I played this game as a translated rom on the GBA. The translation is a bit different from the official version sold on the Wii U. I don't have a Wii U yet, but I intend to buy one soon in order to show my support of the game. Gotta vote with them dollars.

Anywho, the game follows Ninten, Ana, Lloyed, and very late in the game, Teddy, on their quest to...

Well, the story isn't actually quite clear cut at the beginning. You get this history of what happened ages ago and then some weird things start happening within the town. You begin collecting these melodies, somewhat unsure of what exactly they are allowing you to accomplish, but you just kinda have to figure it out because you need to hear the end of the melody.

The game also got kinda creepy about 1/10th the way in. It is strange to have such a light and bright world suddenly turn dark and creepy, with music that actually made me kinda weirded out, and not in a good way. This dialogue didn't help either.

What follows is kind of an emotional ride, there is a lot of heart in this game. Ultimately, I couldn't believe the amount of parental love was tied into the narrative.

You uncover a robot that George builds close to the end of the game. She is there to help you, and she rocks. Ellay pretty much demolishes all of your enemies. When you get closer to the end past a specific point, she fights an upgraded robot enemy that you had defeated before. You only do 1 damage to it, while the robots are damaging each other for 1000s. Eventually she gets defeated, but as she explodes she takes out the enemy robot. You look among the wreckage to find a music box at the heart of the robot, giving you one of the final parts of the melody. I thought it was so short lived, my time with this awesome robot.

After you uncover the last part of the melody (George's tombstone at the peak of Mt. Itoi) you go back to Magicant and talk to Queen Mary about the song she seems to have forgotten. After you sing it to her, she remembers her name is actually Maria. What follows is crazy sad, in a creepy way. She ends up disappearing in the wind (dying), and Magicant is just an old ruins. It turns out that Magicant was just an amalgamation of Maria's consciousness.

I'm not sure how I feel about Gigue. Being raised by George and Maria, and then deciding he wanted to destroy the earth. During the final battle, Gigue says that George was stealing information and bringing it back to earth, which is why he had to be killed. Strange misunderstandings here. But George and Maria's love for Gigue really kinda shines through and gives you the sads, whenever Maria talks about singing to him, and his tail wagging.

The final battle happens when Gigue offers you salvation. You and only you will be spared if you board the ship, while the rest of the earth must die like the insects they apparently are. The ending happens much like the ending in Earthbound, where you get a surprise option to pray, but this time the command is Sing!. You sing the lullaby that Maria sang to Gigue as a child, and it brings back memories of his past. By the time you finish the song after a few attempts, he'll swear to you that he'll return after his defeat and fly away.

The end wraps up nicely, and you get a bit of closure on everyone. There is also a little bit of a teaser dialogue about a sequel, but we all know that was a bust. Teaser dialogue happened in Earthbound as well. You get an image of your father (which is rather surprising to me seeing as how he was represented by a phone in Earthbound, and here you actually see him, or mostly his coat).

Would I recommend this to people? No. No I would not. I mean, if you are an Earthbound fan you might feel the need to run through this. It is a story with a lot of heart. But I feel like this is an extremely dated game, the balance issues are kinda a pain to deal with, and the narrative is a bit stronger in Earthbound.

In this game, you aren't really aware of Gigue as much. You don't really interact with him until the very end, he doesn't even really have minions. You might be able to get some information talking to NPCs here and there, but there is no definitive statement of what it is you are trying to accomplish exactly. You do have the motivation of finding the missing people who have disappeared all over the world. But that seems like a very small tie in to the bigger question of who Gigue is, and why should you as the hero stop him, and what exactly he wants.

All of this was spelled out in Earthbound in the first 10 minutes of the game, when Buzz Buzz comes from the future to tell you about what is going to happen. This is a different game mind you, but there are obvious parallels to this game and Earthbound.

Bottom line, only play this game if you are really dedicated to the series. It is pretty unforgiving, and you aren't really missing out on anything. Read a synopsis or watch a short edited Lets Play.

Finally can say that I beat the a game in the Mother series, and definitely looking forward to continuing the series! The story follows our MC (Ninten by default), and strange things are happening in the world. People are missing and strange creatures are about. As far as I can tell at least. There's definitely story beats I might have missed, but its pretty simple and a fun story. The characters are fun, silly at times, and there's definitely a lot of charm to them and the world. Even the enemies you encounter can be super silly and I definitely had a decent number of laughs throughout.

