All the Reasons I Hate Secret of Evermore for SNES - A Review | hungrygoriya 

oh my god, the jail cell bug. i scripted that area. it was supposed to be written differently but the game always locked up. the programmers could not figure out why. they tried several things. i spent 2 days rescripting the area different ways and finally got the jail cell to work what seemed 100% of the time. and the testing guys passed it. of course, once a zillion people tried it, some people got the freeze again.

This is an excellent video that helps manage expectations. You hit on why I don't like this game either: it feels like work. I'd completely forgotten about the money exchange nonsense. That, and the flea market, are the worst parts of the game for me. I actually ran into that very same bug where your dog gets stuck in the corner. I thought that was just me, I did not realize that was just a problem with the game. I reaaaaaaally want to like Secret of Evermore. I love the theme, and how it looks and sounds different than other action RPGs... but it just doesn't work. Too many problems

I got this game for Christmas when it originally came out. I finished the game with no guides. Looking back I have no idea how I managed to figure out everything.

I am sorry you had a bad experience with this game. I played this game when it came out many, many years ago, and I have to say it was my absolute favorite games on the SNES. As a matter of fact I played it multiple times and beat it each time without any issues.

I LOVED playing this game! It’s a hidden gem!

My name is Brian Fehdrau, and as the lead programmer, I'm inclined to be defensive, but the truth is that you raise a few good points about the bugs, which I have said for many years have left me apologizing to people when they tell me they played the game. Although I wish I could bathe in the kind words of those have since told me they loved the game, in spite of any bugs they might have had to deal with, I think your video is somewhat validating of my worries that not everyone could enjoy the game. So, I'd offer to you, and to anyone else affected, my apologies for the bugs that made it into the released version. We were a crew of relative newbies to the industry and we made a lot of mistakes that we weren't able to fix before deadlines arrived and the game had to go out the door. I've always felt bad about kids who played the game and had a bad experience. I will say that a lot of your other dislikes are things that other people actively like, so in that respect I think it may have been a matter of personal taste. For instance, a lot of people liked the alchemy system vs. effectively-infinite mana pools that didn't really require you to be responsible with your magic usage. Many saw that as a challenge. Similarly so for the market. It all depends on expectations, really. Speaking of the market, I _would_ agree there was too much forced running of long distances back and forth through its maze-like layout. As a gamer myself, I hate make-work and fetch quests. I also agree that the trial-and-error mazes like Thraxx's or the sewer pipes were bad. I plead innocence, as I worked on neither the market nor the mazes, being more focused on the engine that ran the game than on the scripted content, though I suppose I could have at least said something and maybe influenced the design, I dunno. Artists and writers tend not to be very receptive to the sort of usally-autistic opinions that programmers might express. ;) Anyway, for good or bad, I appreciate that you at least gave our game a try. I hope you had at least a few good moments among the bad, and no hard feelings about the review!

Fun fact: The Cecil in the shop 2/3rds through the game is supposed to be the main character from Final Fantasy IV (II in the US) after he had retired from being king.

The market is a unique maze on its own just through the bartering... I liked it.

Secret of Evermore is one of my favorite RPGS of all time. I am, in no way, hating on your opinion. I actually find it incredibly interesting to hear your perspective. Just having experienced this gem cements your pedigree as a cultured gamer, in my opinion.

christmas 1996 SoE is wrapped under the christmas tree. Everytime my mom takes the dog for a walk i open the gift, play it for 15 minutes and re-wrap the box. The game may not be perfect, even flawed at some points. But the memories are priceless.

There were also references to Final Fantasy in a couple of places. FF VI characters are in the audience at the Colloseum and Cecil from FF IV runs a weapon shop in the medieval world.

I'm sorry to hear you didn't enjoy this. Secret Of Evermore was one of the most joyful experiences of the SNES for me, if not the most, if not the most joyful video game experiences of all. I bought it used, so no manual, and needed to figure everything out myself. I didn't even know about the ability to charge up attacks past 100% until way into the game when I did it on accident. The humor stood out a lot, as did the fact that it felt like actual English writing, not Japanese writing that was translated. The settings were distinct, and story was full of character. However, I discovered that over time. I bought it after trying it out (the used game shop I got it at let customers try games before buying), and the first 10 minutes or so hooked me in. The alchemy felt more like the survival lite aspects you see in modern games, like Witcher 3, where you are spending a lot of time looking for stuff. I enjoyed the searching for stuff, and it meant being more thoughtful about when to use magic.

One of those rare cases where you had to be there when it came out. I get it, some day people will look back at games released today and wonder how we put up with things.

I remember finding the exchange system used in that time period refreshing, back when I was twelve. It goes to show that different people can find reasons to love or hate different systems, based on their expectations and previous experiences. Amazing video.

The algorithm just offered me this video, and I had to click IMMEDIATELY, as Evermore is one of my favourite games of the 16 bit era. I'm only a few minutes in and I already want to say THANK YOU for putting the titles on screen when showing footage of other games. I wish more youtubers would do this.

