2 Earth 2 Bound: Mother 2 Twice
On occasion, I like to write an essay on an esoteric topic. This is one of those occasions.
Intro
Like many people, my first exposure to Earthbound was through the Super Smash Bros series, but it wasn’t love at first sight. Ness, Earthbound’s protagonist, always confused me as a Smash fighter. He looked like a regular kid (albeit with a big head), but his move set was all psychic powers. And unlike other characters, it took some effort to master playing as him (a tall order for when I was a kid still developing hand/eye coordination). Instead of coming from a prestigious series that spanned numerous titles, Ness had only appeared in one game that wasn’t even in 3d. So how did such a weird kid make it onto the roster? For years I brushed off Earthbound as some old JRPG, with Ness’ inclusion in Smash a product of its time. It wasn’t until I heard a rave review of the game from YouTuber Dunkey in 2022 that I seriously thought about playing it.
My first playthrough of Earthbound took close to a year to finish, even after resorting to using a guide. I can point to a number of factors, both in the game and my personal life, that contributed to this long gestation, but the main reason was the difficulty spikes Earthbound is notorious for. These hurdles sucked all the fun out of the experience, causing me to abandon it for weeks or even months at a time. But no matter how often I put the game down, I knew that I wanted to get back into it and see it through. Even though I knew about the game’s cult following and enjoyed many moments throughout the run, it wasn’t until I neared the endgame that I began to feel I was in the midst of experiencing something truly special. Upon beating the game and rolling credits, my whole perspective on what a video game can be was upended and my hot/cold courting gave way to a full-fledged love.
The game is a cult classic for a reason, with many essays praising its offbeat humor, unique visual style, incredible soundtrack, and unsettling finale. These same charms deeply affected me, inspiring my decision to later play the other two games in the series, as well as dive into its dedicated fandom. Listening to the OST, enjoying fan-made tributes, frequenting the Earthbound subreddit, even buying official merch while on holiday in Japan; though I didn’t expect to become such a big Earthbound nerd, it’s been a welcome addition to my identity. There’s something so enduringly optimistic about the series, a joy that helps me navigate the stress of adulthood but is hard to convey without just telling someone to play the game.
With 2024 marking the 30th anniversary of Mother 2/Earthbound, it felt timely to revisit the game with a second playthrough. But instead of piloting, I decided to guide my wife through her first playthrough so I could share something near to me heart with someone nearer to my heart. And although I was worried about reliving the hurdles that made the first playthrough a bit of a chore, in the end the second run proved to be a far smoother experience. For anyone that is interested in Earthbound or has played it before and wants to share it with someone else, I highly recommend this co-op approach. It was a lot of fun and gave my wife, who is not an avid gamer, a very positive first impression of the series.
A Tale of Two Mothers
Before getting into deeper thoughts on the game, it’s important to address that Earthbound bears a lot similarities to Mother (aka Earthbound Beginnings), the first game in the series. From its plot and setting to its combat and finale, this surface level resemblance leads many to assume Earthbound is a remake of Mother and thus not worth playing, but I think both games have their own unique draw and identity. In general, Earthbound leans heavier into parody and gags of pop culture at large, while Mother is more focused on playing like a zany mod of Dragon Quest. Structurally, Earthbound is more merciful, providing clear progression paths and tutorial hints along the way, while Mother chucks you into an open world and says ‘figure it out.’ Eathbound’s linearity helps avoid a lot of frustration but it also robs the sequel of the sense of freedom that defines the first game. The technical improvements of the SNES allow Earthbound to replace random encounters with sprite-based enemy spawns, giving the player some autonomy in which battles they pick and strategy in how they fight them. It’s not perfect, but compared to Mother’s unbalanced enemy encounter rate, Earthbound feels far more accessible to modern audiences (and is a big reason why I played it first). All of these differences add up to two unique experiences, so while overall I feel Earthbound improves dramatically on its predecessor, I do feel that both are worth playing if one has the time and patience (see my essay on playing Mother for more thoughts on that entry). Mother 3, the final entry in the series, has its own identity, but I’ll save comparisons on that for another essay.
[If you haven’t played Earthbound, consider doing so instead of reading on and getting spoiled about the game, including the events of the final battle. Then come back and read the rest. Don’t worry, I’ll wait.']
“A bee… I am not”
Earthbound begins in 199X in Onett, a small town in Eagleland. Much like Ninten from Mother, Ness lives on the outskirts of town, awaking to strange happenings and an evil charge in the air. After a meteor crashes nearby, his neighbor (and soon-to-be antagonist) Pokey insists they go investigate. At the crash site they find Buzz Buzz, a time traveling bug (who is not really a bug) that tells Ness he is prophesied to defeat the evil alien Giygas and save the universe. Before his tragic death, Buzz Buzz further explains that Ness must collect eight melodies across the globe and record them to the Sound Stone, a key item that much like a real stone will weigh down your limited inventory for the bulk of the game. Narratively, this opening does a good job of establishing major characters and the central conflict. Gameplay-wise, it’s a walk up a hill and back x2, so not too thrilling. There are some interesting bits of foreshadowing, such as the discovery of the Mani Mani Statue buried deep beneath the earth (my head canon is that it lay dormant directly under Pokey’s house), the first fight with an iconic Starman, and Pokey’s introduction as a cowardly and unpleasant next door neighbor (interesting to note that he says his ‘heart is pounding’ when meeting Buzz Buzz, a terror he’ll experience again at the very end of the game). But as this nighttime lesson gives way to an incredible sunrise, the required tutorial section ends and Ness sets off on his adventure to save the world.
The theme song of Onett is one of the all time great ‘happy safe town’ melodies, jaunting along like a boy with allowance to burn. Its tempo is nice and slow, signaling that you can ignore the whole ‘you must save the universe’ thing for a bit and explore the town, talking to everyone you meet along the way. And unlike most games, you really want to talk to NPCs because the dialogue throughout Earthbound is killer. Everyone is cracking jokes or has something off the wall to say, no two are alike. It’s a far cry from typical video game dialogue, which is either bland flavor text (“sample some of my wares” - every merchant in every game) or stilted tutorials (“did you know you can press Up to go up?” - some random guy that apparently is aware he’s in a simulation and is cool with it). In Earthbound, if you talk to a merchant but don’t buy anything, one might say “Are you here just to say “Hi”? What a loser!” And when you need to learn about the game’s equipment mechanics, it’s explained by Ruffini, a dog who is possessed by the game’s creator Shigesato Itoi. As the first town you visit, Onett is full of NPCs with tutorial dialogue, and while they can be funny, it’s nice to know that all of them are optional. Compare this to the countless games where tutorials are long, boring, and worst of all, unskippable (I’ve known how to throw a Pokeball for 25 years, I don’t need a reminder in every Pokemon game).