Where the game is definitely dated is in the gameplay itself. It follows your classic JRPG with random encounters, and unfortunately, some parts are a pretty big grind especially towards the end. I found that to best enjoy this game, having a guide along side is super helpful. I would recommend it if you do like JRPG's or want to explore the history of JRPGs but this is definitely not a that I could recommend for everyone, unfortunately due to its dated gameplay. Would love for people to try it, or at least watch other people playthrough, (Unless you have ways to cheat the game, as I know there's ways to reduce the grind in different fan translations of this game, from what I understand). I think, should I decide to play this

Preliminary: Welp, even tho it is abundantly clear that it would be more fun to play the 25th anniversary hack, in keeping faithful, we will do the closest to the original version while still being able to read it... since I can't read Japanese lol. So it's gonna be the virtual console release, while keeping in mind some of the graphics were altered so as not to offend Americans.

Great music at the start and I like that it already has a bunch of cute ideas like Bread leaving crumbs to follow your trail back etc. I love it. It's not "like DQ" if it's parodying and neat ideas. Omg omg and I love the music in game too

Nice so many tunes I recognize from Mother 2 and the Smaaaash etc. So far none of this reminds me of DQ tho I recognize the influence... This reminds me, well, of Mother 2! Oh and diagonal movement and free healing from Mother ah! I love it so far, I hope the grinds don't get too brutal because this is the unmodified version.... Now I'm wishing I had picked the modified version haha because this game does seem worth pushing through. Butttt I suppose it was the right decision since I am trying to stick to chronology. Can always return to this and play the modified version for fun.

Early Game

I love the run feature, but then realized that was a part of the 1990 English localization. Still. Uff, inventory management is gonna be terrible... That's so few spots... And I'm hoping they aren't rough about status effects if it's gonna be like this. Neat little world map tho and the music keeps being great

Omgggg the hotel/resting spot songggggg that is in Mother 2 tooooo. I love it so much. This game has so many niceties that its contemporary RPGs just did not, like signs that tell you what's ahead/where to go which reminds me of the later Zeldas (a lot of the game reminded me of later top-down Zeldas) and free healing near good training spots, plus so many cute and neat ideas. I keep crosschecking that they are original to the first Mother, not just the NA localization. I definitely see what people mean about the random battle frequency and why people lowered it for hacks/modernization, but I mean most the RPGs felt this way often. Phantasy Star 2 def did.

Lol I love her hair. Tho I don't like that I answered the questions wrong apparently so no Franklin Badge for me :( (I wound up getting it later, phew.) The capsule in the Zoo office reminds me of Akira. And so many cute animals in the Zoo :) So far what I've most noticed is just how much Mother 2/Earthbound did not change. It helps that I already played that recently so I freshly remember all the control quirks and conceptual oddities like pendants etc etc in the gameplay heh. Everything from the enemies becoming timid after you beat the boss of an area to saving/sister as storage. So much similar for, what, like 5 years different?

Ugh yea the inventory management is terrible >.< But as frustrating as it is, how can people simplify this as a DQ parody? It almost looks like an SNES game, it has so many novel ideas for an RPG, it achieves so many neat ideas that had been super tacky in past RPGs.

Some straight up experimental sounding music in Duncan's Factory, tho this is the beginning of it getting Phantasy Star 2 esque dungeons >.> But luckily maps are available online :) And the Bread concept helps too.

Mid Game

Frustrating, but neat idea, that some npcs have colds that are contagious for you too. And nice that there are so many different tracks, seems a lot more than most NES games (and way better). I love that you have the Onyx Hook to tele back to Magicant. And the AsthmaSpray is a neat idea :-p

I'd say the worst and most dated part so far is (yes yes the grind but I was ready for that, well and I was ready for the high rate of random battles) the FF style even-after-an-enemy-is-gone-next-characters-still-try-to-attack them. >.< Very impressive it has the auto feature, tho. Omg and the easter eggs in the Desert from the designer himself!

Ahhhh finally Teleport! It's a negative that I chose not to do the optional robot boss/monkey cave, but I wasn't interested in the items there and more so, didn't want to clear up 12 empty spaces for the process of accessing it haha. Maybe if I replay it someday.

Lol... as someone who played Mother 2/Earthbound first... so much is familiar.

End Game

I mean yes the RNG-based brutal attacks that can ruin a journey are frustrating (e.g., the grizzly bear on the mountain plateau is just ridiculous) but like, that same stuff happened to me in Mother 2? So why does this get such a worse rap? Maybe it's cuz I played Mother 2/Earthbound on stream so I didn't get to grind as much as I'd like (with Fast Forward of course) and had people watching so I felt extra pressure? Haha.