I always find it wild how divisive this game is. It's easily on my top 5 SNES favorites. When I first played it, it was just so enchanting and atmospheric. Still is. I found myself immersed in this mysterious world, and a character brought straight from the Earth we know helped achieve that. And of course, it was the first video game soundtrack written by the legendary Jeremy Soule. Graphically, musically, and in writing, it was a masterpiece. The combat was darn near identical to Secret of Mana, and that's generally a well-received game. I had no trouble stomaching it, and actually enjoyed the toss-up between using a spell or charging a weapon. I found myself focusing on spells where the resources were readily available to purchase, and casting them frequently. If anything, my complaint would be that even by level 3 or 4, alchemy would absolutely destroy everything TOO easily. Even buying materials, the rate at which it killed would pay for itself. But to me, the combat felt tactical. I needed to make sure I lined up that shot perfectly so I didn't waste the charge. The dungeons were definitely hearkening back to old games with their mazey-structure. Dead ends, loops, and bad-warps can be frustrating, but I gained a sense of satisfaction from exploring the new areas, and sniffing out those rare ingredients or items in the areas. There are just so many secrets and the completionist in me got that sweet endorphin rush as I collected more and more. Sure, I could just restore MP at an Inn in other games, OR I could get the satisfaction of making progress with every ingredient I had sniffed out by my faithful companion. Even if the mazes felt tedious, the atmosphere kept me in the game and enjoying it. But the bugs do suck. Both the glitches and Mazquitos.

just wanted to say that I really appreciate your commitment to these otherwise forgotten games. I'm drawn in by the chance to get a taste of what the game was like, "okay, I'll give this two minutes and I'm out," but I always stay to hear your aggressively holistic take, and I especially appreciate your zeal for the game manuals! I loved seeing your innate politeness being slowly broken down by your experience with the game, and the way you let the game's shortcomings speak for themselves by what you're showing on screen - that long pan across your notebook was subtle and damning. your videos have really come a long way, thank you for taking such care in making them!!!

I like this game and would like to find a copy for my collection some time. It is fun to explore and has a unique play. Combat is basically the same as Secret of Mana, which is one of the most beloved SNES rpg's out there. It was an early system to prevent button mashing trivializing combat. I almost never charge the attack, but I found after the first area that having your dog charge was more useful then not. At the end of the game, the dog is so powerful i had the boy set to charge and just played the dog. Alchemy is more about picking one or two you like and sticking with them to level them. A few are very powerful but are hard to find ingrediants. Others ingrediants are everywhere, so you level them to make powerful instead. I never had a problem with the dog locations either. Did you emulate this? Maybe the image is slightly stretched and the pixels are distorted playing on a modern flat screen. I wish this game got a remaster.

I know the game can have some pretty hefty flaws, but it being your worst time on the SNES? That seems pretty harsh. Personally I always absolutely adored the athmosphere in this game, the music and ambient sounds were a huge part of it and it fascinated me how the SNES was able to make it sound so "realistic." And being someone that played a whole lot of SoM, I was used to the hitboxes of that combat system. Alchemy and charged attacks are key to getting quick kills (especially setting it for the dog attacks). Your issues with the currency are perfectly valid, tho. It sucks that they made this interesting magic system and made it so cumbersome to use, it needs loads of grinding but - can reward you with spells that can be extremely effective against certain enemy types. The market is absolutely infamous for a reason, yes. But it also rewards your tenacity with permanent passive massive buffs. I know you usually play these game as raw as possible, but looking up a guide for that one is totally okay. Anyway, my hope of this game getting a remake/remaster someday that fixes the most obvious stuff prevails.

SO MANY MAZES in this game, and none of them are fun. They all felt like work. I absolutely love this review. You're spot on about the combat and how infuriatingly often you just miss your target. I had some particular gripes about how the character grips the spear at the blade, using it more like a dagger at very close range. Furthermore, leveling weapons seemed meaningless since as soon as your weapon becomes a decent level, you get a new weapon, and those weapon levels don't carry over to other similar weapons. Getting to max level with the first sword doesn't give you any weapon levels for the later swords you get? Plus, I hated the main character so much. In summation, all this game has is its quirky writing and whimsical sense of humor, which... wasn't really my style anyway. Was not thrilled with this game. I played it in tandem with a fellow streamer named MegaHarv (we did a Tag Team Live Stream where we essentially handed the controller off every hour) and we had fun with it despite how bad this game was.

People complain about day 1 patches on modern games, but forget that many cartridge and early CD/DVD media had plenty of bugs. That was actually a benefit of getting a translation of a jrpg a year or 2 later. All those bugs in the original were fixed for the localized versions. As for this game, I only ever played this as a weekend rental. For whatever reason, the game never resonated with me enough to ever come back to it.

My favorite part about this game is how I don't know anyone personally that dislikes it and yet all these Internet retro gaming folks keep putting out videos to explain why we shouldn't like it lol

Secret of Evermore is my all-time favorite SNES title, but it's not perfect and it IS an acquired taste: The Good: 1. The combat system is rewarding for people who, like me, like to fight smarter as opposed to harder.(Part of the reason I love Soulsborne games so much.) 2. The Alchemy system was really fun to experiment with and the fact that you needed to be sparing with them lead to a more tactical approach to using magic. 3. The sound and visual design of this game is stellar(the OST was composed by the mighty Geoff Follin) and the Dark ambience mixed with that campy mid-nineties humor makes this game really stand out amidst it's contemporaries. The Bad: 1. It's level design leaves so much to be desired. the dungeons suffer from some serious Phantasy Star 2 syndrome. 2. As you stated, the hit detection is way off and it's buggier than an aphid ranch. 3. The currency system was cumbersome, especially when you'd find a recipe in later worlds like Gothica nad Omnitropia that required ingredients like Wax and Clay and whoops, back I go to Nobilia and Prehistoria to run some more errands. The Ugly: AAAAARRRRGH! The market sequence gives me som 'nam style flashbacks everytime this game enters my conciousness. You know how when you think back on a game that you grew up with/haven't played in a while, your first thought is usually along the lines of "Oh yeah, I remember that game; I should play it again." but you can bet dollars to donuts that the immediate follow-up to that thought is always"Oh, I'm going to have to deal with THAT section again..."? Yeah, That's what this is like. Thank god it's mostly optional but still, there is a reason why Nobilia is the worst part of the game. EDIT: Me spel gud.

