Cast your minds back to January 2024 and the Xbox Developer Direct. During the previous year’s showcase we had the incredible Hi-Fi Rush shadow dropped, and so speculation was rife about what the “surprise” would be this time around. Enter the gameplay reveal of Visions of Mana.
For those who are unaware, the Mana series (or to translate its Japanese title “The Legend of the Sacred Sword”) stretches way back to the early nineties. Visions of Mana marks the first mainline title in over fifteen years, but the logo still looks like it’s come straight off the front of a SNES cartridge. That tells you all you need to know, as this entry is taking the series back to its roots.
In a world filled with magic and elemental forces, Faerie’s choose Alms every four years, which then travel to the great Tree of Mana to rejuvenate the mana flow by offering their souls. If this fails to happen, devastation will befall the region as the elements rage. To ensure safe passage, soul guards such as the protagonist Val, are tasked to protect the Alms on their grand journey. All clear? Good.
Although it isn’t from Square Enix’s most famous RPG franchise, Visions of Mana showcases the vibrant, high fantasy, semi-open world in which you are invited to explore. The lush visuals look absolutely gorgeous as you journey across the vast world exploring tropical coastlines, brutal snowstorms and arid wastelands. The environments are a mix of linear and more open area, usually alternating from one to the other. Occasionally you will discover a settlement that splits up the action, and offers you a chance to restock key items, upgrade weapons and armour and usually moves the main story forward.
Your map is extremely useful and marked with points of interest in each area, as well as the direction of your main objective. Larger areas can be traversed on the back of the adorable Pikult mounts, which make the journey much faster. As on foot, sprinting is not interrupted by any sort of fatigue which is handy.
Random items will pop up in the wild, alongside more valuable ones locked away in treasure chests. There are loads to find as you would expect, including gear, buffs and other oddities. The hardest to acquire are usually tucked away behind mobs of enemies that are showing off a level much higher than your own, at the beginning anyhow.
The combat in Visions of Mana is real time, and you can skip past enemies if you wish or get up close and personal to engage. The usual level system applies which will give you some guidance on whether it’s a good idea or not to get stuck in. Once you do, a coloured ring will encircle the battlefield which can be crossed to escape, unless it happens to be red. Then there is no escape.
You have a regular melee attack and a more powerful variant at your disposal, which can be repeated to form combos. Different seeds can be equipped which offer buffs, as well as access to special moves. Your most powerful moves vary by class, and are accompanied by fantastic cinematics which never get boring to watch. However, the foundation of the combat in Visions of Mana comes with the elemental vessels and class system. These powerful items imbue party members with elemental abilities and change them to a specific class. These vary by character and can be swapped out easily enough depending on the combo you wish to take into battle. For example, the Slyphid Boomerang is the vessel of wind, and transforms Val into the Rune Knight class (as well as giving him some snazzy armour).
With this comes exclusive combat abilities, but also the power to manipulate the elements as you explore. Here, with the power of the wind, you’ll be able to access new areas and make use of shortcuts. The vessels are colour coded, and there are eight in total to track down and experiment with to find your ideal combination. These come with a skill tree of sorts, in the form of elemental plots. Spending your elemental points along these plot lines will unlock new moves, perks and other benefits for each class. Just remember that abilities are class specific, so choose wisely.
There’s quite a bit going on once you have full access to your party management menus, and it can be a little clunky at times. The shortcut and quick wheel systems certainly help, but I struggled to assign my skills and items to those “hotkeys” for a good while, which is probably the best example of the overcrowding.
Be aware too, rare and much more powerful enemies roam the lands and will take the combined might of your party to defeat. There are all sorts of weird, wonderful and often cute monsters in Visions of Mana. Don’t be fooled however, it’s often the most innocent looking ones which are the most deadly.
There are also elemental aeries which can be accessed with the correct vessels. These trials pit you against waves of enemies against the clock, in return for prized rewards. However, when it’s busy on screen in situations such as this, the game does suffer from some intermittent framerate issues.
Of course, Visions of Mana wouldn’t be an RPG without boss battles. These characters are accompanied by the all too familiar lengthy health bar, but do also have their weak spots which allow you to land critical hits. These are pretty by the numbers encounters, but the creature design is brilliant and keeps them entertaining to play through. Now is probably a good time to mention that the autosave feature doesn’t kick in that frequently in Visions of Mana, unless you are mainlining the story. Lots of exploration and loot can be lost if you die in battle, so make sure to save at meridians to safeguard your progress.
All of these elements and more combine to make Visions of Mana a brilliant introduction to the world of JRPGs. Make no mistake, this isn’t an overly simple or dumbed down game, but instead certain choices take the edge off for the player allowing them to enjoy the adventure. For example, fast travel is available immediately thanks to the meridians you will come across during your travels. These points, along with entrances to each area, can easily be travelled to from the map menu to prevent repetitive back tracking. Another case in point are the various items of interest automatically registered to your map. These include treasure chests, elemental triggers and more which are available for you to check out straight away. There’s no endless searching or saving up to buy expensive treasure maps here.
There are also a range of options available to you to help manage your party members who you aren’t directly in control of, from fighting style to how often they use items in battle. Swapping between playable characters is instant and cost free too, handy if you fancy trying out different classes.
Despite all this, you’ll gradually be introduced to the numerous in-game mechanics within the first few hours of playing, layering on various party management features. I was surprised with how long it took to drip feed it all in, but then this speaks to how well crafted Visions of Mana is.
At around 40 hrs there’s plenty to get stuck into as well. The length is significantly extended thanks to the plethora of cut scenes which split up your adventure. The dialogue between the characters really fleshes out their relationships and before long I really got to know each party member and their motivations. There’s a wonderfully emotional and yet innocent story told in Visions of Mana which is made possible by the brilliant character development.
Side quests will also keep you busy, found in towns and villages around the land. These are used as a way to push you back to go out and explore the larger areas, however they are pretty basic and usually fall into a fetch and find, or battle scenario.
I decided to have faith in myself, and went into Visions of Mana on the “Normal” difficulty. There was most certainly a difficulty curve, however I found the balance manageable pretty much throughout. It may be because I’m the type of player to 100% each area before moving on, so I always had a stash of cash with which to upgrade my gear at every opportunity.
When you peel back Visions of Mana there are lots of great ideas and mechanics that succeed in bringing a beloved series bang up to date. There is so much to talk about, but it’s best to dive in and experience it for yourself. It’s a beautiful Japanese RPG which manages to be charming, engaging but avoids becoming too complicated and distracting from the heartfelt tale being told at the centre of it all.
This is undoubtedly a Mana game, albeit for the present day. Visions of Mana may not break the mold, but it proves just how magical the series can be.
A Classic Fantasy Reborn in Visions of Mana – https://www.thexboxhub.com/a-classic-fantasy-reborn-in-visions-of-mana/
New details, release date window and trailer revealed for Visions of Mana – https://www.thexboxhub.com/new-details-release-date-window-and-trailer-revealed-for-visions-of-mana/
Buy Visions of Mana from the Xbox Store – https://www.xbox.com/en-GB/games/store/early-purchase-visions-of-mana/9NL6ZDP9BZMS/0010
Or grab the Digital Deluxe edition – https://www.xbox.com/en-GB/games/store/early-purchase-visions-of-mana-digital-deluxe-edition/9NZFD4712DB2/0010
