Earthbound/Mother 2 Review

 (Originally published to Glitchwave on 8/21/2021)

[Image from igdb.com]

Earthbound/Mother 2

Developer: Ape/HAL Laboratory

Publisher: Nintendo

Genre(s): JRPG

Platforms: SNES

Release Date: August 27, 1994

The Mother series has always been an elusive anomaly in Nintendo’s back catalog. The series comes highly revered by most who have played it, but that number is practically nothing compared to the number of people that have played their other franchises. It’s a series with one of the biggest cult statuses in gaming, aided by the fact that most of the games in the franchise are exclusive to Japan. The sole game in the franchise that was shipped out overseas to the Anglosphere was (until the first Mother game was released internationally in 2015 and the fan-translated version of Mother 3 was circulated through emulation) Mother 2, or Earthbound as we yanks know it as. My initial impression of Earthbound came with an incredulous range of thoughts. Earthbound is a subversive, unassumingly bizarre JRPG with a quirky, absurd sense of humor contrasted by its surprisingly macabre sensibilities. Yet, it’s charming and awe-inspiring all at the same time. This game came from Nintendo of all places, and it came out as early as 1994? Nintendo has been known to dabble in traces of psychedelia, with the Mario franchise being a clear example, but absurdism? That in itself is absurd. This unique concoction of elements presented in Earthbound makes it a gaming experience unparalleled by anything before or after it. To say that Earthbound was before its time is too easy. That statement connotes that the gaming industry has taken note of Earthbound and has expertly managed to emulate its properties to other comparable games. Earthbound is a gaming experience whose unique elements still give it an unparalleled intrigue, even decades onward. Every facet of Earthbound still offers something that makes it special, but some of these elements are also what makes Earthbound somewhat insufferable.

As an American, I must constantly be reminded that Earthbound is a sequel because of its standalone title and (legitimate) western availability. Nevertheless, the unique properties of Earthbound are more or less borrowed and built upon the unique elements of Mother 1. It’s a “domestic JRPG” set in modern times where a group of psychokinetic children ventures across the land to save the world from aliens. The battle system is minimal, and there are absurdist humoristic quirks. Nintendo isn’t exactly ambitious in terms of diversifying narratives in their properties, but this was mostly indicative of the SNES era. What are Super Mario World, A Link to the Past, and Super Metroid enhanced versions of their older NES counterparts? This distinction between Mother 1 and Earthbound is cut from the same cloth of general enhancements, but this is obviously less apparent to western audiences due to Mother 1 never seeing the light of day outside of Japan. The graphics, battle system, and overall presentation are augmented as an evolution to fit the Mother franchise in the 16-bit era. Judging from retroactively titling the first Mother game as “Earthbound Beginnings” or “Earthbound Zero”, we are supposed to think of Earthbound as more of a soft reboot rather than a next-generation sequel like the other franchises. The rudimentary elements of Mother 1 serve as a beta for Earthbound.

As par for the course with a soft reboot, Earthbound essentially shares the same narrative premise as Mother 1. The tweenaged protagonist is called to adventure when his rest is disturbed at night. In Earthbound, this disturbance is in the form of a meteor that crashlands on the peak of his hometown, causing the earth to quake. Already, the beginning premise is much better than having to beat up a sentient lamp in Mother 1, but this set-up is still all too familiar. Ness, the cannon name for the protagonist, investigates the meteor with some bratty neighbor brothers Pokey and Picky Minch. A fly named Buzz Buzz emerges from the fallen meteor revealing a prophecy to Ness about his integral role in saving the world from an evil entity named Giygas. Buzz Buzz is then obliterated by a single swipe from Ness’s mom, a humbling end to the game’s narrative catalyst. To defeat Giygas, Ness must travel around the world, discovering eight different guardian-protected sanctuaries and recording their essences as a collective force to access Giygas’s whereabouts. He must also recruit three other psychic kids around his age to aid him in his quest.

