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Platform:
Super NES Review by: Alex Jedraszczak
Ah, Secret of Evermore: Square of America ’s
misunderstood child. To me, this game has always been as mysterious
as it is hard to review. I remember seeing the game in a store when
it first came out and wishing I could buy it. Was it possible? Had
my dreams of a sequel to Secret of Mana finally come true?
It would not be until years later that I would
learn the truth of the matter. Perhaps, had I been able to play the
game at its initial release, I could have been spared at least some
of the disappointment. However, to compare Secret of Evermore to
Seiken Densetsu 3 (the Japan-only sequel to Secret of Mana) years
after the release of both with the more mature eye of a game-playing
adolescent, there was quite a sense of disappointment and even
anger. Why had they done that to us? Seiken Densetsu 3 seemed so
awesome in comparison. Were the Japanese trying to mock us?
These days I don’t care so much, though I still
view Secret of Evermore as somewhat of a rip-off. I know the folks
who made the game built it from scratch, but I’ve never understood
why they went to such lengths to copy Secret of Mana. Despite this,
the game does have some redeeming qualities. This made it hard for
me to come up with a good score, but let’s just get to the review.
I’ll start with the game’s good points. I have to
say that the best part of this game, in my opinion, is its sound.
Rather than taking the traditional approach to RPG background music,
with music being essentially all you hear beyond battle sound
effects, the composer went for a more low-key approach. The focus is
more on ambience, bringing players into the game through the use of
natural sound effects found in the game’s surroundings, accompanied
by music to fit the mood. I like this approach, and the sound
effects and music in general are well-made.
The graphics come in next, and pretty close
behind. Aside from menus and such, the game doesn’t bear much visual
resemblance to Secret of Mana. This is a good thing, in my opinion,
since I wouldn’t want to pay to play a ROM hack. While the sprites
seem little poorly animated in parts, the maps are detailed and
visually appealing. Better than I was expecting as I continued to
play, even though I thought the first level of the game was kind of
ugly.
Enough of the good stuff, though. The controls
are horrible. I can hardly hide my surprise that the setup is the
same as for Secret of Mana, but the developers actually managed to
make the collision detection worse. Melee accuracy is awful, at
least until you get the spear’s special attack, which seems to be a
switch to turn on the debugging aimbot. Worse than that is when
you’re trying to pick up the items your dog sniffs out. He just gets
within about ten pixels of the one, singular, exact pixel that you
need to click on from the right direction in order to find the item.
There were several items I left behind because I simply couldn’t
find whatever the dog was trying to point to.
Oh, the dog sniffing thing brings me to the
category that’s hardest to calculate. You see, despite the name,
layout, gameplay and all the other things copied from Secret of Mana,
this game actually does have a lot going for it. If you read
my last review, you can imagine that my play style conflicts
with the item-burning alchemy system used to replace magic, but I
still give points for creativity on that one. The dog sniffing out
items goes along with that, too.
And, let’s not forget about the money exchange.
As with the real world, the world of Secret of Evermore doesn’t all
use gold pieces or something stupid for currency. Each area of this
world uses a different type, so you have to change your money over
in order to buy things in the new area. I actually really liked
this, considering the amount of cash I would rack up on the previous
level. Something to prevent you from being able to buy everything
when you first get to a new area, while allowing you to earn enough
to buy as you play.
Also, being entirely scripted in America , this
game has a rather Western feel to it. The sci-fi movie references
and certain portions of the visual styling are uniquely Western This
is something fairly difficult to find in games even today, and
especially in any that are worth playing. I’m sorry, Madden 2008,
but you don’t fall into this category.
Really, I wish I could give this game a better
novelty score, but the game’s basic foundation is still a massive
ripoff of Secret of Mana. That really drops the points with me,
considering how it officially has no connection. Even the font on
the front of the box is the same as the Secret of Mana font. It’s
kind of sad when there was so much good in this game!
Now, we’re left with fun and replay value.
Originally, I gave the game a poor fun value for terrible collision
detection and for a magic system that can turn the game into a
grind. If you want to level your magic, you have to cast spells,
which costs items, which means you have to kill a lot of monsters in
order to afford leveling it in the first place. As I kept playing,
though, the game actually became addictive. If you can get past the
collision detection, the game has much in the way of puzzles and
other fun things. Your dog can reach places that you can’t, while
you can reach other places that your dog can’t, giving you a chance
to play as each individually. Affording items to level your spells
turned out to be less trouble than I expected, as well.
As for replay value, it’s hard to say. The story
is somewhat linear, though it’s still an enjoyable game for as long
as you can forget the “Secret of” in front of its name. I really
think the entire game would have been better if there wasn’t such a
connection to Secret of Mana, considering what it had going for it.
Such a close relationship should be reserved for games actually in a
series. But, I’m getting off topic. For the replay value, it’s about
average. You can beat it and put it away for a year and it’ll be fun
when you go back to start over again. That is, of course, depending
on whether or not you enjoyed the game in the first place.
In the end, the game was much better than I was
expecting. If you can get past the real-time battle system, ring
menus, attacks having a recharge time that causes you to do less
damage when attacking before it refills, weapon levels letting you
charge up for weapon skills…there’s just far too much in common with
Secret of Mana to ignore the connection, which is kind of sad. I
mean, I can’t say that it would have been the best game for the SNES
if it wasn’t like that, but I imagine that it would have received
better reviews at the time. It’s a game well worth playing.
So, if you haven’t played it, go give it a try!
If you have played it, why did you read my entire review?
-- Alex Jedraszczak {03-2007} Rate this article — |
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Past Reviews by Alex Jedraazczak
Gradius III (SNES) |
