Visions of Mana (2024; PS4, PS5, XBOX Series X/S, PC)

[Koby]

Visions of Mana is an upcoming action role-playing game developed by Ouka Studios and published by Square Enix for PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Windows, and Xbox Series X/S. It is the fifth main title in the Mana series and is scheduled for release worldwide on August 29, 2024.

 

First announced in 2021, it is the first mainline game in the series to be released since Dawn of Mana in 2006, and sees the return of series designer/director Koichi Ishii, producer Masaru Oyamada, and composers Hiroki Kikuta, Tsuyoshi Sekito, and Ryo Yamazaki.

Gameplay and plot

Visions of Mana is set in a fantasy world where players take control of Val, a young man from the Fire Village of Tianeea. When his childhood friend, Hinna, undergoes a pilgrimage to the sacred Mana Tree, which controls the flow of mana throughout the world, Val accompanies her as a protector or "Soul Guard". Other characters who join Val on his mission include Morley, a cat-man and speedy attacker who seeks to overcome a traumatic event from his past, and Careena, a half-human, half-dragon dubbed "The One-Winged Oracle" who is always accompanied by her young dragon companion Ramcoh, the child of a sacred beast.

 

Like other games in the series, the title is an action role-playing game featuring real-time combat with enemies who inhabit the game's environments. The game features "semi-open world" areas made up of large maps the player may freely explore while advancing the story. Players may assume control of any member of their three-person party, each with their own unique skills. Each character has various combat classes which may be unlocked by acquiring items called Spirit Vessels and may be switched freely, granting them access to new abilities and powerful attacks call Class Strikes.

Development

The game was first announced in June 2021 as an unnamed console Mana title during the series' 30th anniversary stream broadcast. Square Enix registered a trademark for "Visions of Mana" on December 7, 2023 for Europe and Australia, and revealed the first trailer for the game during The Game Awards 2023 the following day along with a projected release some time in 2024. An expanded look at the game as well as release window was announced during an Xbox Developer_Direct in January 2024.

 

 

 

[Koby]

Visions of Mana Demo available now!

Experience a section of the story, battles and exploration in this demo of Visions of Mana - available now!

https://store.steampowered.com/app/2490990/Visions_of_Mana/

*Some content differs from the release version of the game.

■ Play the demo and receive 3 x weapons in the full game:
　・Gladius (small sword for Val)
　・Falx (great sword for Val)
　・Horn Lance (lance for Val)

*These weapons can be claimed by starting a new game and proceeding as far as Chapter 1.
*These bonus items can also be acquired by progressing through the game.

The following weapons will be available to equip as classes unlock in the full game:
*The “Gladius” can be equipped once Val becomes playable in Chapter 1.
*The “Falx” can be equipped once it becomes possible to change class to the wind class.
*The “Horn Lance” can be equipped once it becomes possible to change class to the moon class.
*Save data from the demo must be present on the system to claim these items.

*The content featured in the demo has been cut down to make a satisfying demo and progress cannot be carried over to the full game.
*When claiming these items, please ensure you have the latest update before starting play.

[Koby]

People playing the demo on PC seem very unhappy with the the port citing severe studders caused by a bad shader compilation, barebones port with a lack of any sort of graphical settings, cutscenes locked to 30 fps, massive fps dips, etc. Just seems like Square-Enix did an extremely poor port for the game unfortunately. On top of this the combat is basically a button mash spam and most reviews talk about it overall being a huge downgrade from the Trials of Mana Remake from 3 years ago. This is rather unfortunate, but Square is notorious for not giving any sort of features or settings and abandoning their games on PC immediately after release. The Kingdom Hearts games on Steam can't even be played on AMD GPUs and instead of fix it, they just pinned a thread saying it don't work.

[Koby]

Finally played the demo myself and the reviews were right... there's really bad stutter all over the place, combat is extremely laggy and bland with very spongy enemies, characters disappear if the camera gets close to them cutscenes are locked to 30 fps, and the graphic settings are extremely barebones for a PC port.

 

It's an open world game but they highlight all the treasures and items on the world map which kills the need to actually explore, but I suppose that's fine because the area in the demo is very generic, bland, and empty.