Onett sets up a pattern that the next few towns follow:
Arrive to find a big problem that blocks progression
Beat up some goons and a boss
The town goes back to normal
You unlock access to a sanctuary location
Fight more goons and the dungeon’s guardian
You gain one of the eight melodies
Move onto the next town, rinse and repeat.
This loop may seem repetitive, but the designers put a lot of effort into making each town feel unique. Onett is suburban and spread out, with Ness and Pokey’s houses out in the sticks and a waterfront home for purchase nearby (definitely worth the investment). Twoson is denser, with a park and theatre speaking to a larger population. Threed has a few large zones, with apartment buildings, circus tents, and cemetery implying some sense of urban planning. Fourside is a metropolis, its skyscrapers projecting power and grandeur (even if the city’s map is actually smaller than the other towns). As you travel, NPCs will mention other cities, adding to the game’s worldbuilding. Between these main points are a number of offshoot locales, home to side quests or obstacles to Ness’ mission that help break up the action further and make this looping fun.
Combat-wise, the early game of Earthbound can be brutal. You have one party member with low health and few attack options. When Ness does start to learn psychic moves, they’re for healing. As is common with RPGs, townsfolk can’t be bothered to solve their own problems, happy to let a kid fight off street gangs, blue-splattered cultists, zombies, and moles of mean strength. The first boss, Frank, is strong enough to one-shot you if you get unlucky. His fight is a good primer on the combat system because it can be beaten with brute force, but rewards you for using strategy. In my first playthrough I went with the former, suffering many deaths (and many walks back to town from Ness’ home). In the second run with my wife, I guided her on when to guard/heal and when to attack. She still suffered a couple of deaths, but after beating him felt very accomplished… at least until his custom built robot whooped her.
Unlike Mother, all Earthbound enemies appear onscreen as sprites, which allows for some strategy in attempting to avoid them or get in a sneak attack (which in turn can risk having them sneak attack you). Earthbound has a lot of fun with these sprites, constantly looking for ways to catch the player off guard. When you first encounter an antoid, for example, you see a literal pixel draw in for a fight (“WTF that was an enemy!?” - my wife). In hindsight, it makes sense that an ant-sized enemy would have an ant-sized sprite, but in the moment it is a great surprise. Later, things established to often hold useful items, such as garbage cans and present boxes, are reused as enemy sprites, unsettling the player’s sense of what is safe and what is dangerous.
“Blue, blue blue”
Twoson, the second town in Eagleland, introduces a series of seemingly unrelated problems, requiring some puzzling to figure out whom to talk to and how to progress. This approach to game design can get annoying when players find progression chains illogical, but Earthbound smartly treats it as an opportunity to troll the player, adding risk and reward to the trial and error. Twoson has some of the greatest examples of trolling in the game, and it was here that I struggled with how to properly give my wife the “true“ Earthbound experience. After some thought, I decided that, to be a good husband, I had to let her fall for all the funny gags. It’s a similar motto I heard for raising a kid: don’t steal the struggle. So while I was happy to help with combat, inventory management, and the other systems that can turn a new player off from the game, I had to hold my tongue when my wife asked whether she should fund Apple Kid or Orange Kid’s inventions (she gave to both and suffered the consequences).
Mother toyed with expectations on occasion, but Earthbound treats trolling as an art form, and that’s why it’s vital that all players experience the full brunt of it. One of the most famous examples is the bike, which you can acquire in Twoson to travel faster. But as soon as you get your second party member Paula, you find that the item is unusable since it ‘only has one seat’ (“at least the bike sprites are fun” - my wife said in consolation). This kind of logic is so funny to me, since from one perspective it makes sense (not all bicycles are built for two), but in terms of video game logic it is so counterintuitive. For years, games have conditioned players to believe that any item they acquire has some purpose, but in Earthbound they have to learn that ‘it’s funny’ is as valid a purpose as any other.
There’s some other nice stuff within Twoson, including a park with an open air market (my wife’s favorite market purchase was an egg, which naturally hatches into a chicken that will run away if you try to use it) and an optional boss who hurts his leg jumping off the roof to attack you. I also like that if Ness sleeps at a hotel, Paula will telepathically contact him asking for help, adding a sense of urgency but also providing progression hints.
To rescue her from the hands of a blue-obsessed cult, one has to cross the ironically named Peaceful Rest Valley. In my first run, this area was a nightmare. Its confusing map, powerful enemies, and oppressive music annoyed me so much that I put the game down for weeks before trudging through. On the second run, I didn’t want my wife to live through the same experience, so I guided her on the optimal path, and through a mix of strategy and pure luck we managed to get through without a single death. This contrast in experience can be jarring, since a good run relies on knowing where to go and lucky combat RNG, but keep in mind that the original US release came bundled with a strategy guide, so there’s nothing wrong with getting some help. Another difference that improved the second run’s enjoyment was that my wife fought many more enemies in her playthrough (not by choice, she just struggled to get away from them in time). As such, her characters were never under-leveled, whereas on my first run I avoided fights often and later found myself under-leveled. Earthbound isn’t a game that requires heavy grinding, but there does seem to be an optimal amount of battles per area to ensure a steady amount of experience is gained.
After getting past the Valley, Paula gives Ness the Franklin Badge to help him defeat the cult’s leader, Mr. Carpainter. Unlike the Franklin Badges in Mother, which are optional items, the one in Earthbound is now a singular key item (yet another thing shrinking Ness’ scant inventory slots). At least it serves a very useful purpose, reflecting all lightning attacks in combat (thank you Mr. Franklin). In a small twist, Pokey reveals that he kidnapped Paula on the orders of Mr. Carpainter, who in turn is under the influence of the Mani Mani Statue (which in turn gets its evil power from Giygas). This distance from the big bad echoes throughout the game, where enemies are split between earthlings turned evil and alien invaders acting on direct orders. It lends a mystery to Giygas, much like he had in the first game (where he is called Giegue). As with most enemies, defeating Carpainter returns the cultists to normal, except for Pokey, who now bears a grudge against Ness. With the village peaceful, Ness can free Paula, gaining a party member who later will become a powerful glass cannon, but for now is just glass (at least she has inventory space to spare).