“The Domestic JRPG”, a term that is entirely my own creation, refers to several JRPGs that are set in a modern setting that mirrors the real world. The elements of a traditional JRPG, like classes and magic, aptly fit the high fantasy world of those games (Final Fantasy, Chrono Trigger, Suikoden, etc). A domestic JRPG like Earthbound translates those elements into a mundane, modern setting, usually translating the more fantastical elements of a JRPG to fit the more grounded world. At the time, the Mother series was a trendsetter of the “domestic JRPG” style as setting a JRPG in a modern period with modern aspects. The world of Earthbound is meant to look as humdrum as possible. Places like Onett and Twoson are a degree away from having an uncanny resemblance to the town from Leave It To Beaver. The homes of Onett are guarded by white picket fences, the sun is shining as the birds chirp harmoniously, and the town is filled with working-class people operating bakeries and marketplaces. It’s a wonder that Ness’s mom doesn’t have a pie cooling off on the windowsill. It’s like the opening scene in Blue Velvet. In fact, Earthbound seems to share a lot of similarities to the works of David Lynch. There is dark surrealism that permeates through the squeaky-clean Americana setting. In the works of David Lynch-like Blue Velvet, Twin Peaks, or even Mulholland Dr, the dark surrealism is meant to showcase a dichotomy between a seemingly pristine setting with realms of unholy perversities. The barriers between these two worlds are a thin veil as the dark surrealism starts to bubble up on the sugar-coated surface. This contrast is meant to expose the dank underbelly of a seemingly taintless society. While Earthbound’s sense of dark surrealism most likely isn’t meant to be as cynically charged, the dichotomy similar to a work of David Lynch is still readily apparent. Or, it could just be a means to complement the exceedingly bizarre tone the game consistently upholds.

Listing out all of the weird elements of Earthbound would be an enervating affair. Doing so would just result in me giving a long-winded synopsis that includes every moment in the game. Some of these moments cause utter bemusement while some tickle my absurdist funny bone, so I’ll just detail a few highlights. A small town east of Twoson called Peaceful Rest Valley is ruled over by what can only be described as the “Blue Klux Klan”. This cult’s mission is to paint the world blue, a goal marked with the imperative that blue is the one superior color. These cultists wear blue suits with blue hoods over their heads, arming themselves with paintbrushes that exclusively paint the color blue. A touring music group called the Runway Five will make frequent stops in the various towns the characters visit along their journey. The band’s look is inspired by The Blues Brothers, while their antics are inspired by The Beatles in A Hard Day’s Night. These antics usually owe someone a hefty debt that Ness has to pay off at least twice. In return, the band performs free shows for our heroes, gives them rides in their tour bus, and they even aid in fighting a boss with Ness and his friends. The Saturns are a race of pint-sized creatures with whiskers, bulbous noses, and pink bows on a single strand of hair. Their civilization residing in Saturn Valley mirrors the function of towns like Onett and Twoson, but if every denizen spoke broken English (fun fact: the scribbled, borderline incomprehensible font the Saturns speak is taken from the handwriting of the five-year-old daughter of one of the developers). The Saturns are being enslaved by a sentient pile of vomit named Master Belch, who is forcing them to work in his factory making Fly Honey, his favorite treat and #1 weakness. The five guardian diggers of the Gold Mine will all insist that they are the third-ranked mole. After fighting the Kraken, the ship’s captain tries to save face by saying he aided in the fight by throwing his slippers at the beast. The zombies infesting the town of Threed are defeated by planting sticky “zombie paper” like they are common rats. After planting them, they are all stuck inside a once-possessed circus tent.

There are too many weirdly humorous moments left unmentioned, but I have to limit the examples for brevity. Earthbound does a fantastic job keeping the game interesting by maintaining an erratic sense of pacing through all of the different oddities. I was always enticed to keep going and see what wackiness the game had in store for me. It’s Earthbound’s greatest strength and what preserves its uniqueness. However, the consistent weirdness isn’t always to the game’s benefit. Like the films of Wes Anderson, Earthbound sometimes lays the wry quirkiness on a little too thick to the point where I can’t help but roll my eyes and groan. To access Saturn Valley, Ness has to stand behind a waterfall for three minutes in real-time. Thanks, Nintendo, but if I wanted to take a break to piss or jerk off, I would’ve paused the game. Moonside, the neon-illuminated bizarro realm of the city of Earthside, has an opposite gimmick where yes means no and vice versa. It’s not a huge deal as this is easy to learn, but accidentally picking the wrong option can aggravate depending on the situation.

