When you buy the Nintendo Switch Online subscription, you get a slew of retro games through ?the platform's online library of older titles. Of course, there is a step above just the regular ole service with the higher tier, the Expansion Pack. However,?? you don't have to pony up for more just to play some treasured classics.

??????????????????????????For those of you looking to sample some of Nintendo's retro li??brary, I've got some suggestions on where to start with the now 100-tile collection of classics. These are the best games for the base Nintendo Switch Online subscription.

The 10 best games to play on Nintendo Switch Online

Since we're excluding Expansion Pack titles, the following games are from either the N?intendo Entertainment System (NES), Game Boy, or Super Nintendo Entertainment System (SNES). If a game you like from these c?atalogs and they aren't on the list, fret not �these are just the best of the best in a massive library beloved by many of us.

10. Tecmo Bowl (NES)

Sports games and Nintendo don’t go hand-in-hand now unless Mario is involved, but Tecmo Bowl is an exception. Despite being a game from the late �0s, this one still holds up a lot better than most modern American football games. It’s simple enough to break into even for the folks not quite so sports savvy and there's no overly convoluted set of controls just to get your? players moving.

9. Metroid (NES)

The Nintendo Switch was made for sidescrolling games, namely Metroidvanias. So, why not take a trip back to the late '80s and see the game that started it all? The original NES Metroid d?efinitely shows how dated it is, but it doesn’t mean it’s a bad game. It’s loads of fun and will have you hooked from the moment y??ou discover the out-of-the-way or less obvious path forward. The movement takes some time to get familiar with, but if you stick around, it’s well worth putting that effort in.

8. Donkey Kong Country (SNES)

After being the fellow who would hold Pauline captive in the 1980s, Donkey Kong would eventually get his own 2D sidescro??lling? adventure where he’s the good guy. He’s also accompanied by Diddy Kong, who you can swap to on the fly if the situation requires it. 

Its gameplay is akin to the Super Mario games in that you can jump on enemies�heads to defeat them. You can also?? throw things or use a close attack ??to deal damage. Still, it provides its own kind of fun that shows the quality of the 16-bit era. What a glow-up, good guy story for the Kong.

7. EarthBound (SNES)

It’s wild to look back on this game and see the Mother series only started to take off in western regions after Ness and Lucas became a staple in the Smash Bros. franchise. Still, now that the '90s RPG has become popular and made available for NSO subscribers, EarthBound still holds up. So, to all of you hungry for more Mother releases, th??e oldest western release is at least fa??r more available now than it was back then.

6. The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past (SNES)

Fans of top-down games, especially the Zelda games, have to have played this at some point. A Link to the Past is one of the better, if not the best of the games in this style. The first Legend of Zelda game was exceptional in so many ways, but A Link to the Past is just more memorable, ?more fluid, and overall more fun.

5. Tetris (Game Boy)

If you want to break away from the highly competitive nature of Tetris 99, you can always fire the OG Tetris up on the Game Boy app. It plays a lot differently than modern Tetris because pieces automatically snap the mome?nt they make contact on the surface. 

You’ll also be unable to see an outline of where your pieces will drop, so there’s a challenge within itself right there. Tetris on the Game Boy?? i??s based on classic rules, but it’s still such a fun time regardless.

4. Super Metroid (SNES)

If you want even more Metroid that’s faster-paced and has more fluid gameplay, then the third game of the series will provide just that. It’s just an overall better time than the original game, with j????ust the right amount of difficulty that won’t have you pulling your hair out.

3. Kirby Super Star (SNES)

There’s something about the older Kirby games that just have more char?m and character to them. They’re simple enough and follow the whole “pink blob eats enemies and takes their powers�aspect of the game. Then there are the minigames on the side to take a break between the main? story that just feels like a good kind of padding.

Even though Kirby games are doing j?ust fine and are still prevalent in today’s market, it’s a fun trip down memory lane to see the ear?ly days of his adventures.

2. Killer Instinct (SNES)

Killer Instinct is an awesome fighting game that acted as healthy competition against Mortal Kombat in the '90s. While not as gory, it still had great, over-the-top action, sporting a roster of ten wildly different and memorable characters. For the time, it was impressive, and so fun to play, even for those who ?aren’t into fighting games. 

This is the game that introduced the “c-c-c-combo breaker!�and the echoed “ultra!�sound ?effects that we all still use from time ?to time. Novelties aside, it’s such a great addition to the lineup of current games on the Switch’s SNES library.

1. Super Mario World (SNES)

Super Mario World is touted as one of the best 2D Mario games of all time because of the mechanics, the musi?c, and just how much exploratio??n it has. This is the game that introduced the Cape Feather, which is iconic for all the wild verticality that you can perform. It also has the hilarious P Balloon that inflates Mario or Luigi and lets them fly in all eight directions for a short time. You can’t forget the different Yoshis with their own respective abilities, either.

Most people will play this game from start to finish, but there is more than meets the e??ye once you clear the Switch Palaces or ??revisit previous levels with proper power-ups. If you never played this game in any way, you have to.

The post 10 best games on Nintendo Switch Online appeared first on Destructoid.

I picked up both of them in a flash

After months of waiting, Nintendo shadow-dropped the Kirby's Dream Buffet keychain today on the US My Nintendo marketplace. In a separate set of posts, a few more surprises showed up: EarthBound stuff!

Celebrating EarthBound and EarthBound Beginnings (which are on the SNES and NES service for Switch Online respectively) there's two things on offer: an EarthBound Beginnings Eight Melodies Notebook, and a Phase Distorter Luggage tag. Nintendo also dropped a Mario-themed 2023 desktop calendar, inline with previous years.

The notebook clocks in at 64 pages, and has "illustrations of charact??ers from the game, and eight pages for composing music." For 400 Platinum, it's one of the fancier not?ebooks Nintendo has offered on the service to date.

[gallery colum?ns="4" size="m?edium" ids="355550,355551,355552,355553"]

Here's a full recap of everything that arrived on My Nintendo on December 22, 2022, as well as direct links to the merch:

• EarthBound Beginnings: Eight Melodies Notebook (400 Platinum Points)
• EarthBound Beginnings: Phase Distorter Luggage? Tag (400 Platinum Points)
• Kirby's Dream Buffet Keychain (600 Platinum Points)
• My Nintendo 2023 Desktop Calend??ar (400 Platinum Points??)

If you need more My Nintendo Platinum Points now, we have you covered:

As a reminder, if you want physical rewards, you can find our full Platinum Point guide here, which has been updated with details on weekly missions: bookmark it for when you need quick points for a reward. A handful of points is incredibly easy to get, as that’s basically just 15 minutes with Super Mario Run, or a quick sign-on to the 3DS or Wii U 3Shop. Also remember that any shipments are bundled?? together, so you can pay a flat rate for multiple items instead of paying it each time. Just know that items go out of stock on My Nintendo frequentl?y, and some are never restocked.

The post Whoa! Mu?ltiple ??EarthBound My Nintendo rewards just popped up appeared first on Destructoid.

When a game becomes far more than just a game

With the Nintendo Switch Online release of EarthBound and EarthBound Beginnings, the Mother series is fresh on fans' minds �not that they ever stop playing, dreaming, and creating. Today, thanks to a fan-created trailer from Curiomatic, we can peer into an alternate universe where Mother 3 got a remake with stop-motion clay stylings.

It feels strange to even sum this project up as a "trailer" �so much work went into devising the visual identity of this (not actually playable) Mother 3 remake.

//youtu.be/1OGSXeko-iY

"This video represents over two years of work on a scale many times larger than anything we've attempted in the past," sa??id Curiomatic. "It is quite possi??bly the largest fan production we will ever produce."

So while it's not going to be a playable fan game, it was still a capital-e Effort from this group. Sharing more behind-the-scenes context on the official website for this unofficial love letter, the Mother 3: Tribute team explained that they wanted to "freely explore the aesthetics of a hy?pothetical remake without the anxieties related to fan games."

The creators also spo??ke about the clay style and why it fits:

"In many ways, MOTHER 3 has always felt like a game that was never given the same presence as its predecessors.? One particular shortcoming of the original game?'s marketing was the lack of promotional imagery, especially when compared to the previous two games, which both came with a collection of charming clay model renderings.

In an effort to rectify this, many passionate fans in the MOTHER 3 community have taken it upon themselves to create their own clay models, some of which have become ubiquitous among the fandom. In that tradition, we've produced our own key art to represent our vision for what a MOTHER 3 remake could look like.

We've painstakingly created dozens upon dozens of assets, including character models, props, environments, and even typefaces and user interface elements, taking great care to capture the essence of the original game. Our hope is that any fan can look at the results of our work and feel that it authentically represents the world of MOTHER 3."

You can �and totally should �check out more of these character renders.

In a world where Square Enix is cool with bringing an obscure yet wildly interesting RPG like Live A Live to the West for the first time with a pitch-perfect HD-2D art treatment, I can't help but wish that Nintendo would do the same for Mother 3. Given the "hand-crafted" feel of games like Kirby and the Rainbow Curse, Kirby's Epic Yarn, and Yoshi's Woolly World, this aesthetic feels within reach. And Zelda already had its turn!

Similar to how I can't mentally separate EarthBound the game from the fan-made "Pollyanna" animated tribute, this mock remake trailer will pop into my mind whenever Mother 3 comes up. Fans will seemi??ngly never stop pushing for an official localization (for good reason), and they have to get their creative energy out any way they can.

In turn, the least we ??can do is celebrate their passion.

The post This fan-cra??fted Mother 3 remake concept is one for the ages appeared first on Destructoid.

Some helpful hints and colorful pages await

With both EarthBound and EarthBound Beginnings on the Nintendo Switch Online library, subscribers could be hopping into the classic RPGs this weekend. And if you're one of them, you might want to pick up the EarthBound player's guide before you do,? straight from Ninten?do.

Nintendo has put the full EarthBound player's guide up on their site, freely available to peruse and download. Players have found it QR code linked in the app, and it's also available at this link here.

//twitter.com/videogamedeals/status/149176515169??08?01168

The player's guide is not just a manual for EarthBound, but a pretty comprehensive guide to the whole game. At 135 pages long, it tracks the whole adventure from Onett on through the final battle. There are also guides and charts for weapons, food, condiments, Psi, and more. It's basically a handy guide to everything EarthBound, available in PDF form.

Even if you're not currently playing the classic RPG, the guide is interesting enough as a tome of game knowledge. It's got a lot of style and charm to it, befitting the game it's walking players through. There are fun little asides like the?? Onett Times sections, and little notes on different parts of the g?uide. There's an appeal to it, a reminder of a time when large guides for deep RPGs were more common. I almost want to print this out, hole-punch it and stick it in a binder.

