I would LOVE a III or V prequel! And I don't know that the backstories were necessarily more interesting than the primary stories, just that they were SO good it gave you scope for imagination.

Unfortunately Squeenix did the backstory-as-game thing with Seiken Densetsu III (Secret of Mana 2) in the form of an AWFUL RTS called Heroes of Mana . . . and even though I HATE RTSs with every ounce of my soul, I LOVED playing the "prequel" to one of my fav games . . . right up until they totally smurfED it up at the end. I'm worried they would do something similar with III or V.

Anyway, thread at hand . . . no, I wouldn't want a "midquel" to IV, but I wouldn't mind a prequel with Kluya as the main guy. Or a sequel set so far in the future that Cecil and that lot are but myths.