Teleportation is a skill Ness acquires that allows him to warp to any town the player has discovered. This is a very convenient skill once Ness strays further from Onett and the game's world becomes larger. However, the way teleportation is executed couldn’t be any less convenient. To gain enough momentum to travel, Ness and his friends must rocket themselves in a straight path without obstructions. If Ness hits absolutely anything, the teleportation will fail. Unless Ness finds himself in a place with a straight road, attempting to teleport is an arduous task. The teleportation move becomes easier for the player, but they still need enough room to warp in a circular motion. Throughout the game, a bearded man wearing a suit and top hat will drop from the sky to take your picture. This happens at what practically feels like every waking moment of the game, so of course, it gets really irritating. When he takes your photo, he tells Ness to say “fuzzy pickles” as Ness smiles and gives a peace sign. If I were Ness, I’d flip him the bird, and maybe he’ll get the hint. Complaining about the less desirable quirks in Earthbound ultimately comes down to nitpicking. The more unbearable aspects of Earthbound come with the gameplay. Like the quirky, absurd presentation of this game, the combat and RPG elements are certainly unique. However, criticizing this facet of Earthbound does not boil down to appreciating its quirks with a few irksome moments. The gameplay of Earthbound can be so infuriating that you’ll want to take Ness’s baseball bat and beat him to death with it.

One factor of Earthbound’s gameplay that slightly deterred me from it upon the first impression is the minimalistic combat. In most JRPGs, even with Earthbound’s old-school contemporaries, every move during the turn-based fights was clearly shown. In Earthbound, one has to use a bit of imagination as to what is happening. The enemies are displayed as still images with the playable characters completely unseen during the fight. Perhaps the angle of view is a POV view in a first-person perspective. Each move during the fight is displayed in a textbox at the top center of the screen. Any attack the players or the enemies execute is not clearly seen on the screen, with the minor exception of the player’s magic attacks. The battles rely more on the element of sound to make the fights engaging. Every time an enemy is hit, the noises are always satisfying, especially on the rare occasion that one of the players lands a critical hit. I thought I’d quickly become disinterested in the game with this combat system, but it never got stale. I guess turn-based combat is still invigorating as long as it retains its fundamentals. All Earthbound needed was still images, vigorous sound effects, and a range of psychedelic backgrounds like looking through a kaleidoscope.

Earthbound also implements an interesting health system I haven’t seen in any other JRPG. Once health is either gained or depleted in battle or the overworld, the health of Ness and his friends will scroll up or down incrementally through slotted numbers. Suppose the enemy executes an attack dealing “mortal damage”, potentially killing a party member. In that case, this can be prevented by defeating the enemy before the mortally wounded party member’s health scrolls down to zero. This health system is the only means of dealing with enemies that self-destruct upon defeat, which includes an abundant amount of enemies in the game. It’s a unique display, but it’s not always consistently practical. Health scrolls at the same quick pace whether or not Ness and his friend have 10 HP or HP in the hundreds, so the system is only practical later in the game when the player has enough for the scrolling health to take longer to reach zero. Thank god most of the exploding enemies are near the end of the game. It’s still a relief to sometimes prevent potentially fatal damage with this system.

