Earthbound - also known as Mother 2

I have completed my 3rd SNES RPG kind of game! This one is called EARTHBOUND, and it is such an adorable game. Having more experience with RPG games, the process of playing Earthbound has been the most enjoyable (definitely less stressful than playing Zelda). 

STORYLINE

The protagonist, with the red cap and yellow backpack, is called Ness (which I named Sky since I did not know they had default names.). Ness awakens from his sleep, and his friend Pokey needs his help to find his brother. There was a meteorite which has fallen from the sky at Onett and the policemen are all busy with the investigation. He meets Buzz Buzz, a little bee who came from the future, who tells him about his destiny before he dies. The future is in dire states and legends state that there will be 3 boys and 1 girl who will work together to defeat Giygas. One of them would, of course, be Ness. This sounds like Chrono Trigger here, with a team trying to save the world from future devastation. Buzz Buzz also reveals the location of the 8 sanctuaries, which are places where the team can heal themselves. One of them would be at Giant Steps and Ness sets out to find it after bidding goodbye to his family. The first bigger opponent, Frank, is quite tough to defeat for a starter! When he reaches Giant Step, he has to fight the monster that has already taken over the sanctuary. After that, he can heal there and the sound stone will record the melody found there. Sanctuaries like the Pink Cloud is such a beautiful place.

Setting off from his hometown, he travels towards Twoson to find the girl he was meant to meet. Talking to the people in town would let you know that Paula's (I named her Vanny) family owns Polestar preschool but she was nowhere to be found there as she is kidnapped. Heading to Peaceful Rest Valley, the path is blocked by a pencil statue, which requires Apple Kid's pencil eraser. Here is where Ness meets this Apple Kid who would assist at different points of the game with his intriguing inventions. You definitely should invest in him and lend him some money. If not, you probably cannot continue the game. Ness would reach Happy Happy Village and save Paula. Back at Twoson, they make friends with the musical band called Runaway Five after they redeem them from their manager. On their van, they got to the next town called Threed.

Now Threed is a creepy place, dark and filled with zombies. Eventually, both of them got trapped underground and Paula spoke telepathically to Jeff (his name is CH) for him to save them. Now you will be transported to Winters and play as Jeff only. He will escape his boarding school, travel across the river and find his father, Dr Andonuts. Before Jeff flies away in the sky runner, it might be good to level up Jeff quickly by fighting the cave boys at the Stonehenge. Those cave boys always drop picnic lunch after a defeat so you can keep healing and keep fighting.

Jeff will join the team as he rescues them from the trap. Together they will fight Zombies in Threed, meet cute little pink Saturns and defeat the disgusting big boss, Belch. I found the third sanctuary at Saturn Valley and I was shocked! How did I miss the second one? No worries, the team can always go back. Next, they will brave through the hot desert and endure multiple times of sunstroke. The team will reach Fourside, where you will discover an illusionary world called Moonside. When eventually you get to a place called Summers and have the magic cake, you will be transported to Dalaam, and meet the last character Poo (which I call Botak).

There will be a series of fun adventures and eventually all the sounds of each sanctuary will be collected by the soundstone. With this, Ness ventures into the Magicant, a place created by his mind and memories. It is indeed quite fun there, and Ness has to overcome his nightmare and fears to leave the place. Completing that, he grows stronger. This is so true in our real life as well! Once they reach the cave of the past to defeat the final boss, Giygas, peace will be restored and the world would not be filled with monsters and untamed animals.

GAMEPLAY

The characters travel from town to town, fulfil quest by quest to reach their ultimate goal. It is important to follow the storyline or else you might not know what to do next. Due to evil forces, humans, monsters and animals turned aggressive. As such, when they see your team, they will run towards them and you will enter a battle mode with them. One of the hints you will get in the game is that if the characters are back faced the enemies when they approach you, a red swirl will appear and they will have the first hit. If you were to approach them while they are back faced you, a green swirl will appear and you will have the first surprise attack. In a battle mode, there is a general attack using the weapon that is equipped. As the characters level up, they will learn new skills, gain experience, gain HP and PP. Their new skills are psychic powers which utilises PP. Examples of these cool powers are freeze, brainshock, teleportation and etc.

With each turn, you either select bash, defend, PSI attacks or use items. They may even choose to run away but if the opponent is strong, I doubt they can escape. Unlike Chrono Trigger, you have to select your attacks for each characters in the same sequence and everyone has to have an "action". Which characters will attack first will depend on their status of speed. If they are lucky, they may be more likely to get "Smash", a random powerful hit. There is also an "auto fight" option, but that would destroy all the fun, wouldn't it?