After the first sanctuary in Onett, players can choose to do the rest in nearly any order. For my first playthrough, I accidentally skipped the second sanctuary and had to backtrack to beat it later. For the second playthrough, we did them in order and honestly I think the game should have made this the requirement. Enemies in Earthbound do not have scaling power levels, so when you go to sanctuaries out of order, most of them will already be far weaker than your party, diminishing the sense of struggle and progression. There is a correct order to the locations, since the melodies you acquire at each build up into a single song on the Sound Stone, and unlike Mother it is usually not hard to deduce where the next melody is located. I’m sure the creators had their reasons, but to me it feels like an oversight.
Returning to Twoson after freeing Paula brings you into contact with The Runaway Five, a band of six guys that are constantly having money troubles. Once you settle their debt with the theatre owner, you get to watch them put on a concert prior to them driving you onto Threed. For many people, myself included, the concerts are a highlight of the game. My wife was unimpressed, though her mood may have been tinged by the struggle to hand their creditor a wad of bills (one of the game’s quirks that is hard to tell if it is an intentional troll or design oversight). Riding in their bus recalls the Paradise Line train from Mother, though Earthbound gets an accuracy point in depicting America’s unfortunately car-centric infrastructure.
“This is just the way I am…”
Threed brings another difficulty spike, with tough supernatural enemies and less direction on how to progress. In my first run, there was a lot of frustration and I think around here was when I started relying on a guide. For my wife’s run, I tried to only provide hints as needed, and was surprised to see how quickly she stumbled upon the correct sequence of actions that spur Ness and Paula to get captured. In need of help, Paula telepathically reaches out to Jeff, a boy genius who lives far away in Winters, a place that is basically the UK as described by a ten year-old (Stonehenge, Loch Ness Monster, and lots of snow). I like Jeff’s introduction far more than Paula’s, as you take control of him in a short section that explains who he is and how to play his unique combat style (no psychic powers, but lots of deadly items). As the first glimpse of the world outside of Eagleland, the wintery scenery is in stark contrast to the greenery we’ve been seeing so far. It also has a lot of great gags, from bubblegum-loving monkeys to the serene Tessie (“I like his grin” - my wife), to the introduction of Brick Road, a man who dreams of becoming a dungeon (as we all do). The soundtrack in the area is also fantastic, with some tracks reused from Mother fitting neatly next to new songs.
It goes without saying, but the music throughout Earthbound is stellar, building upon the collaboration of Keiichi Suzuki and Hirokazu Tanaka and taking full advantage of the SNES’ beefy audio capabilities. This is one of the first video games to make extensive use of sampling, folding snippets of popular songs into tracks in a way that subtly expands the pastiche of Americana (even if many samples are from the Beatles). The creators also sample their own work from Mother’s soundtrack, remixing old songs in ways that go well beyond the common “let’s reuse this so we don’t have to write more material” approach most games are satisfied with. Lloyd’s elementary school song becomes Earthbound’s file selection theme. The song for Ness’ house is a mellow take on the upbeat Pollyanna, transforming it from a melody for optimistic enthusiasm to a nostalgic sense of home and comfort. I even love that the shop theme remains unchanged, as though the stores have been playing the same jingle for decades (can’t blame them, it’s a banger). It’s a credit to the artists that this recycling feels brand new, allowing it to sit naturally alongside the dozens of added tracks that spill across genres and locales in line with the player’s progression.
Jeff meets up with his amusingly bad father Dr. Andonuts, borrowing his Sky Runner to fly across the ocean to rescue Ness and Paula with a bad key machine. He’s not very strong, really near-sighted, quite shy, and he tends to be reckless. While he sounds like a carbon copy of Lloyd from Mother, he later becomes the most overpowered character in the game, thanks to the unbalanced items only he can use. In my first run, I never gelled with Jeff, mainly because I didn’t want to rely on items and tried to use other tactics (such as banging my head against the wall for every boss). On the second run, we made full use of his arsenal and the relief was like pushing opening a door after spending an hour pulling on the handle. With Jeff in the party, my wife sped through Winters and Threed, having no trouble when fighting the evil circus tent (Earthbound has the best enemies).
To reach the next area, Saturn Valley, you must traverse a gauntlet of enemies that can poison your party or cast other ailments. Already weak entering the mini barf mini boss, who proceeded to knock out Ness and Jeff, my wife was left with only Paula, who was low on PP and health. With nothing to lose, we tried Paula’s unique Pray ability, which causes something good or bad to randomly happen. By pure luck, her prayer took the mini barf down, causing us to loudly celebrate the victory (at least until our son woke up). Moments like these exhibit how intense battles can get, and how rewarding it can feel to overcome a tough enemy. Although the combat in Earthbound may not be its selling point, I’ve come to appreciate the ways the developers tried to make it interesting. The most notable are the rolling health bars, which tick down like an odometer instead of having all damage hit at once. If you’re quick, you can beat an enemy or heal before mortal damage downs your party, adding a time element to later battles. I had a lot of fun with this mechanic on my first run, but my wife struggled to menu fast enough to take advantage. Not every combat mechanic works as intended, but I think a lot of the issues come down more to balancing than system design.
“ZOOM!”
Leaving Threed comes with a big sigh of relief, its dark color palette and oppressive melody giving way to welcoming shades of yellow and bouncy music. Saturn Valley is home to the Mr Saturns, a race of nose-centric bipedal creatures who speak in a language so odd, they have their own font. Not only are they cute, these little guys offer healing services free of charge and powerful items at reasonable prices, making them one of your greatest allies.
After standing under a waterfall for a totally reasonable length of time, the party enters a soulless factory where Mr Saturn are chained and forced to produce fly honey for the evil Master Belch (fittingly a big pile of puke). To see these funny creatures in chains is a great subversion, and a reminder that the evil invading force is indeed quite evil. The dungeon seems intimidating at first, but was a breeze in both playthroughs, with Belch being far easier than the set of mini barfs you fight right before him (they can lock you into a long fight with calls for help and status ailments). In a rare bit of guide railing, the game requires you to use an item to distract Belch so he can be beaten. I don’t mind bosses that can be made trivial, but I am not the biggest fan of ones where it’s required, especially as Carpainter similarly required the Franklin Badge to defeat. The upshot is that beating Belch not only helps return Threed to normal, it also frees all the Mr Saturn, who return to the valley.