There's a lot about Secret of Evermore I love in terms of game design. It makes a game out of so many otherwise routine interactions - from shopping for the best bargains in the marketplace to hunting for ingredients with your dog to hiding so many little secrets and alchemy formulas in almost every area - and it complements the maze style of the dungeons and world very well. If every nook and cranny hides a secret, and every little detail can hide some kind of clue, you become trained very quickly to learn that there's a reward for poking away at every little thing. It's wonderful design in that way. But the game is clearly unfinished. The sheer number of glitches and game breaking bugs alone is frankly unacceptable. Hell the first time I played it as a kid I triggered two separate glitches that preventing me from progressing. But not only that, the game's combat becomes less balanced the further you go in and the size of the worlds and the secrets within drops as you progress through each world. This is a game that definitely could use the modern Square treatment of sprucing up their old SNES games for a Switch remake - or even just rerelease. Fix the glitches and add a little bit more/rebalance the second half and you'd have something worth playing. This will never happen though, so the game will remain an odd curiosity, with everything interesting about it overshadowed by its blatant flaws as it's slowly forgotten as it remains confined to the SNES.

Sorry to hear you had a bad time, this is one of my all time favorite RPGs from the SNES era. Alchemy is actually completely broken in this game, if you find some of the good formulas and start spamming them, you can kill all enemies and bosses without ever swinging a sword. Also, I remember when I was a teen, I would replay through this game just to get to the market section and play out all the trading, I know most people hate it, but I totally loved it :D

Longtime Secret of Evermore fan here to give his two cents. Not going to criticize you necessarily for this review, obviously the game has flaws and not everyone is going to like it as much as me. Not saying this as a criticism of you per se, but there are some issues with how you played the game. You really are supposed to use and rely on magic a lot, and it is actually very feasible to do so. You mentioned you didn't have the money to get the ingredients you needed because you were buying healing items. The biggest thing you missed was using the Heal spell that you get early in the game. It is SUPER useful. When you first get it, it barely heals, which is probably why you overlooked it, but once you level it up a few times it because incredibly potent and extremely efficient because it uses common ingredients. Healing items become totally obsolete and you can spend your hard-earned money on more ingredients. You'll have plenty. Also, whenever your dog's attack levels up (up to 3), you're supposed to go into the AI menu and increase the number on the right side of the screen so the dog will use charged attacks. You can complain that the game doesn't explain to you or do this automatically, which is legit. The dog becomes super OP late in the game, doing an absolute truckload of damage with a fully-charged strike. Your review was fairly written and well-done, so props to that. Again, I know the game's flaws, I'm not expecting you to play through it again or anything, but hopefully at least somebody reading these comments won't overlook this stuff.

This brings back some fond memories. I bought this game back in the day after saving up my allowance for months, because I thought it was a sequel to Secret of Mana. Oops! But I still had tons of fun and yeah, there are some parts that are infuriating if you don't have a strategy guide (the German version came with one, and I at least didn't encounter any bugs while playing, so I guess our version was patched?). But playing while abusing the alchemy-system was what was the most fun: I could just not stop collecting, buying, and using alchemy-stuff. Especially that weird fist-spell ended up killing even the final boss. I was so ower-powered it was ludicrous. Everything just smashed by a huge fist from the sky and 90+ of each ingredient. I'd never have thought someone would try to play the game without constantly using magic, that feels painful, ouch.

I understood all of your criticisms for this game, and yet it is still my favorite SNES game if all time. One trick to making the Bazaar trading less tedious is to go outside the Bazaar back in to the desert and go up and to the left until you find a whirlpool of sand that spins you in circles, sit there for about a minute and it will suck you underground where you will be given 99 spice and 99 rice. Makes trading much easier. Not that I expect you would replay the game just for this little gimmick but maybe someone will get some use out of it.

This is one of my favorite experiences on the SNES, in spite of itself. The soundtrack is one of the best imo, by Jeremy Soule. I found the characters, dialogue, and story are all unique, quotable and engaging. That said, they are the reasons I replay the game. It's a headache to play for all the reasons you stated. Long mazes, annoying combat, lock outs. However there are things to know that make replaying the game much easier at points. Like, the whirlpool in the desert outside the gates of the trading bazaar. Wait until the boy gets dizzy and sucked beneath the sand. You'll find some pots with 99 rice and 99 spice, making your trading a lot easier. The only spells you really need are the functional ones like Revealer(and you'll only need about 5 each tops), the Heal spell, and a combat spell. Maybe Revive Dog spell. There are no elemental weakness(I think) so just pick one you like and use that. I use Hard Ball until I get Crush because it's a low casting cost. If you know this, you won't waste money on ingredients for spells you won't use and it will solve your money exchange issue. Try and remember not to get locked out in Gothica. Follow the paths with the owls in the branches in that one Gothica Forest. Or just play the soundtrack

I never knew about the jail cell softlock. However, there is ANOTHER soft lock in the Egyptian Pyramid level... There are floating stones that permanently disappear after you walk on them. There is a path that you can take that will trap you without escape. Worse, there is a save point available while being softlocked, and you guessed it, I had saved my game after the softlock. ... The gamer rage in 12 year old me was very real that day.