The playable characters of Earthbound are also quite varied in terms of combat. This is a tad ironic considering how minimalistic combat tends to be, but each partner has their own moves and statistics. Ness is the de facto leader of the group but does not hold higher precedence over the other party members. If Ness dies during combat and the battle is won, the player will just walk around as the next player in line. The player will naturally become the most familiar with Ness as the game begins with him and ends with him with a lot of time solely playing as Ness in between. Because all of the time Ness is adventuring solo, his stats are always naturally higher than his friends. His melee weapon of choice is a baseball bat, an item for a boy living in a podunk Americana town. He also has the widest range of psychokinetic abilities to aid in battle. His primary psychokinetic attack is a move that does a great deal of damage and targets multiple enemies. The name of it is PK, whatever the player named Ness’s favorite thing at the beginning of the game. My Ness super move was named PK Pussy, because what else could a growing boy be thinking about constantly? I also thought the fact of Ness’s horny adolescent thoughts generating his psychokinetic powers to be amusing (please tell me it’s amusing too, or else I just come off like a sophomoric misogynist).

Paula is the first party member to join Ness on his quest. She’s a seemingly frail little girl that is anything but in battle. Besides being armed with a frying pan, Paula is the team’s most valuable psychokinetic power user in terms of offense. She has the power of PK fire, freeze, and lightning at her disposal, and each element increases in power as the game progresses. Her psychokinetic moves prove to be much more useful than Ness’s because her moves can target specific enemies. This makes her more than essential in dealing with the sanctuary guardians. She also has a unique prayer feature that does various things to the party with some positives and negatives. Most times, the gamble isn’t worth it. Paula is an offensive powerhouse but is also the most brittle member of the team. It seems like most enemies will take advantage of this as they will target her, resulting in her quickly dying. It is imperative to keep Paula as healthy as possible because of how useful she is in combat.

Jeff is a boy who attends an all-boys school in the snowy northern town of Winters. He’s the son of the brilliant Dr. Andonuts, whose only musing about his son is that he sometimes wets the bed. As much as this embarrassing factoid might be true, the player will come to know Jeff as the technical wizard who specializes in fixing machines and using tools in combat. He’s the only playable character with zero psychokinetic abilities, so he has to compensate in other areas. A less experienced player would write Jeff off as a useless character. Not having any psychokinetic power among those with extraordinary abilities would make him seem underwhelming. His blasters are also the only weapons that do not make critical hits. The trick to maximizing Jeff’s utility is to make enough room in his inventory for bottle rockets, items that can do a serious amount of damage to one enemy. One has to make frequent trips to a bottle rocket dealer, or else Jeff pales in combat. I just wish I knew that when I was stuck with just him and Ness in Moonside.

Poo is the crown prince of the far-off nation of Dalaam, which looks like somewhere sandwiched between China and Nepal. The last part of his training before he joins Ness involves a disturbing ritual involving a spirit revoking all of Poo’s senses, rendering him practically dead. This test of selflessness and hardcore discipline is indicative of Poo’s character and his fighting style. He’s the only party member that does not brandish a weapon, nor does he require any type of armor. He instead fights with only his fists while wearing his robe. He shares the same psychokinetic powers with Ness and Paula but executes a little underwhelmingly comparatively because of how underdeveloped he is once he joins your team. Once he learns the psychokinetic juggernaut move “Starstorm”, he becomes the team’s wild card.

Ultimately, there are plenty of positive aspects to Earthbound’s gameplay. Its uniqueness complements the quirky nature of the game’s presentation and narrative. The bad aspects of Earthbound’s gameplay are so infuriating and tedious that it almost dilutes the positive aspects. I wouldn’t say that these aspects of Earthbound’s gameplay are faulty due to them being dated. I’m not sure if these were acceptable at the time anyways. As I’ve mentioned before, Ness does not have total precedence over all of the other party members in combat. This is not the same case once the player gets a game over. In this instance, Ness will return with full health, but the rest of the party members will still be dead, floating around Ness as incorporeal ghosts with halos on their heads. The only way to revive them for most of the game is to visit a hospital, but these are not conveniently placed everywhere. If the party dies in Dusty Dune Desert, for instance, Ness has to walk to either Threed or Foreside to revive his partners. He still has to rest at a hotel because restarting after a game will not replenish his PP. After all of this tedious backtracking, he can tackle the obstacles in the desert again. Eventually, Ness and Poo can revive party members with a psychic move, but the player will have to figure this out because the game doesn’t tell you what this move does when they acquire it.

