Moments pages are Spoilers Off. You Have Been Warned.
- Secret of Mana's ending. In fact, pretty much every Mana game is like this, with less-than-happy endings, villains who pretty much spend their entire lives across the Moral Event Horizon, and enough Heroic Sacrifices that even the heroes sometimes wonder if there's enough left to fight for.
- Sword of Mana:
- The game becomes a long, painful series of Tear Jerkers from about mid-game, starting with the death of Medusa and working its way along the story, to the point where even the side-story of a comparatively random enemy boss gets somewhat sad as she tells the heroes how she succumbed to a sort-of corruption and thanks them for putting her down.
- Just the way that the tree works... The goddess of the people's prayers is actually long since dead and the world is instead sustained only by the sacrifice of the two innocent mana girls that took her place. The heroine had to give up everything and it's implied in that the hero will stand guarding her as the last Gemma knight for eternity, constantly by his love's side but never able to truly be with her.
- Legend of Mana. Each set of quests (Faerie, Jumi, and Dragoon) have their moments. For the Faerie, it's finding out that even though they're both dead and aren't bound by the rules of their lives, Matilda and Irwin still can't be together. In the Dragoon, it's learning that Larc, being bound to Drakonis, can't leave the Underworld despite Drakonis being defeated, and Sierra has to wait for him for a century. And the worst is the Jumi quests: Pearl is a false entity, every Jumi you meet in the game dies tragically, and when they're resurrected, you cry for them and turn to stone. The following cutscene, however, combines this with Heartwarming due to the music and the Teardrop Crystal. "I'm ba-ack!"
- Final Fantasy Adventure/Seiken Denesetsu...when GIRL says "Bye" to BOY and has to become the last Mana Tree because stupid Julius took out the previous Mana Tree.
- Trials of Mana
- Hawkeye's and Riesz's beginnings. All of the player characters have clear and compelling motives, but these two get the most effective Player Punches.
- Angela's path is even more so, to the right people, even when it turns out her mother was being controlled by the Crimson Wizard. Imagine someone you love, and who loves you back, being forced into calling you worthless and trying to hurt or even kill you. When Angela's mother finds out what she did while under the Crimson Wizard's control, she’s rightfully horrified and guilty even though she technically had nothing to do with it.
- Charlotte. A fifteen year old half-elf child who looks and acts like a five year old. Bubbly, bright, and confident... and also traumatized by the death of her parents at an early age to the point where the slightest sign of someone she cares about getting hurt leaves her panicked and anxious. Fortunately, the remake’s post-game can give her some closure if she's in your party.
- Duran's obsession with becoming strong. Losing to the Crimson Wizard in his opening hits him hard, and it's not hard to imagine why. Comrades in arms, people he probably knew and who definitely knew him, died because he couldn't stop him. Suddenly, his quest for revenge doesn’t seem like a matter of personal pride. He especially gets this on his route when he has to Mercy Kill his own father near the end. Thankfully, like Charlotte, the remake's post-game gives him closure if he's in the party.
