ReCollection: Secret of Mana

 "Time flows like a river,"

 "and history repeats..."

 

I really do not know what else I could possibly have to say about my history with Secret of Mana that I haven't gone over two or more dozen times over the last decade, but darn it, I'm going to try anyway! 

Secret of Mana, known in Japan as Seiken Densetsu 2, was released for the Super Nintendo in the US in October 1993. Just around the time I was really beginning to look at video games in a more serious light, beyond being something my older brother owned and would sometimes let me play around with.

I'd inherit my brother's SNES console the following year, and it was over the course of 1994 that I gradually found myself developing my tastes in video games, largely through the trial and error process of rentals! Yeah, remember those? Going into a rental store, especially locally-owned Mom and Pop joints, usually meant renting games based on the cartridge label and name alone. The boxes were usually discarded and the instruction booklets seldomly placed alongside the rental games. 

Sure gaming magazines were a thing, and I could read (not very well, but I could read!), but who wanted to read if it didn't involve school(even then...)?! Well, low and  behold, my discovery of the RPG genre had turned my whole opinion on reading in my video games around.

Before acquiring my copy of Secret of Mana, which I will get to here shortly, I gotta talk about the event that lead to be finding out what an RPG even was, and name a few of the games that helped spark interest in the genre.

Prior to that fateful day at the used video game place in the local mall, I'd spent my days playing 'Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past', which my brother had incorrectly labeled as an RPG at the time. I'd never heard the term before, but I did make use of it when scoping out possible rentals, as some games would display it on their boxes, or there would be some giveaway in the label or title that meant it was an RPG. Hitting up the bigger rental places, such as Movie Max, where they kept game boxes with the rentals made things all the easier as I could just look at the screenshots on the back to get an idea. Not so at smaller places though, such as the place across the street from my house.

I ended up with Actraiser by renting games like this, and while do love the game overall, an RPG it is not. Same for Illusion of Gaia, which was something I rented based on the screenshots on the back of the box. I think overall, rather than just being something within the RPG genre, I was just looking for top down games like Zelda. Discovering the RPG genre itself and what it actually entailed was just something that happened alongside it.

But hey, had I not been doing so, I wouldn't have all these wonderful memories of playing *ahem*: Breath of Fire II, Chrono Trigger, Tecmo Secret of the Stars, Illusion of Gaia, Beyond Oasis, Brain Lord, Lufia 2, Dragon View, Secret of Evermore, etc.

Remarkably however, I never played a single Final Fantasy game prior to Final Fantasy VII years later, though I still have vivid memories of reading a walkthrough for Final Fantasy 3(6) in Nintendo Power and being mesmerized by the fact that you could hunt down and fight a yeti, then have it join your party.

Now that some brief history is out of the way, let's get the scene setup.

The time: December
The year: 1995
The place: The local mall

I was craving some new video games to play, and after being told by my older brother that there existed places you could take old games to trade in for new-old-games at the local mall, I gathered a few that I nor anyone in the family touched any longer and hauled them up to the mall where my brother worked in the arcade.

Christmas was fast approaching, and so while my mother took my younger siblings to see Santa who had been set up a little ways down beyond the arcade, my father took then eight-year-old Laik to the game store that would change the course of my interests forever.

I remember: Stepping inside the small shop. Sterile, white walls lined with wire racks holding NES, Genesis and Game Boy games, as well as a plethora, with the primo stuff being on the wall rack directly behind the counter. I had brought my games with me, one of which I know for sure was Top Gear. I distinctly remember the guy looking over what I offered--and looking back I wouldn't be surprised if my father hadn't pitched in something extra to get this deal done, to be honest.

I initially pointed to 'Spider-Man Maximum Carnage', with its bright red cartridge. It was the hot new game at the time, and I remember seeing ads for it in all of my brother's comic books. But the dude behind the counter, I recall distinctly, saying that my offer was a bit below what they wanted for Spider-Man, so I had to skip on it. But low and behold, sitting right there beside it, was another game. A green label adorned to its grey plastic, and a little yellow logo.

This is THE cartridge from that day, and one of my most cherished possessions.

 Apparently "okay" with the trade-in, I left the mall that cold, December day with a little old game that, little did I know, would be THE game of the following year for me: 1996. But prior to that, here are some more memories from Secret of Mana's gotcha day.

Upon arriving home that evening, I remember firing up the game on my TV and loading a pre-existing save file that was in Todo Village, the wintry village populated by walrus people. This was my first introduction to the game world, and a relatively positive one at that. I always loved exploring villages in games, so seeing one set in a winter wonderland so close to Christmas AND it being populated by animal people? Sign me the heck up.

I wouldn't start the game in full then, despite starting a new file to explore the beginning. It was too close to Christmas to really focus, and I was all about getting a Sega Genesis at that point to get locked in.

Jumping forward to the new year a bit...

1996

Tax refund time had rolled around, and my parents were busy fixing up the den, putting in a drop ceiling and really bringing the car port they converted into an additional room on the house the previous year together. My grandmother had given the kids (i.e. Me) our monthly allowance, and so we tagged along as we usually did with our parents that night for a trip to WalMart, where the second primary ingredient in shaping who I'd become was discovered...

