Gaming Nostalgia

It seems every time I turn my Wii on and check out the new virtual console or Wii ware offerings i find some piece of gaming goodness that I have missed since my brother pawned the SNES years ago. After Super Mario RPG and Megaman 2, now they bless us with Secret of Mana. For those unfortunates who never played this wonderful game for the SNES, it is a RPG in a long running Japanese series. Only 2 were ported, to my knowledge, to the US but all are outstanding stories and depth exercises. Unlike final fantasy style turn based combat, here your fights are 'real time.' Personally I just find it more satisfying when I get to run my character around the screen avoiding attacks and looking for openings for a swift attack of my own. The combat system has multiple weapon types and magic as well. Defensive & offensive spells to go along with status ailments that directly affect your characters speed, accuracy, and such. One of the most fun features is leveling up your weapons to allow access to special moves, such as multiple sword slashes, crazy leap attacks, spear thrusts and the like. To use these moves you have to take the time to charge up a power meter. To do so drastically slows your speed and opens you up to attacks from multiple on screen enemies. trying to defend and attack against a swarm of cute little killer rabites is endlessly entertaining. If you go the other way and just start slashing away, you'll find your attacks are less effective and often time miss. Once you learn to balance these options you'll find yourself exploiting weaknesses in the enemy AI that allows for some nearly unbeatable combinations, especially after you power up your magic.

I loved this game so much that I kept the SNES cartridge after the console was gone in hopes of stumbling across one, and being able to replay this timeless classic.

THANK YOU NINTENDO & SQUARE