Dawn of Mana

by Square Enix

Product Features

• Experience the beloved world of Mana in a fully 3D environment for the first time.
• Explore sweeping plains and mountains that stretch as far as the eye can see, brought vividly to life by the detailed visuals that fans have come to expect from the Mana series.
• Experience an interactive world that encourages players to “touch” the world of Mana.
• Realistic facial expressions dynamically convey each character’s mood and emotions.

Product Details

• Shipping: This item is also available for shipping to select countries outside the U.S.
• ASIN: B000NGQ26C
• Product Dimensions: 7.5 x 5.5 x 0.8 inches ; 4.8 ounces
• Media: Video Game
• Release Date: May 22, 2007
• Average Customer Review: 3.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (12 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #8,425 in Video Games (See Top 100 in Video Games)
• Discontinued by manufacturer: Yes

Product Description

Edition: Standard

Amazon.com

Long ago, when the world was at peace and magic was yet unknown to man, a beautiful isle called Illusia floated in the center of the Inner Sea. Over the island towered the Great Tree, the source of all life. There it had stood since the beginning of the world. But over time, the Tree gradually turned to stone and slept as though death had come at last.

So unfolds the story of how a boy came to wield a sacred sword and how a maiden became a goddess—entwining the fate of spirits, mortals, and the entire world into an engaging and entertaining tale of ultimate hope.

In Dawn of Mana players will finally uncover the origins of the long-running MANA series, which boasts unique and fully interactive 3D environments. Players will be able to interact with their environment like never before, as they explore, destroy and use objects in their fight against fierce—and often funny—enemies. Four difficulty levels, gameplay-altering emblems and a battle arena with collectable pets add customization to the adventure and increase replay value.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

29 of 32 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Another Mana Game Takes a Dive, May 23, 2007

By 

S. Rhodes - See all my reviews
(TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (VINE VOICE)   

= Fun:2.0 out of 5 stars 

This review is from: Dawn of Mana (Video Game)

It's hard to write a review for a Mana game and not talk about Secret of Mana. A game hailed as not only one of the greatest SNES RPGs out there, but also as one of the greatest RPGs of all time. Over the years, however, the Mana series has gotten progressively worse while other franchises from Square-Enix continue to be strong. Dawn of Mana is no exception as it is without a doubt one of the worst Mana games ever. It seems there will never be another Mana game to hold a candle up to the legacy set by Secret. It's really sad because Dawn of Mana, like the other Mana games to drop the ball, had a lot of potential to be good. The developers just didn't do things right.

Dawn of Mana centers on a guy named Keldric who is out to save someone named Ritzia from an evil King who has kidnapped Ritzia so that he can call forth the power of the Mana tree and plunge the world into Darkness. It's a pretty basic story. The good news is that the story is presented really well. The voice acting is top notch and the cutscenes are absolutely gorgeous to look at. Unfortunately that's about where the compliments to the game end. The gameplay, for as simple as it is, is rather frustrating.

Firstly, the game is fairly action/adventure oriented and has a dungeon crawl like feel to it. Keldric has what's called a "Vine Sword" that he can use to take on his enemies. He can use it to swing enemies into other enemies as well, but the real treat with this weapon is using his Panic attack which causes enemies to drop items. This is really the only way to get items from enemies. They don't just drop them normally. Keldric is also not alone. He's got an ally named Faye there to help him out and she's there to cast some supportive magic on him. Unfortunately unlike other Mana games, Dawn of Mana has no multi-player. It's all really simple stuff until you throw in the games other mechanics.

The targeting system in and of itself is incredibly flawed. When battling enemies you can lock on to them. However, for some odd reason, the game always locks on to an enemy in the distance... never the obvious threat that's taking you on. You can also lock on to other objects, but again, it's never the one you want or one that's close by. And if there are multiple enemies or objects the game has to cycle through them, and again it becomes tedious to wait for the game to get to the enemy or object you want. You're better off going at it on your own and not wasting any time with the flawed targeting system.

Another major flaw to the design of the game is the level up system. At the start it seems all fine and dandy to level up and get your abilities, but the moment you complete a chapter you lose it all! That means after you've gone through Chapter 1, leveled up Keldric and Faye to take on enemies, gotten them some pretty useful abilities and the like, you'll lose it all once you begin Chapter 2 and have to get them all over again. All your work will pretty much go to waste. The game tries to compensate by giving you Emblems which have abilities on them.

