Secret of Evermore is a role playing video game that was released in the United States in 1995 for the Super Nintendo console system. The game was created by Square, Co. Ltd.'s new development house, Square USA .

This game follows a young film buff with a penchant for B-movies and his dog as they try to make their way home from an unknown world known as Evermore. The game shares two major surface similarities with Secret of Mana: it uses a freshly-coded version of that game's ring-based menu system, and it requires the player to control multiple characters one-at-a-time. Mana, has three characters, in Evermore, the player guides both the boy and his shapeshifting dog through Evermore, free (and sometimes forced) to switch characters now and then to proceed. In both games, the computer controls the characters not being controlled by the player.

Secret of Evermore is unique in that it often uses ambient background sounds instead of music. For example, rather than hearing a majestic Roman tune in the background of a classical marketplace, we hear muffled banter, clucking chickens, and various other tones reminiscent of a bazaar. When the game's original music is played, it is often rather royal and melancholic at the same time.

Another unique element to Secret of Evermore is its system of magic. Rather than using a traditional system of collecting magic points and using them to cast learned spells, the boy must, with the help of his trusty dog's nose, find various ingredients that may be used to perform alchemic formulas which the alchemists across Evermore teach him. The ingrediants are consumable and some are rarer than others, making players turn back to other areas to collect them if they'd like to cast a particular spell. (The system foreshadow's Final Fantasy VIII's system of drawing magic, although that game lacks the combining-ingredients aspect of Evermore.)

The "Secret of" prefix was tacked on shortly prior to the game's release. Until then, it was known simply as "Evermore." It was the marketing department's suggestion that the title be tweaked, perhaps to take advantage of those hoping that it was the sequel to Secret of Mana.

Although both the boy and his dog are playable characters for the majority of the game, Secret of Evermore is a single-player game. To remedy that, a member of the emulation community created a patch file that allows for two players to play the game at the same time, one controlling each character à la Secret of Mana.

Controversy

There is an unfortunately strong misconception among video game fans that this game was released in lieu of an English language version of Seiken Densetsu 3, the follow-up to Secret of Mana. These ill feelings probably stem from titular and mechanical similarities.

The reality is that Secret of Evermore did not occur instead of or bear any effect on any translations of Square's Japanese titles. The decision of Square, Co. Ltd. (the parent company) to add a new development team to its existing Squaresoft distribution office in Redmond had absolutely no effect on any such translations and did not tie up any of the people involved in translation. It was the parent company's decision not to continue translating titles, including the would-be Secret of Mana II.

Furthermore, Secret of Evermore was not made instead of any new titles in any existing series: Its team was specifically hired to create it and they would not have been assembled otherwise.

Apropos its plot, its central themes of a boy and his dog and campy B-movies were dictated from overseas and fleshed out by Square USA, resulting in dialogue and themes uncharacteristically American for a Squaresoft title. No Square game had before displayed such a command of English idiom and American cultural references. Due to copyright issues, all of the references had to be imaginary. (The writers often poked fun at B film titles, as when the main character observes that a gladiator battle reminds him of a scene from Blood, Dirt, Sweat, & Togas.)

Plot

The story of Secret of Evermore revolves around an anonymous boy and his dog, whom the player may assign names of up to fifteen characters each. In the beginning of the game, the boy, a fan of old, B-list horror films, is leaving with his dog from a matinee in a small town called Podunk , USA. Upon leaving the theatre, the dog begins to chase after a cat in the street. The boy hurriedly follows his best friend, finally reaching a large, abandoned mansion. When the dog begins to chew on some wires in a hidden laboratory, they soon find theselves transported to the mysterious world of Evermore.

Throughout the course of the game, the player explores Evermore's five main areas, many corresponding to different epochs of Earth's history, including Prehistoria (an area with dense jungle and cave men), Crustacia (a pirate land), Nobilia (a Romanesque area), Gothica (a Victorianesque area) and a futuristic area.

Wending the world of Evermore, the dog's body transforms in a manner that corresponds to the theme players find themselves in. For example, in the world of Prehistoria, the formerly friendly mutt is transformed into a feral wolf, while in the Nobilian region he becomes a majestic greyhound.