EarthBound (universe)

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Itoi and Nintendo eventually decided to rerelease both ''Mother'' titles in Japan as ports compiled on one Game Boy Advance cartridge, ''Mother 1 + 2'', which was released in June 2003 in Japan and included all of the enhancements the English prototype had made to the original ''Mother''; to the dismay of fans, this was never released in the West either. However, Itoi realized he would once again be pressured into reviving ''Mother 3'', an idea he was initially opposed to, but encouragement from fans led to his decision to restart development for the game for Game Boy Advance, which he approached as though he were developing his magnum opus. After three years of development, ''{{iw|wikibound|Mother 3}}'' (essentially now a Game Boy Advance recreation of ''EarthBound 64'') was finally released in Japan in April 2006, twelve years after development began and over a year after the launch of the handheld's successor, the Nintendo DS. This Game Boy Advance title returned the series to a two-dimensional aesthetic but placed more emphasis on a serious plot and character interaction and tweaked gameplay elements of its predecessors. It was released to critical acclaim that praised its new rhythm-based but otherwise simple approach to turn-based combat and, most significantly, tragic storytelling and characterization that achieved a rarely seen degree of depth in titles in the genre.

Unfortunately, Nintendo of America would once more decline to localize the game for Western audiences, once again apparently because of fears that its inconvenient timing at the end of the commercial lifespan of the platform it was based on would negatively affect its sales. The fansite Starmen.net made headlines in October 2008 when it released its own English translation patch that could be applied to a copy of the ROM image of ''Mother 3''. This monumental translation effort was spearheaded by professional translator Clyde "Tomato" Mandelin and the patch received over 100,000 downloads from the website in the first week of its release. Despite the project not being completely legal, it became one of a handful of unofficial video game localization projects that officials in the video game industry did not formally object to, but instead expressed admiration for. In the meantime, the ''Mother'' series has regularly appeared in every subsequent ''Super Smash Bros.'' game to date, including ''Mother 3'' being focused on in 2008's ''[[Super Smash Bros. Brawl]]'', though Itoi has announced that he has no plans to direct a fourth ''Mother'' game and reaffirmed this statement several times. In the years to come, developers large and small would create role-playing games that would draw heavy inspiration from the world, humor, and battle system of the ''Mother'' series, including the critically-acclaimed {{uvm3|Undertale}} in 2015. Although the series is seldom referenced directly by Nintendo, the rights held to it by Itoi have enabled the continued development of merchandise and other projects honoring its legacy, such as a collaborative tribute book and a rearranged version of the first game's studio album.

Unfortunately, Nintendo of America would once more decline to localize the game for Western audiences, once again apparently because of fears that its inconvenient timing at the end of the commercial lifespan of the platform it was based on would negatively affect its sales. The fansite Starmen.net made headlines in October 2008 when it released its own English translation patch that could be applied to a copy of the ROM image of ''Mother 3''. This monumental translation effort was spearheaded by professional translator Clyde "Tomato" Mandelin and the patch received over 100,000 downloads from the website in the first week of its release. Despite the project not being completely legal, it became one of a handful of unofficial video game localization projects that officials in the video game industry did not formally object to, but instead expressed admiration for. In the meantime, the ''Mother'' series has regularly appeared in every subsequent ''Super Smash Bros.'' game to date, including ''Mother 3'' being focused on in 2008's ''[[Super Smash Bros. Brawl]]'', though Itoi has announced that he has no plans to direct a fourth ''Mother'' game and reaffirmed this statement several times. In the years to come, developers large and small would create role-playing games that would draw heavy inspiration from the world, humor, and battle system of the ''Mother'' series, including the critically-acclaimed {{uvm3|Undertale}} in 2015 by [[Toby Fox]], and more recently ''{{iw|wikipedia|Omori|video game}}'' in 2020 by omocat. Although the series is seldom referenced directly by Nintendo, the rights held to it by Itoi have enabled the continued development of merchandise and other projects honoring its legacy, such as a collaborative tribute book and a rearranged version of the first game's studio album.

