Secret of Evermore was localized into Spanish, which not many RPGs of that time were, so yeah, SoE for the win. I remember as a kid seeing Breath of Fire in a catalog and the game looked so cool, but I never dared to tried since it was in English...
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Secret of Evermore is Underrated
- Thread starter kubev
- Start date
I love secret of evermore, but that love comes from nostalgia after playing it through back in the day, replaying it, and enjoying it for what it is.
But when it came out, I felt the lack of good multiplayer (my brother and I co-op secret of mana two summers in a row in the mid 90's), felt it was both too long (fire eyes and renaissance sections take forever) and too short (Egyptian and future both are so much shorter in comparison), the alchemy is broken to the point that only a few are worth it, weapons aren't as varied.
But the music, the nostalgia, the art direction, this and Digimon were my first real forays of entertainment into the Isekai genre and this game does not disappoint.
Secret of mana is better than Evermore, and trials of mana is so good as well (just 25 years late by comparison).
But evermore is still great on its own
But when it came out, I felt the lack of good multiplayer (my brother and I co-op secret of mana two summers in a row in the mid 90's), felt it was both too long (fire eyes and renaissance sections take forever) and too short (Egyptian and future both are so much shorter in comparison), the alchemy is broken to the point that only a few are worth it, weapons aren't as varied.
But the music, the nostalgia, the art direction, this and Digimon were my first real forays of entertainment into the Isekai genre and this game does not disappoint.
Secret of mana is better than Evermore, and trials of mana is so good as well (just 25 years late by comparison).
But evermore is still great on its own
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The more people mention multi-player (or the lack thereof in Evermore's case), I can't help but wonder if that's one of the main differentiators for most people. I usually played games AGAINST my brothers or sister, but I honestly can't think of a single co-op game we played back then. Also, I can't imagine playing a game of this length with anyone, and I'm not so sure any of my siblings would've played a game like Mana in the first place.
Going from CT and FF6 to SOE felt like having the experience of GTA3 then getting State of Emergency.
I loved mana despite recognizing the technical shortcomings because of the art and music and playing with my friends, even the one time we managed to get a multitap. Everyone liked that game.
When Evermore came out I really wanted to like it because it was sold to me as a follow up to mana. I played through it and liked it a decent amount, but at the end of the day it just didn't provide the same things I liked about mana. The art was fine but other than the dog transformations nothing was particularly memorable to me. I doubt there was anything technically wrong with the art or its quality, but it just didn't stick with me the same way colorful rabites and mushbooms have years and years later. I don't remember any music from this game whatsoever.
If you want you could sum that up as, it wasn't Japanese, and you wouldn't be entirely wrong. This was right on the heels of FF3 and "wait what do you mean FF3 is really FF6 and we never got 5." I would have seen Vampire Hunter D for the first time at like midnight on TBS shortly before Evermore came out as my first anime. Evermore came out right as we (or I at least) was really starting to comprehend that all of the pop culture I really enjoyed was coming out of Japan, and at the same time that there was a world of even more amazing stuff that we weren't getting access to. It wasn't like I was reading Diehard Gamefan and seeing how awesome Bahamut Lagoon or Live A Live were and thinking to myself "it's OK we got Evermore I don't need those games."
And obviously those don't actually have anything to do with each other. But that's how it went down in 1995.
When Evermore came out I really wanted to like it because it was sold to me as a follow up to mana. I played through it and liked it a decent amount, but at the end of the day it just didn't provide the same things I liked about mana. The art was fine but other than the dog transformations nothing was particularly memorable to me. I doubt there was anything technically wrong with the art or its quality, but it just didn't stick with me the same way colorful rabites and mushbooms have years and years later. I don't remember any music from this game whatsoever.