And also like yea, huge difficulty spikes and grinds. But imo, the difficulty spikes were more reasonable than Phantasy Star 2's or Final Fantasy 2's. And the game had so many new ideas and advances compared to FF2 and DQ3. Just a bit confused why this game isn't as beloved as Mother 2/Earthbound. I know I already said it but it keeps blowing my mind how little changed between this game and Mother 2. Like even the dialogue with Dad on the phone is so similar.

The Check feature is really nice. And this is a cute aquarium (and no enemies here hallelujah)

Ayyyy the Sea Pendant like in Mother 2 <3 And lol yessss a robot teammate

Ugh these femme robots are so brutal I don't understand if there's some strategy with them I'm missing? But I've tried everything.

I'm personally finding the storyline more, um, understandable and impactful than Mother 2/Earthbound, but maybe my future replay of Earthbound will make more sense after having played this

I think I'm at end game? Some spooky experimental music in this final cave but ahhhh I need to start dinner cuz I have class shortly.

Sweet Look for the final boss and everything is verrrrry Earthbound-esque of course, etc etc, and the storyline is even better imo!

I wish the final boss tune was better. This guy did NOT like lullabies!

Lol I love how it's like the end of a movie, telling us where everybody is now. And lol "the kidnapped parents". And love the song for the ending, and then the credits song a jam too!

Look: 8.5/10 Not as epic as Phantasy Star II, but other than that, I haven't seen another RPG yet with such a unique and 90s seeming Look

Sound: 9/10 Wow. It helps that I already loved the Earthbound soundtrack, so I had some vague nostalgia for parts namely the Hotel song. But just full of amazing tunes.

Play: 8/10 Harsh, unforgiving, heavy grinds, frustrating enemy mechanics -- but that's to be expected with late 80s RPGs. And in fact, imo, this game had a bunch of advanced features and niceties that its contemporary RPGs did not. So, contrary to most people's views, I found this a better-balanced and enjoyable RPG than most its contemporaries. That being said, I had access to Fast Forward (again, tho, I used that for PS2 and FF2 etc). And I was heavily in the RPG grind hook like I did with those other RPGs, but I didn't once question whether to go on. Even after a cheap death.

Feel: 9/10 Wow. What is there to say. I can confidently say no RPG was like this before it, and it (obviously) led to the Pokemon and Earthbound 90s vibe that is so unique and touching. I also found the storyline more understandable and impactful than Mother 2/Earthbound.

Attachment: 9/10 I certainly see myself replaying the Mother series for years to come. Likely will try the 25th anniversary version when I replay this. But I always had heard of the Earthbound games and now finally can say I played them and for me, this one (as the foundation and as a product of its time, when compared to its contemporaries) really did shine imo.

Overall: 8.7/10

Completion: Main Story, no extras/optional bosses

I played this version on Nintendo Switch Online.

As I've said in my other reviews, I'm reviewing this game from the context of a player in 2022, engaging with a game released in the 1980s*. I cannot - no matter how much I'd love to be able to do so - view this as a player might have in that time. I can take into account the positive, and I can try my best to situate it within the context of its release and what was going on in the game scene at the time.

However, you shouldn't play this game today outside of morbid curiosity. To say it didn't age well would be generous. It was clearly unbalanced for its time, much less for today; the story is charming, but barren; the characterization is non-existent. The gameplay is maddeningly difficult, but not in a fun, engaging way - it is maddeningly difficult to overcome an erratic "AI" that can't decide between barely grazing you or one-shotting you. There are too few times to save (mitigated, thankfully, by the Switch Online), and you'll find yourself either over-leveled or under-leveled within a few minutes. It's strange that a game that clearly has taken the Dragon Quest model so completely misses the mark with this. Dragon Quest on the Famicom/NES is still a blast to play, nearly forty years later; Earthbound Beginnings/MOTHER is not.

So, why the two stars? Despite not liking it, I give it credit for its charm; I legitimately found the ending boss a blast and was even emotionally moved. The setting is cute. The game isn't firmly in the trash pile; there is the skeleton of an amazing game built into it. But that game already exists: its sequel, Mother 2/Earthbound.

If you're curious and own a Switch, boot it up and play around. But honestly, if you truly feel the need, skip it altogether and try out Earthbound. It's not just its sequel; it's practically a remake, and it solves a lot of the issues here.