After a hot spring soak and an interesting coffee break, the next sanctuary dungeon is pretty short, but it’s full of enemies that cast the ‘mushroomized’ status, which flips around your movement controls at random intervals. It’s funny the first couple of times, but soon becomes the most annoying ailment in the game, and was enough burden on the second run to cause us to lose to the sanctuary guardian multiple times (with one due to a self inflicted PK Fire death). Eventually, we won and got back to Threed, finding it free at last and cheerful once more. With the ghosts and zombies gone, we were free to move on towards Fourside, passing first through the Dusty Dunes Desert, which is definitely a location in Earthbound.
“The power of being third”
The Desert is a place you have to return to multiple times, and as such it is spread out and slow to traverse. The enemies here are either poisonous or explode upon defeat, and every so often the party will get sunstroke (I don’t know if it’s intended, but I feel like Jeff gets it more frequently than anyone else). There’s a few fun bits mixed into the nothingness, including a talking skeleton, a lost contact lens side quest, a living slot machine, and a tragic romance between two sesame seeds (Shakespeare, eat your heart out), but it’s not enough to keep the area from feeling like a valley between two peaks.
Between trips to the Desert, you’ll be spending time in Fourside, a city which by now the game has talked up as the biggest metropolis on the map. There is a lot to be done and the order in which it must be accomplished can be hard to figure out. I think a lot of people get stuck here, but by this point in my first run I was fully using a guide. On the second run, I guided my wife based on my memory, but even then it was easy to get lost. Enemies within the city are mostly delegated to possessed people and mad taxis, so it’s never that hard to move around, but exploration is slowed by how spread out key buildings are from each other (the main stretch of hospital/department store is on the far side of the city from the bridge to the Desert). I’m not a fan of this kind of layout, it reminds me of how they design airport gates to be further away from baggage claim on purpose to keep travelers from complaining about waiting on their luggage, but at least the theme song of the city is immaculate (arguably the melodic center of the game). If you explore enough, you find that Pokey has moved up in the world, now the right hand man of Monotoli, the new owner/slave of the Mani Mani Statue and most powerful man in Fourside. Pokey is as obnoxious as ever, but I must admit he looks great in his new suit. After berating you, he has security escort you out, showcasing how Giygas’ influence is slowly spreading up the food chain (from runaway dogs to business magnates). Pokey’s father is also here, having road his coattail from Onett to boast of his son’s success (with a wheezing cough not unlike one found later in Mother 3).
The plot has many paths that lead to dead ends, but as you start to find a thread the rest comes pretty naturally. The Runwaway Five are in financial straits (again), sending you back to find gold in the Desert. But first, you have to clear the gold mine of five moles in one of the best rake jokes ever written (distracting from how tedious the dungeon is). In the second run we thankfully we got through this in one go, whereas in my first run I died and realized the hard way that it’s better to save in Fourside (close to the hospital you must visit to revive party members) than at the shack near the mine (requiring a slow walk to the Fourside hospital and back). Once the mine is clear, George and Gerardo Montague (two underrated characters) start digging. There’s no gold, but they do find a big diamond, which works well enough. After some more stage shows (these ones have better choreography), the Runaway Five are debt free and by sheer coincidence the Fourside department store opens back up. There’s absolutely no reason for one of these things to block the other and feels jarring when so much of the game so far has been well constructed.
Around town, we also did some exploring, which includes some nice foreshadowing for later areas. While earlier NPCs would talk about other towns in Eagleland, now you hear about other countries in ads or in the museum. Some of the allusions can be pretty subtle, such as an old man in the archaeology museum who dreams of seeing a live dinosaur someday (my wife scoffed at him while I bit my tongue). We tried revisiting Pokey and his dad to see if their dialogue changed, but there wasn’t anything new. Finally, we went into the department store, where the game throws a cruel curveball.
Moonside, Monkeys, Monotoli
Earthbound loves establishing a repeated thing as safe so they can later fool the player. In Threed, it’s the hotel and in Fourside it’s the department store. Many games deal in this kind of deceit, such as the Souls series with its famous mimics, but in Earthbound it comes less from a place of “suffer or get good” and more from a place of “hey, wouldn’t this be funny?” In the department store, the lights go out and Paula is kidnapped (again), leaving you with Ness and Jeff, who may still be quite weak by this point. Since you’re caught unawares, you also may not have your party at full health and may have put some key items into Paula’s inventory (like the Franklin Badge). For my first run, I was definitely under prepared, while for the second I helped ensure we weren’t in bad shape. This may seem disingenuous to the challenge this area presents (foresight as a form of cheating), but my goal was for my wife to enjoy the game, not submit to it. Some parts of Earthbound can suck and this one ranks up there for many people, especially due to the enemies you have to fight on your way up to the boss (I’ve never hated a cup of coffee so much before playing this section). My first run was a slog, the second we got very lucky with encounters and the boss fight, which you may notice is a common theme between the two playthroughs. It’s why I enjoyed the co-op run so much, it reduced the barriers of the game (combat and inventory management) while emphasizing its best features (humor, dialogue, and music).
Defeating the boss does not return Paula, not by a long shot. The sequence that follows expects a lot of patience from the player, which is why it’s funny that you can test the patience of an injured NPC by asking him to repeat important info a bunch of times. It’s like the developers knew that you’d be at wit’s end so they provided catharsis. After some trickery, a dive bar becomes a portal to Moonside, an opposite version of Fourside complete with dark palette and bizarro conversations (more so than usual). The enemy designs here are fantastic, from abstract art and melting clocks to annoying fire hydrants, while the crux of getting back to normal involves talking to everyone you meet (sometimes twice). Its topsy-turvy atmosphere and sparse song make it a highlight of the middle game. I like that even in this temporary area, which disappears after you defeat the boss, there are optional bits to explore. In my first run I don’t recall stepping into the Moonside museum, but we checked it out on the second playthrough and it was well worth it. The boss of Moonside is the Mani Mani Statue itself, an evil object that has run a parallel journey alongside you all the way from Onett. Defeating it feels significant, even if upon breaking its illusion you find yourself wandering the storage room of the dive bar.
