The Earthbound/Mother Series

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A while ago, around 2014 or so, Earthbound came up in my radar thanks to a suggestion from an old chiptune pal. So they asked whether I knew about Earthbound at all and I said I'VE NEVER PLAYED THAT GAME, so they said that I should since it's a one-of-a-kind game, and it's very quirky too. With such an elegant description, I was thoroughly convinced. Anyway "quirky" is kind of a cliché word for referring to these types of games, but I think it fits perfectly here.

It quickly became one of my favorite games ever. I tried the other two games in the series after finishing Earthbound, though it did take me a while. I don't know when I tried Earthbound Beginnings (or Mother 1), and I know that I played Mother 3 in April 2018. Over the years I've replayed Earthbound a couple of times, but not the other two; Earthbound Beginnings because I don't love its gameplay, and Mother 3 because it's probably the heaviest game I've ever played and I never thought I was prepared to play it again.

Now that I've grown older, I decided to give all 3 a fresh run, to appreciate them from a more mature perspective.

This article is not a gameplay guide, as many excellent ones already exist. The point of this article is to give my own thoughts on a game series I love, and perhaps convince you to check them out.

These games make liberal use of flashing lights, so if you have a strong enough photosensitive condition, stay away from them. I don't feel totally comfortable during the battle sequences due to the frequent flashes, especially when PSI attacks are used.

Also known as Mother 1, or Earthbound Zero, maybe some other names. This game was released for the NES in the middle of 1989 and is a product of its time, the gameplay is very barebones and unrefined. As such, I consider it the hardest game out of the 3.

The weird naming is due to the fact that this game was initially released in Japan only, under the name of Mother. Some time after, a fully translated ROM of the game made its way into the internet, dubbed Earthbound Zero, and in 2015 it got an official Virtual Console release, named Earthbound Beginnings.

The game was fully localized and was slated for release in the US under the name of "Earth Bound", but things didn't quite pan out so it never saw the light of day. Years later, a prototype cartridge made its way into the hands of interested fans, who extracted the ROM and put it up on the internet for preservation. I believe it was edited to change its name to "Earthbound Zero", but whatever the case, Earthbound Beginnings seems to be the widely accepted name nowadays, owing to its official Virtual Console release. It's an interesting story that serves as a great argument for video game preservation.

I think the strength of this game lies in its story events and the humor. The storytelling is nothing spectacular, but it serves as context on what happened before the events of Earthbound. Even though the story is linear, there are a few instances where you can reach certain places before you're supposed to, which adds a bit of an experimental factor. I personally got into a tunnel that I really wasn't supposed to get into, and braved the insanely strong enemies there until I managed to get to the other side. I've also heard that you can skip getting some characters altogether, maybe even finish the game with Ninten alone. I haven't confirmed this, and I'm not insane enough to attempt it either, but it seems plausible. I also never rode the train.

Speaking of Ninten, you can name your playable characters at the beginning of the game. It doesn't give you the option to use the default names though, so you'd have to look them up if you don't want to use custom names. Luckily for you though, I'm so kind that I'll lay them out in plain view, just for you:

• Ninten, the kid with the baseball cap
• Loid/Lloyd, the fucking nerd (to this day I have no idea which spelling is considered correct)
• Ana, the girl that uses magic
• Teddy, the tough guy, truly a fitting name
• Prime Ribs, the favorite food

You owe me money now, I'll send you an email with payment details.

The game tells a story about the mysterious disappearance of a marriage, and the equally mysterious reappearance of the husband but not the wife years later. He begins a study on psychic powers. Several decades later, his grandson, who also has psychic powers, fends off the attack of a poltergeist inside his home, and then sets out on an adventure to investigate strange incidents across the country. Kids truly are the future of the nation it seems, as adults appear completely helpless against whatever is going on.

On the gameplay side, it's your typical '80s RPG. You fight enemies, you collect items, perform different quests and eventually reach the end of the story. Magic moves and items are available in battle to spice things up. The menus for these are a horrible mess. The run button also makes the game do everything faster, instead of just moving your character faster. I think that's really funny.

One aspect of battles that, thankfully, was not carried into future games, is that you need to be very deliberate about who you're going to use your moves on. For instance, if you have two characters attack one enemy, and the first attack defeats it, the second attack will not automatically go to a different enemy in the battle, instead it'll be completely wasted. On one hand, this does make you use a bit more strategy from time to time, but it also feels unnecessary and wasteful.

Encounters are completely random, and the encounter rate is totally bonkers and batshit insane, I'm not kidding when I say you can take one step out of a fight and immediately get into another fight, with no downtime in between. It's down to luck whether you'll end up fighting 30 battles, or none at all, just getting from point A to point B. The difficulty of battles is also all over the place, and the length of dungeons, likely so.