I barely remember using weapons to attack, because I think I just cheesed the heck out of Alchemy. There was a fight I had no idea how to complete, so I levelled up a skill (that involved a fist falling from the sky, Crush?) from Lv0 to like, Lv15, and then I could one-hit KO almost anything from there on

I could only play 30 min per day as a child, so the long mazes were very stressful for me. But that actually contributed to the global experience.

I was present for virtually all your time livestreaming this game, and while I acknowledge I wasn't following gameplay closely, I fully recall the vibe of those streams. When people would ask how you were enjoying the game, your words said you were still having fun playing through it, even during the latter streams, but the tone of your voice said otherwise. It felt to me as if you were giving the game every chance to win you over, even deep into the adventure, but it never quite managed to do so. I am glad to see you pour your heart out here after some reflection, and give us your true and full opinion, even if it disagrees with some other people's equally valid experiences with this game. I'd much rather see you wearing your heart on your sleeve than diluting your views so as not to upset anyone. I've always taken your reviews to be summaries of your personal experiences with each game, rather than trying to objectively rank and evaluate them in a cold, sterile way. Whatever criticisms some dedicated fans of this game may have here about your playthrough and this review, I can vouch that you gave this game every opportunity to endear itself to you. Secret of Evermore just wasn't for you, as it turned out, and you've clearly explained the reasons for that.

Sad to hear you didn't enjoy it. This is honestly one of my favorite SNES games. The aesthetic was so unique, and Jeremy Soule's first soundtrack is fantastic. It's a shame the magic system is just as broken as SoM's but at least the whole alchemical thing was its own spin. I still go back and play this every now and then.

I tried hard to enjoy this one, but after slogging through the muck for about 30 hours, I simply moved on. The game did have some good things working in its favor. However, the alchemy system left me frustrated and irate. I just felt like I shouldn’t have to try that hard to squeeze a little enjoyment from a game. My favorite part of the game was when I explored one of the towns and actually ran across Cecil and Rosa from Final Fantasy IV. :) Another thorough and detailed review. I thought to myself a couple of days ago that I had not seen any new videos from Hungry Goriya lately. It’s refreshing to get the notification!

Reading the comments under this and under SNESDrunk’s review(s) of Evermore (which had similar complaints to yours) is pretty interesting because both comment sections are filled with people who really loved the game, which is a dynamic I don’t see often.

The hate this game gets... lol. I loved it and had it, Played it so many times.. My favorite part was figuring out the Bazaar part as a youngster, It was the hardest thing I had ever done at the time and im pretty sure i took a spin around the block on my bike in some kinda triumph ride!

The bartering bazaar segment was an object lesson on the value of a solid medium of exchange when I was a kid. Whenever I've run into someone who says stuff like "money is evil" or something similar, I know they never played Secret of Evermore at the very least.

It's fun to hear you, a generally positive and open-minded game reviewer, rag on this game so hard. I'm sure if I, like so many others in the comments, absolutely loved this game, I would be a little off-put by that fact -- but fortunately, I 100% agree with you. Secret of Evermore was a game I was SO looking forward to as a kid, since I enjoyed Secret of Mana a lot, but... man, even back then, as someone who legitimately enjoyed games like Deadly Towers and Super Pitfall on NES (meaning I could demonstrably put up with just about anything)... this game was just mind-numbing. I never finished it, and I think it was that very market where I finally threw in the towel and decided the game was just NOT WORTH CONTINUING. I had all the same complaints you did, but I don't even think fixing one or two of them would've saved it for me. The map design and pacing were the worst offenders, though, by far, as there was just NO FUN to be had from exploration, and it took bloody AGES to get through ANYTHING. The reagent system was cool in concept (I also likened it to Ultima IV at the time, having fallen in love with that game on my NES not long before), but I got SO TIRED of my dog sniffing something new like, every 3 steps I took, and then me having to fumble about trying to pick it up (or ignore it, which I could never bring myself to do) -- that just piled up with the finicky combat and massive, repetitive stage designs to make the whole game the single biggest slog in all of gaming. With no catchy tunes to at least keep my ears happy while I was slowly wending my way through it, no less! No hate to those who enjoyed Secret of Evermore, as I have a number of friends who did as well... but I've never been able to figure out HOW they enjoyed it, and that remains true to this day. Seeing this video was thus very cathartic for me. ;)

Ohhhhh this game, I remember renting it as a kid, getting to the first boss...and getting stunlocked against the back wall of the boss's arena as he constantly spammed some kind of knockback ability that did about 1-2 damage, and I got to watch my entire health bar fade away bit by bit without ever getting to control my character. And then trying it again in my 20s in college and getting to the magic tutorial, going "I need items for magic?" and tossing it in the trash immediately. Seems I dodged two bullets! Props to my dad for actually beating it the whole way through, it was at least mildly fun to watch...but I definitely remember him getting angry more than once along the way. I just liked the silly dog forms...and that's about all I remember of the game past my experiences.

it's a frustrating game to finish today, but as a bored kid in the 90s with no internet you could immerse yourself for hours on end. especially milking that market dry was a fun weekend spent. that's oldschool difficulty. some games took forever to figure out, or were feindishly tough in all the wrong ways. :D

Back in the day I played Secret of Evermore all the way to just before you move on to the last level, which I think was outer space. Anyways, you talk to this dude and give him something, then you're supposed to get on a ship and go onto the next stage. Instead of doing that, after I gave him the item I exited the building and explored around a bit, then went back in. Dude asked for the item again, I couldn't go on without it. So I backtrack to where I found it... not there. Looked all over, had to resort to calling the Nintendo hotline and basically the game counselor told me I was screwed, I'd discovered a glitch. All these years later still bugs me I didn't beat it.