EarthBound has Nintendo Switch Online subscribers excited for a reason, after all. The off-beat RPG about four kids braving the world and trekking through a comical, psychic power-infused journey has stood out over the years. Now that it's on Switch, there's one more easy way to play it. Plus, anything that might boost up the demand for a Mother 3 port is a good thing.

The post The EarthBound player’s guide is available online, for those hopping in this weekend appeared first on Destructoid.

The adventure of Ness, Paula, Jeff, and Poo �or whatever you name 'em

Shigesato Itoi was not trolling on Twitter. Nintendo has decided that now's the time to bring EarthBound back on Nintendo Switch. It's official!

Granted, this isn't a localized-for-the-West Mother 3 Hail Mary play or anything �the Nintendo Switch Online service is adding EarthBound and EarthBound Beginnings to its SNES and NES library later today, after ?the Nintendo Direct dust has fully settled.

//www.youtube.com/watch?v=4KqnZBXEdQw

EarthBound is a humble, subversive, laugh-out-loud funny RPG that people who like �or dislike! �RPGs can share together. I never played it on Super Nintendo as a kid, but circling back to it as an adult was a treat. Doubly so with the ability ??to create save states that can help sand down some potentially frustrating moments in battl??es and exploration.

EarthBound Beginnings is actually Mother �the first game in the series �by another name. It's great to have this localized game for posterity, but it's a bit of a harder sell today. If you're on the fence about which game to jump into as someone who wonders "what the big deal is with EarthBound," I wouldn't force it. You can always go back.

As cool and crazy as it would be to have Mother 3 f??ind its way onto Switch, I'm stoked about this shadow drop. The music unearthed something deep inside me.

Considering the sentiment surrounding the pricier Expansion Pack tier, it's worth noting that you can play EarthBound and EarthBound Beginnings with the basic Nintendo Switch Online membership. Sav??e those N64 (and Sega Genesis) ??games for a rainy day.

The post At last, Nintendo is ??bringing?? EarthBound back on Nintendo Switch appeared first on Destructoid.

25 fascinating seconds of EarthBound 64 footage from Space World just popped up

It's a joy whenever we can fill in gaps in our gaming history with new, rare, or resurfaced footage of old games. Thanks to the efforts of Zen, who purchased a Nintendo Company Report from 1998, we've got a short but detail-rich look at EarthBound 64, a game that's arguably more fu?n to talk about and pine for than it would've been to play.

//youtu.be/R51fqY1MJ0k

Zen uploaded scans of the 15-page Japanese report and clips of a bunch of Nintendo 64 games from the CD. We've seen EarthBound 64 before, but not quite like this.

Visually speaking, EarthBound 64 couldn't be much further from the vibrant pixel-art world of Mother 3 we know and love, and that's what makes this cli??p such a fascinating wat??ch. It's surreal to see the game in motion, even if it is just a rapid-fire preview without sound.

As one commenter notes, "if you go frame by frame when the Pig Mask soldier gets hit you can see that he??'s wearing nothing but his underwear underneath hi?s armor."

Had this game been finished for the 64DD, it absolutely would've creeped me out in the same way as something like Glover or Space Station Silicon Valley. That low-poly era, particu??larly when it came to muddied N64 graphics, re?ally got under my skin.

The Claymen alone! Don't make eye contact.

Are any of you holding out hope for an out-of-nowhere rom? What a find that wo??uld be.

[Via Nintendo Enthusiast]

The post This resurfac??ed Ea?rthBound 64 footage is a cool, weird window into the past appeared first on Destructoid.

A Profound Waste of Time may be the only place you'll see those franchises this year

Physical gaming events are dead, at least for now. E3, Gamescom, and EVO have all gone online-only. Physical media, on the other hand, is thriving. Limited Run, the boutique retailer and publisher, had arguably one of the best showings at E3 this year. Collector's editions for everything from Metroid Dread to No More Heroes 3, are selling out almost instantly. With COVID-19 vaccination rates leveling off and new variants of the virus causing infections to rise, people still can't get together like we used to. Maybe that's, in part, why we're willing to buy physical things, made by real people,? that we like and admire so much. In a lot of cases, it's the closest we can get to each other.

When it comes to that kind of cozy intimacy, game stuff doesn't get much better than A Profound Waste of Time. The second issue of the magazine (that's really more like an art book filled with essays and prose), just went up for pre-order, and it's bound to sell out soon. The first issue �which, full disclosure, features a massive Shovel Knight cover story written by yours truly �has been sold out for a while, and there's no reason to think the next one won't follow suit?.

We took the pending release of the new issue as an opportunity to catch up with Caspian Whistler, creator of the 'zine, and longtime member of the jbsgame.community.

In fact, many of you may remember his posts in our cblogs about the project, back when it was something he was working on for college. A lot has changed for him since then, but as you'll see, he's still got the same love for games that brought him here?? in the first place.

Jonathan: Cas, you're running a small start-up, working e?xclusively in print media, creating a physical product that's only sold onl??ine, in the year 2021. How's everything going?

Caspian: It's been a bit bumpy but I'm hanging in there.

J: I know A Profound Waste of Time has been pretty much been the defining work of your adult life, and that frankly, you've been something of a perfectionist about it. So out of all the games you could have chosen to best represent this ongoing project that you've put tens of thousands of hours of work into, why did you choose Shovel Knight, and now Katamari Damacy, for your cover stories?

C: In a lot of ways Shovel Knight is the definitive modern indie game. I don't mean that just because of its quality, but also in terms of how it was crowdfunded and supported after its launch. It has all the charm of the 8-bit games that many people grew up with, yet it's also decisively modern and fresh. It felt right then that APWOT would have a game with that?? background our debut cover, as this is a p?roject that is also steeped in the past with a contemporary edge to it. We're a physical games magazine. Most of them have died out, yet our approach to games publishing is still viable, thanks to crowdfunding.

I think beyond that, while I can't pretend to know any of them truly, it's always struck me that the team at Yacht Club are really open to experimenting with their worlds and characters, so I figured there might be a chance that they'd be up for collaborating with us. I showed them the zine I made with people from the Dtoid community, and they said yes to letting us put Shovel Knight on the cover!

With issue 2, now that we were established, I wanted us to do something with a bigger and grander scale, focusing on many games rather than just one. I'd always been fascinated by Keita Takahashi??'s work, and how unique his style is. All of his games are very different, yet you can tell instantl?y that he had a hand in them just from the aesthetics and energy. I wanted to see if we could capture that in an original composition. His career is incredibly experimental and interesting, so to try and unify it all and celebrate it in one image was an amazing challenge. We worked with architect and illustrator Doug John Miller, which has given the final image a really endearing mix of realism and surrealism. Working with him and Keita on this was incredibly fun.

J: I didn't know that you showed Yacht Club that early version of the 'zine that you made with members of the Dtoid community. And the way that process has stacked for you, how that little zine led to the big one with Yacht Club, and how that one led to this even bigger project with the creator of the Katamari universe and so many other amazing games. Well, it's just incredible. I've heard that issue #1 of A Profound Waste of Time w??on multiple awards, and was even featured in a museum? Clearly, it scratched an itch that your audience wasn't getting scratched elsewhere. But who exactly is your audience, and what's, uh, making?? them so itchy?

C: Huh. Hones??tly, I'm not sure if I can?? define the audience.

I think a big part of creating the magazine for me was just having a space that spoke about games in a celebratory and positive manner, where at the time a lot of games discourse felt very caustic, at least in my opinion. (Note: this was back in 2015.) I also was really taken aback by how many beautiful and considered journals there are for other areas of?? the arts and culture sector, but there was almost nothing comparable for video games, even though they are such a huge part of our zeitgeist.

You see this disconnect when mainstream news reports on something video game-related, they often open with a little reminder of how big the industry is and how much money it makes, even if it's just tangential to the story at hand. It's almost like that cash flow qualifies games for our attention in some way, but that's not really what's important. We all understand that games make money, but there's still a gap in terms of how games are discussed broadly and what they actually do for us as human beings. APWOT is trying to give games the same care and respect that we would give any other area of our art ??and culture.

When people see this magazine with no adverts, reviews, screenshots or 'news' to speak of, I think they're baffled at first. Thing is, readers quickly recognize that dropping that stuff opens us up to do something really timeless and different with the format. I think anyone who enjoys good art and nice words can enjoy it, even if you haven't got any real interest in games at all! That being said, if you are interested in games, or more specifically if you care about games as a medium, APWOT is for you.

J: I want to hear more about what you're saying about how, and when, your readers first recognize that APWOT is special. You know that I've brought a bunch of copies of the first issue with me to PAX a? few years ago, not to sell, but just to let people hold in their hands for a bit and flip through. Not everyone cared, but the ones that did loved it so much. The smiles on their face made the back strain from carrying around a magazine that's the size of a small phone book around all day totally worth it.

More than any other project I've been a part of, I think APWOT is something you can't really "get" by reading about it online or looking at screenshots. You really have to feel the weight of it, to feel the space it takes up, to get even close to the full effect I know I may sound a little like David Lynch ran?ting that you can't? watch a movie on a fucking phone, but, well, I guess there are worse things than sounding like David Lynch.

[embed]//w?ww.youtube.com/watch?v=BcN??LEwf2pOw[/embed]

Was that always part of the plan? To make a magazine that was almost like a sculpture, in that it was only ever inte??nded to be a real, physical object?

C: It's completely unnecessary to release a new video game magazine in the age of the internet, ??so we try hard to justify it being a physical thing by including elements that you can't really replicate on a screen. Fold-out sections, glow-in-the-dark ink, removable prints, cutouts and stuff like that. The things that make it a pleasure to hold in your hands are what make it special.

Also, I think when people have the full magazine they hopefully get a sense of impact from looking through the whole book in its entirety. This is going to sound a bit daft but I try to channel the Smash Bros. series when making the magazine. In Smash, when they're representing a series or a character, you really get a sense that they did so with a huge amount of love and attention. The joy of seeing a series represented in Smash isn't just from the fact that 'X video game IP' is now in the game, but also how that series is re-imagined and recontextualized in a wonderful way. The sense that the implementation was done with care and understanding for the source material is somet??hing we try very hard to carry over into the final magazine.

Hopefully, when people see A Profound Waste of Time and how we represent all the games in there, they can feel that it's done with a genuine love of the medium and the worlds and characte?rs within it.

J: It's got to be s?tressful though. I'm not going to lie, part of me envies you for being able to pull off this amazing project two times in a ??row now, but I don't envy the amount of work, and the number of risks, that you've had to take on in order to get it on. With the next issue about to release, what are you hoping for, and what are you most afraid of?