This ordeal will happen several times throughout the game because the enemy encounters are merciless. For being still images in battle, they are ferociously sprightly in the field. The player cannot avoid enemies on the field no matter how hard they try to swiftly dodge them. The enemies move at practically twice the speed of the player, and trying to avoid them will only result in screwing the player over by giving the enemy the advantage in battle. Earthbound has an unfortunate mechanic in which the player can get an advantage in battle by sneaking up behind the enemy on the field. Conversely, the enemy can get the advantage by moving up behind Ness and his friends. Considering that the enemies are twice as fast as Ness and his friends, what do you think is the likely outcome of this on most occasions? The enemies move so quickly that they always have an advantage on the field, and no amount of skip sandwiches can change this. The game also won’t let the player run away from a battle, no matter how bruised and battered they are. In most RPGs, the game would let the player run away with no questions asked with only a few circumstances preventing this. In Earthbound, I’d say the success-failure ratio with running away is 70-30. Those aren’t exactly great odds. The areas with the sanctuary guardians are especially vexing because of this. By the time Ness and his friends encounter the guardian, they would’ve used up most of their PP and healing items dealing with the inescapable enemies. Every sanctuary guardian fight is especially tense because of this, but the reason for this is totally unfair. Once Ness becomes over-leveled, the enemy encounters are skipped entirely, and he still gets some experience. This is truly the only way to get past enemies. If this is the game’s clever method of forced grinding, I’m not amused.

The tedium of the game doesn’t stop with combat. Some of the more tedious aspects are in the overworld. To save the game, Ness has to call his dad on a phone residing in most hotels. If you haven’t played this game before, I will give you a disclaimer to only pick the fast text at the beginning of the game. This is not to skip on the game’s witty dialogue but to make the saving process quicker. Ness’s dad will ask the player if they want to save but then goes on a tangent about how Ness must stop working so diligently. Every. Single. Time. It’s even the same series of dialogue each time the player saves. Fortunately, Ness’s dad makes up for these mind-numbing interactions by providing Ness with a steady flow of cash he can access through an ATM. Because Ness’s dad is always working and the amount of money he sends, is he a stockbroker or something? The player will also have to make frequent calls to Ness’s mom because of an unfortunate mechanic in which Ness gets homesick and can’t fight. At least the conversations between Ness and his mom aren’t usually the same.

The inventory system in Earthbound is the epitome of tedium. I have never seen an inventory system so inexcusably faulty in my entire history of playing video games. Each party member gets twelve different slots in their inventory for twelve different items. The maximum load for each character doesn’t sound limited initially, but everything ranging from weapons, equipment, consumables, and key items takes up space in the same inventory. Throughout most of the game, I never had room in my inventory for any of the characters. Items are scattered all over the place, and even the enemies will often drop items after being defeated. There is never enough room for all of the items. Some key items will only be used once, but the player can’t sell them once they’re done. The player has to call a delivery service via the phone and call a guy to pick up a minuscule three items to store. Buying items and storing them were always a complete drag, and I feel as if this could’ve been a lot less taxing if the developers made a few minor improvements.

Between the quirky oddities and the tedium of Earthbound lies the game's substance: the themes of the wonderment of childhood and the eventual passage into adolescence and adulthood. While Earthbound was deemed for everyone by the ESRB, I think the substance of Earthbound’s themes can only be appreciated by someone who now has the hindsight of childhood in retrospect as an adult. It’s along the lines of the famous Oscar Wilde quote claiming that youth is wasted on the young. The story and presentation of Earthbound are wacky and full of whimsy. Still, we only describe the game with these adjectives because we have the adult capacities to fully articulate this. Earthbound is not specifically for kids, but it is written and presented as if it was written by a group of kids that are just playing as kids do. There is no sense of structured narrative when kids play. They just conjure up as much wacky shit as humanly possible because they think the scenarios are fun. The minimalist combat also provides further depth to playing as a child because none of what they do is literally displayed. One can’t help but figure that once Ness and his friends sprinkle a bag of Dragonite on their heads that they merely pretend to grow into a dinosaur and breathe fire instead of literally doing it. It’s all pure imagination, something definitely present in Earthbound’s erratic narrative. The game is a testament to the playful nostalgia of youth.