You play way more retro stuff than I do. I think you appreciate them more than I do(although I do enjoy some outside of my own nostalgia. Love to find hidden gems). However I think a lot of old games suffer from limitations of not only technology but also just limitations of game design. The industry is so big now. So many designers grew up with modern gaming. People have a better idea now on what works and what doesnt. I think back in the 90s, we were able to put up with certain annoying and grueling things that we don't have the tolerance for now. That is, unless the game has nostalgia armor.

My main problems with the game: - Maze-like levels over and over again - Ingredients for spells unevenly distributed (like Limestone only purchasable at one trader) - Recycling of many game elements (sewers etc.)

Many valid points made here. I love SoE, but I first played it when I was 14 years old and had a lot of free time - so long boss battles were extra tense and all the more rewarding. I got good with the enemy hit boxes, but I never got great at picking up hidden ingredients. That said, the game is very rewarding if you grind a bit at several key points, which, again, is game design that worked for mid-90s sensibilities but does not work well as a first experience today.

Hands down one of my favorite games for the SNES. Actually having to use the alchemy system to level it up was super rewarding and I never felt like I was too poor or too ingredient starved. Granted I do enjoy some casual grinding in my games. Sad to see someone not connecting with what I feel is a classic overlooked game. I beat this game once every couple years. :/

It's a game of its time, designed for kids. There wasn't an abundance of media like today so time wasters were kinda welcome since you probably only had that one game for month and as a kid you also have more time and patience figuring stuff out. I have to agree with the mazes though, never was a fan of them, they were the bad kind of time wasters even back then. I did really like the market place as a kid though, it was a fun puzzle and I wrote everything down on paper and tried to come up with the best way to get the most stuff. I'm pretty sure I didn't even get half the stuff you can get there, but still felt clever for the stuff that I DID get. You have to remember that the internet just got started at the time and that people played games on their own without looking everything up on a wiki for the 100% optimal play, so you could still feel pretty good about yourself even if you actually "played terrible". Without nostalgia and in this time I have to agree with a lot of things you said, though I still find the verdict overly harsh. There are lots of things in the game that are awesome and very unique, like the dog that changes the appearance appropriately to every new era, or that you have an AI companion at all that you can switch to and that can sniff out treasures. Years later Fable 2 made that the unique selling point and wrongly called it a worlds first. There are so many themes in the game that look and feel entirely different, many with great music and/or SFX. The alchemy system was a fresh take on magic that worked pretty good IMO, the only problem it has it that it is a bit too tedious and difficult to find ingredients for the spells, it really should have been the focus of the game and the other weapons should just have been a fallback in case you run out of spells. The writing, the humor, the charm, ... etc. So too harsh of a verdict for a review IMO, but understandable from the personal bad experience you had with the game.

I loved this game 😂 It was much, much darker in tone than other Square titles, with a weirder story, weirder soundtrack, just... Weird and dark everything. I loved it.

16:18 "No amount of good story writing or character development can make up for the atrocities committed by the combat, and the gameplay." I laughed out loud at this sentence. Excellent wording!

I love "The Secret of Evermore." It's one of my favorite games from the 1990s. It's difficult to specify exactly why, but it had that certain quality --- atmosphere.

Don't let Evermore be nevermore forevermore

I am actually playing it for the first time, and playing it slowly and getting immersed in it is very rewarding. I mean, grinding is fun and the atmosphere is very unique. Trying to rush it feels lile the "mistake". I just feel like this is the perfect game to wind down and mindlesly grind to get ready for the next boss or set of hard enemies.

As a kid during the puppet boss fight I was spamming alchemy attacks as quick as I could and the color pallet messed up and the save game screen opened up mid battle. I saved the game and it hard reset right then and after it restarted and played the intro I don't think it ever got to the load game screen. I think I broke the cart, it was a rental so I returned it and never went back to that place for a really long time.

I loved the market. I think its important to understand that back in the days when this game was new, people didnt have the internet and gamefaqs and such, and people did NOT take for granted a 100% have everything approach to gaming. So every item you got from the market, which again was optional, felt like a really special thing you earned and cherished that you could brag to yourself about knowing other plebs didnt do it (and many didnt). Feeling obligated to get them all however, I could see it as a massive wall of work just slopped in the middle of the game.

The really, genuinely, honestly frustrating thing about the market is that when you first go in, you're basically put in a situation where you will have absolutely no idea what you are doing, have a very narrow timeframe, haven't saved since before crossing the desert, and there's numerous vendors who will swindel you out of valuable items without hesitation. A save point right before you enter would have been extremely helpful and reduced how stressful it all was, to be honest.

Thanks for this video, it's wild I just completed a run of this on my own. It's one of my favorites and I'll always defend it but yeah I just used maps for the mazelike areas, although I did write out a Nobilia market flowchart just like old times. I'll always remember Secret of Evermore for the areas where the only sound backdrop is birds chirping, a lonely gust of wind. First time I had such a strong sense of place from a video game. Many years ago I read a bunch of posts on the gamefaqs forum by someone claiming to be one of the devs who said the game's working title was just "Evermore" until weeks before the game shipped Square made them change it to "Secret of Evermore" presumably to drum up more sales based on the popularity of Secret of Mana. It's been a long time though so I might be distorting/misremembering details! Or basic facts!