If you want you could sum that up as, it wasn't Japanese, and you wouldn't be entirely wrong. This was right on the heels of FF3 and "wait what do you mean FF3 is really FF6 and we never got 5." I would have seen Vampire Hunter D for the first time at like midnight on TBS shortly before Evermore came out as my first anime. Evermore came out right as we (or I at least) was really starting to comprehend that all of the pop culture I really enjoyed was coming out of Japan, and at the same time that there was a world of even more amazing stuff that we weren't getting access to. It wasn't like I was reading Diehard Gamefan and seeing how awesome Bahamut Lagoon or Live A Live were and thinking to myself "it's OK we got Evermore I don't need those games."
And obviously those don't actually have anything to do with each other. But that's how it went down in 1995.
Evermore had such an unique atmosphere. I love it. I actually replayed it on OG hardware 5 or 6 years ago. A blast.
French localization had a nice touch as they (she) relocalized the starting city as the one where Nintendo HQ are. 14 years oold me always loved this detail.
It has cool and unique mechanics, but also its flaws (a bit too much of a maze sometimes, balancing issues too).
Actually if it wasn't for the fact it's a 100% US-made game, I would have hoped for a 2d-hd remake.
French localization had a nice touch as they (she) relocalized the starting city as the one where Nintendo HQ are. 14 years oold me always loved this detail.
It has cool and unique mechanics, but also its flaws (a bit too much of a maze sometimes, balancing issues too).
Actually if it wasn't for the fact it's a 100% US-made game, I would have hoped for a 2d-hd remake.
Evermore is pretty rough around the edges, and can get a little tedious, but I guess I can say that about Secret of Mana as well. The nice thing about Secret of Evermore is how it embraces elements that just you just didn't really see in other games at the time. You can even argue it still is fairly unique to this day. It has a bunch of oddball mechanics and it goes pretty hard on the settings. The dog was also pretty ambitious for its time, but I think if I were to ever play it again, I'd probably look into that patch that lets the dog become controllable by another player.
At the end of the day, Trials of Mana is the only one of the three I like, but understand how the other two could be special if you played them back in the day.
At the end of the day, Trials of Mana is the only one of the three I like, but understand how the other two could be special if you played them back in the day.
I tried it as a kid and never liked it, it always felt like an overly american 90s cartoon which I dislike as well. Might give it another chance.
Looking at a longplay, I'm still not a fan of the very drab looking tilesets and some sound effects.
Looking at a longplay, I'm still not a fan of the very drab looking tilesets and some sound effects.
Kid me didn't know anything about it being from the US an not a "real" Seiken Densetsu game - Mana was my favourite game back then and there was a new "Secret of ...". Hype at max levels. And I freaking loved it back then for being so special and moody and the German translation was great, too.
Game had a fantastic haunting atmosphere, especially in the third world. Loved it.
Here's a fun easter egg you may not know about. If you have "fuck" anywhere in your name (and only that one swear works for this) then the skeleton in the desert will charge you three Amulets of Annihilations to cross the desert rather than the usual one.
Here's a fun easter egg you may not know about. If you have "fuck" anywhere in your name (and only that one swear works for this) then the skeleton in the desert will charge you three Amulets of Annihilations to cross the desert rather than the usual one.
SoE was very rough around the edges, but at least it tried to be different and I'll always give it marks for that. I had a great time with it as a teenager. I remember I replayed it some 12 years and while I stopped about half-way in, it was still as fun as I remembered. Still have my original copy too.
I remember reading this really odd, unsettling creepy pasta about this game that suggested it had a darker, scrapped original story involving missing children from a writer who was fired. It was a pretty good creepy pasta!
This game is a lot of fun. HD-2D please!
This game is a lot of fun. HD-2D please!
Did you know?
rainwoodworks.blogspot.com
The original story behind Secret of Evermore.
The Secret of Evermore was one of my favorite games as a kid. I play through it again every few years and it somehow always manages to imme...
rainwoodworks.blogspot.com
This is the creepy pasta I mentioned!Did you know?
The original story behind Secret of Evermore.