C: My main hope is that people like it and share it with people. It's not simple to live through times like this, or to try and get something made during them. The magazine lives o??ff of goodwill, both from the people who donate to our Kickstarters and the contributors who pour so much into it. It would be really gratifying if after all of that work, the magazine was a success and it resonated with people.

I think my b?iggest fear is that it's simply ignored. Whenever you make something after a long period of time has passed, there's always a fear that it may not be received in the same way. Have people moved on? Is this thing you've worked on even relevant anymore? Will it meet the expectations of the people who've stuck around? There are so many unknowns, but regardless of what happens I'm incredibly proud of what we made with this issue.

J: So for the long term, what are the best, worst, and most likely possible outcomes for the future of A Profound Waste of Time?

C: Best case is we sell out ins??tantly and massively expand our audience, so there's enough attention and support to be able to afford a reprint of both issues and begin work on a third!

The worst case, like I said, is that no one cares?? about it.

Despite the success of the Kickstarter and all the amazing people who have come on board to be a part of the magazine, A Profound Waste of Time is still my side gig. Most likely, I'll need to tak?e some time to work my day job until I can properly plan the next move for the magazine.

J: I pre-ordered two issues today Cas, and I plan on ?giving them out as gifts to Dtoid folks who I know will love it. So no matter what happens, I know you're going to make at least those two people very happy.

C: Bless you.

The post Katamar?i Damacy, EarthBound, and Hollow Knight headline this amazing? new book-sized magazine appeared first on Destructoid.

Cblogs Recap: Week 24

-Lord Spencer reviews Disruptor as part of his PS1 REVIEWS blogging series.

-Lord Spencer reviews Gex: Enter the Gecko as part of his PS1 REVIEWS blogging series.

-Black Red Gaming sheds a light on the release of Gunfire Reborn and the development of the System Shock remake.

-Blanchimont reviews Phantasy Star Online 2 on the PC.

-Rabite ranks a selection of portable systems.

-Kerrik52 reviews Tales of Xillia as part of?? his Traveler in Playtime blogging series.

-Sam van der Meer talks about Killer7 in its 15th anniversary.

-Boxman214 pred?icts what would have been revealed in this year's E3.

-Nior continues his retrospective on the Command & Conquer serie?s by focusing on the unfortunate death of the franchise. Is this th??e end for the famous RTS series?

-Black Red Gaming predicts wh??at would have been the big reveal in this year'??s E3.

-TheLimoMaker is early in listing his best games of 2019.

-Shouryuuken shares some news on the possible sale of Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainme??nt.

-Deatheagle wonders if Earthbound had an accidental secret hard mode.

-PhilsPhindings discusses the similarities between some tracks in Chrono Trigger and many other pop culture tunes.

-PhilsPhindings discusses the similarities between some famous tracks in Super Smash Bros. and other music in pop culture.

Thanks to Lord Spencer for the Cblog Recap and to our community for another week of great content! If you'd like to see your gaming thoughts recapped on our front page, then head on over to the Community Blogs and tell us a tale.

The post Cblogs of 6/6 to 6/12/20??20: Killer7 a?nniversary, PSO 2, and portable gaming appeared first on Destructoid.

Hobonichi is making moves again

Mother and EarthBound fans are always looking for fresh ways to share their longstanding love of the series, and while there aren't any game announcements to cover – let's get that out of the way right now – there is a new comic to check out. It's the first big part of the Hobonichi Mother Project.

Any excuse to hear "Pollyanna" and I'm there. The song always puts a smile on my face.

The Mother tribute comic, Pollyanna, is a collaboration with 35 artists and writers including Mother 3's Nobuhiro Imagawa and Undertale's Toby Fox. There are illustrations, essays, and even stickers with characters from all three games. It's the kind of thing collectors tend to cherish, especially as major anniversaries come and go with less-than-ideal fanfare on Nintendo's part. Mother fandom is lifelong.

For th?ose of us unwilling or unable?? to track down a Japanese copy, we can at least enjoy the art.

Pollyanna is releasing next month in Japan – first at the Hobonichi store, on June 12, then at general booksto??res, on June 25. The comic will sell for 2,640 yen (around $25), and customers who snag a copy during Hobonichi's advance release period will also get a cute Mr. Saturn tote bag as a bonus.

The video ends with an intriguing "To Be Continued..." scree??n, but this isn't our first rodeo.

The post The Moth??er tribute comic Pollyanna is ?a trip down Onett lane appeared first on Destructoid.

Promoted from our Community Blogs

_{[Sam van der Meer is here to talk to you about mushrooms. No, he's not referring to psychedelic mushrooms. We’re not here to talk about something that might prompt you to run around at midday in a public park, wearing only your underwear, while laughing hysterically, scaring every innocent family around you. There may or may not have been seven cops chasing you too. Who really knows, in this most hypothetical of situations?}

_{The important thing to remember here is that these are completely wholesome, totally-not-drug-related mushrooms that just happen to be in video games. There’s definitely nothing illegal going on here, I swear. – Kevin]}

So, I was making quiches (as someone who essentially eats once a day for dinner, an entire six-inch-across quiche is something I will personally and entirely devour, prompting those "quiches" for other members of my household.) the other night, which is in itself a bit of a lie. My mom, bless her, ma??kes the crust. I can't bake for diddly. I do the eggs and cheese proportions and the carame??lized onions ...

and saute the mushrooms.

That's literally the impetus for this list you find yourself currently ensnared in. You're trapped in my mire of absolute nonsense yet again, yourself and that itchy trigger finger of yours the only ones to blame. But, also sort of a lie, I recently started Dragon Quest XI S: Echoes of an Illusive Age - Definitive Edition ("Say my name") and came across these devils, which got the 'ol noodle thinkin'.

And, you know what happens when we let Sam think.

But really, mushrooms. I like to eat them, and I like to look at them. I also like video games, and it just so happens that video games feature a whole lot of great mushrooms. So, without further a?do...

The Ramblin' Evil Mushroom from EarthBound

I mean, you didn't think I wouldn't mention EarthBound, did you? Especially when we're talking about mushrooms in video games (for some reason; I'm so sorry) and especially when my beloved features one of the more iconic fungal fie?nds in gaming. The Ramblin' Evil Mushroom is a jerk, straight up. It gases you, like many of these shrooms do, and inverts the heck out of your controls.

That's a jerk move, Mushroom.

I'm not going to make this post any attempt on my part to dissect video game theory -- as if I could come up with one! However, the Ramblin' 'Shroom's reversal of your controls is sort of in keeping with EarthBound's MO, no? For a game that so often reaches beyond the confines of the screen, nudging the player directly a??nd addressing the irony of it all, an enemy who directly affects player control is pretty fourth wall-breaking, I'd say.

Super Mushroom from some game

Stick around these parts long enough and you'll start to realize Nintendo has quite a fondness for fungi. Look, this is about as obligatory an inclusion as you're bound to find in a list about mushrooms in video games. Mario's iconic choice of sustenance and the player of just about any Mario title's eternal aspiration, the Super Mushroom is the King of All Mushrooms. The Don of Champignon. 

The sheer recognizability of the Super Mushroom is something I think most artists and multinational companies would dream of, with mushrooms at large associated by many with our favorite Japanese Italian plumbe?r, who is in turn tantamoun?t to thinking of Nintendo.

There's also something remarkably comforting about the Super Mushroom's singular motivation. Entering this world and charging ahead, whether it's directly into Mario to be gnashed and digested, or off of a cliff into that final rest. The Super Mushroom doesn't give a fuck about things, and in this climate of political tomfoolery and Reese's Pieces put inside Reese's Cups??, sometimes one can only move forward with a happy-go-lucky attitude of apathy. We should all strive to be a little more Super Mushroom.

Second Cousin Kinoko from We ♥ Katamari

The Katamari Damacy games are factually among the greatest things the medium has given us. They blessed us further with Kinoko, everyone's favorite second cousin who first appeared in We ♥ Katamari. She's great, really. A really dry wit at parties and generally someone who doesn't try to put on an act for public appearances, but not pretentious or anything. She also loves Bowie and makes a great chocolate chip cookie. Kinoko is the kind of second cousin you actually gravitate towards when you hit a funeral or other big family event.

Speaking of Katamari, shout out to the Space Mushroom planet in general, the gathering place for The Prince and all his cou??sins. They just hang there. On a mushroom.

Pax from Mushroom Men: The Spore Wars

Fact: I have not played either Mushroom Men: The Spore Wars or Mushroom Men: Rise of the Fungi. Also fact: I'm perusing eBay in an effort to add to my backlog in order to right thi?s egregious wrong.

Did you know Les effin' Claypool did the score for Mushroom Men? How wild is that!

I digress. (Do I really though?) Pax? is a mushroom protagonist in a game series that includes the word "mushroom" in its very title. Of freaking course? he's on this list. Look at 'im! ... It's about all I can say in trying to flesh out this chunk of this failed comedy sketch that is my life. I haven't played the games. Pax might be a jerk.

Clickers from The Last of Us

"That's cheating, Sam, clickers aren't really mushroom people, really ... " might be something you're thinking. Oh, I'm sorry, did you exclude the horrifyingly-mangled victims of cordyceps? Oh, sorry. Your list about the Greatest Mushrooms in Video Gaming must be so much better. Please! Let me learn from your list.

I'm sorry,??? I'm not actually being petty, it's just a bit.

But, actually, clickers are some of the best enemies to come about in all of the seventh console generation. This is the first time I've thought that, but yeah, I'm sticking to those words I just typed. I don't even love The Last of Us. Although, I am eager to try to learn to love it with a replay, "soonish." Still, the clickers are instantly iconic. They're creepy, man. They're the remnants of a person overtaken by shrooms. Don't do drugs, kids!

Puffstools and Mushroom Pikmin from Pikmin

I have a real traumatic past with these guys.

Here I am, a veritable child (physically, at this time, not just mentally) playing Pikmin. Havin' a ball, as one does. Along comes a puffstool in Olimar's path. Alone, without our pikpik-looking compansions, we approach. The puffstool huffs and puffs and releases its spores to no effect. "Neat!" I say to myself, and go about my business.

Returning, pikmin in tow, I approach the puffstool. It huffs and it puffs and good lord, they're killing me. They're killing me. The puffstool's spores, so obviously filtered by O??limar's suit, induce a catastrophic effect upon my complicit companions, transforming them into "mushroom pikmin." These pikmin, deranged and zonked out of their little?? freakin' minds, turn on Olimar in a PCP-like haze of adrenaline and bloodlust. It's pretty wild.

Celestial Emissary from Bloodborne

Is he a mushroom? Is he a he? For our purposes, I won't pigeon-hole that glorious blue stallion into a single gender. Also, for our purposes, the Celestial Emissary is a goshdarn mushroom because I say she is. 