Eventually, ''EarthBound'' was rereleased in the west on the Virtual Console service, and throughout the recent years the series has had multiple rereleases across different platforms:

Line 41:

Each of the ''Mother'' / ''EarthBound'' games are relatively loosely connected stories set on a fictional rendition of Earth, with the setting and scenario being different each game:

:[[wikibound:EarthBound Beginnings|'''''Mother''''' / '''''EarthBound Beginnings''''']]: The first game in the series starring a young boy with psychic powers named {{iw|wikibound|Ninten}}. In 1988, a 12-year-old American boy named Ninten, living in a town named {{iw|wikibound|Podunk}}, discovers that an alien race is invading the world, and is then warped to the surreal world of [[Magicant]], where its amnesiac queen tasks him to go on a quest to collect pieces of her favorite lullaby, the Eight Melodies, and play them for her. Ninten's quest eventually leads him to a confrontation with the original incarnation of {{iw|wikibound|Giygas}} (whose appearance closely resembles the design of [[Mewtwo]] from the {{uv|Pokémon}} franchise; this may be due to one of the developers of ''Mother'', Ape Inc., becoming permanently involved in the ''Pokémon'' franchise as Creatures, Inc.).

:[[wikibound:EarthBound Beginnings|'''''Mother''''' / '''''EarthBound Beginnings''''']] (1989): The first game in the series starring a young boy with psychic powers named {{iw|wikibound|Ninten}}. In 1988, a 12-year-old American boy named Ninten, living in a town named {{iw|wikibound|Podunk}}, discovers that an alien race is invading the world, and is then warped to the surreal world of [[Magicant]], where its amnesiac queen tasks him to go on a quest to collect pieces of her favorite lullaby, the Eight Melodies, and play them for her. Ninten's quest eventually leads him to a confrontation with the original incarnation of {{iw|wikibound|Giygas}} (whose appearance closely resembles the design of [[Mewtwo]] from the {{uv|Pokémon}} franchise; this may be due to one of the developers of ''Mother'', Ape Inc., becoming permanently involved in the ''Pokémon'' franchise as Creatures, Inc.).

:[[wikibound:EarthBound|'''''Mother 2''''' / '''''EarthBound''''']]: The second game in the series stars [[Ness]], a young boy who was similarly granted with special psychic powers. In the 1990s, a resident of the fictional country Eagleland, Ness, is told by a tiny bee-like alien from the future, Buzz Buzz, that a hostile alien named Giygas is fated to dominate the universe in the future, and Ness must go on a quest to visit eight sanctuaries to unite his own powers with the Earth and gain the strength required to confront Giygas in the past. But along the way, Ness is repeatedly harassed by his obnoxious next-door neighbor, [[Porky Minch]] (rendered as "Pokey Minch" in ''EarthBound''), who is eventually revealed to have become Giygas' right-hand man and a willing believer that the universe should be destroyed. Ness and his friends' infamously disturbing final battle against Giygas - who has long since been driven incoherent and physically rendered into a visually frightening, gaseous form by his own boundless power - comes to demonstrate that Ness' quest to hone his power is insufficient to win (referencing a theme of the previous game that "brute force is not enough"), and so the heroes can only fall back on praying for help to come out alive.

:[[wikibound:EarthBound|'''''Mother 2''''' / '''''EarthBound''''']] (1994): The second game in the series stars [[Ness]], a young boy who was similarly granted with special psychic powers. In the 1990s, a resident of the fictional country Eagleland, Ness, is told by a tiny bee-like alien from the future, Buzz Buzz, that a hostile alien named Giygas is fated to dominate the universe in the future, and Ness must go on a quest to visit eight sanctuaries to unite his own powers with the Earth and gain the strength required to confront Giygas in the past. But along the way, Ness is repeatedly harassed by his obnoxious next-door neighbor, [[Porky Minch]] (rendered as "Pokey Minch" in ''EarthBound''), who is eventually revealed to have become Giygas' right-hand man and a willing believer that the universe should be destroyed. Ness and his friends' infamously disturbing final battle against Giygas - who has long since been driven incoherent and physically rendered into a visually frightening, gaseous form by his own boundless power - comes to demonstrate that Ness' quest to hone his power is insufficient to win (referencing a theme of the previous game that "brute force is not enough"), and so the heroes can only fall back on praying for help to come out alive.

