Retro Hackers LogoGuestLog in

Summer Tree
News
Database
Users
Projects
Game Ports
Videos
Music
Material
Feedback

More Useful Evil Gate

Original game : Secret of Mana

Platform : SNES

Author : Kethinov

Release date : 05 November 2019

Category : Improvement

Patch version : 1.2

Modifications : P

Downloads : 267

ROM Information

Secret of Mana (USA).sfc - NOINTRO
CRC32: D0176B24
MD5: 10A894199A9ADC50FF88815FD9853E19
SHA-1: 8133041A363E3CC68CEDEF40B49B6D20D03C505D
SHA-256: 4C15013131351E694E05F22E38BB1B3E4031DEDAC77EC75ABECEBE8520D82D5F

Hack description

In the original game, the Evil Gate spell is notorious for being useless. It costs 8 MP and can't be used on bosses. Boo!

This hack makes the Evil Gate spell more useful by making it possible to use on (some) bosses but also imposes some new limitations to prevent it from being too overpowered.

Specific changes:

- Evil Gate will now work on any enemy (including bosses) without Shade resistance.
- The following bosses who previously did not have Shade resistance now have Shade resistance: Mech Rider III, Hexas, and the Mana Beast.
- Those changes have the side effect of making Mech Rider III and Hexas weak to Primm's Lucent Beam spell. Since that spell is rather underutilized in the original game, this is an arguably desirable side effect.
- Evil Gate now costs 12 MP instead of 8 MP. This limitation helps to offset the fact that using Evil Gate on a boss (not strong against Shade) basically always does 999 damage.
- There is no longer a multi-targeting damage penalty.
- Increased Gremlin and National Scar MP to max to compensate for increased spell cost of Evil Gate.

Some important things to note:

- This hack is compatible with "Easier or Harder Monsters" and "Harder Final Boss," but only if this hack is applied after.

Screenshots

Contributions

ContributorType of contributionDescription
KethinovHacking

Reviews

Mavolia's curse be upon you (finally)!zoolgremlin2019-11-05Version 1.1

Tested as part of the ongoing Secret of Mana Turbo Project, by Queue (with various resources provided by zhaDe as part of Secret of Mana: New Game Improvement). Latest version used.

A quick backstory of mine: I remember the first time I tried this spell, and how shocked I was when for 8MP, it did less damage than Dark Force which costs only 2! Playing as I was on real hardware back then, it was shocking to me that such a seemingly obvious flaw could be left in a piece of commercial software. Well I think we all eventually find out, that this happens sometimes. But I was a teenager back then, so I didn't.

And it has such a cool animation too! What a colossal waste of ROM space... seriously.

Anyway... I can tell you right now that even if the Creator had built no other hacks/patches, he would've had my eternal gratitude for doing this one. 1 less useless/underused spell in the game, 1 step closer to a good game becoming truly great.

The original percentile formula for Evil Gate uses both current HP AND maximum HP as variables, which hasn't changed as far as I know. With the increased MP-cost, that means the revised spell is really only useful on Bosses. Even more so if you are using a hack to increase their starting HP total, as hitting the damage cap is almost certain in that case.

Despite percentile damage ignoring Magic Defense, 12MP is really too much to spend killing regular Monsters. Most of them don't have enough M.Def. to bother piercing, nor enough HP to take away in fractions unless they're also given more. Unfortunate, but not a dealbreaker.

It is a way of saying that a small tweak could raise the utility and power of this spell further, because the idea is very solid. Chances are that even with minimal hacking skills, a player could make the tweak him/herself.

But even if the player has no choice but to reserve the spell for Bosses, it's a very firm Yes from me for using this patch.

NOTE: See "Lunar Magic Boss Gravity Attack" and "Hellfire", by the same Creator, for alternatives to this excellent patch.

Recommendedhmsong2019-08-28Version 1.1

This makes Evil Gate to be somewhat useful. Not as useful as it can be, but way more useful than the original game. 12 MP is kinda overkill, since 10 MP spell was the most expensive spell in the original game.