Finally, after many years of curiosity, I've been able to play and complete the original game in the Mother series - known as "Earthbound 0" outside of Japan.
Where to start.. First, I'm a huge Earthbound fan, have been since probably '97 or so when I first played it. I've never been a huge fan of RPG's but Earthbound is so quirky that it was easy for me to get drawn into it's world and leave an emotional connection that'll stand the test of time. It really is one of those games you can play forever and not get old. With that said, I knew Mother/EB0 might not live up to the expectations that I held for it.
I'm glad I went in with a realistic outlook, not to say this game was bad but clearly it's sequel, Mother 2/Earthbound, is the ultimate realization of the original idea. I had some background knowledge of the games plot and some of the characters, and long before ever playing it I had the idea that Mother 2 was was almost a remake than a sequel and that idea stayed with me only until, say, the middle of the game. Right off the bat, there were a lot of similarities between the two games, and it was actually a good thing in my eyes! It wasn't long before the similarities (other than gameplay/mechanics) ended, and I played it for what it was, now how alike it was to a game I treasure.
Unfortunately, the whole experience wasn't as positive as my initial impressions. Part of the fun in Earthbound was talking to the many NPC's and hearing the quirky things they had to say. They weren't all fun and games though, talking to people was a good way to progress; finding out hints to lead you to the next goal or even just embarking on a random sidequest. This dynamic was somewhat lacking in Mother. In the first town you arrive at, there's a similar moment where you're asked by the mayor of the town to help him out with a crisis that the townsfolk are all talking about, but for the rest of the game, there really aren't too many instances of the NPC's giving you even slight hints on where you need to go next. In fact, I can only recall one other particular instant of someone telling you outright where you should go next, and even then - this moment may or may not have come if you the player didn't trigger a certain event. I understand it may of been a hardware issue, but the lack of dialog (informative or quirky) was a big disappointment. Not only did the game feel vague as you aimlessly wondered, but when you arrived anywhere with people, you couldn't at least enjoy what they had to say (well, far and very few between).
What I did like, and wasn't included in the sequel, was the way certain NPC's could pass on a certain status ailment to you. At one point in the game I was wondering around and the screen began to blink. I thought to myself "wait, I know what this means" and checked my characters status; the main character, Ninten, had caught a cold. I had no idea how it happened as no enemies affected my status in battle. It was only until I spoke to an NPC with a dead giveaway that s/he was sick and made me pull up the menu in order to verify I had in fact been passed a cold. While having a cold out-side of battle sucks, it's nice touches like that that make you feel connected to the games world and something I'm surprised didn't make it to the sequel.
Another gripe about the game feeling pretty empty is that the "check" action was basically useless. Again, part of the fun in Earthbound was exploring everything and hitting "check" to hopefully find something new, even if just silly text (like the magazine you can find in a particular house in the first town of the game). Outside an occasional road sign, Mother had a handful of instances where "check" actions were used, and only a few of them affected the game.
My biggest issue with the game, however, is the one that most affects the gameplay and it's.. stats! The game felt very unbalanced in terms of stats. You could absolutely have to level-grind to get ahead because even the earliest enemies are so powerful compared to your starting stats that you'll be lucky to make it in to the first town without dying. Then, with all your level grinding, you acquire so much cash that you can buy some powerful items early on but still barely help you out. By the time you get to Magicant - which is fairly early in the game* you can purchase the best defensive equipment in the game (save for one pendant you have to find later on) which boost certain stats up significantly. It helps initially because suddenly your defense shoots up, but by the end of the game, most of your party is still pretty weak compared to the baddies you confront. Hell, your second party member has such shitty physical offense that she's only useful as a healer at first, but you spend more time healing her in order to keep her alive because there's no easy way to revive a fallen party member until MUCH later in the game. She does have strong offensive PSI but you burn through PP so quickly that you can't really use certain PSI until you're much more leveled up/ie higher PP stats, which of course leads us back to.. level-grinding!
A big shock to me was that you can only use a three party team, and unless you complete a certain action, you won't get your fourth member (which switches out with one of the original three) who is by far the strongest and the only other character aside from Ninten who can hold his own in battle. Oh and unfortunately, even if you get him in your party, it's only temporary. Another shock was that the there are barely any good weapons to equip. Most RPG's (read: the few RPG's) I've played have a natural progression in the weapons available to you, usually in the next major area you have to venture to and at higher cost than the previous weapon, but usually well worth it and a great help in battle; not so in Mother. Again, you can afford a decent weapon almost immediately, but it doesn't really help you in the long run. Unlike Earthbound, which has character specific offense items as well as a few generic ones with high offense sts but a good chance of connecting your hits, Mother has only one generic item; the boomerang. It gives you +30 offense which is a big step up from the 2 items available to Ninten and 0 items available to Ana at the start, but you're pretty much stuck with it until the last quarter of the game, so your offense really relies on your stats - which again go back to level grinding. There were far too many times where I would wonder around the outskirts of the current town level-grinding before I could progress into the next area, just to barely scrape by. Even by the end of the game, your healer Ana is worthless when it comes to physical attacks because unless you're lucky enough to land a SMASSSSH attack, she's only dealing 1HP worth of damage - it's pathetic really.
All in all, it's not a bad game. There were many things Mother did that Mother 2 didn't even offer, making Mother 2 feel linear by comparison. There were many scenarios that could change the progression of the game (but not the plot) which add some replay value, not much in this game but some. Overall though, Mother is a decent game but Mother 2 just did it all better. This includes even the story execution, which is disappointing because on paper, Mother's story could very well have surpassed the sequel's in terms of connecting you with the game emotionally. Unfortunately the hardware limitations held this game back in a few areas, but without it being what it is my beloved Earthbound might not be as special as it is due to the similarities between the two.
The final verdict: I'd recommend this game for fans only.
Mother 2/Earthbound is up next, should be a quick play-thru as I've seen it all before. If I'm inclined I'll throw a review up (most likely praising the game) but I will definitely be back once I get around to playing Mother 3. That one should be a more interesting read as I've never played the game and I purposely kept myself in the dark in terms of story (or rather, any thing I might have come across has long been forgotten).
Topic: Mother (Earthbound 0 - NES) (Read 3247 times)