I mean look at him! Look at all of those little mushroom guys she sends out at you! Droves of little mushroom men and women, just swingin' and pawin' at you because they've just gotta defend their god!

So, I'm not going to lie, it's been about five years since I played and loved Bloodborne. Any semblance of comprehensive lore-lookin' has left my brain via the left-eardrum, so as always, I'm riffin' here. It's a vague memory, but you know what? That's a big alien mushroom friend-o (except not), and she's speakin' to me.

Also, definitely a cousin of:

Battleborn

It's Battleborn.

Every Darn Mushroom-thing in Hollow Knight

Every.

Last.

One.

Hollow Knight's aesthetic is just the best thing ever -- glad we can agree -- and all of the Fungal Wastes are positively ripe for this list. Could I just say "the Fungal Wastes are one of the ten greatest mushrooms in video games?" Sort of like Ego? Just a big, collectively?-sentient mass of mushrooms?

Anyway, yeah, the mushrooms in Hollow Knight own. Look at those guys! They're gonna hurt you only because you violate their home. Mushrooms look out for other mushrooms.

Then there's Mister Mushroom, the mumbling-grumbling macguffin of Hollow Knight's multiple endings. Hollow Knight is too good. It's too powerful.

Alright, that's it. Sorry for wasting your time.

[*I started to write this up before the world started to go totally screwy, so if that does or doesn't say much about how utterly insignificant a post this is, I'm glad it did or did not help!]

The post The 10 greatest mushrooms in video games appeared first on Destructoid.

Travis, Floyd, Meryl, and Leo �the gang's all here

Mother 4 is no longer Mother 4. The project has adopted a new name – it's going by Oddity now – and it has severed its fan-game ties. While it might not be an on-brand sequel to Mother 3 as previously planned, Oddity is still a game m??ade by people who cherish anything and everyth??ing Itoi.

We're kicking off the new year in style with a re-reve??al teaser trailer.

As someone who toyed with the idea of replaying EarthBound over the holiday break and didn't but is now very much second-guessing that decision, I'm all about these seedy small-town-America vibes. It's been five whole years since I last thought about Mother 4, but I'm no less excited in 2020.

As it now stands, Oddity is a "surreal quest full of oddball c??haracters and serious challenge with lots of heart." It's set in the 1970s – an underused decade in video game storytelling that's especially ripe in this context – and it stars a boy, his two pals, and a biker. Animals aren't themselves. Kidnappings are on the rise. A secret society, the Modern Men, is up to no good. It's dire out there.

Travis Fields wields a baseball bat, a pellet gun, and powers "he's only now discovering," all of which should be music to any Mother fan's ears. I'm als??o stoked about the return of rhyth?m-based combat.

Full resolution thumbnail art! Thanks to @waholarts - She's been helping bring to life the vintage cartoon aesthetic that's been guiding us in a big way. pic.twitter.com/DWeX8l7opG

— COÌ¥MING SOON (@OddityRPG) January 2, 2020

Before you even ask, no, Oddity isn't coming out soon.

"It'll be out when it's ready," according to the cre??ato?rs. "Relax til then."

The old subreddit, r/Mother4, is still up for posterity, but the game's community is rallying around a new home, r/OddityRPG. The original Mother 4 website is a real trip down memory lane.

I never, ever expected to start 2020 with thi?s news. I hope product??ion wraps up smoothly.

[Thanks, Perro] [Twitter]

The post Long-awaited Mother 4 fan game ??transformed into Oddit??y appeared first on Destructoid.

Event coming this week

Ah Mother 3. It feels like a few months can't go by without some insider report alleging that "Mother 3 will be localized soon!" followed by another report that claims "it will never be released because of the inappropriate content!" It's entirely possible that there's one or two important people blocking th?is, and when they move on or relent, one day we'll get a nonchalant release: who knows what Nintendo is really thinking.

Either way Nintendo loves Mother/EarthBound, that much is clear. It gets a lot of love in games like Super Smash Bros. (from the very beginning, as Ness was present in Smash 64), and it's getting even more love this week with a Smash Ultimate event centered around the series. It's being held in part for a "30 years of Mother" annive??r?sary, with the event kicking off on July 26 and running through the weekend.

Oh word, the 30th anniversary? Mother 3 confirmed?!

Smash Bros. JP [Twitter]

The post Nintendo is celebrating the Mother/EarthBound series in Smash, and we still have no Mother 3 l??ocalization appeared first on Destructoid.

Loveably lame

You'd have to be terribly boring or ??adverse to trying new things to have never played a game you didn't enjoy. That’s just the way things are, and it’s not always the game’s fault. Sometimes the situation you’re in sours the taste or, perhaps, you’re just not in the mood for what you’re tasting. Maybe the main character rubs you the wrong way, maybe the game has aged worse than a dumpster full of milk left in the Sahara, or maybe you’d rather have spiders plug your ear canals with their young than hear another moment of the soundtrack. Sometimes, games just miss the mark.

But then there are games that, even though they leave you feeling like you need a shower, you still feel a certain kinship with. They’re experiences that you’re glad when they’re over, but don’t regret the time you spent with them. That could be because it’s the black?? sheep of a franchise you’re shamelessly enamored with and you just have to grit your teeth and bear it, because -- dammit -- you're committed to playing every entry in the series. Perhaps it’s just because having played through the whole thing finally equips you with the ammunition you need to convince people their favorite game is garbage. Or maybe there’s just a single character that makes wading through the whole cesspool worthwhile.

I’ve ?encountered games like those. Have you?

ELDER SCROLLS ARENA AND DAGGERFALL

A long, long time ago, The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind dug its hooks into me and started a love affair that lasts to this day. I obediently followed the series through the forests of Cyrodiil and the mountains of Skyrim, but the games that came before the third entry remained shrouded in mysterious mist. Recently, I took the dive and found myself on a journey I didn’t enjoy. I’m happy it’?s over, but I’ll treasure the memories all the same.

In the case of Elder Scrolls: Arena, it’s Bethesda’s reliance on procedurally generating everything that kills the games for me. Arena gives you the opportunity to visit every city on the continent of Tamriel, but every city looks and functions essentially the same. If you’re the type who likes to explore, the countryside is an endless stretch of randomized landscape, giving you no opportunity to get to know the game world or even walk from one city to the next. Even the lore wasn’t yet established, so you’re better off just reading one of the plot summaries written in the books of later games. Despite its big world, Arena just doesn’t offer anything that something that a game like Ultima: Underworld already did better.

As for Daggerfall, it too was procedurally created, and despite the fact that the world is now an absolutely gargantuan, cohesive map, there’s still no incentive for exploration. Its design makes it obvious that you’re not intended to actually walk to your destination, but rather fast travel using the map. That said, it’s still a deeper game, giving you the ability to become a homeowner, rise in the ranks of various factions, and even pick who you align with in the main storyline. There are some interesting feats that Daggerfall pulls off, but the thrill is killed off when you realize?? it all revolves around delving some of the worst dungeons I’ve encountered in an RPG.

Seriously, the dungeons are identical-looking collections of corridors, all wound together like a mess of Christmas lights. The map system is almost aggressively unhelpful, and your objective can be hidden absolutely anywhere, even behind doors that blend into the walls or are hidden in some obscure corner. Daggerfall certainly has ??its fans, especially people who first experienced it back when it was new, but you absolutely could not force me to plumb another one of those horrible brick caverns.

Nonetheless, I’m glad I experienced them if only to see how the series evolved. Morrowind was a big step out of procedurally created content. While some of t??he depth had to be draine?d out of it, the result is something that is a lot more interesting to play.

EARTHBOUND BEGINNINGS

If you really put the screws into me and demanded to know what my favorite game is, I’d probably say Earthbound. With as many games as I have played, choosing a top title is a complicated process, but I’ve got something of a kinship with Earthbound. I feel like I owe it. It helped me out in a hard spot in?? my life, so the very least I could do is give it priority.

That doesn’t mean I have to love its younger sibling, however. In Japan, the original Mother is still held in high regard, having enjoyed an unusually large player-base during the height of Famicom fever in Japan. Over here, however, it nearly launched during the height of the RPG genre’s unpopularity in the west but got canceled at the last minute. Nintendo finally threw the Earthbound fandom a bone in 2015, when they released the original Mother game in North America as Earthbound Beginnings. That was our first leg?itimate chance to play it.

From the outset, it’s easy to see the connection to Earthbound. While actual story threads between the games are questionable, a lot of the personality and lightheartedness of the SNES classic was well established in Earthbound Beginnings. However, while Earthbound’s terrific sense of humor and tendency to push you through weirder and weirder situations makes up for its rather drab core gameplay, Earthbound Beginnings is mundane, and even hostile, in comparison. Random encounter rates are off the charts, the gameplay flows like a river of defective shopping ?carts, and the enemies are brutally abusive.

It’s honestly not all bad and I don’t hate Earthbound Beginnings.?? However, for all its positive messages and sunny dialogue, it’s pretty obvious that it hates the player. Having finished it twice now, it’ll probably be a long time before I revisit it, but at least the soundtrack will linger on with me.

ARMY MEN: SARGE’S WAR   

The Army Men series has long stood as my biggest guilty pleasure in the world of video games. I’ve played the vast majority of the series by now and can confirm that most of them aren’t worth the time. But I keep playing them because something inside my mind is broken and I can’t help myself. Most entries in the franchise belong on this list, but one stands as more important than any of them: Army Men: Sarge’s War.

The final game developed in part by 3DO, Sarge’s War is a surprisingly bleak game in a series that was better known for cartoonish humor. All the side characters from the Sarge’s Heroes sub-series are annihilated in the same bomb blast, and a grumbly, brooding?? Sargeant Hawk is out for revenge against the tan army.

The game itself is abou??t as dry as a silica gel factory, with its only key feature being the ability to dismember your enemies. But it stands as an intriguing end to the 3DO series. It feels like it was made by a group of people who knew that the end was coming and wanted to see the series off in the bleakest way possible. One final scream into the void. It was a sad eulogy for a series that got no love; closure for a friend that you didn’t necessarily like spending time with but were compelled to out of pity.

For me, it was a s??ad goodbye. It’s too bad it wa??sn’t also an interesting game.

Those are just a few games that I hold near and dear, even if I think they’re kind of lame. What lame games have you played that you hold a certain kinship towar??ds? Let me know in the comments.

The post What games are you glad you played, but didn’t enjoy? appeared first on Destructoid.

Some people shouldn't be parents

Moms don't often take the spotlight in?? the world of video games. They're usually killed early on, take on some sort of villainous role, or sit quietly in the background while t?heir children go off to save the world. 

