Dawn of Mana

"Unique at best, but still retains the Secret of Mana feel in some ways."

Its officially the fourth game of the Seiken Densetsu series, yet its reputation proclaims it as the worst title. Perplexed of the very idea of a Mana game being "bad", I finally plugged the game in. I was quick to realize, this is not like the other games in the series.

First thing I noticed was the title screen, which was great. It looks just like the SD2 title, with the tree and the pink birds flying in the background. Immediately, the music grabbed me, and I knew this was going to be a good soundtrack. Suffice to say, I was totally right, as the soundtrack turned out to be one of the best features Dawn of Mana had to offer. The variety of music ranges from the usual calm, sad songs, to pumped up, guitar laden boss fight tracks. I would consider it an evolution or version 2.0 Legend of Mana OST.

The game starts out with some neat fmv, and a bunch of the mana spirits chatting about some problem. I was quickly annoyed by the voice acting, such as the obviously fake Scottish accent of Gnome, the half German/half French Undine, and what I thought was Irish from Dyrad, could also be mistaken for a British person chatting with a mouthful of chips. The main characters in the story had better actors for sure, and I thought they did wonderful jobs when the more emotional plot points occurred.

Getting to game play, my first question was "why use the Havok engine??". The environments were nice to look at, but the high emphasis on "chaining" attacks, wore away on me quick. The game controls terribly, and I found myself falling, facing the wrong way, and fighting with the camera more than I would have enjoyed. I got stuck in walls a few times, and also behind a sign.... a wooden one. When I am in a game where I can destroy 17' tall boulders, and a god damn sign traps me, I have to wonder wtf, seriously? Apart from that combat was fun, boring, simple, and easy to perform. Problem is there is A LOT OF BAD GUYS. They just keep coming and coming and coming. You don't gain levels in the game like say the rest of the series, but instead start at level 1 for Attack and Magic, every chapter. Stat increasing bonus' are gained through, chaining attacks on groups of enemies, causing them to go "panic". When in panic, hitting them will give MP/HP/ATK tokens that raise your stats to a max of Level 4. It is exactly like a "roguelike", and not like the rest of the series.

The game was very short, and took me 4 devoted sit downs to beat. There were 8 chapters, each taking about an hour to complete. There is no use in exploring, and there are no npc's to talk to. There are no stores, and no world map. This game is basically a story, that lets the player personally play through the important parts of the game. Its very different from the rest of the series. Story delivery is given through FMV, and other menial cut scenes, but its very well written. I will say it was an enjoyable experience, and I was always asking "whats next!!!". The game unfortunatly was ether too big a project, or Square cut corners, because the game needs fleshing out in some areas. Your moved from 10 min time, to a few years time, and it all happens in the span of a few sentences.

My biggest complaint was the Magic system, or lack thereof. You get "hexorb" pellets, that contain a certain element. You can only hold 8 of some, 12 of others, and they are EXTREMELY SCARCE. I found this very frustrating, as many boss fights are dependent on their abundance. Out of curiosity, I gamesharked some infinite hexorbs, and the game was much funner as a result.

The bosses were all neat to fight, and employed some fore-thought before attacking. The end boss was unfortunately, very unoriginal, and I seriously thought Iishi,pulled the name out of his ass (PM me for the name if you want the spoiler). The end though, made up for all the hard work. It was sad, unexpected, and capped off this mediocre game in the best way it could. I would suggest playing the game only for its ending.

At first, I didn't think the game deserved the Seiken Densestu moniker, but after finishing it, I can see why it is the 4th game. Its all about perspective, and as we all know Squeenix is all about emotional, story driven games, rather than good game play. The whole point of this game (being its the first in the series timeline-wise), is to tell the story of the Mana Goddess, the Tree, and the Holy Sword. While all the other games in the series revolve around the Holy Mana Sword, this game shows the events leading to its inception. It truly is the legend of the holy sword.

Ultimately, the game is worth playing if you are a fan, and have some serious patience. There are some stat boosting medals you gain by meeting achievements, and there is a high emphasis on replaying the game (how pompous of Square, I know!!). As an action RPG on its own, the game is boring, lackluster, and nothing like the rest of the series. If you look at it from a story perspective, its actually pretty good, ties many plot holes together, is very nice to look at, and very unique.


Simply put

PROS
-Great music
-Great story
-Ties the whole series/jump starts all SD events
-Very good ending, non cliche plot devices
-Thematically, its very Seiken Densetsu
-Not too long, but not too short

CONS
-Terrible Controls
-Boring Environments
-Same enemies, over, and over, and over, and over ect
-Havok engine "novelties" were more of an annoyance than anything
-Level up system, and game delivery (Mission Based??) didn't fit the SD profile
-Game play is very different from the rest of the series. This would be a good thing if the game play was good, but its not.
-Magic system extremely frustrating, and lackluster.

If your a mana fan, buy the game. Please don't spend more than $40 brand new though. If not, avoid this game, as its a big waste of time. The only reason I liked it, is because I am familiar with the series as a whole.

Reviewer's Score: 6/10, Originally Posted: 12/04/08

Game Release: Dawn of Mana (US, 05/24/07)