 

They give you a mount to ride around on but said mount can't jump as well as you can and gets stuck on the walls and stuff pretty often.

 

Enemies also don't do anything but stand in place in the field. They won't aggro or initiate combat in my experience. They just stand there motionless until you attack them.

 

I was considering pre-ordering the game but after this abysmal demo this has fallen to "wait for deep discount and hope it gets some performance patches by then" category. No way in hell is this game worth the full asking price in this state. No reason cutscenes should be locked to 30 fps in 2024 and the shader compilation being broken rendering the entire game a stuttering mess is just absolutely bothersome.

 

Just over all did not enjoy my time with the demo and feel this game is a massive step down from the Trials of Mana Remake from 3 years ago.

[Zemekis]

Brutal. I was considering this game but if it's as bland as I feared it may be then I'll skip it. I have plenty of older Mana games to play yet anyway. I may pick this up on a deep sale many years from now. I know @Starwind55 was excited for this and played the Demo as well.

Judging by what I've been reading, even playing on console won't fix this game's issues. Performance, perhaps, but the game itself seems like a massive step down from the highs of the series. I thought the Remakes were a bit dumbed down too. From what I'm seeing online, this is shovelware with a coat of Mana paint. Thanks Squeenix.

[Koby]

2 hours ago, Zemekis said:

Brutal. I was considering this game but if it's as bland as I feared it may be then I'll skip it. I have plenty of older Mana games to play yet anyway. I may pick this up on a deep sale many years from now. I know @Starwind55 was excited for this and played the Demo as well.

Judging by what I've been reading, even playing on console won't fix this game's issues. Performance, perhaps, but the game itself seems like a massive step down from the highs of the series. I thought the Remakes were a bit dumbed down too. From what I'm seeing online, this is shovelware with a coat of Mana paint. Thanks Squeenix.

Curious to what his experience was with the demo and whether or not it killed his hype for the game as much as it did mine.

[Zemekis]

18 minutes ago, Koby said:

Curious to what his experience was with the demo and whether or not it killed his hype for the game as much as it did mine.

I shot him a message asking him to share his thoughts. He may grace us with his presence if he sees fit. 

[Koby]

Visions of Mana Demo Update Content

 ・Improvements to overall game stability

・Minor bug fixes

 

Square Enix isn't too informative with their patch notes, but maybe this fixes the shader compilation studders? I might have to check the demo out a second time with this update and see how it runs.

[Spoony]

The demo operates much better after the update, but most of Koby's other complaints are still valid. I'll play Visions day one, but I feel like Trials is much better.

[Koby]

Retail launch sales of Visions of Mana in Japan are the second worse launch of the series, only above Heroes of Mana on NDS. Nearly 1/4 of the what the Trials of Mana remake did at launch.

 

[Koby]

Ver1.03 Update Content

 ・Improvements to overall game stability

・Bug preventing game progression in certain circumstances fixed
・Minor bug fixes
・Adjustments made to mechanic to dispel frozen status effect on allies.

[Zemekis]

Apparently this release was pretty brutal. Did anyone in this thread actually play it and confirm that it's busted? Reviews are mostly negative.

[Koby]

57 minutes ago, Zemekis said:

Apparently this release was pretty brutal. Did anyone in this thread actually play it and confirm that it's busted? Reviews are mostly negative.

I didn't. After playing the demo twice I decided to hold off for a deep sale. Though that decision was only in-part because of the game and largely also because of my lack of time to play it now and the abundance of games coming out lately. FF16 came out this month, Metaphor Refantazio comes out next month, then Dragon Quest III comes out the month after that. Though hearing the reports that Metaphor is probably 200 hours long gives me great pause on that game. I just ain't going to have the time for that anytime soon. So I'll probably jump back into SMTV whenever I finish FF16 instead and try to get that one completed finally.

 

Visions of Mana combat still felt very laggy with inputs and slow overall and enemies didn't feel like they reacted to hits or anything. It just overall had this feeling of cheap to it and I figured I could finally play Trials of Mana at some point before jumping into Visions anyways and wait for a deep discount because I decided it didn't feel like it was worth the asking price of admission.