After so much oblique progression, the game hits you with a string of exposition-dumping characters. You learn that Monotoli’s maid wants trout-flavored yogurt which will help you confront the villain, then learn the trout-flavored yogurt machine shipped to you by Apple Kid (an unsung hero of the game for constantly inventing oddly specific and useful items) is lost in a cave in the Desert, then learn that the monkeys who live in the same cave want you to come meet their master who has just finished meditating. Most games would have an NPC blurt out such nonsense with no charisma, but Earthbound goes further and has three different NPCs do it. This lampshades what was clearly a difficult bit to exposit naturally to the player, but it’s funny so I’ll let it pass.
The less said about the monkey cave, the better. Alongside the yogurt machine, you also learn how to teleport, a skill that is essential for later in the game (and very convenient since it allows you to take full advantage of Saturn Valley’s free healing services). In Mother, teleportation is an optional ability because its map is interconnected and can be traversed on foot. In contrast, Earthbound’s map is made up of unconnected chunks set in various countries across various continents, giving the game an epic, globetrotting second half. After defeating a bunch of sentry bots (“these suck” - my wife) and one clumsy robot (“well at least he’s cute” - also my wife) you finally confront Monotoli, finding the once powerful businessman a feeble shell of himself (his life force drained by the evil idol). He is peaceful after the Mani Mani Statue’s destruction, showing that Paula is safe and sound. As she rejoins your party to a reprise of her theme song, the old man offers to let you use his helicopter to continue your adventure, only for Pokey to steal it for his getaway (“I don’t like him. He’s ugly and annoying” - my wife, poignantly). From this point on, the party will trail the bad boy, seeing signs of his presence as they progress. It’s a neat shift in balance, one I think ties well into the feeling of Giygas’ reach extending through his disciples.
Globetrotting
Following Fourside, the gameplay loop changes, mixing a globetrotting tour of exotic places with teleporting trips back to old areas. As points of interest, the foreign lands must include all required services (ATM, stores, telephones, hotel, etc.), but each is adapted to suit their locale, often in humorous ways. In Summers (the eternal tourist trap) everything is incredibly overpriced, while in Scaraba (a stand-in for Egypt) conventional shops are replaced with an open air bazaar. These design choices capture the uncanny feelings travelers experience when they see familiar things in unusual forms and settings (such as how we Americans are always curious to see what McDonalds is like in foreign countries). It also plays into the game’s homesickness system, which randomly afflicts Ness with a need to call his mom. Some people dislike these kinds of RNG-heavy systems (RNG was very nice in our second run, not giving the ailment until we’d reached Scaraba), but I enjoy it from a narrative point of view. When I travel to foreign places I often get homesick, so it’s not a stretch to imagine a 12 year-old feeling it too. There’s something exciting and exhausting about immersing oneself in unfamiliar cultures, a feeling Earthbound deftly conveys.
After a stopover in Winters to upgrade the Sky Runner (and fight a big mushroom for another melody), the team lands in Summers, a lengthy map without clear objectives. Like Fourside, the number of enemies is minimal, encouraging the player to roam around and enjoy the breezy background music. Summers is ripe with parody, poking fun at the rich and pretentious in equal measure. My favorite are the patrons of the Stoic Club because they remind me of people I went to art school with. Eventually, players will figure out how to get a magic cake, which cause Ness to “dream” that he is the prince Poo of a far off land called Dalaam, an odd conceit since Poo will eventually become your fourth party member (so it’s not a dream at all? They don’t explain this very well). As Poo, you get to walk around Dalaam opening gifts and hearing how great you are (all the women fawn over Prince Poo, except for one who eats a lot of garlic). This could all seem like flavor text, but it serves a sneakier purpose of establishing how great Poo’s life is so the stakes are higher when he’s asked to give up everything in his meditative Mu training.
Mu, which roughly translates to ‘nothingness’, is a concept found in many Eastern philosophies, the notion that the world we experience is all illusion and must be rejected to attain enlightenment (Note: I am not an expert on Eastern philosophies, so apologies if this is not an accurate summation. I tried my best.) The way Earthbound portrays it is a multi-sensory experience, playing with the format of a video game itself in a fashion that even today feels novel. It’s a powerful way to introduce a new character, which is why it’s disappointing how insignificant Poo ends up being as both a party member and character within the story. As the last one to join the party, he is usually weaker than everyone else, with a redundant move set and constraints that can feel annoying (he requires special food and special gear, like a true prince). His unique move, Mirror, is functionally useless. While Paula’s Prayer is randomized and Jeff’s Spy move often doesn’t provide helpful info, Mirror never resulted in a hit on an enemy across both my playthroughs. I tried it a few times in my first run and forgot about it, while my wife was more tenacious, using it throughout her run to no avail. Narratively, the main help Poo provides is translating a hieroglyph, a small task for someone built up as a big deal.
After getting the full party, the game offers several avenues to progression. We followed the path back to Fourside to fight a big rat in a sewer, which in turn unlocks the sanctuary in the clouds. The former is an easy dungeon with a tough boss, while the latter is the opposite. This kind of content is nice since it makes use of the teleport power to access things previously in sight but unreachable. However, it does disrupt the flow of the game since the natural path forward is to sail from Summers to Scaraba. This voyage is notable for changing the art style, making the ship’s sprite small to capture the scale of the trip (as well as the massive Kraken). The Kraken puts up a tough fight, taking a few tries (and bottle rockets) before going down. While I don’t really like the artwork of the creature (it feels like a first draft) the battle song is a banger.
Dank Dungeons
Landing in the Scaraba, the first thing you’ll notice is the bazaar, which has some nice details. For one, not every vendor is friendly, with some giving out bad deals. Another small detail is that when making a purchase the sound effect changes depending on if it’s from a cashier or not, which I just think speaks to Earthbound’s charm in being extra. You can also find a corner of town that stinks, a clear sign Pokey had been there (it was the 90s, some toilet humor is expected). South of town is the Pyramid, a dungeon unlocked by baby’s first puzzle. Earthbound’s dungeons are not given much thought for layout/puzzling but the Pyramid is the exception, with its interior design a clever reflection of its exterior structure. The party climbs up flights of stairs to a peak, continuing onward down a number of flights. At the base on the other side they flip a switch, backtracking to the summit to find a trap door has opened. Jumping in, they descend into the burial chamber at the Pyramid’s center, uncovering a key item required for navigating the next area. The execution of the Pyramid is straightforward but well done, even if the hieroglyph and mummy enemies inside can be annoying (at least they don’t respawn). Exiting the dungeon is surprisingly tough, full of poisonous foes and booby traps à la Indiana Jones. Upon exiting, you get a free heal at least, then Poo is whisked away for more training. To have him join and leave your party so quickly is an odd choice, but as he contributes the least I suppose he’s the most expendable. You can also put the key item in his inventory before he leaves to enjoy how the developers avoid a potential soft lock.