*Switch has this game's release as 2015, which is kind of funny considering. There is a whole backstory, apparently, about how it was translated officially but never made it to western shelves. Suffice to say, the game is a bit older than the Switch is implying.

I ran into an existential and nearly life-threatening dilemma during the writing of this review for this 25-year-old video game. The thing is, I opted to play both the officially-released EarthBound Beginnings translation, as well as an underlooked and ultimately superior fan-made Mother “remaster” titled Mother: 25th Anniversary Edition (made by the talented DragonDePlatino and his team). It was like the difference between night and day, like having played two distinct works. I felt compelled to write two separate articles for each version, because I had such different experiences with them. But I was missing the point.

The point of me writing on this game over 25 years after its initial release is not to determine if it’s a good game or not, but rather, to spark discussion on its context in the wider setting of digital play, how its heartfelt story might resonate with players across cultures and generations, what its themes are trying to communicate. With the West receiving this game only many years after playing its beloved sequel, I think it’s useful to look at it with one eye to its identity in the present and the other eye to its place in the past. So, despite my experiences being very different during my time with Beginnings‘ two versions, the game, regardless of version, remains the same at heart.

Let’s get this out of the way: EarthBound Beginnings, in its raw form, feels very much like a hollowed-out version of EarthBound for the SNES. Its themes will feel familiar to EarthBound fans, albeit executed rather sloppily and lacking much aesthetic personality. I dare say that the original is only of any use to long-time EarthBound veterans as a historical document and a return to the whimsical tone of Itoi’s trilogy, and it otherwise falls into the long catalog of stereotypical grind-heavy Dragon Quest clones that it attempts to satirize, despite being sprinkled with writing that far surpasses its gameplay. However, the 25th Anniversary Edition remaster makes EarthBound Beginnings feel less like a prototype of its superior sequel, and gives the game its own unique identity or personality, drawing out the best elements of its eccentric and especially charming story.

Click here for the full review... https://thewellredmage.com/2018/03/05/earthbound-beginnings-mother-1989/

Very grindy game, but its a product of its time I guess. The battles are incredibly simple, and like many older RPGs, if a team member attacks an enemy that died earlier in the turn, it counts as a miss. When I started I knew it was going to be grindy, but it is even more so than I expected. I don't think you can get through the game just going straight through. At certain points you HAVE to grind, and you have to grind a lot. There aren't any bosses, so technically you could try to run from most encounters... Sometimes you will get in a fight one step after finishing the last one. This really got on my nerves at points in the game. You don't get another character in your party until a few hours into the game, so up until then its just attack, and heal. When you get the next two party members, they start at level one, so I just had them guard so they wouldn't die in battle until they leveled up enough to be useful. This took a really long time.

The last few hours of this game were the most enjoyable to me. The plot is simple, nonsensical and pretty wacky but there was something about it that I enjoyed, especially towards the end. Also, the battles get a little more interesting here. Instead of just using the fight command 95% of the time, I had to start using a lot of different skills that my party had. Its a shame that the battles were only this way towards the end.

The game does have a certain charm to it. I liked the setting, and I really liked how everything is connected. There is no switching to another screen when you go to a town. I'm not sure how long the game took me to beat since there was no timer, but I would guess about 25 - 30 hours, a lot of it grinding so I could do something other than guard with 2 of the characters... I was going to give this game 2 stars, but I enjoyed it a lot more as it wound down. Probably closer to 2.5 but yea.

It's honestly mindblowing to me that this game was on the NES. It really feels like they were stretching the limits of what the NES could do, in terms of telling a story through the gameplay. There's so many little touches in this game that would have just been mind-blowing to experience when it was new.

I will say that it has the "old-game" nature of sort of requiring a walkthrough to get through in any reasonable amount of time or fashion. But that's alright, I can forgive it for that -- it was a different time, and there was a different sensibility for how length of a game could be achieved, and frustration was something that was a little more accepted, back then.

I have read that some people have complaints about the random battles in this game. I can sort of see where they're coming from, but I found that the battle system was actually well done for the time. The Auto-battling is a great feature, and I enjoyed figuring out how to beat enemies most easily by using the different psy powers and such. I personally just spent the time with the auto-battler leveling up, and also taking advantage of a few times during the game where you have more powerful characters with you, to level up so that I didn't really feel a frustration with the random battles. I think also Emulator save-state scumming helped in these regards.

All in all, I am really happy that I played through Earthbound Beginnings. It was impressive to see this piece of history and get a feel for where the beloved Earthbound came from.