The Secret of Evermore was one of my favorite games as a kid. I play through it again every few years and it somehow always manages to imme...
One complaint at the time was that it didn't have the multiplayer that Secret of Mana had, but if you play via emulation, there's a hack that lets player 2 play as the dog!
www.romhacking.net
SoE - 2 Player Edition
Secret of Evermore… like many people back in the SNES days, when I tried this game out I was expec
Yup, and you can export this to the SNES mini and play as god intended on the same TVOne complaint at the time was that it didn't have the multiplayer that Secret of Mana had, but if you play via emulation, there's a hack that lets player 2 play as the dog!
SoE - 2 Player Edition
Secret of Evermore… like many people back in the SNES days, when I tried this game out I was expec
OP
OP
Did you know?
The original story behind Secret of Evermore.
The Secret of Evermore was one of my favorite games as a kid. I play through it again every few years and it somehow always manages to imme...
Haha. I'm gonna have to read this.
One complaint at the time was that it didn't have the multiplayer that Secret of Mana had, but if you play via emulation, there's a hack that lets player 2 play as the dog!
SoE - 2 Player Edition
Secret of Evermore… like many people back in the SNES days, when I tried this game out I was expec
Yeah, I love playing improvement rom hacks through a flash cart, though I've honestly sometimes considered updating the versions of games on some of the Classic/Mini consoles released by replacing them with improvement rom hacks.
I would love that. I think this game is a perfect candidate for that treatment.
Secret of Evermore has this special "je-ne-sais-quoi" that makes it very unique and quite great. Though it does suffer from a few issues, such as the air vent maze with the dog section (because hidden paths are such a good idea). Gothica as a whole is a world that can break the player, with bad sections and very sudden jumps of difficulty.
The Alchemy was a fantastic idea, and hunting ingredients too, though it had a big issue of making old spells much more useful and powerful than newer ones, since you can usually level up your first spells for cheap, and the new ones require grinding before they can measure up, and they are usually much more expansive.
The soundtrack is mostly atmospheric, though quite a few tracks stand out, such as this one that, weirdly enough, always stuck with me:
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E5v9B6Z2e-Y
The Alchemy was a fantastic idea, and hunting ingredients too, though it had a big issue of making old spells much more useful and powerful than newer ones, since you can usually level up your first spells for cheap, and the new ones require grinding before they can measure up, and they are usually much more expansive.
The soundtrack is mostly atmospheric, though quite a few tracks stand out, such as this one that, weirdly enough, always stuck with me:
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E5v9B6Z2e-Y
User warned: incendiary drive-by featuring no evidence of claims
Hasn't the guy who directed it been outed as a white supremacist?
... (*blinks*) What? I'd like a source for that, please.
It's just very subdued/atmospheric. It's good on its own but if you come into it expecting a God-Tier soundtrack like Secret of Mana, I can see why it underwhelms.
SoM suffered from originally being designed for the SNES CD add-on and once that got dropped it got chopped up to fit on IIRC a 48Mb cart, then further when Nintendo wouldn't give them that it got cut down even more to 32 and then finally 16Mb and was part of what drove Square to Sony. I played through it a ton back in the day but I always disappointed by the lack of an ending but that explained why and why other things were lacking.
SoE suffered from being in SoM's shadow and stigmatized as being the reason we didn't get "Secret of Mana 2", I ended up playing it some time later and enjoyed it but I don't remember a whole lot.
I played SD3 with the fan translation patch until I think something broke. That game being riddled with bugs was the actual reason we didn't get it until the remake. Still need to pick that up.
SoE suffered from being in SoM's shadow and stigmatized as being the reason we didn't get "Secret of Mana 2", I ended up playing it some time later and enjoyed it but I don't remember a whole lot.
I played SD3 with the fan translation patch until I think something broke. That game being riddled with bugs was the actual reason we didn't get it until the remake. Still need to pick that up.
