Headscratchers / Trials of Mana

• This bugs me every time I play the game—why did Isabella remove Jessica's curse? Nikita tells you that the curse stopped Jessica from being brainwashed (for some reason) but when you see her with Bigieu she isn't cursed or brainwashed, and you're never given a reason why.
  • Wasn't she planning to use Jessica as a sacrifice to break the seal? The curse tied them together so that Hawk couldn't gut the witch — kill Isabella, and Jessie'd croak too, remember? Probably wouldn't have been a good idea to keep that link up when she's about to kill her, and she was more useful as a sacrifice than a hostage at that point. (That's also probably why being cursed protected her from brainwashing, that same possibility of a backlash onto Isabella. She wasn't going to risk herself, so she just didn't brainwash Jessica.)
    • The official translation confirms that this is the case; the cursed choker prevented Belladonna from using her as a sacrifice for the manastone.
  • One Curse Limit.
• I always wonder how long Valda was under Koren's mind control for. Angela's opening states how her mother ignored her ever since since she was young, but in her ending seems to care very much about Angela and states that she says a small prayer to the Mana Goddess every day, hoping that she will one day be able to use magic. The way Angela talks about Koren implies that he made the deal with the Dragon Emperor for his soul, brainwashed the Queen and rose to power in Altena in a very short time period, probably about a year. It's not like The Dragon Emperor was going to gain control of Altena, then wait for years to start releasing the power of the Mana Stones.
  • Valda didn't ignore Angela on purpose; she was just too busy, being Queen.
• Something that always bugged me: the amazons are ruled by a man.
  • Since he was married to the queen, it's presumably until Lise is old enough to ascend.
  • In Lise's intro, one of the Amazons comments that the Father of the Winged Ones lives at the top of the mountain and only allows virgins by his side, which is why the Amazons guard him. I've taken this to mean that the existence of an Amazon army isn't necessarily indicative of a strictly matriarchal society.
  • The implication is also that Riesz's mother was the ruler until she died in childbirth. At the very least, the Kingdom isn't patriarchal; it's made clear at the end of Riesz's story that Elliot is going to help her run Laurent. She's still the one set to ascend the throne, and there's no hint that she'll simply serve as regent until Eliott comes of age. Additionally, the other games in the series have shown that Laurent is typically a matriarchy, and there's no reason to believe that's not the case here.
• I've played Hawk's storyline a couple of times, but I hadn't noticed something until now. When Isabella kills Eagle, she uses the Fireball spell. How was she able to frame Hawk for Eagle's death? He uses knives, not magic.
  • Presumably there were knife marks already from the previous fight. Considering the amount of control she had over the king and his attendants already, that much evidence was probably enough to manipulate their minds effectively.
• Why the beast solders (and the king) look more bestial than the average citizen in the beast kingdom? The average citizen in the beast kingdom look 100% human. and also why are there no female beastmen?
  • Are you talking about the people in the castle itself, or in the Moonlight City of Mintos? Because the people in Mintos are humans.
    • They're not. I'm not sure if this made it into the translation, but in the Japanese version there's an NPC specifically stating "We're all beastmen". That should also answer the question of where all the female beastmen are.
    • They are not humans, if you talk to everyone you get speeches like "Wow humans!?" and fully transformer beastmen (and the only single transformed female in half wolf form) who talk about the Altenans coming through. Also one of the NPCs mentions they enjoy the night because they can freely transform between human and wolf form at will.
    • Also in the castle, at the beginning of the game, Kevin can chat with a female beast(woman?)even though she's a NPC. Another beastman comments to watch out, she's strong when she transforms.
• Why does the team hunt for Zable Fahr, again? Shade told them that the Stone of Darkness was missing (so why did they think it had been unleashed?), and that Zable Fahr had settled down after its rampage and vanished. Are the party just completionists? Also, how are you able to find the stone? Didn't it break apart when Zable Fahr was released a long time ago? I understand it happening in the Jungle of Illusion, which is pretty timey-wimey, but the other two possible locations for it don't make sense to me.
