A solid generation of gamers carried an immense nostalgia with the Square Enix anniversary bomb biting deep. It is the 30th Anniversary of Trials of Mana, the old-school JRPG first released for the Super Famicom! Thirty years! Just, a washout! The time when we’d blow the dust off our cartridges debating which Final Fantasy was better.
On the 30th anniversary of the game, the official Mana Series account tweeted to celebrate the happening and reminded that the magic can be experienced in two ways: Collection of Mana on Nintendo Switch if you require the blood-and-go-retro experience, and 3D on everything imaginable-Switch, PS4, Xbox Series X|S, Windows, Steam, and even on Mobile. One can say, literally no stone remains unturned.
But also, as the comments section unfolds, the demands have gone wild quickly. Mostly, people are demanding Collection of Mana for release on other platforms. Joseph (@Demaeter) commented along with many others that “need this on other platforms with achievements 🤓,” which I second with a huge “same dude.” Sir Render (@render_sir) literally begs “Please for all that is mana release the Collection for Steam as well,” complaining that the remake weirdly doesn’t have an option to play with friends.
Landlock (@Escaflowne2001) and Stian Schultz (@Carnivol), in turn, argued about how great it would be for Collection of Mana to be on PS5 and Xbox, with Stian adding that he’d also like to see Adventure of Mana and Secret of Mana on Xbox as well. It seems like they all share a wishlist.
Some aren’t happy with how the remake came out. The Antarctic Painter (@Anthill2k) came out strong with, “the remake is cringe as fuck though. took away the badass gritty feel of the original, awful dubbing too 🥹,” ouch. That’s quite a harsh review.
Meanwhile, some players were beginning to share their connections with the game, and it’s just so sweet. Junior (@jun96al) said it was “Important part of my childhood and am really very happy that it finally got the spotlight.” Andreas Jervström (@mistwalker1985) reduced it to a history, sharing his whole saga about viewing a screenshot in a Swedish gaming magazine and not believing his eyes, then having to wait until summer 2000 just to play it in English. The struggle was real back then.
Felipe Chalreo (@FelipeChalreo) gave some historical insight into the discussion, bringing in that the game was “hidden in Japan for like what… 10 years?” and saying that it was actually the fan translations that brought it into public view in the west. In other words, if not for those hardcore fans, we might have never gotten to experience this jewel.
Here we see Rhyno (@kulitbadak1) and Brayden (@Brayden9669) engaging in what is turning out to be a very interesting debate about which Mana is which, with Rhyno demanding ports of Adventures of Mana, Dawn of Mana, Children of Mana, Heroes of Mana to all consoles, and Brayden attempting to lay out the distinctions between Sword of Mana and Adventures of Mana. It’s basically historians at work.
Lucios~ Lu🦊⛩️ (@LuciosAngelo) felt one very specific grievance, and it’s very close to home-the only thing i didnt love about this game was the missing multiplayer 😒.” Fair enough, multiplayer RPGs were all the rage in those days.
What’s really striking here is how passionate people still are about this three-decade-old game. Blkkirby (@FlambeBoy) could say, “Loved replaying it over and over again,” and xɐɯ ƃᴉq snɔɹᴉɔ (@Blitzableiter) went as far as describing it as “the most important game of my life.” Metabolically dedicated.
Alph (@AlphN008) gave a rundown of their experience with the 3D remake outside of the original, “…didn’t take it seriously at first, but boy it was just what I needed,” rave about the class mechanics and character combinations. Sometimes you just stumble into exactly right game at the right time.
The whole thread is an equidistant blend of nostalgia, criticism, requests, and pure love for a classic JRPG that somehow still holds up after all these years. It’s wild to think that a game that only launched in Japan at the start and was initially made playable in the West only through fan translations is now celebrating 30 years and actually has multiple ways of playing it in today’s platforms.
It seems Square Enix has definitely kept an eye on the Mana series with all those re-releases and remakes, but judging by the responses, the gamers still want more. Let’s Play Nintendo ITA (@LPNintendoITA) is talking about “done already 😉 now give us visions on switch 2,” because gamers are never satisfied, are they?
Thirty years is a big period for any game to remain relevant, but Trials of Mana has surely retained something special that keeps drawing players back. Classic or modern remake, the base experience of putting your party together, choosing a path, and walking around that vibrant world still strikes a chord with fresh-faced or old-fashioned alike. May be, after another thirty years of mana magic, those platform ports that the gamers have been begging for finally see the light of day.