I have alot of nostalgia for SOE but you're spot on. About everything. I was actually having the itch to replay it again the other day but maybe i'll wait a bit lol

I played this game as a kid and never experienced the bugs; it is interesting to see other peoples gaming experiences with this game being so different! I totally feel the leaving items behind out of fear of losing your progress in a maze, it felt tedious at times for sure! Great review!

I loved the game. The intro with the comments of the boy without seeing it made my imagination and curiosity go wild, similar to the scene in the governor's mansion in The Secret of Monkey Island. And i never experienced the bugs you mentioned, at least not on my original SNES cartridge. The market in Nobilia is great idea in my opinion, but you need the official guide to find the needed items. Luckily it was included in the box with the game. The fighting system is not as bad as you make it. I see the loading of the attack like a cooldown in other games, but here you can interrupt the cooldown for making a weaker attack. Anoying was only the weird hit detection. Even if you hit, sometimes there was the message "miss", especially with this nasty mosquitoes. With alchemy and getting ingredients I never had problems. You need only a few spells from the first or maybe second world and the ingredients for these particular are easy to find and nearly always available at shops. But it's sad that this makes later spells just useless. :(

On the fly strategy, the bazaar, mazes, the absolute bliss that is the soundtrack and the stunner graphics. It seems like the features that make this game a flawed masterpiece to so many people, myself included, just hit you badly. New coaster? Damn. Sell it to someone who will cherish this rare gem of an snes classic.

SoE is one of my favorites as a kid, both for the setting and being an SoM alike with a more grounded(ish) take. It is however, basically the poster child for Needs A Remake™ due to conventions and attempts of it's time being most of what you hate in it, and even I now as an adult have some reservations with. Also, first game by Jeremy Soule as composer, so that's a nice piece of trivia.

I didn't play much but my cousin enjoyed this game. Said it was underrated.

Guess I'm weird. Enjoyed the game as a kid and beat it. Haven't revisited it as an adult. Might be time for a 2nd try. Anyways, appreciate the video and your perspective as always.

So I know this video is a year old-and thanks be to the algorithm for recognizing how often I listen to the SoE soundtrack-but what a strange feeling to hear all the criticism! Bugs aside, most of the features you disliked were a part of the appeal for me when I was younger. The meticulous tedium of things like the combat and the market had the same effect on me that loot boxes have on kids now. I just shut off my brain and enjoyed it. When I wasn’t playing, I was filling in a notebook with all my plans on how to optimize. While personal preference accounts for all of this I’m sure there was a time and place aspect to it as well, both for game design and who we were as individuals back then. What a trip, great video and looking forward to deep diving your channel!

Im 42 and I bought this game when it came out...and absolutely loved every aspect of the game. I only played RPGs in those days and S.o.E was a welcomed change of pace. I leveled up every spell, mastered the layout of the market...and never got stuck in the jail! To this very day, I still play it on my phone with an emulator. Some of us are just better at RPGs than others. Sorry.

Oh man I'd love to see an updated version of secret of evermore, it was one of my favorites. I had fallen deeply in love with RPGs and these games made it action rpg secret of mana, evermore, illusion of gaia, super Mario rpg. I've never found a genre that resonates more with me and my style!

I actually liked it. In 95, my cousin got Chrono Trigger and I got Evermore and we switched off when we cleared each of them. Thought it was pretty fun.

One of my favorite games of all time. And with every other rpg that existed at the time, the market was the most interesting grind i had seen. This game was so atmospheric for me when i was a kid that it left a huge impact on my imagination.

I can definitely understand most of your complaints about Secret of Evermore. It hasn't really aged that well, especially from a gameplay perspective. Like many games of its time, it doesn't respect your time. The exploration can be frustrating due to its obscure design, and the melee combat feels kind of sluggish. The alchemy system inherently discourages exploration of its spells as a lot of ingredients are hard to come by, and the fact that low level spells suck. It seems to have some depth at first, but it's effectively reduced to a few powerful spells with easy to come by ingredients that trivializes the combat after a certain number of casts. It always was the world, atmosphere and music that made Secret of Evermore a gem. A flawed gem, but still a gem in its own right. I have heard a lot of people say that there's nothing quite like it, and it certainly has its own quirky charm. With a more fleshed out combat system and streamlined exploration; it probably could have been remembered as a great game of its time.

14:30 "How could you NOT have brought up the Market Place!?! The Video is almost over!" 14:45 You bring up the Market, and my PTSD kicks in from the mere sight of the place.

Not every game is for everyone, it is fine if you didn't like this one. You definitely hamstrung yourself by not engaging with the alchemy though. When I played it many years back, the alchemy system was what kept me engaged. Hunting ingredients and leveling all of my spells as high as I could made combat easy and exploring worthwhile.

Good points. These Reviews need more attention. As a young kid I saw the european TV commercial for this game. I could not wait to get my hands on this. The design and crazy story hooked me so hard even if I had not yet played it. My thoughts exploded what this could be. My birthday present back then finally was this exact game, cause my mother recognized my excitement when the commercial was running. It was such a holy moment to finally hold the big package in hands. I still have the Manual (art, secrets, walkthrough also included called Spieleberater). Awesome Memories. Maybe I should start this game once again. This time with the points of the reviewer in mind👽 Greetz u all

It breaks my heart to hear someone say so many negative things about one of my favourite childhood games! lol. Sorry you didn't have a good time with Evermore... I still love it, though 😁

Secret of Evermore has been an underrated gem. Some blame the game for Secret of Mana 2 (Seiken Densetsu 3) not releasing in the US, but today, you can play both games. Yeah, there are a few bugs in the game, but emulation today, pretty much resolves anything. The music is done by Jeremy Soule, the first game he did video game music for. In other words, the person who later made the music for amazing games like Skyrim.