Back in the Scaraba desert, you soon find a key to access an unusual man-shaped tower. Inside, you are greeted to the greatest song in the entire game, which plays across several floors as you climb to the top, avoiding weak enemies and trudging through a lag-inducing zoo. At the top you find melded into a wall the face of Brick Road, who with Dr. Andonuts’ help has merged with a dungeon to become Dungeon Man, the tower you are currently inside. Like EVE in Mother, Dungeon Man joins your party for a spell, whooping any enemies you come across. Unlike EVE, who stays with you for a decent part of Mt. Itoi, Dungeon Man almost immediately gets stuck on some palm trees and is forced to leave your party (“That’s it?! He was in our party for two seconds“ - my wife). To reach the next area, Deep Darkness, you need a submarine, which Dungeon Man recalls is within his vehicle collection. Thus, you retread his dungeon to exit through a different path, getting another chance to experience the majesty of his design. Many people bemoan Dungeon Man because of its boring layout and forced repetition, failing to see how perfectly this parodies so many RPGs of its era. Dungeon Man is the epitome of SNES dungeon game design, for better or worse (mostly worse), and it’s one of the funniest parts of Earthbound because of it.
Deep Darkness isn’t too notable, by contrast, with a gimmick that is more tedious than difficult. Most of the region is a swamp that causes the party to move slowly and continually take damage, though it’s such small amounts that it’s barely an inconvenience. The services have some funny gimmicks that are bad deals, such as a man who serves as an ATM but charges a huge fee for withdrawals, but since you can just teleport to other towns there’s little reason to use these. You can also hunt for magic truffles within the swamp, but it’s not worth the effort. The main fight is a rematch with Belch (now Master Barf) that features the dramatic return of Poo. Barf drops a notoriously powerful weapon, the Casey Bat, which is perhaps the most Googled of any weapon in the game (“why does the Casey Bat always miss????“ - people that need to read more poetry), but once you’re past this area there isn’t a lot of reason to return. Overall, I’d probably rank this as my least favorite area in all of Earthbound (after Peaceful Rest Valley).
Tendas, Stonehenge, Lumine Hall
Beyond Deep Darkness is the Tenda Village, home to many shy guys. To help them overcome shyness you need to find a book, a task easier said than done. The only copy is at Onett’s library, but it’s been checked out by Apple Kid, who has in turn been kidnapped by Pokey. Back in Winters, you can now enter the base under Stonehenge, one of the hardest dungeons in the game. Instead of fighting earthlings turned evil, this base is full of Giygas’ army of aliens and robots, including the Starmen featured on the US box art. These guys teleport around the screen, making it nearly impossible to sneak up on them, and hit hard (especially the Super variant). Worst of all, they often group with Atomic Power Robots, who replenish their health and explode upon defeat. While I like that the enemies are consistent with Giegue’s army in Mother and the kidnapped people are kept in giant tubes, giving the two games some continuity, I do feel like more could have been done to differentiate them and imply that Giygas’ second invasion attempt had learned more from the first failed one. On my first run, where my party was a bit under-leveled, this area was hell. But my wife’s willingness to grind made the second run much smoother, getting through it without a game over. We didn’t bother trying for the Sword of Kings (one of the most notorious 1/128 chance enemy item drops in the game), but did go back for the good loot after the base is shut down.
Upon saving Apple Kid and getting the book (I wonder how he felt knowing that was the main reason we bothered to help him), the Tendas help you get into Lumine Hall, the seventh sanctuary location (for those who are counting). This is the only area that can’t be returned to after defeating the guardian, which is a shame as it has the coolest point of power, a wall that writes out Ness’ thoughts in real time (thankfully he doesn’t have the mind of a typical 12 year-old). Lumine Hall leads directly into the Lost Underworld, which pulls off a great stunt of making the players teensy (reminds me of Giant Land in Super Mario Bros 3). The designers put a lot of thought into this scale shift, with tiny sprites for fallen party members as well as failed teleportation. The Underworld has a lot of giant dinosaur enemies that can be tough, but by this point in our second run my wife’s party was pretty overpowered. There is a unique system of geysers that is not super useful, but I do appreciate the sense of ancient power conveyed through their frequent eruptions. Most notable in the area are some important equipment, a funny lost tribe of Tendas, a preview of the finale battle’s area, and the path into the final sanctuary location.
Fire Spring makes sense to be located near the Earth’s core, but it’s a pretty boring dungeon full of fire-based enemies (who would’ve guessed?). It’s main feature is the boss Carbon/Diamond Dog, one of the hardest in the game. My first run did not go well against him, while my wife’s fight was a breeze (luckily she never got ‘diamondized’).
Magicant 2.0
After collecting all eight melodies, Ness is transported into Magicant, a world within his mind. Here, he must battle the evil within his own thoughts to unlock his full potential, a neat idea that is executed expertly. It would have been easy for the developers to make Magicant in Earthbound a facsimile of the Magicant of Mother 1, but lucky for us they took the hard road and made something fresh. Ness’ Magicant is smaller and has fewer inhabitants than Queen Mary’s, perhaps a reflection of the many years that hers existed. Ness’ is also far more personal, with many references to past events in the game or from his childhood, while Mary’s just feels like a magical realm (my interpretation is that since Mary has amnesia, her Magicant cannot fully reflect her memories.)
Logically, it makes sense that each version of Magicant would vary based on the psychic user’s subconscious, but there are some shared design elements that tie the two realms together. Both have similar enemies, require venturing deeper to exit, and both feature the Flying Men, optional companions that represent courage (or desperation, depending on how many you let die). The Flying Men in both games will leave a tombstone upon death near their house, though in Earthbound the epitaphs are funnier.