With Mother's Day just around the corner, I thought it might be a good time to look at some of the worst moms and maternal figures in video games before honoring the best. Your mom may not be?? perfect, but at least she isn't hell-bent on resurrect??ing some ancient evil.

Ness' mom (Mother series / EarthBound)

Ness' mother isn't evil, but she isn't really a responsible of a parent. Like a lot of RPG parents, Ness' mom sends him out the door at the fir??st sign of adventure, and they won't touch base for weeks at a time. She is a little bit more hands-on than the kid's father, though. Ness' dad only bot??hers to make an appearance over the phone. 

Queen Brahne (Final Fantasy IX) 

The mother of the true pri??ncess G??arnet and the adoptive mother of her lookalike is probably one of the shittiest parents out there. She plots to steal the magic eidolons from her adoptive daughter even if it costs the girl's life.

She also r?aids neighbori??ng kingdoms using her army of black mage soldiers and sends hired assassins after Garnet and company when she's done with them. At least she feels terrible about it all in the end, but the damage is done. Also, why is she blue?

Isaac's mom (The Binding of Isaac)

Isaac's mom might be the worst on this list. First off Isaac's mother is clearly batshit crazy, as she kicks off the start of the game by trying to sacrifice her son to please whatever god it is she?? worships.

Ther?e's no denying some of the other moms on this list suck, but Isaac's mother's only goal was to kill her child, and that's just plain not cool.

Jenova (Final Fantasy VII)

The second Final Fantasy mom on this list is Jenova. Jenova has technically been dead for thousands of years since the destruction of?? the Cetra, but this doesn't stop her ??from nearly destroying the planet all while looking creepy inside a jar.

She's also the biological parent of Sephiroth, and I think we all know that kid is all sorts of fucked up. Mommy dearest was a significan??t influence on Sephiroth's particular brand of evil.

Brigid Tenenbaum (BioShock)

Dr. Tenebaum is the creator of ADAM, the genetic cocktail that eventually turned all of Rapture's citizens into a bunch of deformed murderers. Naturally, her experiments on the little sisters lead her to develop something of a maternal bond w??ith them. 

It would be that which eventually led her to attempt to repent and set things right. In the end, Tenenbaum does her best to save these little girls and give them a life, but experimenting on kids has earned her the lousy mom st??amp.

Mother Brain (Metroid)

I'm not entirely sure this one counts as a real mom either, but "Mother" is in the name, so here we are. Mother Brain is the main antagonist of the Metroid series. It's ??fair to say that Mother Brain played some role in Samus' upbringing by training her how to use the power suit, even if she was sort of a jerk about it.

Maybe ??Samus and Mother Brain would've gotten along if it weren't for the whole leading a faction of evil space pirates thing. 

This list could go on for a while so I'll cut myself off here. I'm sure I missed a large number of horrible gaming moms, but at least now you have something to? reflect on this Mother's Day. Your mom is far from perfect, but she never infused you genetica??lly with some weird slug or attempted to destroy the planet. ;

The post The worst moms in video games appeared first on Destructoid.

Banging on a trash can

Knuckle Sandwich is a surreal RPG in the vein of EarthBound, but there’s so much more to it than that. Andrew Brophy, the creator of the game, uploaded a cryptic trailer last week announcing that there would be an “announcement” on April 19. It featured warped, psychedelic images across an old television, while obscured gameplay lurked in the background. To??day, we finally got to?? see what the big secret was all about.

Alongside a brand new trailer, Brophy announced he's launched a Kickstarter campaign to help fu?nd the rest of development. He's asking for a modest amount just under $20,000 so he can work on the project full-time. I got the chance to get my hands on a demo of the game and it's every bit as ridicul?ous as it looks. 

During the roughly 30-minute demo, Knuckle Sandwich tells a linear story ushering you from scene to scene. The pacing is spot on, and almost every interaction elicited a sturdy chuckle from me. Even just checking out random items in people's homes often yielded some fun, little one-liners. I discovered an ?alternate scene in my second playthrough, so I wouldn't be surprised if I misse?d something else too.

The main character is a silent, pink-nosed dork who’s traveling to the big city in search of a new job. Unfor??tunately for him, he’s really bad at it. I watched him awkwardly plod from opportunity to opportunity and completely fuck it up each time. Every encounter consisted of a different minigame, and almost all of my would-be employers treated me like total dirt. It’s downright refreshing to play as a character who is so lacking in skills he makes me look good.

My favorite thing to do was to knock over trash cans, which shoot rainbow-colored crap all over the ground. It’s dumb and completely pointless, but I definitely want more trash cans in the finished product! Speaking of rainbow-colored crap, there are all of these multi-colored NPCs that show up occasionally. When I tried to talk to them, all they did was shout this random gibberish language at me. I ha?ve a feeling those characters, whoever they are, will play a much larger role during the full experience.

Considering there are also plenty of normal-looking NPCs you can ??chat it up with, the presence of these adult-sized, sherbert-colored baby creatures piqued my interest. Who are they, and why can’t I understand them? Am I just that terrible at social interactions, or is this some kind of alien species? The suspense is killing me.

It only popped up twice, but the combat appears to be your standard turn-based RPG fair with an added spice of action cues for each attack. It’s got that whole Super Mario RPG thing going for it, and it’s perfectly serviceable. Nothi?ng more, nothing less. The soundtrack, on the other hand, charmed the pants off of me. Each track never hangs around too long and I’m curious to see if the full game will be able to keep up the quality and pace. They swoop in, do what they need to do for the scene, and then dip on out. Never to be heard again..... maybe.

The final moments of the demo completely changed the tone and successfully set the story in motion to go to some delightfully unforeseen places. There's a dark undercurrent here that's only hinted at until the big reveal. It’s a great introduction with a ton of potential. Knuckle Sandwich is sha??ping up to be something really goofy and wonderful, and, with the level of polish and personality on display, I think it’s safe to say that we’re in for a real treat when the finished game finally hits.

_{[This preview is based on an early build of the game provided by the publisher.]}

The post Getting weird with Knuckle Sandwich appeared first on Destructoid.

Sans is making sure of it

Undertale made a quick appearance duri??ng today's Nintendo Direct. Details were pretty scarce, but the game will be coming "eventually" to?? the Switch. Here is the quick trailer to get you hyped.

The post Undertale will ‘eventually’ be on Switch appeared first on Destructoid.

Unfortunately not a scratch-and-sniff comic

?Shigesato Itoi is not what you would call a video game superstar. H??e broke into the game industry as a copywriter with a question: "What RPG would Steven Spielberg create?"

From that question, coupled with his perseverance to bring his vision to life, he created the MOTHER franchise. Sure it's only three games, two if you wanna count the ones that have seen western releases, but it cannot be denied that fans of the MOTHER series are passionate about the trilogy. But does even the greatest fan know what the first MOTHER game was an homage to?

If you don't know the answer to that last question, fear not because series creator Shigesato Itoi himself was recently interviewed by Japanese author Keiichi Tanaka about the inspiration, the arduous development process of the MOTHER, MOTHER 2/EarthBound's development and, briefly, MOTHER 3. The best part? It's all presented in comic form, which brings a?? great visual aid to Itoi's story. The interview could also serve as inspiration for anyone that strives to complete their goals, as it also touches on persevering through multiple failures, while still maintaining enthusiasm for your vision.

The translated interview comic can be found here and is part of a series of interviews on denfaminicogamer.jp where notable Japanese game developers are interviewed about the passion projects of the early parts of their career. So far, beside Itoi, the creators of Yakuza, and Zoids as well as the legendary Hironobu Sakaguchi have ?also been interviewed as part of the series.

Keiichi Tanaka explores the history behind MOTHER [denfaminicogamer]

The post Shigesato Itoi interview comic explores the origins of ?MOTHER appeared first on Destructoid.

Retro deliciousness

A cookery book, full of recipes inspired by beloved SNES RPG EarthBound, has annihilated its Ki?ckstarter goal, and is expected to go into production for release this year.

Mother's Cookbook is the brainchild of New York chef and EarthBound devotee Bryan Connor, who decided to stir his two loves together to create the culinary oddity. Starting a crowdfunding page, Connor originally set a target of just over $7,000. Now, with over a week to go, the total stands at a little over $22,000, as EarthBound fan??s clamor for ??the secret of his Down-Home Burgers.

The finished book will feature around fifty recipes for all occasions, including Mach Pizza and Peanut Cheese Bars. The cookbook will be made ?available in hardcover, pa?perback and digital form and will feature over 140 pages of recipes, photos, kitchen tips and nostalgic tales about the 1994 classic.

Mother's Cookbook, published in part by Fangamer, is scheduled for release in late 2018. For more details, visit the official Kickstarter page right here.

The post EarthBound cookery book s??mashes crowdfunding targets appeared first on Destructoid.

Legend of (New) Zealand

I've only very recently heard of Reverie, a top down 2D action game very much in the style of old school Legend of Zelda with a visual style very closely resembling EarthBound. ??A bigger surprise with this title is that it was announced as coming to the PlayStation Vita of all places, and today it got a announced worldwide, and will come out early next year in Q1 2018.

A PS4 will follow soon after the Vita release, with a Switch version "likely" and that will be looked into according to the developer Rainbite on Twitter. The initial release will be digital wi?th a limited physical release to follow.

Reverie is set on a fictional island in New Zealand, where players take on the role of Tai, who must go on an adventure to put angry spirits to rest. Checking out the new trailer below, it looks to be very much in the style old school early 16-bit Zelda with more gameplay to show off the movement and some new stuff. They're really going into the EarthBound weirdness as inspi?ration with some of the enemies as well. Can't wait to try this game out.

Upc??oming 90s style RPG on PS Vita adds another v??ersion to its party [PlayStation Blog EU]

The post Rev????erie bound for Vita early next year, PS4 soon after appeared first on Destructoid.

Mine is EarthBound and I can't believe it

There are 21 games included on the SNES Classic -- which one are you most into? right now?

My playing habits have been all over the place since the mini console launched. I beat Mega Man X's iconic intro after booting up the system. (Ahh, it's so good!) I meticulously cleared the expectation-setting opening level in Super Ghouls 'n Ghosts with much-needed assistance from the rewind feature. I finished all of Donkey Kong Country because, dang, that game is way shorte??r than I remember.

But the SNES Classic title I've spent the most time with, by far, and enjoyed more than anything else? Why that's gotta be EarthBound. This is actually a huge deal for me.

I never played the cherished RPG as a kid or even knew anyone with a copy, and my attempts to ??get into it since then -- as recently as the Wii U Virtual Console releas??e -- have fizzled out. Now, in 2017, I've just defeated Master Belch for the first time. The adventure is in its early days, but I know I'm going to see it through to the end; I'm too engrossed to lose interest. I genuinely want to chat with the NPCs!