Hate is a strong word. It's not perfect but it honestly gave me the perfect gaming experience. So unique and fun. Very memorable!

I remember the combat being very finnicky, even in Secret of Mana. Thankfully, magic/alchemy is so overpowered compared to weapons, in both games I ended up just leveling those up and getting carried by it. I remember the "Crush" spell in particular being super useful all game long.

Ah, thank you for your review! I tried to play this years ago and had a bad experience in the first dungeon and rage quit. I watched a Let’s Play on RU-vid a couple years ago from someone who seemed to know the game inside and out and it was fun to watch, but I don’t want to play it myself

Evermore was one of the best games on the SNES, the market was brutal though.

One of the best reviews I've seen. 1st play through I absolutely agree with this. Having completed this game 7 times it's an utter joy, however. Once you are zoned in you really get what the developers tried to accomplish. Trust me this game absolutely excels in a story driven, thought provoking and sense of accomplishment. The hidden spell to the left of the castle is a game changer. Save your call beads! And the market place is a doddle when you know what your doing. Stops the flow killer. I tore my hair out trying to defeat the swamp monster and the colleseum fight but once you know how it's amazing. I might even do a RU-vid play through just to show how insanely fun this title can be

The late 1900s. You’re making me feel old. Chill. I love this game personally. Dunno and a sleeper hit for one of the best SNES soundtracks.

One of my favorite game of all time. Just so different and original. A masterpiece.

Nooooo Hungry Goriya doesn't like one of my favourite games, big sad ;_;

I felt the same way, and I was alive and a kid when it dropped. I had high hopes and assumed it was related to Secret of Mana. No multiplayer... very tedious... and worst of all was the hard lock save of the final boss. If you didn't buy/have enough healing and you went past the no point of return and saved, you basically had to start the game over or somehow win without taking damage, unless that last rant was illusion of Gaia, both of those games made me very disappointed as SECRET OF MANA set the bar high i guess

Boy… if you didn't like this game, you'd probably _hate_ the game it inspired by. But, let me address some of the things you pointed out: - The intro cutscene was a stylistic choice. _The Secret of Monkey Island_ does a very similar gag during the first part of the game where the character describes a ton of things that are going on in another room the player can't see. It's kind of a throwback to the old "stuck in the dark" cartoon cliché. - The power bar charging for melee attacks is kind of a variation on the "active time battle" system introduced in _Final Fantasy IV._ The idea behind it is to make combat more strategic. Instead of being forced to take hits like in more traditional RPGs, you can dodge about while waiting for your power meter to charge up or while over-charging your attack manually. It can be tedious or boring for people who prefer to just beat the hoo-hah out of enemies, but when played correctly, it can be pretty interesting. - Alchemy is a huge part of the gameplay experience. By choosing not to use it due to "lack of resources", you kind of locked yourself out of a very handy and helpful part of the game. It's even nicer when you realize there's a multi-cast bug you can do which makes spells incredibly powerful. - The bugs with The Dog are exactly that: bugs. Trust me, it's not just you that experienced The Dog teleporting or sniffing in the wrong place. - The trading sequence was intentionally convoluted because, ya know, bartering. I imagine that it was intended to be something unique for the player to experience, and while I personally enjoyed it, I can understand how it's not for everyone. I very strongly disagree with a lot of this review. It's not just nostalgia glasses speaking, either - I played through about half of this game a couple years ago, again, and still enjoyed it. In fact, I think I enjoyed it even more with the camera fix patch I made for the thing. I'd like to see your stream of this and see exactly what got under your skin, and maybe I should stream it, myself. Between the soundtrack from Jeremy Soule of _The Elder Scrolls_ fame, to the charming characters, to the unique locations, and yes, even the gameplay, I very much enjoyed this game. It was a small part of my childhood, and a small part of my adulthood. And really, it's just a nice, unique action RPG. Also, the US commercial for this is freaking wild. Hee hee.

This makes me pretty sad. Secret of Evermore was one of those RPGs from the 16-bit era that I never got to play, so it always kind of had this mystical quality to it. I already really liked Secret of Mana, which this definitely has a good bit of DNA from, and as you said, the settings and character definitely stand out. I always thought this one never got rereleased because of it being made outside Japan, but maybe that isn't the reason after all.

Well, I very much feel otherwise -- I genuinely loved this game when I played it back in the day, as part of my summer break that year. I even made maps of some of the later areas on notepaper. If I were playing it for the first time now, as an adult with precious little free time (and thus never enough time to properly de-stress from a work week) I might not be able to enjoy it the same way... the trading game in the second location probably would have been the major roadblock. This is actually something I've been thinking about a lot and not just limited to video games; I have a hard time reading now because most of my free time is just trying to relax long enough that I actually am able to have _interest_ in the things I want to do. And by that time it's usually at the end of the weekend and I need to make sure I'm prepped for another week of laboring for a paycheck. And that's even with me not having a _good_ job that doesn't tear up my body, but _only_ builds up stress and mental exhaustion. Yay adulthood in a boring dystopia that's a bland version of the cyberpunk genre, lol. Anyway, I really, really had a good time with the game as a preteen and enjoyed the at-the-time very fresh take on an RPG video game and story as well as the different style of magic system. Plus the visuals were fantastic for setting the theme and mood. If a sequel or spiritual successor could be made today -- not just by the soulless game corp that owns the rights but by folks passionate about and talented at making RPGs with the time to make it -- I think it could be a really, really great game experience.