The Bandai 2 inch Dragon Ball figurines!

Now, I plan to do a separate ReCollection for this specific toy line, but I wanna give a quick nutshell rundown here:

As a kid, I always preferred miniature figures. Toys that I could fit inside larger toys, such as plastic cars, boats, or even mouths! It was easier to cram a bunch of small dinosaur or animal figures into a pencil box and lug it around with me than it was three or four 5 to 7 inch Power Ranger or Godzilla figure. 

So upon seeing these figures, with perfectly sized molds and designs that screamed "RPG", something clicked in my little money brain, turning on a sound bite that repeated "Buy. Them." over and over again.

And thus I did.

I went home with Goku, Puar, Emperor Pilaf and Ox-King. Now, at this point, I had played Chrono Trigger, but had no idea what Dragon Ball was beyond the blister card these figures came one, but the appearances of Goku, Bulma and even Pilaf really reminded me of Crono, Marle and the blue imp enemies in Chrono Trigger. And while Dragon Ball itself has a ReCollection in its future, I thought the similarties were incredible and had never seen toys with such video game-like designs before!

You're probably wondering at this point, "what on earth does this have to do with Secret of Mana?" Well, the short of is, I'm a storyteller, and these figures--in tandem with my discovering RPGs as my muse--became my actors and lead to many, many discoveries and interests in things I wouldn't have otherwise bothered with.

But enough about that, it's time to lunge forward and get back into my summer with Secret of Mana!

My adventure began in earnest probably late spring/early summer, based on some home video footage of me booting Secret of Mana up and just gawking at the opening scroll. Little did I know that the those few seconds would go on to define me and the summer 1996 as one that would live forever in my memories.

 

I named the boy Goku, which I pronounced "Go-Ku-You", having no frame of reference that his name made the "ooo" sound. The girl would be named Bulma (ponytail) and the Sprite would be named "Yamcha", for some reason. Krillen would have made more sense, but whatever. I know later playthroughs would see that used, as well as Jason-Kim-Zack, and Crono-Marle-Magus, and even Rocky-Kat-Adam.

I remember running through Pandora Castle, talking to various NPCs while gaming on the old Zenith floor set in the newly renovated den. My father, who had just come home from work for the day, sitting in the recliner watching me play, even laughing at some of the dialogue. Specifically, the Pandoran Soldier in the barracks who claimed to be faking illness so that he wouldn't have to march with Dyluck when they went after the witch.

 

How I managed to do so, I have no clue, but during the bit of dialogue between Randi and Luka at the Water Palace, I somehow got stuck in a dialogue loop because I refused to select any other option than the one that was highlighted upon prompt, resulting in my getting frustrated and just turning the game off once. 

The thrill of finally making it to Tropicallo one late night was also something that stood out. I remember getting domed by him a few times before figuring out that, with the way I blazed through areas not bothering to gain levels, that simply swipe and run was the best method of attack. 
It was also this time period where I was spending late nights in the den, alone, playing games, watching TV and drawing. And on that same night, I was drawing up a little Mega Man X comic when my brother's friend came knocking at the back door, scaring the bejeezus out of me. I told him I'd have to go ask my mother if he could come in first, but after that, he sat back and watched me play Secret of Mana for a bit before switching over to F-Zero.

As my playthrough progresses, I figured out the intricacies of the game; exploiting weird hitches in the programming such as magic spam and when to time your next cast based on frames of animation. (I also wouldn't learn what Faerie Walnuts did until getting hung up in Northtown Ruins)

 One specific area that I am sure most people get hung up on unless they are level grinding an ungodly amount is the fight with the infamous Spiky Tiger in Elinee's Castle!

 

Clocking in with only around 300 hit points, the Spikey Tiger packs several moves and spells that make dealing with such a foe so early on in the game a chore. On top of being able to momentarily chew on a party member or paralyze them, this beast can leave the battlefield entirely and perch atop a nearby tower where it will cast fire spells--at which point your only means of attacking is with the bow or pole dart, which will either prompt the beast to launch another volley of spells or return to the battlefield.

It's a tough fight and certainly one that I know most if not all, new players will get at least one game over on. It certainly ran younger me through the ringer a dozen times or so.

Because I lacked the game's manual, a lot of info about game mechanics, item purposes and whatnot went unknown to me, and it was through trials that I'd discover just what certain items and spells did. 

For example, everything Luna does as far as stat buffs go! The first time I cast Moon Sword on the boy, I took a whack at an enemy that actually reflected the damage, so what did it do? Healed the monster and dealt equal amount of damage to myself. I did later learn, however, that only certain enemy types did this, while it worked the opposite on most everything else.

 Lunar Boost was another one I played around with a lot until I figured out what it did, in which case it served as the ultimate weapon during the final battle, but more on that later. 

I didn't know what Faerie Walnuts did for the longest time, and usually I would just max out magic levels while around an Inn and just hope that was enough to do a boss in before I ran out of MP.

