I’m replaying it right now. I gotta say I don’t like it as much as mother 2. it’s “better” by every technical measure. but there’s so much attention and energy devoted to kind of meaningless things. like the attic of club titiboo is this whole sub dungeon, and it’s basically this diversion in the plot and an excuse to have more fighting and another boss fight. so much of the game seems like these odd vignettes without much thematic purpose towards the whole. earthbound would send you on tangents but they usually had some compelling sub plot that established characterization or had some emotional resonance or general overarching theme, if they weren’t directly related to the plot. a lot of the stuff in this game just seems like “lol so random” type elements.
the pace of the game is more enjoyable but it doesn’t give much time to breathe and take in the atmosphere of any of the environments, and you are constantly being hit over the head with story nonsense (a lot of which is like deliberately, self consciously “nonsense” type maguffins). I don’t know. I really dig earthbound as this like aesthetic experience where you go around seeing and hearing pretty things and reading strange dialog and occasionally seeing strange events. it had a much more contemplative vibe. mother 3 is more story driven, which isn’t necessarily bad, but like. I don’t know. I’m more than halfway through and it seems like the story maybe isn’t that good? or not always that well told?
am I just old and jaded? anyone feel me on this? is it cool that I’m still neurotic about videogames?
The rhythm-fighting thing was a pretty important improvement but then there’s always a sensation that action elements in something still fundamentally turn-based is a nasty ol’ fudge, even if I always would rather it was there than not
The sight of a tiny pixel man losing his shit over the bizarre death of his wife was unusually arresting though
I think it was generally held to be better than Earthbound when it first came out, owing mostly to the smoother play and more plot-focused storytelling, but i’ve noticed a sea change recently at most of my internet haunts.
I myself replayed it for the first time in several years last summer.
Generally speaking i think the MOTHER games are all brilliant and worthy of appreciation in their own rights, particularly taken in the context of their time, and the thematic development from game to game is really fascinating (been meaning to write a lot about this sometime)
So while i’d agree that Earthbound is overall the most well-rounded and ably fleshed out, MOTHER 3 has its own unique virtues w/r/t its bolder emotional resonance and how it caps off the series in such a beautiful way, at once open-ended and utterly final.
From what i recall reading about the original plans for the game (when it was going to be an N64 release (and boy can i not imagine that now, the style in the videos for MOTHER 3 64 is a complete mismatch for the series and also BUTT-UGLY)), it was intended to be 12 chapters long, and there’s evidence that the 8-chapter story we got is essentially the same. Playing it with that in mind really made me aware of how “edited” it feels. There aren’t any big plotholes, it wraps up as neatly as it can, but you can really tell there were certain characters and ideas that were intended to be fleshed out more.
The character-to-character chapter switching, for instance – attention is drawn to the switch in perspectives from Flint to Duster, but other than a few totally optional lines of dialogue you can get from Lucas, nothing is really done with the possibility of meeting and hearing from your other PCs when they’re NPCs. It also makes the game feel curiously lopsided, as you get three loosely connected vignettes starring different characters and then you’re in Lucas’s shoes for the remainder. (And it’s always bothered me that Kumatora doesn’t get her own POV chapter!)
P.S. here is the song that plays over the fully organic THE END screen (where you ultimately have to turn off the game)
After my recent playthrough, i sat and listened to this track for a long time. It’s beautiful, and it fascinates me in a way that’s hard to describe. There’s no other track in the game quite like it, it’s one of the rare songs on the soundtrack (perhaps the only one??) that does not possess some kind of leitmotif. Just wanted to draw attention to it, i guess.
I still like Mother 3 better, I think. It’s an apology (not an apologia) for EB: hardnosed where EB is sentimental; anticapitalist where EB takes Leave It To Beaverism for granted; final where EB lingers. M3 is the adult to EB’s child, and I think it’s important to play both, in order. To live with EB’s moral principles forever is to cede worldly power to those willing to take it and ultimately make your naive environment unlivable. M3 tells EB fans, you weren’t supposed to love it forever, you were supposed to move on and grow into adults. Move on.
I agree with all this. it’s just that I feel like earthbound is ultimately a more enjoyable game. I don’t disagree with the message or themes. but on this playthrough they are coming off as significantly more hamfisted. I can practically the see the outlines of itoi’s cranky old man face contouring through some of the dialogue. it does not improve the experience.
it’s still a great game. I just like earthbound more.
this is a truly incredible moment. it hits me harder every time. I wish the entire game maintained that level of directorial skill. there are a handful of other moments that are nearly as good though. the sunflower chapter I think is heartbreaking and beautiful in a similar way
Buy all the pencil rockets you can and have Boney go to town. The attic dungeon is probably the game’s nadir though, yes.
I like this and i agree with it, though i think the tone the game takes is more ambivalent than hardnosed. Porky is obviously the critique of the Earthbound superfan, unable to let go and grow up, permanently a child to the point that his “defeat” is locking himself in an artificial womb. Equally unable to let go is Flint, who spends the entire story looking for the son he lost and neglecting the one that’s still around. His house remains untouched by “progress,” no happy box or modern accouterments.
Lucas represents the right balance. He’s gentle and sentimental – still thinking wistfully of his deceased mother, palling around with his childhood dog, wearing the same cute stripy shirt – but he resists both the efforts to “modernize” Tazmily and the desire to follow his father on a hopeless, endless search for his brother. He’s forced to grow up and make hard choices, but it’s the power of his memories and love for the lost past that inform those choices, and that save him.
The most distilled example of that ambivalence is the Earthbound museum boat ride right before you face Porky. “Pollyanna” plays in its most jaunty and friendly rendition yet, as you gaze upon the artifacts of a forgotten world. The game is, i think, asking you to remember Earthbound fondly, to cherish those memories – and then to be willing to clear the slate and build new ones. At the end of it all, the people of the world of MOTHER 3 survive, but it’s not the same world anymore, it’s something new and not MOTHER 3, or 2, or 1.
I agree with that. You’re not supposed to jettison your childhood, but develop it. Itoi is too sensitive to reduce that kind of complexity to a singleminded moral, like my post implied.