The first dungeon in particular gave me a lot of trouble, so I saved up until I could buy a bat at the store. If you keep banging your head at the wall, you'll eventually get through anything, since you do get to keep all XP you earned if you get a game over and you choose to keep going. Beware though, as you'll have no PP, your friends will need to be revived, and spent items won't come back.

The rest of the game is tolerable though, and quite fun at times. There's a lot of goofy dialogue to enjoy the whole way through. I had to check a walkthrough once because I got lost. You should definitely keep a walkthrough handy in case you're struggling, because the game is sometimes not clear at all on what the hell you're supposed to do next.

If old ass crummy RPGs aren't your cup of tea, this game is totally skippable. I personally don't think the additional story context is needed to enjoy Earthbound, as that game can stand on its own. If you're curious anyway, this is not a bad game, it just suffers from some poor balance and design decisions, some of them certainly due to having to meet tight deadlines. It would've been much more enjoyable with just a bit more polish.

MOTHERFUCKING EARTHBOUND DUDE!!!!! Anyway, right out of the gate, we're told who we're fighting against, even before getting to the title screen. If you played the prequel first, you probably expected this, and if you didn't, what the heck is a Giygas?

Earthbound released in the US in 1995, for the SNES. It didn't quite make a splash. I think the marketing was terrible ("This Game Stinks!"), though this sort of thing was common in the '90s, so it's forgivable. According to what I've seen, the graphics style was thought of as childish and dated, and there also wasn't a huge audience for RPGs at the time. Those who were playing these kinda games often opted for those that looked more "mature".

Despite this, a niche fanbase developed, which kept slowly growing over the years, up to the point where people like me found out about this rare treasure of gaming.

A cute thing I love about this game, that the other two don't have, is that if you wait for a bit on the title screen, you'll see an intro movie showing off many of the characters and locations in the game's world.

In a way, Earthbound feels to me like a complete makeover of the first game, rather than just a direct sequel. You're collecting melodies again. You're going through some of the same environments once more, with new ones added on top. Lots of the enemies are similar between the two games. Even the role of the main characters is largely the same. That's not to say that Earthbound Beginnings is a lesser game though, but Earthbound does feel as if they took the first game, streamlined some aspects of it, added new features, reimagined the story, and then redesigned the whole package for the next console generation. If it weren't for both games' stories being significant on their own, I think my interpretation would have at least some merit.

Like in the previous game, you still meet some really weird enemies, but here it's cranked up to 11. Inside of battles, a wide assortment of strange backgrounds will be present, with shapes and colors that change as time passes. The enemies that you fight that could be considered "normal" can probably be counted on one hand. The battle music is quite peculiar, yet varied, and in my opinion, really fun. The outlandishness of the foes you must face only increases as you progress through the game.

The cute art style and goofy humor are quite deceiving. Within the whole "saving the world from bad guy" narrative, there's plenty of mature themes to be explored, or at least noticed as you advance through the story and go to new places. As a youngster, most of these would fly over your head, so there's a lot of replay value in getting to understand the different topics that the game addresses, as you get older yourself.

All of this is barely scratching the surface. If you love absurd humor, have a taste for whimsical-yet-deep narratives, and don't mind some clunky mechanics, this game will fit you like a really comfy glove.

Gameplay-wise, Earthbound improves upon pretty much every aspect compared to its older sibling. Perhaps the most significant in-battle change, is that you now have a fancy rolling counter for your HP. What this means is that if you take damage, it doesn't get instantly subtracted, instead decreasing slowly. This allows you to, for example, finish a battle before you lose too much health. It also allows you to survive fatal hits if you manage to heal yourself up, or end the battle before your health counts down to zero. The speed of this counting is quite generous, but you're still better off if you're able to move through the menus quickly.

The menus are better organized this time around, particularly for PSI moves. In Earthbound Beginnings, PSI moves were strewn about in a messy, rusty, slow menu that you could only navigate forwards, so if you scrolled a page too far, you'd have to loop all the way around to get to where you wanted to. In Earthbound, all of your PSI moves are now sorted into 3 categories: Offense, Recovery, Assist, and "Other". Each move gets its own dedicated spot in the menu, so it's easy to memorize where everything is. Still, in order to learn what a move does, you need to check the Status menu outside of a battle.

Enemies now appear in the overworld, as opposed to encounters being totally random. Enemies will chase you if you come close to them, though if you become strong enough, they'll actually run away from you. If you manage to sneak up on an enemy from behind, you'll get a free turn, but if an enemy catches you from your back, they'll get a free turn. You can also avoid battles entirely while still getting the XP, if your party is stronger overall than the enemy you're encountering. This only works if you run into a single enemy though, with the chance being highest if you approach them from behind.