Getting Emblems is a task in and of itself. As you go through the chapters the game will rank you. An S ranking is the highest you can get. If you get a good ranking you'll be rewarded with an Emblem. There's an Emblem rewarded for each difficulty level as well. Completing Chapter 1 on Normal and getting the best rank will yield you a different Emblem than if you were to complete Chapter 1 on Hard mode with the best rank. Your rank is determined by things like how fast yo complete the chapter, how many enemies you killed etc. Yet even the Emblem system has its own flaws. You can only select to equip them before the chapter starts. You cannot change up Emblems in the middle of a chapter. Instead you'll have to complete it. A little more freedom would've been nice. Also, getting Emblems is just all out difficult. It's almost not even worth it to try.

As you go through the game, there's also a radar in the upper corner to help you out. It doesn't really provide that much help, though. There's a yellow box which represents your goal and then there are blue and red boxes for your enemies. Blue just simply means that the enemy has an item. Although, for some reason, you'll run into enemies on the map that are marked red on your radar that will drop items while some of the blue monsters give you nothing. Chances are yo won't really need the radar, but one has to wonder how Square-Enix managed to screw up something as simple as a radar system. Especially since they've done these sorts of things in plenty of other games flawlessly. The radar isn't scaled properly anyway. There are moments when it'll appear an enemy should be right next to you, and you discover they're actually a little ways away. Again, it's not too big, but it's such a simple concept that the fact that it wasn't done right is rather questionable.

The last major flaw in the gameplay department: The camera. It's a pain to mess around with. Especially when in battle and it swivels on you while you're taking on an enemy. It's controlled via the right analog stick, which makes things a little easier, but it's the fact that you'll spend a lot of time fighting with it to readjust because it positioned itself behind an object so you can't see yourself, or because the angle just isn't good. You'll spend quite some time fighting with the camera, and it's just annoying. The fact that there's no button to fix the camera right behind you is also sad.

To the game's credit, though, it looks and sounds really good. If anything, we can say that. Square-Enix is known for making some gorgeous games and despite Dawn of Mana's flawed gameplay it's true here. The look and feel of the game is absolutely fantastic. The voice acting is also pretty good. But the best part of Dawn of Mana is its soundtrack. The music in the game is nothing short of brilliant. On a technical level, Dawn of Mana is fantastic. But pretty graphics don't make a game fun, and that's also true of Dawn of Mana.

Dawn of Mana isn't a horrible game, it's just a very flawed one. The part of the game that matters most--gameplay--suffers from things that a game in this day and age shouldn't suffer from. It's especially disappointing considering what's flawed in this game are aspects that Square-Enix knows how to do well and have demonstrated they know how to do them well time and time again. It'll be hard for Mana fans to look past the flaws in this one. Another Mana game takes a dive.

Pros:

+Good graphics
+Good Soundtrack
+Well done voice acting

Cons:

-Horrible targeting system
-Bad Camera
-You start each new chapter at level 1, losing all the work you did in the last chapter
-Getting Emblems is a pain, and you can't change them in the middle of a chapter, they can only be equipped at the beginning of one
-The radar is virtually useless

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars It's not Secret of Mana, but don't trash it just yet..., July 15, 2007

By 

Zeth (VA, USA) - See all my reviews

= Fun:5.0 out of 5 stars 

This review is from: Dawn of Mana (Video Game)

Ok, I'll cut straight to the chase here. I won't waste your time doing in-depth reviews the many aspects of this game, good or bad. You've read those; good acting/presentation/graphics/idea, bad execution (Camera/lock-on). If you wanna review these aspects, go visit Gamespot or whatever where it's their job to do stuff like that.

This is one of those games that you will either like, or you will hate. I happen to be one of them who liked it, and here's my stand on getting this game.

I won't deny that the camera and lock-on systems in this game are subpar, and I won't deny that some of the problems created by these problems make parts of the game aggravating. After the first couple hours I became real annoyed trying to figure out how to advance through a stage while being assaulted with a wacky camera and hard to grab enemies. Did that stop me? No. I wanted to beat the game, not let the game beat me.

So ask yourself: "How much do I really care about a crappy camera angle or a bad lock on?" Quite personally, I got over it. After a while, you get quite used to it, and you can figure out how to have a good time without crabbing about it. Sure, it may still be buggy, but once you're used to it, you can compensate rather effectively.

It bothers me a bit when people don't like something in a video game , and they go off on a tirade about its level of epic failure before they work with it some and give it another chance (Not pointing to anyone in specific; everyone is entitled to their views). Yes, first impressions can leave a lasting mark, and yes, some games are doomed to failure, but if you never give the game a chance after you've had some level of disgust, how can you be positive?

