Enix has felt the need to not only bring the Collection of Mana, which people thought was abandoned, and a Trials of Mana remake to light.
In honor of that, I wanted to take a trip down memory lane with the Mana series. I haven’t played all of the games, but I do own a majority of them. As such, I want to cover all of the domestic (US) released games and related titles. You’ll understand what I mean by that last point soon, as I already have a review in the works.
The games I intend to visit include, but are not limited to;
Final Fantasy Adventure (Gameboy)
Secret of Mana (SNES and PS4 remake)
Trials of Mana (Switch)
Legend of Mana (Playstation)
Children of Mana (Nintendo DS)
Dawn of Mana (Playstation 2)
This does miss games like Heroes of Mana and Adventures of Mana, but I don’t own either of them. I also intend to eventually take on the remake of Trials of Mana. I do intend to pick up Adventures of Mana eventually, though, so I’ll do a special for it when I get a hold of it. I do not, however, intend to play Heroes of Mana, as it is a real time strategy game, a genre I am garbage at, and I have no interest in the game. I mainly want to focus on the main games and the more interesting side games, in my opinion.
I will also be ignoring the Japan-only games, being Friends of Mana, Circle of Mana, and Rise of Mana. This is because they’re all Japanese only mobile games that have had their services discontinued, so, as such, they are unplayable. Even if I could find a way to play them, being in Japanese, I wouldn’t be able to understand them, thus defeating the purpose.
There’s also a few bonus games I want to touch upon, but I want those to remain surprises. I am, however, excited to talk about them and be given an excuse to replay these games.
The Professional Protagonist 