The Mana Tree is in danger once again, or perhaps for the first time: Sword of Mana is a remake of the original Seiken Densetsu, released in North America as Final Fantasy Adventure. Developed by Brownie Brown, this, the second of Square Enix's GBA titles looks and plays a lot like Secret of Mana, but without the edge that game had back in 1993.
A job opening on the Square Enix website requesting, amongst others, an Art Director and Character Model Designer to work on a new Seiken Densetsu project alludes to an upcoming announcement of a new game in the Mana series, presumably for a platform that supports 3d (why else would you need a model designer). Here's some production artwork shown to give applying artists an idea of what they're looking for.1
And of course you're depending on Square Haven to reprint it in full list glory. Naturally. Read on
Out of nowhere, some random Japanese company "Meikyosha" announced the Shinyaku Seiken Densetsu Deluxe Pack, which will be released alongside Sword of Mana and contain a battery-powered figure of Li'l Cactus which can, get this, rock back and forth. It also comes with a sock puppet Rabite and a calendar. For those of you insane enough to waste money on importing this, it'll come at ?7800 (?57/US$66).1
"My penis is very large," Yoichi Wada proudly brought up during the conference, "Very much larger than Mr. Miyamoto's; in fact, I believe I may have the longest, most durable penis in the gamesindustry." Read on
Nintendo will release yet another Game Boy Advance SP variant color in Japan, this time to commemorate the release of Square's Sword of Mana. The color is named "Mana Blue" and will go on sale packaged with the game. The cost: a cool Y18,300, or about $152.1
