Retrogaming, you know, never goes out of fashion, as does the nostalgia effect. Without having to deal with high-end anthropological or philosophical studies, it is well known that a product that was dear in puerile times is a winning move to the market, especially video games. The SNES Mini is the proof, but the approach of the Commodore 64 , which we have been able to find out at Milan Games Week, shows how this trend is ever stronger and in vogue.
By leaving the appearance of the consoles, however, this year Crash Bandicoothas shown how the nostalgic effect can be a real sales success, both to bring back the most experienced adults and experts back to mind and to make the younger ones find out what was happening to us when we were old. Secret of Mana will be back to more than twenty years after the release of Super Nintendo in Japan on our consoles. We tried it for the first fifteen minutes, in its PlayStation 4 version. The King Arthur of the Euphoria Sol
We find ourselves in an enchanted world, governed by this magical power known as Mana, from which, moreover, the title of the game. To have this mystic force available would allow us to enjoy a lush and lush period, which in the past had supported a very thick development throughout civilization. In our path, however, far from these expansionist and enhancing species, we find ourselves in the role of three young boys who explore the nature surrounding their village in a dramatic way. Among them is Randi, our protagonist, who after a tumultuous fall into the water is found in a small pond in front of the Mana Sword, an ancient sword that draws its attention by calling it by name.
Soon our Lord will find himself in the custody of an ancient power, which is to be worn with great spasticity, but at the same time it will lead him to a very important role, but also to great problems to win, including exile from his own village. Our adventure, in the remake that has been proposed to us, begins right here, from the sword’s finding and from the approach to the village, with all the gameplay critiques that had already been proposed in the 1990s.
The feeling is the same, with the mechanics that do not tire us: we will have a bar of stamina that will take us to have to measure the inflicted strokes to our opponents, who will therefore not be subjected to continuous spam strokes. In short, it will touch on the attacks, taking advantage of the time at our disposal to reload and hit opponents in a timely fashion.
Despite years of copying underneath the bridges, the secret system of Mana’s battle system can still be pleasing, especially because of its immediacy and its rapidity, far from the turnarounds that the new generations can not charm. Having this control over stamina now opens up to so many different meanings that prompt us to develop a strategy that will always have the best impact for our shot.
There is still to be said that the build was heavily worked, which pushed us into the hands of a product that suffered from some bugs and some imperfections: leaving out the textures still clearly to be reviewed, lag in the inflicted damage was heavily annoying. Hitting and having a very late hitbox response allowed the opponent,
The strength of the first Secret of Mana was, supported by the multitap, to be able to handle a party from three warriors, if we can define them, alongside Randi also a goblin and a girl, endowed with both weapons and specific skills: in this first trial, which stopped before a boss after sinking into the subsoil of a village, did not allow us to go so far in the adventure and enjoy an enlarged party, but anyway, we reiterate, the feeling with Randi is was a positive and very similar situation to what we could enjoy twenty years ago.
However, passing the style with which Secret of Mana has been reproduced we can confirm that he has seen before us the same fantasy and the same colors that hit us in the nineties: pixel art was completely abandoned, to give free expression to a different modus operandi, but not to condemn it, indeed. The characters follow the style of the super deformed, but they are not stoned in an environment that makes colors heavily lit up its strength.