Playing it back in the day allowed me to enjoy it for what it is.

I feel that a lot of the reasons why players struggle with this game so much, is that they are lacking critical need-to-know information, and true, a game should tell you these things, but... if you go into the game knowing them... then you will get a much better experience. I can offer a few tips right off the bat: The game really wants you to do hit-and-run tactics, and you are supposed to choose what enemies you will fight, and which are simply not worth fighting. Also, enemies are meant to have different weaknesses and timing in their attacks. The flying skulls you mentioned? You will always want to use spells on those. In fact, the first time you encounter them is right after you get a spell called Crush. Killing the skulls awards you with more money than it takes to buy the reagents for Crush, and the Skulls are actually weak against that spell (and so are their stronger brothers later in the hedge maze) so there's an infinite money/ludicrously powerful spell levelup exploit to take advantage of, if you know it exists. All flying enemies are hard to hit with melee attacks because, well, they fly. Picture yourself holding a stick, and picture a bat flying in to bite your ears and picture how hard it would be to actually hit that bat by swinging at it. It would be fairly difficult and you'd have to time it just right. Spears are difficult to use, because they are more meant to be a thrown weapon. Swords' Lv2 charge is ludicrously powerful, downright OP even. If you know what enemies to kill, what to avoid and run past, the game is much more fun. Also, knowing what to grind on is also a huge help. I plan on doing a playthrough of it sometime on my channel, or at least a few tips videos because I feel a lot of people end up in your shoes, they like the aesthetics, sound, but struggle with the gameplay. Once you figure it out, though, it's quite fun! Perhaps one day if I ever do cover the game.. maybe you might take a look at it. Or not, either way.

One of my favourite SNES games as a teenager. I would hire it out from the video store for two days at a time, and would have it completed by the time I had to return it. What a game!

A game that tests the legendary patience of Hungry Goriya!

SoE is one of the few games of this genre that I never played back in the day but certainly heard about it. I remember my younger siblings playing it and they seemed pretty frustrated and I'm not sure if they ever completed it. Your critiques of the game are valid, although this is one of those "classics" that some people will defend with their last breath while casually overlooking its flaws. I applaud your honesty for speaking out with an unpopular opinion!

The biggest issue is that this game was falsly advertised as a sequel to Secret of Mana. It was supposed to have a similar ring menu and all. But playing it left me often times scratching my head.

I have to respect that you even powered through the parts that you found the most frustrating to go it a fair review. Not many reviewers do that.

I can only watch people play this game, I would find it hard to play myself. I enjoyed watching you play it on twitch and thought you really had a lot of patience to play this adventure! Great job! Cool that you had the game manual! Thats always neat to see one of those!

I'm so glad HCBailly did an incredibly thorough Let's Play of this game, because I never had the patience for it either. I think playing Secret of Mana first colored my expectations.

I also played this game when it first came out. As a huge Secret of Mana fan, I was hoping that this was exactly the sequel I wanted. Well, it really wasn't. I ran into nearly all the same issues you did: the hitboxes made melee combat difficult, and the alchemy system never clicked for me at all. I was just a kid! Trying to keep track of where to buy those alchemy ingredients was way too hard, and it meant that I never leveled up the vast majority of my spells because I never had enough uses of them to spare to do it. I still forced myself to finish the game, but I've never gone back and replayed it since. Recently I watched a playthrough by someone who knew all the ins and outs, and seeing him display all the glitches and explain which charms were and weren't useful was just mind-boggling to me. Half the things don't do what they're supposed to, and a surprising number of items you can get in that bazaar in the second world can only be gotten during the timed event your first time there. It just doesn't seem worth it to me to take the time to learn the ins and outs of the system, because, at the end of the day, the game just isn't fun for me. I guess my point is I'm sorry you ran into similar problems, but you aren't the only one. Even when this game was new, it was pretty divisive!

I remember the spell system, and I vaguely remember stumbling across what I guess is 'chain casting'. If you play as the dog and cast spells through the boy you can quickly renter the spell casting menu right after a cast, so you can level up spells without waiting for the spell casting animations. It would also blow up enemies in a single volley of spells as well. I think I went through the game basically spamming the first spell you learn, which I think is 'flare' since it was easy to level it up to a high level. Course the thing I liked most about the game was the soundtrack, for good reason as the composer Jeremy Soule went on to make a lot of video games for the Elder Scrolls series.

Sorry to hear that it didn't go well for you; I'm a fan od the game, but your critiisms are ABSOLUTELY valid. Alchemy wasn't as good as magic was in Secret of Mana, so coming from that, I felt really out of my element, because this was before the Internet, and I didn't know about dogcasting. I can't even count the number of times I softlocked myself and had to start the entire game over from the beginning, either. I don't know if you found the Magic Gourd, but one of the game's programmers is on record stating that even he doesn't know what it does; think this might've needed a little more time in the oven? Liking it now is the result of many playthroughs and knowing how to game the system (or system the game?), but I don't even like to think about my first trip through it.

Love this game. It's def limited compared with Secret of Mana but my god the soundtrack is amazing. It creates such atmosphere.

Great game. Alchemy was such a fun system to use. Could do better with some storyline tweaks and some extra levels.