While I still regret not growing up with EarthBound, I'm happy beyond words to finally have the game click for me, thanks in no small part to the Classic's save states and rewind ability. It just feels right playing this on official hardware with a proper SNES controller while sitting way too close to my TV. If any of you are thinking of making your way across Eagleland, don't forget the incredible player's guide.

The post What’s your most-played SNES Classic game so far? appeared first on Destructoid.

Wondertale

I’m going to have to be a bit controversial when it comes to Undertale. Maybe it was all the hype for years leading up to me playin??g it, but I guess you could say that the game just didn’t capture me in the same way as everyone else. I don’t know what I was expecting, but I felt deeply let down by it a lot of the time, and it just didn’t resonate with me on a level th-

Nah, I’m just kidding. The game is absolutely wonderful.
Asking me to review Undertale on PlayStation 4 is sort of like asking me to revie?w sex. Even when it’s “bad�it’s still incredible, and the extremely brisk pace and short length (there’s a joke here I’m sure) of the game means that if you hit a puzzle or gap you do??n’t really enjoy, it will be over quickly enough that it shouldn’t bother you.

Undertale (PS4, [reviewed] PC, PS Vita)
Developer: Toby Fox
Publisher: Toby Fox
Released: August 15, 2017
MSRP: $19.99

Undertale is one of the best games I’ve ever played. It manages to take a genre that has existed since the earliest days of video games and actually do something new and unique with it while drawing the player in with a beautiful, heart-twisting storyline, quirky hilarious dialogue, bizarre and wonderful characters, and one of the best soundtracks ever produced. There isn’t a single moment of Undertale that isn’t imperative to the world building and st??oryline. Not a string of dialogue, battle, or puzzle goes wasted.

All in all, Undertale transformed my expectation of what a good role-playing game should aspire to be, and it’s almost upsetting to think that I may never have an experience like it again. It just seems an all too rare lightning-in-a-bottle occurrence, and I doubt I’ll ever look at other RPGs in the same way or resist the impulse t?o compare them -- and such?? a comparison would be woefully unfair.

I’m not going to go into any details about the storyline. You, the non-g?ender specific human character, have fallen into a cave and found a subterranean monster world below the surface of your own. With the aid of a friendly monster named Toriel, you are able to get your bearings by navigating through a tongue-in-cheek tutorial dungeon which introduces you to the basic mechanics of the game. Before long, you express your desire to go home, and decide to leave the comforts of Toriel’s comforting abode and butterscotch cinnamon pies. And I will leave it right there, because revealing just about anything else about this six- to eight-ho??ur experience would be a major spoiler.

Like other RPGs of this kind, you will have to deal with random encounters as you explore the underworld. But taking cues from games such as Shin Megami Tensei, you have a number of alternate options to combat which vary on each unique encounter, allowing you to interact with your foes in a more passive manner. You will be taught very early on that fighting and killing your enemy is just one option; there is always an alternative to fighting available to you, so part of dealing with battles is uncovering the right order of actions to perform in order to do so. If you do kill an enemy, you wil?l be granted experience points and gold, and will get stronger and more resilient in combat. If you spare a monster, you will only be granted gold, and the combat will? be harder to deal with as the game goes on. It’s up to you to decide how you want to proceed through the story, and every single choice you make will greatly affect the final outcome.

Combat is not a simple matter of rock paper scissors. Your character is represented as a heart in a tiny dia??logue box which can be moved about for a very brief amount of time each time a combat action takes place.?? Each enemy attacks in a unique way, the battles playing out more like a bullet hell game where you are weaving between projectiles, whether they be falling tears raining down from above you, or a monsters flexing muscles rising up to hit you from below. There are variations on how attacks work, with some projectiles being green in color (which heal you) and some blue, which will hurt you only if you’re moving when they make contact. But every single battle is a surprise, boss battles being particularly insane. The story doesn’t pause and take a break, leaving you waiting for the next critical dialogue; interaction with boss characters is intertwined within the combat itself making each encounter special.

As far as the PS4 version goes, it runs perfectly fine. Undertale is simple; there is no online multiplayer, no challenges, no big extras. Avoiding spoilers, after you have ??finished the game you will immediately be given the opportunity to jump back in, and to see everything you will need to do this a few times -- not a new game plus, mind you, but...well, you’ll see if you get there. You get a few colorful borders to play with since the game is natively 4:3, some other basic settings, and that’s about it. I did not run into any performance issues while playing.

Surprisingly this was the first time I actually got around to playing through Undertale, but I did have the PC version to compare it too. And frankly it doesn’t matter which version you choose; what matters is that you play it. If you like RPGs even remotely, and especially if you have any love for the 16-bit era classic EarthBound which it takes several cues from tonally, Undertale fits exceedingly well in that list of “classic�RPGs and in many ways, surpasses them. Emotionally it accomplishes what many games take sixty hours to convey in a fraction of the time, and this isn’t done at the sacrifice of engaging gameplay. Undertale embraces the fact that it is indeed a video game, and it demands your attention and interaction throughout the entirety of its brief length -- it can be very difficult sometimes, and despite joki?ng about literally holding your hand in the intro, when it a??ctually matters, the game does anything but.

Undertale is a clever and charming masterpiece, through and through. I didn’t look back at our original review until after beating it and deciding for myself what I wanted to say about it, but I have very little to add or modify. No game is perfect, but a very rare handful are special, exceptional examples of the best there is to offer, and Undertale stands proudly beside them.

_{[This review is based on a retail build of the game provided by the publisher.]}

The post Review: Undertale (PS4) appeared first on Destructoid.

Many on sale for a Cyber Monday

Print media about video games is on the rise again, so we had a lot of options to work with this year for a book-specific gift guide. No need to focus on just one publisher anymore. In fact, it's arguable that we have too much material to work with this year. That's also why books that we've previously covered, like A Profound Waste of Time, Super Mario Adventures, and Dia?blo III: Book of T?yrael/Diablo III: Book of Cain, won't be explicitly included in the list ??below. This darn thing is already big en??ough as it is! 

We have quite a few entries here that are on sa??le through Monday, Nov. 28th though, so best give it a browse now before you mis??s out on some glorious psuedo-holiday savings. 

And away we go! 

Legends of Localization Book 2: EarthBound

Fangamer has a ton of amazing new books on their storefront, so it's hard to pick just one for this list. The Indie G Zine (featuring a Forward by yours truly), the hand drawn Stardew Valley Guidebook by Kari Fry, and the Undertale Art Book are all must-haves for fan??s of their respective int?ellectual properties. 

But since we're already cramped for time and space here, we decided to put Legends of Localization Book 2: EarthBound out in front. Written by MOTHER 3 translation patch project lead Clyde 'Tomato' Mandelin, and clocking in at 432 pages, this hefty tome exceeds all expectations. Not only does it uncover the many differences between MOTHER 2 and EarthBound in intricate detail, but it also explains nearly every cultural reference and underlying meaning embedded in both games, examines both MOTHER and EarthBound's marketing and?? related m??edia, and includes copious examples of other localization efforts for context.

The life and career of MOTHER/Earthbound creator Shigesato Itoi, the other staff on the project, fans of the series, and the MOTHER/Earthbound's connection with other media are also given plenty of space here. Just when you think Clyde and his team have dug as far as one could go into one aspect of the EarthBound phenomenon, you get two or more pages of extrapolation on whatever point they were making. On top of that, they're still updating the Legends of Localization website as we speak, and plan to "patch" the book with free content as they go.?? 

So much has already been written about this legendary, influential RPG, but after reading this book, I realize that we'd only just scratched the surface of the full story behind Mother/Earthbound. Clyde Mandelin and his team have set the new standard for game historians and journalists to live ?up to. Thanks a lot, ya jerks! 

Art of Atari

Look back on the original Mega Man box art, and you may find it hard to imagine what the team at Capcom USA was po??ssibly thinking. The bowlegged, off-brand blunder displayed on their box has been a laughing stock for over 20 years. That said, their choice to create an overly complicated take on a simple character makes more sense when looked at in the larger context of video game box art history. The Atari 2600; the defining game console of the early 1980s, was populated with games that looked almost nothing like their boxes. 

Back then, video games could only?? display a few colors on screen at a time. They were completely incapable of generating, even the most basic of cartoon characters, let alone something as complicated as Norman Reedus hugging a troubling fetus. You may think these limitations held the medium back, but it didn't feel that way at time. As someone who lived through that era of games as it happened, I can tell you first hand that the excitement people had for the medium was just as intense then as it is now. The synergy between the vivid, detailed?? worlds shown to us in the promotional art, and the simple, iconographic visuals found in the actual games, created a dreamlike world in our heads that was beyond anything I've experienced in gaming since. 

Art of Atari by Tim Lapetino pays full tribute to that process, profiling the art and artists (including Star Wars legend Ralph McQuarrie) that brought gaming in the 80s to life. The 351 pages book is filled with huge, beautiful reproductions of the original artwork, concept art for unreleased games, promotional fliers, behind the scenes mem??os and documents, and a lot more. They even found the space to get into some of the less known Atari Jaguar developments, like the ill fated Atari Jaguar VR. The writing here remains positive throughout, which is fitting for a tribute, but not for criticism. The upbeat style may be a turn off for those of you looking for some snark to go with your nostalgia, but it's hard to imagine that many of you who long for the old days will complain about the book's lack of bite. 

Shovel Knight 2-Disc Vinyl Soundtrack

This one is a bit of a cheat, but since this limited edition record album technically opens up like a book, and it comes complete with a special edition booklet containing an interview with Mega Man and Shovel Knight co-composer Manami Matsumae, I felt like I could get away with it. The custom interior and exterior artwork by Mega Man Megamix creator Hitoshi Ar?iga is arguably worth the price of ent??ry on its own.

Shovel Knight's soundtrack speaks for itself, so you don't need to hear from me how amazing it is. Getting those tunes on wax is wor??th passing down to your kids after you're too old to listen to r?ecords or play video games. 

Boss Fight Books: Spelunky

It's rare to get a novel-length post mortem on a specific game, written by the creator of the game in question, but that's exactly what we have with Derek Yu's Spelunky. Derek is one of the most frustratingly talented artists in games today, skilled at both coding, game design, level design, game art, and illustration. Just look at his sketches from last Inktober! It's downrigh??t unfair to see all that talent welled up in one human mind.&nbs?p;

Yet you'd never know it from reading Derek's breakdown of designing and contemplating Spelunky. Well written and humble thr??oughout, the book humanizes a game that many developers and fans see as an unreachable pi??nnacle of minimalist design brilliance.  