:'''''{{iw|wikibound|Mother 3}}''''': The final game in the series, starring [[Lucas]]. In an unknown time period long after the events of ''EarthBound'', a resident of a rural egalitarian village known as Tazmily in the {{iw|wikibound|Nowhere Islands}}, Lucas, and his father {{iw|wikibound|Flint}}, tragically lose his mother, {{iw|wikibound|Hinawa}}, and his brother, {{iw|wikibound|Claus}}, goes missing - both as a result of the arrival of an army of mysterious pig-masked soldiers. In a story told from multiple perspectives, Lucas is eventually thrust into a quest to pull out seven special needles spread out across the island before the Pigmasks and their [[wikibound:Masked Man|mysterious masked field commander]] can do the same, for the world would be destroyed if the needles are pulled by those of evil intentions. It is eventually revealed that the "King" of the Pigmasks and author of the plot to have the masked man destroy the world is Porky Minch, having traveled across time and space to the present and being rendered immortal by the effects of time travel. Lucas's quest ends at the capital of Porky's invasive, hedonistic, and industrious society on the Nowhere Islands, [[New Pork City]], where he fights both Porky in his last stand and the Masked Man himself, who turns out to be none other than a brainwashed Claus, in front of the final needle.

:'''''{{iw|wikibound|Mother 3}}''''' (2006): The final game in the series, starring [[Lucas]]. In an unknown time period long after the events of ''EarthBound'', a resident of a rural egalitarian village known as Tazmily in the {{iw|wikibound|Nowhere Islands}}, Lucas, and his father {{iw|wikibound|Flint}}, tragically lose his mother, {{iw|wikibound|Hinawa}}, and his brother, {{iw|wikibound|Claus}}, goes missing - both as a result of the arrival of an army of mysterious pig-masked soldiers. In a story told from multiple perspectives, Lucas is eventually thrust into a quest to pull out seven special needles spread out across the island before the Pigmasks and their [[wikibound:Masked Man|mysterious masked field commander]] can do the same, for the world would be destroyed if the needles are pulled by those of evil intentions. It is eventually revealed that the "King" of the Pigmasks and author of the plot to have the masked man destroy the world is Porky Minch, having traveled across time and space to the present and being rendered immortal by the effects of time travel. Lucas's quest ends at the capital of Porky's invasive, hedonistic, and industrious society on the Nowhere Islands, [[New Pork City]], where he fights both Porky in his last stand and the Masked Man himself, who turns out to be none other than a brainwashed Claus, in front of the final needle.