The inventory system sucks ass, but it's still much better than in the previous game. One marked improvement is buying equipment in stores. The status box for a character will flash if the item will improve their stats, or stay still if it won't. If an item is incompatible, then it turns dark. Upon buying equipment, you're offered to equip it immediately and sell the old item, which saves time. There is also a unique system where you can buy seasonings, which apply automatically upon consuming a food item, either improving or degrading its effects depending on the combination. Unfortunately, because inventory space is so limited, it's hard to get to enjoy this feature. If you need to buy multiple of the same item, you need to buy them one by one, and go through the entire chitchat with the character selling you the goods, every single time.

On that note, the limited space is perhaps the main reason the inventory system reeks of cheeks. You also have to carry way too many key items, all of which eat into your precious inventory real estate. Each character gets 14 slots, and Ness gets particularly shafted due to having to carry a bunch of junk at all times (an ATM card, seriously?). Equipment also eats into your inventory space, so in practical terms, each character gets 10 inventory slots, with Ness getting 6 or 7 at most, and Jeff blowing a bunch of his own space on special items that only he can use, and which aren't always effective or needed. Trust me, I can't overstate how big of a relief it is when you finally meet Paula and can actually start carrying some stuff with you. Perhaps this is an example of realism in video games being absolutely impractical... but then, why would equipment eat into your inventory space? Aren't you wearing that, with everything else going into your bag, or your pockets? Well, maybe Paula's clothing has no pockets because, y'know, girls and women don't get pockets and shit. Complete madness.

In spite of its glaring flaws, I think Earthbound is a unique piece of gaming and truly something that must be experienced. It's so full of personality and charm, that you can't help but forgive all the things it does wrong.

This is the final game in the series, and the best one if you ask me. You get to name your whole family this time. You also play as many characters throughout the story, instead of just the protagonist, which is a nice touch.

Mother 3 was released for the Game Boy Advance in 2006, and to this day it's stuck in Japan, with no signs of an official English release happening anytime soon (hint: not happening, 4gedit). The good news is that a translation patch was made by a very dedicated community shortly after release, and it's quite the marvelous translation at that. You need to have a ROM of the game ready, and then apply the patch over it. If you have no idea where to get a ROM... well, I can't give you one because the copyright mafia will dunk on Neocities if I do, but I can tell you to check out Myrient. Myrient is dead and doesn't host 390 TB of various video game media, so naturally all of it is now in heaven. If you decide to go looking, try finding the Roman goddess of wisdom, I hear she's into video game preservation. Consider wearing a Λictor-₽apa-Иovember if you came from the great parking lot.

I think this is the best game for a number of reasons. First of all, the gameplay is now super polished, and flows like you'd expect from your typical RPG. Buying and selling stuff is now quick and convenient, you have more inventory slots, and, I SHIT YOU NOT, THEY ACTUALLY ADDED A SEPARATE KEY ITEMS CATEGORY!!! HOLY FUCK!!! Gone is the ugly bloat from Earthbound; now everything that serves a role in the story, or has another important distinction, has its own space among your items. I know this is typical fare for most games, but after two entries with a fucking horrid inventory system, they finally got it right.

On the more... gameplay side of things, battles now contain a rhythmic element. Mother 3 does away with the esoteric battle music that was characteristic of Earthbound, and instead uses a large selection of tunes with varied styles and rhythms. When using your basic attack, you can press the A button repeatedly to land more hits, as long as you follow the beat of the song. Some songs have really tricky rhythms, and later battles throw you a curveball by reusing earlier songs but with plenty of variations. So then, on top of keeping up with the beat, you need to know what parts of the song will shift it.

You can land up to 16 consecutive hits with this system, but if you mess up, your combo will cut off. It's not necessary to be good at it to win the game, but it does help you get a lot of extra damage. Sometimes it'll more than double your damage output if you get enough hits. You can learn the precise beat of a song by putting an enemy to sleep, the game will then play a loud thumping sound on each beat. I do think it's a bit too loud, but it's better than nothing.

Even when I don't need to, I find myself moving around the menus rhythmically. It's a very engaging mechanic.

Getting around the world is now faster, since you get an actual run button. You can run through weak enemies to avoid combat with them, but you won't get any XP, unlike the previous game.

As for the story... I don't want to tell you about this game in particular, because I think you should experience it for yourself. But, if I can summarize it in one sentence...

Hey, that bears a striking resemblance to real life!