The thing that truly makes Ness’ Magicant special are the NPCs. These encounters reframe a lot of what we’ve come to know about the protagonist, adding complexity to the struggle he’s endured and his trepidation in what he must face to save the world. Fallen enemies curse him for being bested in battle. His younger self asks to play, only to find Ness is too busy (I wish there was a way, little guy). A snowman, long since melted away, asserts that he is still real as a memory. Perhaps the most surprising encounter is Pokey, who is far kinder than he’s acted throughout the game. It’s left up to the player whether this is how Pokey once was, or if this is a projection of what Ness wishes their relationship could have been. With each interaction, the colors of the landscape change, reflecting shifts in mood and thought as Ness grapples with his past, present, and future. It’s a potent blend of visual and narrative that recalls the emotional turbulence of puberty and the fear of childhood’s fast approaching end. Ness has not chosen this path, but nonetheless he accepts it, winding deeper into his subconscious to fight… the Mani Mani Statue again.
Ness’ Nightmare, as the boss is called, was one of the hardest for both our playthroughs (though ironically I beat him the first time using the Auto fight feature). The trick is to allow the boss to inflict mortal damage and hold off on healing until absolutely necessary. Players are conditioned to heal as soon as they see the mortal damage warning in most games, but as Ness by this point has enough health to endure mortal wounds for multiple turns, you have to risk waiting or you will soon run out of psychic points (PP). Between heals, the most effective attack is to bash, since it doesn’t require any PP (a bit ironic to defeat a mental enemy with your fists, not your mind). In theory this is a very cool fight, with success well served by an advanced strategy, but in execution it can be a nuisance, since dying returns you all the way back to the beginning of Magicant. The trek back to the boss is long and inevitably includes some enemy encounters that will reduce your health or PP, making it a chore to repeat. After my wife died to the boss a couple of times, I offered to do the trek back, since I had more experience with avoiding/despawning enemies.
Upon defeating the boss, not only is it cathartic to never see that statue sprite again, you also get treated to a cool cut scene where Ness’ full power is finally unlocked. I like how this is tied into a literal level up, with a huge chunk of XP making Ness a powerhouse upon return to the party. Ness also finally unlocks Teleport beta, an upgraded version that so far has only be known by Poo (the last thread that made him a useful party member). It’s neat that this vital psychic ability gets connected to different means of enlightenment (Mu training and Magicant meddling), another example of how deftly Earthbound weaves narrative into its game system design.
Endgame
Ness awakens to rejoin the party and prepare for the final fight, which becomes a question of where and when, since Giygas is now on the defense. Dr. Andonuts, Apple Kid, the Mr. Saturns and Gerardo Montague are working on a machine called the Phase Distorter to take the party to Giygas, but first need a MacGuffin from Buzz Buzz’ meteorite. This side quest back to Onett (now in a state of darkness as powerful enemies try to stop Ness) is a nice way to tie the early game back to the finale, even if the enemies are annoying and plentiful. What gets me is seeing Ness’ mom terrified, adding a personal stake on top of the whole ‘the universe must be saved’ conflict. Once back with the thing, the Distorter takes the party to the Cave of the Past, an area you can peak at from the Lost Underworld. The Cave is empty, but as Dr Andonuts explains the location is correct but the time isn’t. Giygas is attacking from the distant past, so to defeat him they must use a new version of the machine to travel through time. It’s not clear if Giygas has retreated to the past to avoid Ness or if he’s been there the whole time, but considering the Mani Mani Statue was buried long ago beneath Onett, I lean towards the latter. For the party to survive time travel, they must first put their souls into robots. It adds an extra dread to the point of no return, sending you in with no guarantee of returning, even if Giygas is defeated.
After the operation, the party succeeds in time traveling, the clanks of their little robot bodies echoing against the warped ambient sound of The Place. The composers for Earthbound’s soundtrack innovated in many ways, but sampling might be the most enduring. Although sampling was possible as far back as the NES, most used it just to get a nice instrument noise (the steel drum of Super Mario Bros 3, for example) to help set a mood. In Earthbound, parody is an essential part of the game’s setting and humor, so sampling becomes a natural fit. The sound of The Place is a great example, taking a lovely Beach Boys harmony and transforming it into a looping nightmare.
The Place is a gauntlet of the toughest enemies Earthbound has to offer, often grouped in ways that leave one cursing. Dying here is pretty inevitable, but with free full heals you will eventually get to a level that lets you venture deeper into the maw. There isn’t much to say about this area, but on the second run we did get the incredibly rare Goddess Ribbon on a fluke (one of the 1/128 chance drops). The Final Starman, as the name implies, is the worst fight in the game, but luckily we only had to beat one before entering Giygas’ lair.
“What an all-mighty idiot!”
Earthbound throws a lot of weird stuff at you, but most is in good fun. Enemies can be gross, goofy, or somewhere in between, but few would rank as unsettling, let alone disturbing. Giygas throws that dynamic out the window, delivering one of the greatest final boss battles of all time. Nothing in the game prepares you for the fight with Giygas and little of what you see is given an explanation. A manifestation of childhood trauma, the battle is meant to scar you by design. Playing this as an adult, I was struck by the experience. I can only imagine how hard it would have hit had I played this as a kid. My wife didn’t find it scary, but she conceded that it was creepy and memorable (high praise from a Junji Ito fan).
From the barren path of The Place, you enter a den of pulsating entrails, leading to a massive organic device identified as The Devil’s Machine. The cave shakes and from the Machine appears a projection of Ness’ face. Pokey materializes out of thin air, piloting a heavily armored vehicle with spider-like legs. The machine he drives doesn’t seem fully mechanical, an unnatural blend of flesh and metal (predating a significant theme in Mother 3). It’s never explained how Pokey is able to time travel within his human body, but it doesn’t need to be. A lot of the power of the final fight lies in leaving aspects unspoken, giving the player’s imagination room to fill in the rest with dreadful explanations.
After berating Ness and dropping some lore, Pokey attacks and the fight begins. Giygas is immune from damage in this phase, requiring the party to focus on Pokey. As the intensity of the battle increases, the music suddenly shifts from chip bit tune to heavy metal downpour, drowning the atmosphere in distorted guitars and gated drums. The samples used to achieve this effect are top tier, warning you that something is off, as though you’ve accidentally booted up an entirely different game. Eventually, Pokey takes enough damage to get desperate and turn off the Devil’s Machine. He explains that it’s the only thing keeping Giygas’ mind together, as the being has grown so powerful that his physical form cannot hold it. Giygas is no longer just evil, he is the embodiment of evil itself, but in becoming this he has also become an “all-mighty idiot.”