The game is also a testament to how impressionable children can be and how terrifying the world is because of it. Earthbound’s creative director Shigesato Itoi was infamously traumatized from walking into the wrong movie as a child and seeing a graphic murder scene on the big screen. This trauma inspired him to create Giygas, the main antagonist of Earthbound. This is where the dark surrealism of the game kicks in. Describing what Giygas is isn’t exactly feasible. He is essentially supposed to be an ambiguous force of evil and corruption. The Mani-Mani statue in the game is a tantalizing force of evil that corrupts individuals. It’s supposed to be a tangible representation of Giygas, but the statue's evil is not as powerful or concentrated as Giygas himself. After visiting all eight sanctuaries, Ness goes to an ethereal realm called Magicant, where all his childhood memories and desires reside. Like Poo’s final ritual, Ness must explore his collective childhood while wishing a bittersweet goodbye to it at the end to give him the strength to defeat Giygas. Magicant is like a psychedelic bar-mitzvah. It’s Ness’s rite of passage to adulthood that is necessary to defeat the evils of the world. His impressionable, childlike self has to be left behind to overcome the odds.

Once he does this, Ness and his friends have to travel to the future to defeat Giygas, putting their earthly bodies behind and journeying to the center of Giygas’s power in robot suits. Remember when I said the trek up to a boss was grueling? The run-up to Giygas is one of the most vexing excursions I’ve ever faced in a video game. Prepare wisely. Once Ness gets to Giygas, his neighbor Pokey is revealed to be a servant to him. This brat has always been on Ness’s tail for the whole game, trying to outdo Ness at every step. He was once a neighbor kid, then a multi-millionaire, and now he’s a step closer to becoming a transcendental being of pure evil. His journey is reminiscent of how adulthood can corrupt a misguided youth and turn it for the worse. The fight against Giygas is absolutely nerve-racking. His design is creepy, his presence is ominous, and his massive attack power. As the fight progresses, Giygas’s presence only becomes more hectic. Appropriately, the only way to defeat Giygas is to pray as Paula, collecting the wishes of everyone to incite a miracle, including a fourth-wall-breaking moment in which the player prays for them to succeed. It makes sense considering this is exactly what I was doing when fighting Giygas. It was an incredibly anxiety-inducing fight.

After overcoming the seemingly impossible odds by defeating Giygas, Ness and his friends return home in their bodies and go off in their separate ways. Ness returns home to his mother and is treated to his favorite meal (which you also get to choose. Yes, I went with the canon steak and not anything dirty). The ending is a relief and a bittersweet victory for the children. After the experience, something was at the back of my mind. What is the significance of the series titled Mother? As I see it, motherhood is deemed a symbol of purity and warmth. No matter how old you get, your mother will always see you as her baby. Ness might have shed the skin of childhood to tackle the presence of pure evil, but he returns home to his mother after a long journey as a place of comfort from the evils of the outside world from corrupt adults. It is the purest symbol, and it’s the base of all humankind no matter how far one strays from their roots with age or experience.

I fully understand the appeal of Earthbound and can absolutely see why the series has persisted over the years with a cult fanbase. I wanted to love the series as much as most people do, but I could not ignore all of the undesirable aspects of the game. While it was a consistently interesting experience full of whimsical mirth, the tedium grated on me so much that I frequently had to persist through the game instead of genuinely enjoying my time with it. The strengths of this game are so stark, and there are so many of them that it made the experience constantly invigorating. However, all of the bad aspects, like the lack of enemy leniency and congested item inventory, made me shake my head with irritation. Earthbound is a mixed bag, and maybe that’s what is retaining the point of its cult status. I will say that no matter how aggravating the game became, it was unlike any other game I’ve played. Nintendo still had something special.