Your characters can regain HP through purchasing food or using those items that drop after a monster's defeat. At the start, I loved buying hamburgers since they heal about 45HP which is quite a lot at the start. Cookies & cup of coffee is quite useless at a higher level. Brainfood lunch and magic truffles are the gems! Magic truffles are used to restore PP used for psychic powers. It also heals about 20 PP for each character as they come into contact with the magic butterfly, making them feel relaxed. Hotel stays can heal both HP and PP to the max potential but I am stingy and I don't want to spend on hotels. Places like Saturn Village, Tenda Village & Lost Underworld have the cutest residents and there is free hot springs and hotel stays to recharge the whole team.

ITEMS

One of those initial features I found really cute about the game is that you have to withdraw money from the ATM! The money is used to buy food, equipment, weapons and special items.  Do you have an unlimited amount of money from the ATM? No, the dollars are earned through fighting monsters! A call to his dad will let Ness know how much money he has, how much experience to the next level and to save the game. Phones and ATM are generally found in hotels & drugstores but they are generally available when you need them in the game. There is also a cap to how much you can withdraw since it only allows 5 digits on the screen, so you may want to stop withdrawing. I was a super rich kid in the game so I had no problems buying anything! (Mainly because I am unlucky with my directions, so I end up fighting the same monsters which re-spawned. There are a few cool mazes in the game and my brain could not remember the route.)

Each character only has a limited number of slots in their bag. Hence, there is an option to call Ness's sister who is working at Escargo Express, to pick up things to store at her place or deliver things back to the bag. It costs $18 each trip and carries 3 items at maximum. But as you know, I was very rich and $18 is nothing. The delivery man will always ask whether you can afford the fees. Do not be misled like me to think that the Escargo Express has unlimited space. It has only 36 slots! So choose wisely as there will be some items that you cannot sell or drop, so you definitely need to send it away to clear up space. I spent some time delivering things back to my bag just to throw away because the Escargo Express space was full!

As the game goes by, it is important to be prepared with weapons and food. This is especially so when you enter mazes or dungeons because you really do not want to walk out and then fight those monsters again! Personally, I find multi-bottle rockets and heavy bazooka having the best damages coming from Jeff. He only has physical attacks since he does not have any PSI. But this guy is so smart and he can repair damage goods into powerful weapons depending on his intelligence level. There are useful items like the exit mouse which can transport the group to the entrance of any maze (like Magic mirror in Zelda!) and cool items like dragonite where your character transforms into a dragon to attack the enemies. Getting teddy bears also helps to shield the team from some damage. You may either purchase useful items or get them from the many presents found along the way in your adventure. Some monsters drop great items as well. You can see the "help" option to know the uses of each individual item.

MONSTERS & CHARACTERS

At first, the enemies are stray animals who turned wild due to evil powers. Killing them gives you a very small amount of experience and those like the crows will drop you cookies. The first boss at the first sanctuary is the Titanic Ant, and it was indeed tough when Ness is fighting alone. Like most games, you have to know the weakness of the bosses. Eventually, when you recruit Jeff in the team, you have the option of "spying" to know what the enemies are susceptible to. It is quite interesting as your enemies or characters may feel "funny", "funky" or "nauseatic" after an attack and this would affect the defence and attack powers.

For certain sickness, Ness and Poo can help heal the team. If left untreated, each character will lose some health with each turn of attack. Sunstroke, for example, will slowly deplete a member's health as he continues to walk about. Other funny cases include a tiny ghost following the character and taking amount small of HP with each attack and being mushroomised with a mushroom on the head in which can be healed by the magic healer. One of the most irritating and yet amazing sickness that happened to Ness during my path to the bigger boss was that he became homesick! Because of that, he will miss quite a number of attacks with statements like he misses his mum or he wants to eat his favourite food. Only nearing the next half of the game did I realized why he had the option to call his mum.

MUSIC

The list of soundtracks for Earthbound is also super cute and makes the whole game more fun! They are short and sweet kinds. My personal favourite is the one that plays at the hotels. There is also a playlist for Earthbound on Spotify!

Overall, I was really engrossed with this game. It might not sound special to others but there are a lot of elements that fascinated me. Features like the withdrawing from the ATM, taking the bus, playing the jackpot are examples of what enhances the game. There will also be one photographer who will go around taking photos of the team as they hit a milestone. *Fuzzy Pickles*! The storyline, however, is not that impactful. I still don't quite understand who Giygas really is. 😆 Nonetheless, the whole process of the game was entertaining and enjoyable. <3

Pictures: Screenshots from the game