==In ''[[Super Smash Bros.]]''==

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@@ Line 32: / Line 32: @@
 Itoi and Nintendo eventually decided to rerelease both ''Mother'' titles in Japan as ports compiled on one Game Boy Advance cartridge, ''Mother 1 + 2'', which was released in June 2003 in Japan and included all of the enhancements the English prototype had made to the original ''Mother''; to the dismay of fans, this was never released in the West either. However, Itoi realized he would once again be pressured into reviving ''Mother 3'', an idea he was initially opposed to, but encouragement from fans led to his decision to restart development for the game for Game Boy Advance, which he approached as though he were developing his magnum opus. After three years of development, ''{{iw|wikibound|Mother 3}}'' (essentially now a Game Boy Advance recreation of ''EarthBound 64'') was finally released in Japan in April 2006, twelve years after development began and over a year after the launch of the handheld's successor, the Nintendo DS. This Game Boy Advance title returned the series to a two-dimensional aesthetic but placed more emphasis on a serious plot and character interaction and tweaked gameplay elements of its predecessors. It was released to critical acclaim that praised its new rhythm-based but otherwise simple approach to turn-based combat and, most significantly, tragic storytelling and characterization that achieved a rarely seen degree of depth in titles in the genre.
-Unfortunately, Nintendo of America would once more decline to localize the game for Western audiences, once again apparently because of fears that its inconvenient timing at the end of the commercial lifespan of the platform it was based on would negatively affect its sales. The fansite Starmen.net made headlines in October 2008 when it released its own English translation patch that could be applied to a copy of the ROM image of ''Mother 3''. This monumental translation effort was spearheaded by professional translator Clyde "Tomato" Mandelin and the patch received over 100,000 downloads from the website in the first week of its release. Despite the project not being completely legal, it became one of a handful of unofficial video game localization projects that officials in the video game industry did not formally object to, but instead expressed admiration for. In the meantime, the ''Mother'' series has regularly appeared in every subsequent ''Super Smash Bros.'' game to date, including ''Mother 3'' being focused on in 2008's ''[[Super Smash Bros. Brawl]]'', though Itoi has announced that he has no plans to direct a fourth ''Mother'' game and reaffirmed this statement several times. In the years to come, developers large and small would create role-playing games that would draw heavy inspiration from the world, humor, and battle system of the ''Mother'' series, including the critically-acclaimed {{uvm3|Undertale}} in 2015. Although the series is seldom referenced directly by Nintendo, the rights held to it by Itoi have enabled the continued development of merchandise and other projects honoring its legacy, such as a collaborative tribute book and a rearranged version of the first game's studio album.
+Unfortunately, Nintendo of America would once more decline to localize the game for Western audiences, once again apparently because of fears that its inconvenient timing at the end of the commercial lifespan of the platform it was based on would negatively affect its sales. The fansite Starmen.net made headlines in October 2008 when it released its own English translation patch that could be applied to a copy of the ROM image of ''Mother 3''. This monumental translation effort was spearheaded by professional translator Clyde "Tomato" Mandelin and the patch received over 100,000 downloads from the website in the first week of its release. Despite the project not being completely legal, it became one of a handful of unofficial video game localization projects that officials in the video game industry did not formally object to, but instead expressed admiration for. In the meantime, the ''Mother'' series has regularly appeared in every subsequent ''Super Smash Bros.'' game to date, including ''Mother 3'' being focused on in 2008's ''[[Super Smash Bros. Brawl]]'', though Itoi has announced that he has no plans to direct a fourth ''Mother'' game and reaffirmed this statement several times. In the years to come, developers large and small would create role-playing games that would draw heavy inspiration from the world, humor, and battle system of the ''Mother'' series, including the critically-acclaimed {{uvm3|Undertale}} in 2015 by [[Toby Fox]], and more recently ''{{iw|wikipedia|Omori|video game}}'' in 2020 by omocat. Although the series is seldom referenced directly by Nintendo, the rights held to it by Itoi have enabled the continued development of merchandise and other projects honoring its legacy, such as a collaborative tribute book and a rearranged version of the first game's studio album.
 Eventually, ''EarthBound'' was rereleased in the west on the Virtual Console service, and throughout the recent years the series has had multiple rereleases across different platforms:
@@ Line 41: / Line 41: @@
 Each of the ''Mother'' / ''EarthBound'' games are relatively loosely connected stories set on a fictional rendition of Earth, with the setting and scenario being different each game:
-:[[wikibound:EarthBound Beginnings|'''''Mother''''' / '''''EarthBound Beginnings''''']]: The first game in the series starring a young boy with psychic powers named {{iw|wikibound|Ninten}}. In 1988, a 12-year-old American boy named Ninten, living in a town named {{iw|wikibound|Podunk}}, discovers that an alien race is invading the world, and is then warped to the surreal world of [[Magicant]], where its amnesiac queen tasks him to go on a quest to collect pieces of her favorite lullaby, the Eight Melodies, and play them for her. Ninten's quest eventually leads him to a confrontation with the original incarnation of {{iw|wikibound|Giygas}} (whose appearance closely resembles the design of [[Mewtwo]] from the {{uv|Pokémon}} franchise; this may be due to one of the developers of ''Mother'', Ape Inc., becoming permanently involved in the ''Pokémon'' franchise as Creatures, Inc.).