This sequences says more about Pokey than one may realize, his inability to surrender reflecting a childish stubbornness. The way he chooses to unleash Giygas subverts the expectation that Pokey is still the servant of evil. Now, he is in control, and happily risks the destruction of the universe if it means besting his nemesis Ness. It’s a flimsy piece of power, since after Giygas is free Pokey has no willpower over him, so it can read as a dumb move that’s incredibly shortsighted. But to me, this is a perfect summation of the evil within mankind; cowardly unleashing a destructive force you have no control over with no regard for the consequences because it’s better than losing.
The contrast between Giegue of Mother 1 and Giygas of Mother 2 leads some to argue they are different characters, but I think there’s a reasonable thread to his collapse into madness. In the first game, Giegue is driven by fear and hatred of humanity, with defeat only brought on by the recollection of motherly love from a human. This ‘weakness’ is something he’d naturally want to destroy as he continued to work on increasing his psychic power, inevitably leading to some point where he went too far and lost his original motivation (forgetting his human mother could also negate his personal hatred of humans). Giygas comes to Earth solely because a prophesy says that Ness will defeat him, and though there isn’t much exposition, I like to think he’s already forgotten the events of Mother in his mad pursuit of power.
After the Devil’s Machine is turned off, the real nightmare begins. The final fight takes place in a hellish dimension where instead of fighting an enemy against a trippy background you fight the background itself, a blood red face eliciting a scream of agony (very Francis Bacon). Throughout the fight, Giygas tries to talk to Ness, seemingly unaware that they are even fighting. A lot of the dialogue is fragmentary but narrowly focused on Ness, as though the prophetic hero is the last thing tying Giygas to reality. His emotions seesaw between sorrow and pain, repeating Ness’ name not out of hatred, but agony. Like Giegue, Giygas’ attacks cannot be comprehended and they hit hard. Without the right equipment, certain moves can cause instant death to party members. The only way to deal damage is to make use of Paula’s prayer, which now trigger emotional cutscenes of friends from throughout the world praying for the well being of the party. Although Giygas has forgotten his adopted mother’s love, again it is love that wounds him.
Pokey’s dialogue gives the player a hint that they must use prayer to win, though I knew the trick going into my first run from my guidebook. My wife was able to figure it out on her own, though I wonder how many kids struggled to do the same back in the day. The fight doesn’t provide much feedback, since attacks on Giygas will all say they do damage, even though behind the scenes he gets an instant heal to full health each turn. As the prayers set in, they make Giygas unstable, with the background growing in distortion and fury alongside the music. The soundtrack for the final fight is dissonant, a mix of husky breaths and mechanical tones that gives way to snippets of melody and eventually a wash of noise. Like a signal desperate to reach a set-top TV antenna, the image of Giygas churns through pixelated distortion, on the cusp of succumbing to nothingness. Paula’s prayers also grow increasingly desperate, trying to think of others to call for help until eventually she runs out. Eventually, the prayer is heard by you, the player, a meta moment that can be very emotional or very stupid, depending on the name you’ve entered for yourself earlier in the game. For me, it was really cool. For my wife, it was a bit silly. Giygas disintegrates into noise as Pokey decides to leave (he refutes that he is running away), vowing to return. Silence follows, revealing the robotic bodies of the party in ruin. But as expected, the hero’s souls make it home safe and sound, set to an emotional swell of music. The battle is over and evil has been defeated.
Postgame
With Giygas gone and Pokey in hiding, the world is at peace once more. Jeff and Poo say their goodbyes, though you can talk more with them if you like, and Paula can either go home or be escorted there by Ness (or you can take her to Ness’ house to end the game). I like to walk around with Paula, the two of them deserve a vacation after their great struggle, but she will occasionally ask if you’ll take her home soon, which spoils the mood a bit. The game, in a final surprise, has a pretty robust postgame for a SNES title, allowing you to explore the entire world and talk to NPCs, many of whom have new dialogue related to the victory. There are guides that cover all the new bits of dialogue, so I’ll just highlight a few of my favorites: you can return the shyness book to the Onett library (and get a kiss from the lady at the front desk), find that Pokey’s mom is being kept company by a new man while her husband looks for Pokey in the dive bar in Fourside, and (if you have brought Paula home) you can finally ride the bike again (even in Deep Darkness’ swamp). There’s plenty more, but by this point we were tired so I had my wife head to Ness’ to end the game.
There’s two sets of credits, first up being a roll call of the game’s cast (a nice feature since there’s so many memorable characters) and then the actual development team’s credits. The team names are shown alongside the picture album of a photographic genius that players either love or hate for his frequent interruptions and penchant for saying ‘fuzzy pickles’ (I fall into the former, my wife the latter). Over this plays the song “Smiles and Tears”, a triumphant track that blends the eight melodies into a longer composition, similar to the song at the end of Mother, which likewise expands that game’s eight melodies. Right before the song’s climax, a sampled voice quietly says “I miss you”, a small moment that gets me every time and helps end the game and its soundtrack on a high note.
Post postgame
And so the game is over, at least until there’s a familiar knock at the door. In a final teaser, Ness repeats the start of the game, only this time it’s Pokey’s little brother Picky who’s knocking. He has a taunting message from Pokey, setting up a potential sequel. Although Mother 3 would go through many changes in its development, I like to imagine that Pokey never intended to return, or at least in a way where Ness was aware. Despite his outward persona, at heart Pokey is a cowardly and tragic figure whose shame I think would prevent him from either attacking Ness again or trying to reconcile with him.
Final thoughts
Completing Earthbound had an unexpectedly deep impact on me, putting me on a path of becoming a lifelong fan of the series. Getting to share this game with my wife was incredibly special, and someday I also hope to share it with my son. Although she didn’t come away with the same emotions that I did, she enjoyed its thoughtful characters, funny dialogue, and the time we spent hanging out. At some point, I hope to play co-op through Mother 3 with her, but for now, it was nice to honor its big anniversary and reflect on all the things that make Earthbound such a special experience .