It's not really what happened lol. It's not like they developed the full game for SNES CD and then chopped that up to fit a cartridge. The SNES CD was canceled way before they had even coded a single line of program.
I love SoE. It just feels different and the music is so good. Also, the FFIV Cecil cameo had me like 🤯
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I think other Final Fantasy characters (mostly from VI, if I remember correctly) also make a cameo during the intro to the fight in the colosseum. They're in the crowd. But yeah, having Cecil as an NPC you get to talk to was kind of cool.
Trials is like so much better on nearly every level it's not even funny, heck it's even the one with a proper translation (and I don't mean just English even).
Far more beautiful, better AI, still buggy but way less so than Mana and also waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay less grindy to get to impressive visual attacks and also still poses a challenge unlike Mana where even looking in the direction of some bosses will have them die on you.
Also save system is abhorrent in Mana too.
Mana is fun for the 3 player option that was stupidly difficult to setup back in the day (because who the fuck had a multitap back then).
Evermore is getting too much crap and is a legit great game, vastly overshadowed by pretty much everything else that was released back then but still worth playing.
Far more beautiful, better AI, still buggy but way less so than Mana and also waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay less grindy to get to impressive visual attacks and also still poses a challenge unlike Mana where even looking in the direction of some bosses will have them die on you.
Also save system is abhorrent in Mana too.
Mana is fun for the 3 player option that was stupidly difficult to setup back in the day (because who the fuck had a multitap back then).
Evermore is getting too much crap and is a legit great game, vastly overshadowed by pretty much everything else that was released back then but still worth playing.
This game was not finish, it show, so many bug i've encounter during my multiple play, a lot that i was never able to appear again.
But that setting and the music was top notch. The first jungle section was where they put much more love/time and it's show, if all the game had that quality.
But that setting and the music was top notch. The first jungle section was where they put much more love/time and it's show, if all the game had that quality.
Out of the 3,
I think Evermore was probably the one released in the most finished state if we're being honest with ourselves.
Trials was so unfinished it didn't even release outside of Japan.
Mana is unbalanced, buggiest of the bunch and some stuffs are barely unlockable.
they're all a product of their insane times.
Evermore feel the most unbalanced of both, like they had 0 minutes to balance the gameplay in any way after the pyramide section. Dog damage is broken, every enemies hit 1 damage in some section, magic is totally broken for 75% of the spell, artifact make no effect when the text say they did. I was able to bypass section in Evermore that i don't know how, door that not suppose to open now is open, that final section is horrible, worse then mana last dungeon. Both were buggy, but i think evermore is way worse.
I guess I need to replay it, it seemed more stable to me.
But I think the only game of the 3 where any thought was spared for balance was Trials.
Alchemy is clearly not properly balanced with the stupid requirements and thus you're probably never seeing lvl8 of most of the spells there.
Secret is still fresh so it seems worse to me.
Funnily enough I've played Trials more than the other 2 combined easily....even on original hardware.
View: https://media0.giphy.com/media/3oFzmkkwfOGlzZ0gxi/giphy.gif?cid=ecf05e477n2hnomy6crmvpcr4runrqikrbp6hsl5lzjeozgk&rid=giphy.gif&ct=g
I know this got blasted back in the day, but as an angsty 13 year old this game hit just right. the ominous tone, the melancholy vibe, the music, its all so good. Very different from the super bright and cheerful games of that era.
I didn't say anything about development or code, I said designed, you know pre-production, fucking obviously it wasn't mid actual production and that's exactly what happened, the team behind it didn't want to continue it after the add-on was cancelled but Square decided to do so and they had to cut planned content to get it to fit on the cart size made available to them, including endings.
It's not just endings that they cut. They basically rebooted everything, including Akira Toriyama's concept art. The original project was called "Chrono Trigger".
When the SNES CD was cancelled, they split the project into the game that eventually reused the Chrono Trigger name and a game that they eventually turned into a sequel to Seiken Densetsu.