+:[[wikibound:EarthBound Beginnings|'''''Mother''''' / '''''EarthBound Beginnings''''']] (1989): The first game in the series starring a young boy with psychic powers named {{iw|wikibound|Ninten}}. In 1988, a 12-year-old American boy named Ninten, living in a town named {{iw|wikibound|Podunk}}, discovers that an alien race is invading the world, and is then warped to the surreal world of [[Magicant]], where its amnesiac queen tasks him to go on a quest to collect pieces of her favorite lullaby, the Eight Melodies, and play them for her. Ninten's quest eventually leads him to a confrontation with the original incarnation of {{iw|wikibound|Giygas}} (whose appearance closely resembles the design of [[Mewtwo]] from the {{uv|Pokémon}} franchise; this may be due to one of the developers of ''Mother'', Ape Inc., becoming permanently involved in the ''Pokémon'' franchise as Creatures, Inc.).
-:[[wikibound:EarthBound|'''''Mother 2''''' / '''''EarthBound''''']]: The second game in the series stars [[Ness]], a young boy who was similarly granted with special psychic powers. In the 1990s, a resident of the fictional country Eagleland, Ness, is told by a tiny bee-like alien from the future, Buzz Buzz, that a hostile alien named Giygas is fated to dominate the universe in the future, and Ness must go on a quest to visit eight sanctuaries to unite his own powers with the Earth and gain the strength required to confront Giygas in the past. But along the way, Ness is repeatedly harassed by his obnoxious next-door neighbor, [[Porky Minch]] (rendered as "Pokey Minch" in ''EarthBound''), who is eventually revealed to have become Giygas' right-hand man and a willing believer that the universe should be destroyed. Ness and his friends' infamously disturbing final battle against Giygas - who has long since been driven incoherent and physically rendered into a visually frightening, gaseous form by his own boundless power - comes to demonstrate that Ness' quest to hone his power is insufficient to win (referencing a theme of the previous game that "brute force is not enough"), and so the heroes can only fall back on praying for help to come out alive.
+:[[wikibound:EarthBound|'''''Mother 2''''' / '''''EarthBound''''']] (1994): The second game in the series stars [[Ness]], a young boy who was similarly granted with special psychic powers. In the 1990s, a resident of the fictional country Eagleland, Ness, is told by a tiny bee-like alien from the future, Buzz Buzz, that a hostile alien named Giygas is fated to dominate the universe in the future, and Ness must go on a quest to visit eight sanctuaries to unite his own powers with the Earth and gain the strength required to confront Giygas in the past. But along the way, Ness is repeatedly harassed by his obnoxious next-door neighbor, [[Porky Minch]] (rendered as "Pokey Minch" in ''EarthBound''), who is eventually revealed to have become Giygas' right-hand man and a willing believer that the universe should be destroyed. Ness and his friends' infamously disturbing final battle against Giygas - who has long since been driven incoherent and physically rendered into a visually frightening, gaseous form by his own boundless power - comes to demonstrate that Ness' quest to hone his power is insufficient to win (referencing a theme of the previous game that "brute force is not enough"), and so the heroes can only fall back on praying for help to come out alive.
-:'''''{{iw|wikibound|Mother 3}}''''': The final game in the series, starring [[Lucas]]. In an unknown time period long after the events of ''EarthBound'', a resident of a rural egalitarian village known as Tazmily in the {{iw|wikibound|Nowhere Islands}}, Lucas, and his father {{iw|wikibound|Flint}}, tragically lose his mother, {{iw|wikibound|Hinawa}}, and his brother, {{iw|wikibound|Claus}}, goes missing - both as a result of the arrival of an army of mysterious pig-masked soldiers. In a story told from multiple perspectives, Lucas is eventually thrust into a quest to pull out seven special needles spread out across the island before the Pigmasks and their [[wikibound:Masked Man|mysterious masked field commander]] can do the same, for the world would be destroyed if the needles are pulled by those of evil intentions. It is eventually revealed that the "King" of the Pigmasks and author of the plot to have the masked man destroy the world is Porky Minch, having traveled across time and space to the present and being rendered immortal by the effects of time travel. Lucas's quest ends at the capital of Porky's invasive, hedonistic, and industrious society on the Nowhere Islands, [[New Pork City]], where he fights both Porky in his last stand and the Masked Man himself, who turns out to be none other than a brainwashed Claus, in front of the final needle.
+:'''''{{iw|wikibound|Mother 3}}''''' (2006): The final game in the series, starring [[Lucas]]. In an unknown time period long after the events of ''EarthBound'', a resident of a rural egalitarian village known as Tazmily in the {{iw|wikibound|Nowhere Islands}}, Lucas, and his father {{iw|wikibound|Flint}}, tragically lose his mother, {{iw|wikibound|Hinawa}}, and his brother, {{iw|wikibound|Claus}}, goes missing - both as a result of the arrival of an army of mysterious pig-masked soldiers. In a story told from multiple perspectives, Lucas is eventually thrust into a quest to pull out seven special needles spread out across the island before the Pigmasks and their [[wikibound:Masked Man|mysterious masked field commander]] can do the same, for the world would be destroyed if the needles are pulled by those of evil intentions. It is eventually revealed that the "King" of the Pigmasks and author of the plot to have the masked man destroy the world is Porky Minch, having traveled across time and space to the present and being rendered immortal by the effects of time travel. Lucas's quest ends at the capital of Porky's invasive, hedonistic, and industrious society on the Nowhere Islands, [[New Pork City]], where he fights both Porky in his last stand and the Masked Man himself, who turns out to be none other than a brainwashed Claus, in front of the final needle.
 ==In ''[[Super Smash Bros.]]''==