I've had a lot of fun destroying environments and chucking them willy-nilly at unsuspecting enemies, and then taking said unsuspecting enemies and chucking them at each other. Repetitive? Maybe. A reason to cast a thousand curses upon a game? Probably not. The large levels and interactive environments help make some of the possibly repetitious battles more unique, and if anything, its fun just to look at all the colorful details and beautiful scenery.

To be more specific: Get this game if you like chucking large objects around, enjoy a beautifully rendered world, a decent story with pretty good voice acting, and don't mind a few improperly executed details that can be overcome (I mean really, no game is perfect, and not every game can be SoM or FF7) if you just take the time to not be discouraged. If you're patient, you can do it.

Don't this game if you like absolutely flawless systems or can't stand bad camera angles. Don't get it if you don't like chucking things around for hours on end, or if you like to keep your powerups between levels (So, I guess if you don't like old platformers!).

If you're not sure: Rent it, but don't return it right away. If you're patient enough, you might end up liking it. If not, no biggie. I'm a stubborn person with a lot of patience, so I could withstand a lot more than some people can when it comes to games, and my advice may not apply to you.

As far as the stars...5 for fun, because some of the mass mayhem I got to cause was pretty exciting, but some of the aggravation going into getting over the camera and locking pulled it down a little.

(Ok, so I slipped a little bit of a review in with my advice, big whoop)

11 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars An Underrated Classic after North American fixes., June 1, 2007

By 

M. Riser "arts and entertainment guru" (CA, USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

= Fun:5.0 out of 5 stars 

This review is from: Dawn of Mana (Video Game)

Let's just get something out of the way up front: Dawn of Mana is NOT an action RPG. In fact, it isn't any kind of RPG. Nor does it have anything that could be conceived of (logically) as "RPG elements". Mana fans might find this disconcerting, given that the previous games in the series were light RPGs mashed into an action/adventure core, but what we have here is something that aims to be a different experience entirely. Anyone who tells you the game is an RPG in which your level resets at the end of each stage is a very sad individual. Just because a game has "levels" of something doesn't mean it's an RPG or meant to be taken as one in any way. Plenty of shooters and other game types have had levels of one thing or another, and that in no way indicates that the game had RPG elements.

So...

Much ado has been made of the gamut of problems that Dawn of Mana suffers from, and while most of these accusations are on at least some level true, your mileage will definitely vary. There are gamers who apparently loathe this game as if it had its way with their wives and daughters, and there are some, like myself, who feel it is unjustly criticized and can actually be quite a positive experience for many. Part of the problem is the original release in Japan was far too difficult and often frustrating due to some design issues, but these have almost entirely been resolved in the North American release. Don't let the general negativity fool you - this is by no means a terrible game.

The big issues? Firstly, the camera. We can all agree that the camera is terrible. You've played games with terrible cameras before, and this one is just like those were. Secondly, the control. Some say it's completely broken, some say it's fine. I say it's in the middle. It's perfectly functional, it's just quite stiff, leading to some occasional frustration before you've gotten used to its nuances. Thirdly, there are some minor inconsistencies when it comes to the game's radar and its objectives, but many players may bypass those problems altogether simply because they may not happen to get lost. Where some did, I didn't. Where others didn't, I did. Those elements could certainly have been improved, but they don't destroy the game by any stretch of the imagination.

As I see it, those are the game's major problems. If you feel you can get beyond those, give it a try. Renting is a good option if you have doubts.

So we know the bad, what's good? Firstly, the art. Everything is well designed, well animated, very colorful and full of heart, and oozes Mana from every pore. Secondly, the gameplay. While I initially felt that swatting enemies around with environmental objects was going to feel gimmicky and boring, I was proven wrong. Most levels are just big sandboxes in which enemies and objects coexist together, waiting for you to come along and introduce the latter to the former with a few good swings of your whip-sword or the kinetic energy from a good punch. Thirdly, the sound and music. The soundtrack is a beautiful thing well worth listening to, and the voice actors in the English dub do a surprisingly solid job.

Do you have any hope of liking Dawn of Mana? You certainly do. The best advice anyone can give you is to try it. Despite what seems like an overwhelming wall of negativity from those who don't like it, there are many of us who find it to be an enjoyable experience worth the price of entry. There's no guarantee you'll be able to get past the flaws, but these are minor compared to what you're hearing on the whole, and there's a perfectly good chance that you will enjoy the game as evidenced by the number of people out there playing and enjoying it right now.

Take a chance. You might be pleasantly surprised.

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