  • It's less that they hunt for him and more that they stumble upon him (them?) by accident; they all thought the Mana stone of Darkness was already destroyed (beucase Shade told them) and were just going to their respective Big Bad's hideouts (in the Jungle of Illusion, The Glass Desert and the Dark Castle), I don't remember very well but I think they DO express some surprise to finding the stone, and that's when it cracks. As to what he/she/it/they were actually doing there is another matter entirely (maybe it sensed the Big Bad using the power of Darkness or a high concentration of mana thanks to the sword or something).
  • In the Ancient City of Pedan, you can find someone who managed to find out where the stone ended up according to old records - this position happens to be the Big Bad's dungeon every time (coincidence? I think not). Also, as Shade mentioned in an off-hand comment, it is possible that Zable Fahr, after wrecking the world, created a new dark stone for herself (it's a she, look at the third head in the battle's second part) to wait out until she has recovered or the world is populated again. For the Evulz being her main MO, she did exactly that and feeling someone strong, she came out. TOO BAD now there are people strong enough to kill her off.
• Bigieu's brainwashed minions kidnap Prince Eliott. They sell him to a slaver in Byzel. There, he is purchased by the red-eyed Jagan, where the plan is to use him as the Dark Prince's new host body (or some such). But Bigieu and Jagan both work for the Dark Prince and they're in direct contact with each other as allies. If they wanted to use Eliott's body, why the heck did they need to use the slaver at all?
  • They wanted to hide the trail? Not that it worked.
    • There was no trail to begin with, though. Well, not until they sold Elliot to a slaver only to buy him back moments later.
    • It should be mentioned that game never stated that Elliot was to be the Dark Lord's vessel and has been shown face down on the floor next to said Dark Lord during all his appearances so it's likely that Elliot is just a hostage.
    • The official translation has it that Belladonna and Malocchio planned to use Elliot to draw the mana sword, but he couldn't do it. After that, he was useful as a hostage. It's possible that selling him into slavery was something Bil and Ben did purely on their own to make a quick buck and Belladonna and Malocchio only discovered what they did after the fact.
• How is it that there are three evil groups planning to destroy the world and none of them have crossed paths until the game?
  • Well who's to say there weren't other factions of villains that got wiped out by each Big Bad before the game started? They'd be too busy to notice the remaining respective two.
  • There's always the possibility that one faction was avoiding direct confrontation to the other for one reason or another, depending on who was your first pick it turns out that the losing factions would've been better if they had waited rather than rushing to the Mana Holyland.
  • Well, first off, all three were active in different parts of the world, which would make it difficult for them to interfere with one another. And if they WERE all aware of one another, they may have not wanted to upset the status quo for risk of weakening themselves, given that all three had roughly equivalent strength. If A starts a fight B, then they would be weak enough for C to finish both of them off.
    • The actual events of the game basically confirm that this is the case. The villains mostly maintain neutral stances against each other while working to activate the manastones. The moment the truce breaks and they begin actively fighting each other (when the Mana Sanctuary is opened), two factions invariably get obliterated.
  • Not to mention, it probably served everyone's interest for things to be kept quiet. All three factions were consorting with individuals that were known enemies of the forces of good; if the more civilized places of the world caught wind of any of the three Big Bad characters starting to become active, they risked the whole thing falling apart.
• Something about the flashback involving Faerie and her friends trying to get to the land below the Sanctuary bugs me. Some sources say her fairy friends died en route to Earth, but the game footage makes it look like they didn't die, but just got really tired and flew back home. Is there anything confirming that Faerie's friends actually died?
  • The original does a better job of conveying their deaths. They just disintegrate.
• Storywise, why did Anise set up all 6 of the home towns of the heroes? There's only three of the heroes at any time, and both in-game legend and interactions with the unchosen heroes show that, in-story, there will never be more than three people together. If she's trying to create the illusions to traumatize the heroes, why bother showing places that the heroes have no relation?
• If the faerie cannot be separated from the first selected player character except through said character's death, how in the world did she get kidnapped by the storyline big bad?

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