Fire Emblem Awakenings Art Book 

_{(Note: Enter code HOLIDAYBOOK for a discount on the Amazon link above. Expires Tuesday, Nov 19th 2016.)}

Nintendo of America used to distance itself from the Fire Emblem series, presumably because they didn't want the games to tarnish their "kid friendly" image. Since the "smashing" success of Fire Emblem Awakenings, the company has done an about face on that attitude, pushing the Fire Emblem brand to the forefront in multiple ways. 

While the series does many things to set itself apart from Nintendo's expansive stock of reliable franchises, its focus on a huge cast of interrelated, painfully attractive characters is probably the ingredient that resonates most deeply for fans. Knowing that any one of Fire Emblem's lovable warriors could suffer a permanent death only serves to intensify our attachment to these intricately accessorized, bloodthirsty scamps. The Fire Emblem Awakenings Art Book does a great job of keeping all your favori??tes alive on the printed page, allowing you to soak in their darling styles at your lei?sure. 

120 Years of Vlambeer & Friends

Speaking of darlings, here we have Vlambeer, one of the most successful game developers today. Mixing accessibility with absurd humor and painfully well crafted mechanics have helped games like Nuclear Throne, Ridiculous Fishing, and Super Crate Box to be widely regarded as modern classics. Thing is, it doesn't matter how great your games are if no one tries playing them in the first place. Through honest, audience-facing marketing efforts and inviting, exciting promotional work?, Vlambeer managed to both obtain and maintain millions of fans so far, and they show no signs of slowing. 

120 Years of Vlambeer & Friends details the ?exact path that the developer took to became the humble powerhouse that they are today. This special edit?ion book is limited to just 1000 copies, so make sure to snatch one up while you can. 

Good Nintentions 1985

Could Vlambeer become the next Nintendo? It may seem impossible, but when you look back on the humble line up of 16 launch games that hit stores along the Nintendo Entertainment System in 1985, it's easier to imagine what could be. Jeremy Parish, one of the game industry's greatest analysts, has gone back in time to examine those 16 games, as well as the 9 games that launched with the Famicom in Japan. He calls this examination Good Nintentions 1985. 

You may guess that digging into relatively small games like Gyromite and Kung-Fu wouldn't take much space, but Parish's in-depth autopsy on the NES's initial line up required 182 page??s to get through. If you're struggling to track down the NES Classic Edition and feel like you'll never be able to relive Nintendo's baby days without one, this book will cost you half of what Nintendo's plug-and-play console is going for, and offers a lot more understanding of what the NES experience was all about. 

Hardcore Gaming 101 Presents: Data East Arcad??e Classics

Hardcore Gaming 101 is a collective who focuses on forlorn or forgotten games gone by that were, at one time, as big of a deal as Watch Dogs or Infamous are today. Their website and backlog of print publications provide a wealt?h of insight and inf??ormation, but their recent book on Data East is particularly dear to my heart.

While they're considered relatively obscure now, games like Bad Dudes, Burger Time, Karnov, and Robocop were once fixtures in arcades around the world. Riding off the success of those tent pole titles allowed Data East to take interesting risks, like the genuinely unhinged Trio The Punch and the similarly nonsensical Night Slashers. Now the company, and all its storied intellectual properties, are effectively dead, proving that no one is truly safe in the world of game publishing. Thankfully, this book also proves that if you truly put yourself out there, your work can live forever, in the hearts of fans that will never forget you. 

Unseen64: Video Games You Will Never Play

Dig even deeper into gaming's past, beyond the often forgotten publishers that Hardcore Gaming 1010 covers, and you'll find the work of Unseen64, a group that works to uncover and understand games that were so unappreciated that they were never released to the general public in the first place. Thanks to them, we know a lot more about Mario's premature retirement f??r?om Volleyball-Wrestling, Clint Eastwood's dashed plans for a Dirty Harry game on the DS, poor old Project H.A.M.M.E.R. and countless other missed opportunities?? and incomplete c??oncepts. 

The smarter you are, the more you kno??w that there is a lot that you don't know, and?? when it comes to known unknowns in the gaming world, no one knows more than Unseen64.

EarthBound Handbook

Well what do you know! It looks like Fangamer ended up getting two books in this guide after all. It may seem like favoritism, but I couldn't help myself. The EarthBound Handbook is unlike anything I've ever seen from this publisher, or any other games media publisher for that matter, and I can't help but gush about it. Even the Mother 3 Handbook (which I adore) doesn't quite measure up to ?this one. 

Let's say that Legends of Localization Book 2 is like getting behind the scenes instructions from the adorable illusionist David Blaine on how the greatest magic tricks are performed. If that's the case, then the EarthBound Handbook is like if David Blaine suddenly transformed into a talking blue cat, yelled "CURIOUS ABOUT MY POWERS?" and disappeared into the sky on a cloud of neon butterflies. The former helps you to feel close to EarthBound from the inside out. The latter rein??vigorates the mystery and majesty of the game by adapting its soul to a whole new medium. 

EarthBound's enigmatic appeal is just one side of what makes it special. For many, playing the game feels like spending time with a beloved friend. That means going beyond being just entertaining. Being "fun" is the primary trait of someone you go out with to pass the time, but don't really care about. In contrast, a true friend will make you feel happy, sad, worried, relaxed, annoyed, proud, confused, and many other feelings, all in ways that ultimately bring you closer together. EarthBound does this too, using a variety o??f techniques, making for something larger than the sum of its parts.?? 

The EarthBound Handbook follows the same structure. Made from fake newspaper articles (sometimes written by zombies), audio log transcripts, magazine ads, first-hand interviews, real photographs of in-game characters, hand-crafted sculptures, virtual trading cards, and a variety of other media, this physical scrapbook chronicles a virtual road trip that, until now, had only existed in the minds of EarthBound fans. It even comes with a scratch and sniff card that allows you to smell the adven?ture! 

The only way this book could have be?en more multifaceted is if it came with a cassette tape soundtrack to listen along to as you read. Knowing F?angamer, I wouldn't be surprised if they're already working on that. 

The post Our Video Game Book Holiday Gift Guide 2016 appeared first on Destructoid.

Yellow on Metacritic

If Metacritic had existed when EarthBound launched in 1995, the cult-classic RPG would be rocking a 72%. Over at The Video Game Preservation Dump, Frank Cifaldi scanned every timely review, "to try and figure out why it failed." The last ditch effort marketing might've helped.

"The biggest takeaway I get, slapping all these magazines on my desk and reading them back-to-back, is just how completely offended the critics were by the game's art direction," Cifaldi notes. "The 'infantile graphics' made VideoGames' Geoff Higgins 'want to gag,' apparently. EGM's John Gurka 'laughed out l??oud' when he first saw the game, while GameFan capsule reviewer Skid's initial impression was 'no way! These graphics are just to [sic] fruity.'  Not one reviewer seemed to like the art direction, though some - particularly at GameFan - were able to power through it and enjoy the game underneath."

As Cifaldi notes, EarthBound came out around a time where role-playing games were closely linked to the "serious" fantasy aesthetic, while the recently released Saturn and PlayStation meant hype was turned towards the new explosion of horrible 3D graphics. The trends led to EarthBound feelin??g low rent to the handful of critics who wrote on it at th?e time. Sad!

The Video Game Preservation Dump

The post Why’d EarthBound bomb? Well, critics at the time didn’t help… appeared first on Destructoid.

Have you played it before?

By the time EarthBound hit, I was pretty well-versed in JRPGs (my first was Dragon Warrior as a kid) -- but that wasn't the ca?se for everyone else. For those of you who haven??'t played it yet, Nintendo has a new miniseries up on its official channel called "Backlog Buster," which has Big N employees Kit & Krysta travel through classic games they haven't experienced before.

This is going to be a remedial "Let's Play" type of situation for any EarthBound fan, but if you've been waiting to pull the trigger, the video should g??ive you some sort of idea of what the wacky game entails as an outsider. Sadly, I never owned the game (I only rented it), and I'm extremely jealous of my friend who still has his original cartridge with the Player's Guide.

The post Nintendo kicks off new series ‘Backlog Buster’ with EarthBound appeared first on Destructoid.

Wow, can you believe it's been that long?

On this day in 2006, Mother 3&nb?sp;wa??????????????????????????s released for the Game Boy Advance in Japan.

Or in other words, the third entry in Shigesato Itoi's beloved role-playing game series has existed for ten whole years now and Nintendo still hasn't localized the?? damn thing for inter??national audiences.

No, I'm not ??bitter about this. Not at all. Not in the slightest... Sigh.

[Thanks, Kotaku]

The post Mother 3 hasn’t come west for 10 years now appeared first on Destructoid.

Lucas' butt might be a no-no

We've waited nearly 10 years for Nintendo to officially localize Mother 3. The wait has been so long, it's started to seem like an impossibility. However, due to some rumors over the past week, it's beginning to feel more and more likely that a western release might finally be happening. Especially when you factor in EarthBound and EarthBound Beginnings' recent arrival the Wii U eShop, Lucas joining Super Smash Bros. roster, and the 10th anniversary of Mother 3's Ja?panese release fast approaching, it has us won??dering if this might this actually be the year.

Of course, with any localization (especially coming from Nintendo), many fans are worried about the possibility of censorship. Mother 3 is one of the greatest vid?eo games I've ever played, and I'd hate to see too much of its content changed, but due to certain events and characters featured in the game, that seems inevitable.

So, what would Nintendo change during the localization process of Mother 3? Well, let's first take a look at EarthBound, a game that received quite a few notable changes before it made its way out of Japan. This might give us a clue as to the types of things Nintendo will be looking for in Mother 3.

Ignoring the many revisions to text and dialogue for now, EarthBound featured several sprites and background visuals t?hat were altered for various ??reasons. The major ones include:

• Ness's nude sprites in Magicant being covered with the pajama outfit from the beginning of the game, obviously because nudity would be more problematic in the West.
• The Octopus and Kokeshi statues changing into Pencil and Eraser statues, since the cultural references would be lost on a young international audience.
• The Insane Cultists' battle sprites had the letters "HH" removed from their hats and were replaced with little puff balls to make them look less like KKK members. Also, the town name Threek was changed to Threed, possibly because Threek could be interpreted as Three-K, or KKK.
• Red crosses were removed from hospitals and a certain red truck's appearance was altered to avoid potential lawsuits with the Red Cross and Coca-Cola.
• Signs that read "drug" were replaced with "store" in most instances (but not in the Dusty Dunes Desert, for some reason), and signs that said "bar" were changed to "café." Moreover, any references to alcohol being replaced with coffee, espresso, cappuccino, and the like.
• There was an emphasis on removing or reducing references to violence and death, including new sound effects used when Pokey and his brother are disciplined by their father.

More changes can be found over at Legends of Localization??, a handy resour??ce compiled by Clyde Mandelin of Starmen.net.

