Secret of Mana — stories left

He has stated that he feels Secret of Mana is more "his game" than other projects he has worked on, such as the Final Fantasy series.

Tanaka said that it "always felt like a sequel" to Final Fantasy III for him.

The plot that remained was different from the original conception, and Tanaka has said that the original story had a much darker tone.

Kikuta stated in 2001 that he considered the score for Secret of Mana his favorite creation.

The 16 tracks are upgraded versions of the original Super NES tracks, and Kikuta said in the liner notes for the album that they are "how he wanted the music to sound when he wrote it", without the limitations of the Super NES hardware.

Secret of Mana was announced for a release in July 1993, marketed as a "Party Action RPG".

At the request of the series producer, the main theme "Angel's Fear" was recorded with a full orchestra.

Edge reported in November 1993 that the game was "the most widely covered game of the year in Japan" with a high number of sales, but was initially released in North America "completely un-hyped and mostly unheard of".

Electronic Gaming Monthly magazine's reviewers heavily praised the graphics, music, and multiplayer gameplay, saying that it had "some of the best music I've ever heard from a cartridge".

GamePros review praised the graphics, plot, "first-rate gameplay" and "positively massive" world "dwarfing even Zelda", while stating the gameplay and multiplayer were "rough around the edges", concluding it to be "one of the finest action/RPGs" on the SNES.

Nintendo Power said that it has "beautiful graphics and great depth of play" but criticized the "unnecessarily long" sword powering-up and "awkward" item selection method.

SNES Force magazine praised the game's "superb" graphics, "fantastic" sounds and "revolutionary three-player mode".

Edges review said that Secret of Mana was better than contemporary role-playing games Ys I & II, The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past, and Landstalker: The Treasures of King Nole.

The review stated that Secret of Mana "includes some of the best game design and features ever seen: simultaneous three-player action, the best combat system ever designed, the best player interface ever designed, a superb control system, and yes, some of the most engrossing and rewarding gameplay yet".

Computer and Video Games said in 1994 that Mana was "doing for adventure games now what Zelda did several years ago" and that Mana is "one of the best games for the SNES this year and more playable than" Donkey Kong Country.

Next Generation said in 1996 that many players considered it "the RPG equivalent of Lord of the Rings."

In 2008, Lucas Thomas of IGN reviewed the Virtual Console release of Secret of Mana and stated that it was considered one of the best video games ever made.

In 2014, Edge magazine described Secret of Mana as "one of the high points of the 16bit era".

The 2018 remake saw "mixed or average" reviews according to review aggregation website Metacritic, with the PS4 version scoring 63 out of 100 based on 60 reviews, while the PC version was scored 57 out of 100 based on six reviews.

Meghan Sullvan of IGN described the game as "a charming but clumsy 20ish-hour adventure that both frustrates and delights", praising the artstyle but faulting a lack of improvements over the original.

In 1995, Total! rated Secret of Mana 12th on their "Top 100 SNES Games of All Time," with Super Play ranked it eighth on its list of the best 100 SNES games of all time the following year.

Critics also praised Hiroki Kikuta's soundtrack and the customizable artificial intelligence settings for computer-controlled allies.

Dengeki Oh magazine ranked it the second best-selling video game of 1993 in Japan, where units were sold that year, just below Street Fighter II Turbo.

Electronic Gaming Monthly magazine's reviewers heavily praised the graphics, music, and multiplayer gameplay, saying that it had "some of the best music I've ever heard from a cartridge".

GamePros review praised the graphics, plot, "first-rate gameplay" and "positively massive" world "dwarfing even Zelda", while stating the gameplay and multiplayer were "rough around the edges", concluding it to be "one of the finest action/RPGs" on the SNES.

Nintendo Power said that it has "beautiful graphics and great depth of play" but criticized the "unnecessarily long" sword powering-up and "awkward" item selection method.

SNES Force magazine praised the game's "superb" graphics, "fantastic" sounds and "revolutionary three-player mode".

The iOS version of the game was praised by Nadia Oxford of Slide to Play for its improved graphics and computer-controlled characters.

She also praised the quality of the touch controls relative to other role-playing game phone versions, though she disliked that the multiplayer mode had been removed.

This is the first game for which Kikuta was entrusted with the role of composer after joining Square.

An English version, identical to the Japanese original aside from its localized packaging and track titles, was later released in North America in December 1994 as Secret of Mana Original Soundtrack, making Secret of Mana one of the first Japanese games to inspire a localized soundtrack release outside of Japan.

A rendition of the soundtrack was commissioned for the first ever BBC Proms gaming music concert in 2022.

The game was released on Virtual Console on the Wii in 2008 and on Wii U, only in Japan, in 2013.

Despite this, Secret of Mana went on to become the second top-selling Super NES game on the monthly US Babbage's chart in October 1993, below only Mortal Kombat, with Secret of Mana remaining in the US top ten SNES game charts for a year up until October 1994.

GamePros review praised the graphics, plot, "first-rate gameplay" and "positively massive" world "dwarfing even Zelda", while stating the gameplay and multiplayer were "rough around the edges", concluding it to be "one of the finest action/RPGs" on the SNES.

The 2nd title in the company's Seiken Densetsu series (1991 - ).

The previous game, the 1st title in the Seiken Densetsu series, was titled Seiken Densetsu: Final Fantasy Gaiden, and was a computer game connected to the Final Fantasy series (1987 - ), but from this title on the setting became independent of the Final Fantasy series.

Before the game was released, in the period when information first began to be made public, the 3 party members had not been given proper names, as in the previous title Seiken Densetsu: Final Fantasy Gaiden, and only settings such as their backgrounds had been decided. The policy was changed during development and proper names were set.

In the "Game Report Card" reader poll run by the magazine Family Computer Magazine,it scored 25.6 out of 30, as shown below.

Next Generation reported in 1996 that the game had sold more than 500,000 copies in the United States alone.

Before the game was released, in the period when information first began to be made public, the 3 party members had not been given proper names, as in the previous title Seiken Densetsu: Final Fantasy Gaiden, and only settings such as their backgrounds had been decided. The policy was changed during development and proper names were set.

At first it was distributed on Seiken Densetsu MOBILE, a mobile phone site run by Square Enix, but the service ended on 2011-3-3. Distribution then resumed on SquareEnix MOBILE, with the i-appli version from 2011-5-18 and the BREW version from 2011-5-19.

Secret of Mana, originally released in Japan as is a 1993 action role-playing game developed and published by Square for the Super Nintendo Entertainment System.

She also praised the quality of the touch controls relative to other role-playing game phone versions, though she disliked that the multiplayer mode had been removed.

In the Virtual Console version the game-stopping bug was fixed, and the version included in Seiken Densetsu Collection was further adjusted to meet the ethical guidelines as of 2017.

Before the game was released, in the period when information first began to be made public, the 3 party members had not been given proper names, as in the previous title Seiken Densetsu: Final Fantasy Gaiden, and only settings such as their backgrounds had been decided. The policy was changed during development and proper names were set.

An English version, identical to the Japanese original aside from its localized packaging and track titles, was later released in North America in December 1994 as Secret of Mana Original Soundtrack, making Secret of Mana one of the first Japanese games to inspire a localized soundtrack release outside of Japan.

Jeremy Parish, writing for Polygon, felt the remake compared poorly to the original's recent ports on Nintendo platforms, finding issues with its 3D redesign and repetitive character conversations.