I remember waking up one eerily cool summer morning, just as my father was heading off to work. Fog had set in, and the front yard was obscured by it, so my he'd waited closer to 8am to go in versus his usual 6:30am. I'd woke up and fired Secret of Mana back up, which had returned to my room along with the SNES the previous night as I was making steady progress; having just arrived at the Todo Village and, later, the Ice Palace where I had to fight another Gigas boss and rescue Santa Claus!

Sleeping at inns in RPGs during this era were so cozy; seeing the characters sleep as the lights go out, peaceful music playing in the background. Just so cozy!

 That one cool morning aside, the summer of 1996 was as hot and humid as one could expect. Nothing outrageous or scary as they are these days, and thunderstorms were basically an every day(or night, to my disdain) occurence. Summer was summer back then, unlike nowadays where it's been severely amplified by climate change to the point of being unbearably dry and hot.

I came into poession of the full set of the Dragon Ball figures by June, and was having a blast with them, acting out scenes(or even new scenes!) from Secret of Mana, be it in the pool or in the back yard (sometimes even in the front yard when I was allowed to out there). 'Dragon Ball Village' had been established and was a place all of the characters lived together in harmony. And naming characters in the RPGs I played after the figures extended their adventures beyond the toybox.

 And at the peak of summer, around the mid July, it happened...

The Mana Fortress had been revived, and the Mana Tree itself tasked Goku and his friends to smash it with the Mana Sword and restore peace to the world.

I was there. The endgame. The final stretch! I fought through the twisting, turning corridors of the Mana Fortress, destroying were-beasts, mechanical monstrosities and ghoulish ghouls alike. The two bosses that thought to stand in my way were either under qualified for endgame bosses or overly qualified to the point of being game breaking.

In the case of the latter, Dread Slime was an absolute nightmare. Sure I'd learned what Faerie Walnuts did by this point, but when but the latter Mana elementals never provided the same sort of support that the initial four did, attack magic-wise, so I never bothered leveling Shade, Lumina and especially Dryad. This left me in a bit of a pinch for these endgame bosses as I was tackling them with level 1 spells, eating away my MP before I could cast them enough to strengthen them to be worth a darn.

 

But that wasn't my biggest problem with Dread Slime. Unlike the first iteration back in the Shadow Palace, this version of the monster grew as it took damage, and with a really clunky hitbox as well. Run out of magic during a boss fight? Okay, run around and try to deal some physical damage. No problem, eh? Wrong. If you don't have a leveled up long-range weapon and don't think to position yourself near its core as it grows, you will not only be unable to damage the core in lue of magic, but also be out of range to even land an arrow or pole dart in its stupid face.

Needless to say, I got stuck in the corner a few times before I was finally able to bring it down, resulting in a mad dash back to the entrance and a visit to the closest village to restock and save.

But then, it happened: The final battle had arrived.

Thanatos appeared, transforming into a gigantic, cloaked skeleton called the Dark Lich! Accompanied by an incredible, new battle theme! I threw every spell I had the beast, and when my go-to level 8s failed, I turned to physical attacks. Slicing through the giant head with a charged level 7 sword attack, I was easily dealing six to seven hundred points of damage each.

Thanatos, as it turned out, wasn't as powerful as he had been made out to be.

The final boss, however...

Anyone that has played the original Secret of Mana on the SNES back in the day can attest to two things: Spikey Tiger is a skill check boss and the Mana Magic spell is broken. And not broken in a good way, oh no, it flat outs glitches the game more often than not, stripping you of your sword. On top of that, if the spell DOES work, unless you've leveled up Dryad, it isn't going to be of much help.

This left nine-year-old me perplexed. If I did what the game wanted me to do, it spazzed out preventing me from actually doing damage. Absolutely none of my level 8 spells were doing damage to the Mana Beast, and more often than not, it had Wall cast on itself anyway, so they were just flying right back at me.

It was then that I started toying around with Lumina's magic some more. Having noticed some enemies would cast it on themselves. And after a few more runs at the final boss, I figured something out.

Moon Energy always gave me a critical hit without fail. Stacked with Lunar Boost, which increased my attack power and Moon Saber, which allowed me to absorb the damage dealt, I was dealing the max damage of 999 per charged attack to the final boss! I had figured it out! Without the help of a guide, the instruction booklet and certainly not the internet, I worked out a surefire method for defeating the final boss of the game that otherwise required a broken, glitched out spell.

And that is a technique that I still use to this very day.

So there it is, the summer of 1996, at least part of it, anyhow. The day I beat the game, one of my sisters came to visit and we all went out to the park around the community college where we fed the carp and ducks. It was hot, humid and cloudy that day as well.

My adventure through Secret of Mana had molded me and shaped my interest in gaming and storytelling, as I acted out my one tales with the aforemention Dragon Ball figurines. An interst that, decades later, eventually turned into a love of writing, where I could create my own worlds and my own characters and tell the sort of stories that I would have wanted to read as a kid, or even today. I play every new Mana game that comes out, and just about every RPG from Square period. RPGs make up 80% of my gaming time, and I ahve so many memories tied to each one that I can't imagine what kind of person I may have ended up as had Secret of Mana not been sitting there on that wire rack that day.

Secret of Mana will forever be my all time favorite video game.