So, to break it down, with EarthBound, Nintendo was specifically interested in nixing or mitigating any references to nudity, sexuality, drugs, alcohol, violence, material that might lead to a lawsuit, and obscure cultural references. Since Mother 3 happens to contain a few of those things too, here are some of the changes I expect Nintendo might make if (*ahem* when) Mother 3 finally comes to western shores.

First off, a few name changes are probably in order. It's safe to assume that the game will be called EarthBound 2, or some other variation on the EarthBound name, rather than Mother 3. With the original Mother being changed to EarthBound Beginnings for its western? r??elease (I still wish Nintendo stuck with"EarthBound Zero!"), this would come as little surprise.

There are also a few character and location names that might need to be reconsidered. Specifically: Kumatora, Hinawa, Club Titiboo, Osohe Castle, and DCMC. Of course, it's important to note Super Smash Bros. Brawl did use the names Kumatora and Hinawa on stickers, so they would probably stay the same -- although I honestly wouldn't mind Hinawa's name being changed to correspond with her husband's name, Flint. "Hinawa" refers to a matchlock gun, similar to a flintlock gun, and considering the names of with neighbors, Lighter and Fuel, I've always wondered why Hinawa wasn't changed to something more consiste?nt. "Match" would be a weird name, but I'm confident a localization team could come up with something suitable to keep with the theme.

As for the others, I'm sure Club Titiboo could be seen as potentially offensive (heh, Titiboo), Osohe Castle is a little hard to pronounce, and the band name DCMC might be too similar to ACDC. They already re-colored the Runaway Five to look less like the Blues Brothers, so who knows what else they might change, but I hope they leave it as is. I also expect w??e won't see an enemy called the Gently Weeping Guitar for similar reasons, even though it's a great name!

Now onto the bigger stuff. Whenever the topic of Mother 3's localization comes up, fans poin??t to a handful of scenes and characters as reasons why it will ne?ver see the light of day outside of Japan.

For starters, we have the Magypsies. These wonderful characters are technically not human and have transcende?d gender. Their appearances resemble those of stereotypical drag queens, complete with dresses, makeup, and facial hair. They even give Lucas and friends mementos comprised of razors and lipstick. The Magypsies are some of my favorite characters in the game, but given their depictions, it would be no s??urprise if Nintendo thought they were too controversial for a western audience. I could see Nintendo changing their outfits, mannerisms, removing any references to gender, or choosing one specific gender and sticking with it. However, I sincerely hope the Magypsies would be left unchanged. I think they're perfect just the way they are.

There's a specific moment involving a Magypsy named Ionia that I can almost guarantee would be changed, though. The scene in question occurs in a hot spring, when Ionia teaches Lucas how to awaken his PSI powers for the first time. The fan translation makes it a bit unclear what is actually happening, and it's probably just as ambiguous in the original Japanese text. Basically, Ionia (who admits to being naked in the hot spring) tur?ns Lucas around as the screen fad?es to black. We then hear Ionia saying, "Don't struggle! Just endure it for a little bit!" After a moment, the screen opens back up to Lucas with his head under the water and Ionia standing behind him. And suddenly, Lucas has awoken to his latent PSI abilities.

Now, I'll admit this scene has always left me feeling rather ick??y. It's more than likely that the scene was meant to be a sort of "baptism," with Lucas keeping his head under the hot water until the stress and pain forced his mental powers to surface. But it's definitely not made clear, and it's easy to see how it could be interpreted in a more sinister, suggestive way. This is actually one change I really hope Nintendo does decide to make, and it would be very easy to do. Simply add a bit of text when the screen goes dark to make it clear what's actually going on, or better yet, don'??t have the screen go dark at all so that we can plainly see what's happening. Problem solved.

Aside from the Magypsies, the other big moment occurs in the jungles of Tanetane Island, where Lucas and friends consume some suspicious-looking mushrooms and end up with some seriously psychedelic hallucinations. With Nintendo's insistence on removing references to drugs and alcohol in EarthBound, it's no wonder why fans would be skeptical of this scene. Personally, I honestly don't think this part of the game is too problemati??c. They're eating the mushrooms to survive, rather than for recreational purposes, and they have to deal with the consequences. It's meant to be humorous.

However, it's possible Nintendo ?doesn't not view this issue the same way and might decide to alter it, but how anyone's best guess. I think it's likely the mushroom sprite could be changed to something else, perhaps a pool of liquid or a food that causes? dehydration, some kind of creature that uses hypnosis, or whatever other creative solution localization editors can come up with. Then just rewrite the text and remove any potential drug references, and Nintendo is in the clear. If they do decide to keep the shrooms though, it would certainly be ideal. It's one of my favorite moments in the story, after all!

Staying consistent with the removal of drugs and alcohol, they might also decide to remove the wine-drinking ghost in Osohe Castle. They could also just make a point of having the ghost call it "juice" or something, kind of like the guy in EarthBound who calls his drink a cappuccino when it's obvio??usly a mug of beer. Wa??tching the wine flow through the ghost's body and splash onto the ground is always hilarious, so I hope they keep him.

Next up is the issue of violence. Ignoring the final boss fight (which better not change, or so help me, Nintendo!), there are two questionable moments: the campfire scene and the chapter with Salsa and Fassad. The former is one of the most powerful moments in the story and it would be a huge shame to see Nintendo cut any of it out. But Flint straight up smacks a dude in the gut with a piece of wood and whacks another guy across the face with it before getting clubbed in the back of the head with a huge piece of lumber. If Nintendo is still concerned about the violence in EarthBound, then it's poss??ible some parts of this scene could be edited.

As for Salsa and Fassad, there's the whole issue of animal cruelty. But seeing as how Salsa eventually gets revenge on both Fassad and the device he uses to electrocute the poor monkey, hopefully ?none of that will have to be altered.

Last, but certainly not least, we have the Oxygen Supply Machines of the Sea Floor Dungeon. These machines were made to resemble mermen with luscious lips, and in order to get oxygen from them, one must give them a nice big smooch. S?o, basically, we have a young boy, a woman, a man, and a dog making out with mermen in order to stay alive under water. Now, I'm of the opinion that the Oxygen Supply Machines are too ridiculous and hilarious to be seen as sexually obscene, but it's entirely possible Nintendo feels differently. I sure hope the company would keep them, though, because I love those guys. The Sea Floor Dungeon just wouldn't be the same without them.

Oh yeah, and there'??s also the scene where we ??see Lucas's butt. Are butts okay, Nintendo? It's a funny moment, but I could take it or leave it.

Other than that, I'm sure we'd see some new dialogue, updated enemy and item names, and many other changes to the text to make it stand out from the fan translation. I know the creators of the fan translation offered to let Nintendo use their work for free, but I highly doubt Nintendo would take them up on that offer. And that's fine! I'm excited to see what Nintendo's localization experts come up with, and if I don't like it as much, I can?? always go back and play the fan-made version.

Those are the biggest changes I expect we might see if and when Nintendo finally localizes Mother 3. A few of them I would honestly be okay with, but some others would be severely disap?pointing. Of course, we'll just have to wait and see what happens. I'll be happy as long as we actually get the game. Anything is better than nothing, and I say we've waited long enough.

Nintendo, we want Mother 3!

The post Wh??at changes can we expect from an official Mother 3 localization? appeared first on Destructoid.

Multiple sources say 'yes'

Mother 3 has been a long-awaited localization -- perhaps one of the most? requested in the history of gaming. Gamers have been assuaged by fan translation efforts, but a real, actual release would get this classic into the hands of more people, which is what we all really want.

According to multiple rumors floating around, we may get just that. In addition to Emily Rogers (whose Twitter account was deleted after sharing the news), a Nintendo-focused writer who has made predictions in the past, another source has come forward at Eurogamer, adding credence to the murmurs. It would make sense, as this is officially the game's 10th anniversary since its launch on the Game Boy Advance in Japan -- and wouldn't you know -- the Wii U supports GBA games, and has hosted several Mother releases in the past few years. The most popular translation effort has also been offered to Nintendo for free.

The fact that Lucas was brought in the new Smash Bros. as DLC is definitely a sign of sorts. Sure they could have left him to die in Brawl, but making him relevant again has some sort of meaning. Note that the anniversary is officially in April, but this could also be a prime E3 ann??ouncement.

The post Is Nintendo preparing a Mother 3 localization? appeared first on Destructoid.

Siege Miiverse

The ultra-dedicated fans at Starmen.net never seem to give up. They have been campaigning for an official Western release of Mother 3 for what seems like a lifetime. According to the fansite, now is the ripest it will ever be with Lucas joining Super Smash Bros. for 3DS and Wii U, along with the Japanese Virtual C?onsole release.

The message is that it's now or never. In order to get Nintendo's attention, the campaign is leveraging that recent release by posting Miiverse art to promote the idea of bringing it west. The organizers want quality posts rather than spam, but they are inviting all to participate.

Who knows if this will have any effect on Nintendo of America's decisions? On the one hand, we've heard this a thousand times?? before and there's not much reason to expect anything different. On the other hand, I feel like Nintendo ought to just want us to shut up and may eventually give in.

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He cares about quality

Mother 4? ??Not going to happen. Not with Shigesato Itoi, anyway.

"Totally impossible."

Speaking to Game Watch Impress, as translated by Kotaku, he said, "Among big-time pop stars, if they, you know, put out ten albums, around the fourth album, they can't make very good songs. The albums sell, but eve?ryone at the concerts want?s to hear songs from those first three albums. Everyone."

While Itoi is best known in the West for his involvement with the Mother / EarthBound series, his storied career extends far beyond the game industry. "I'm glad that video games are not my profession," he said. "If it was my job, I would've already made [Mother] 4 and 5."

I respect that? restraint, but who knows. Maybe Itoi wil?l feel inspired one day and come around.

We still have the upcoming fan-made Mother 4, and it looks groovy. I wanted to write this story with the soundtrack running, but it's mysteriously gone from SoundCloud. Bummer. The last blog, posted in late October, showed some enemy designs. The team noted it would b??e quiet over the holiday seas??on and that regular updates would return in 2016.

糸井重里氏降臨！ 「MOTHERとほぼ日と糸井重里。」インタビュー [Game Watch Impress]

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Virtual Console

There was at least one noticeable difference between today's Nintendo Direct in North America and Japan, and of course it involved Mother 3. The latter region is getting?? the treasured role-playing game on t?he Wii U Virtual Console next month.

It's not our year,? apparently. Will it ever be? Perhaps in my lifeti??me.

The port will be available digitally in?? Japan on December 17, 2015.

The post Such a tease! Mother 3 is headed to ?Wii U in Japan appeared first on Destructoid.