This game lets me feel like a kid in the 90s again « EarthBound / MOTHER 2 « Forum

Phazon_Corrupted Giygas

Long time no see, Starmen.net! How long has it been? I think it’s been 12 years so far since I’ve been here, but the Universal Cosmic Destroyer powered by the sentient radioactive all-consuming chemical returns!

Anyways, I’ve come to say that no matter how much time has passed, Earthbound to me feels like it immortalizes the feelings of the 90s. It allows me and I assume other players to feel like a kid going on adventures in America during the 90s. I don’t know if Itoi has been here, but it feels like he’s been to America! Onett and Twoson feel like towns or small cities with suburbs like where I was raised! Going into Fourside gives me the feelings when I was young whenever my family would drive by/through city areas with skyscrapers.

Even though I work and am in my early 30s, playing Earthbound puts me through the perspective of Ness, and Ness allows me to feel like a kid doing stuff again with less fear of breaking rules/laws. For me personally since I have black hair, Ness is able to feel like an even better avatar. Earthbound will always be dear to me since it is the embodiment of the 90s and the time of my early childhood. It’s as if Itoi took all the vibes of 90s America, and put it into a time capsule for the future to endure.

As long as the information that allows Earthbound to be playable is stored and open to the public, to me it can keep the 90s immortalized. Earthbound itself feels timeless to me no matter how much time passes, even with game graphics soon to be indistinguishable from reality.

MondoBilby

That’s one of the things I love about Earthbound too. It makes me oddly nostalgic for the 90s even though I wasn’t even alive in that era. Itoi did a really good job of capturing the feel of 90s America, and it’s also funny that I feel that because I’ve never even been to America.
Basically what I’m saying is, Itoi is a genius lol.

Oh, I’m REAL funny.

Have a squiz at my art: https://mondobilby.newgrounds.com/

archonic

I know, right? I wasn’t alive in the 90s either, but somehow Earthbound makes me feel nostalgic in a warm and fuzzy way. Also, isn’t it strange that you can actually call a pizza guy or delivery worker to come to your location instead of just clicking through a menu? And the way that you withdraw money from an ATM, or check into a hotel… it’s all designed to be very physical.

Henry Midfields
7th Duke of Na****ria

I’ve played this many years ago myself. And now, revisiting this, I say that Earthbound is the best Nintendo example of how America is depicted. As many people mentioned before, Onnett and Twoson are a very good depiction of suburban America with so many pop culture references from the 90s USA era.

On a tangent: I actually dislike Pokemon BW for this very reason. It’s another game that is supposed to depict an alternate USA, but compared to Earthbound, they did a half-hearted job depicting the region. Some aspects feel too generic, like Castelia City looking like some random downtown anywhere, while Fourside’s Art Deco and Historic, wedding cake-looking skyscrapers and buildings actually look like an American city that grew in the late 19th and early 20th Century. Or how almost none of the smaller cities (with maybe Aspertia or Nacrene being the exception) are like Onnett or Twoson with its wide suburban roads, shops, and houses, nor its Everytown USA feel.

Or how they ended up not adpoting some of the more American aspect of the game, like its near-obsession with politics. I dislike how Ghetsis was some sort of medieval king – which feels out of place for a modern/future-set game and in a country that was anti-monarchial to start with. Corrupt politicians similar to Monotoli would have been appropriate villains showcasing how corrupt politics ruin everything – especially now that we got a particular demagogue (who made a name for himself in the 90s). While I wasn’t too keen on BW/Unova’s region worldbuilding, it feels worse now that I’m revisiting Earthbound, together with XY onwards, or GSC in the past, more fully, obviously, or stereotypically depicting their real-life counterparts.

Starmen.Net

EarthBound / MOTHER 2