Square Enix To Release ‘Visions Of Mana’ Later In 2024, Newest Mainline Entry After 15 Years
by Michael Betar IV
Visions of Mana (Image: Square Enix)
During 2023’s Game Awards, Square Enix revealed a first look into the upcoming Visions of Mana game through an announcement trailer later uploaded to their official YouTube channel. Within the video’s description, they have teased that “for the first time in over 15 years, a brand new entry in the mainline Mana series arrives,” bringing hype among fans of the franchise.
This reference refers to the 2007 game Heroes of Mana, which was, at the time, the fourth and final entry of the mainline series under the direction of series creator, Koichi Ishii. Ishii is involved with the design of the newest entry of the franchise, but the fifth installment has been under the view of Masaru Oyamada, who has been producing for the series over the last ten years.
Despite uncertainties over whether fans of Mana would be interested in a new main series game, in an interview with Xbox Wire, Oyamada stated that “following the good reputation” that the 2020 remake of the 1995’s Trials of Mana, the series’ third entry released to the Super Famicom, “it became clear” that making a fifth installment would be well received by fans.
After announcing the development of the game in 2021, Oyamada and Ishii, alongside series composers Hiroki Kikuta, Tsuyoshi Sekito and Ryo Yamazaki, have been working with developer company, Xeen, to create the action RPG with the series’ first attempt to include aerial combat. The gameplay will be a mixture of semi-open-world exploration, hack-and-slash mechanics and magic-based combat.
In a gameplay reveal during Xbox Developer Direct 2024 on January 18, Ishii and Oyamada went in-depth into the new game’s combat with special attention to the aerial mechanics, alongside showing the new look of the creatures that players will interact with in Visions of Mana.
The game is slated to release this Summer 2024 for Xbox Series S/X, PlayStation 4 and 5, as well as PC. The noted exclusion of the Switch from the game’s platforms has left fans speculating on whether the game will receive a Nintendo release, as some have suggested that the studio may wait for the rumored Switch 2’s launch.
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