After playing Earthbound I have to say I really liked the game, I wanted to move on with the series but the only problem is that mother 3 was made in only Japan and this go without saying that obviously the language in the game is Japanese so how would I be able to review a game in Japanese? Well there is an answer, a dedicated work of fans made a fan translation for mother 3 into english so with that information this was a no brainer to play and I'm so glad that I got to play this outstanding game.
Story:The story of Mother 3 is pure brilliance, The story starts of with everything in the world great, we our introduced to the town of Tazmily. Everyone here knows eachother and everyone gets along with eachother because there is no money in this town which basically means that there is no human conflict because there is not a want to have more. Mother three is played through chapters eight to be exact the story dosen't reach it's main plot until really the fourth chapter while chapter one through three are explaining more of how things will eventually go down. I will give a bit of an overveiw for most of the chapters. The first chapter is basically the introduction of us meeting the main family in this game, Lucas, Claus, Hinawa, and Flint. Hinawa and the boys Clause and Lucas are at their uncles house and are having a good time.You start playing as Flint and that is when things are going a bit crazy in Tazmily. There is a huge forest fire and it's up to flint to try to help the town put it out. After this we get some really bad news it turns out that Hinawa and the boys should have been home right now and some of the people in Tazmily are worried. As time goes by Alex(Claus and Lucas uncle) delivers some very bad news to Flint it turns out that Alex had seen a Drago peirce Hinawa's heart(A drago is basically a dinosaur that is usually very peaceful, and wow isn't this supposed to be a kids game? What a dark game, and I love it.) she was protecting both her children and unfortunatley died in the process, Lucas and clause are ok until we find out that later Claus later runs away and after a long time searching Flint can not find Clause but the person who is playing at the end of chapter two sees Claus lying on the floor(is he dead? We don't really know but one has to presume he might be). As you go through the story we meet a man by the name of fassad, he's an evil greedy son of a bitch who basically wants to change Tazmily into any other city, with money and whats basically a brainwashing TV, crazy things are going on and Lucas, Kumatora(A girl you meet later in the game) Duster(one of the sons of a man who lives in Tazmily, and Boney(Lucas's dog) this is the main characters in the game their basically after Fassad for the main part of the story but there is a lot of the story that I will explain more later in the review.
Presentation:When it comes to Mother 3's presentation everything is just perfect, the art style, the graphics, the sound, the characters are all just perfect, Mother three goes for more of a different art style then Earthbound does(or mother 2 whatever you want to call it) its more of just many place you can go instead of mostly visiting towns like in Earthbound both have their own style too it and both are great. The sound for a GBA game is really good every song to the soundtrack plays really well and the soundtrack itself probably has to be one of the most memorable soundtracks in gaming every song in the game is memorable I mean pretty much every single one, there is not one moment in the game where there is a melody that is bad all of them just add so much more immersion to the game. Earthbound had a lot of charm when it came to its characters and Mother 3 is no different in fact I would probably say that the characters in Mother 3 are even better, you will always run into weird quirky characters that will always put a smile on your face, its not that they say something funny all the time, its the way they say it that makes everything hilarious, and that's what makes this game so charming. The presentation is perfect hands down.
Gameplay: If there is any complaints with the game Earthbound it was that when you would fight with enemies their wouldn't be much animation to the actual game, and sad to say that that's pretty much the case in Mother 3, but you know what the mother series really isn't about that so if you are looking for some pretty type of RPG with masterful attack animations then this isn't the game for you, but you know what the Mother series does everything else right and really doesn't even need that. Mother 3 is just like the other games in the series when it comes to it's gameplay with little added tweaks, when you encounter a battle you can mash the A button to the beat of the song and continue to attack your foe over and over again, this can get a little repetitive however you don't really have to do it every single time and when it comes to actual bosses it's really not needed that much because you will be using a lot of PSI attacks. The actual Rpg mechanic to this game is really good its the same aspect of going after your enemy strategically so you can get free hits in by attacking from behind, the battles themselves maybe aren't in as much depth as a game like Final Fantasy 6 however they don't need to be you've got your basic PSI moves that will help out immensely in battling and there are also other nifty things that your other characters can do in the game. There is one nitpick I do have to get out of the way with this game though, when you are about to learn a new PSI move your character develops a fever, making you unable to run until he or she gets over it and actually learns the move, I like the idea of this but running is kind of essential in this game why did they do this? Their isn't a whole lot of new variety when it comes to PSI moves also and to tell the truth I don't even think their our any new PSI moves, this is a bit disappointing but the ones that our there are still enjoyable to use. When it comes to the difficulty to the game it's a bit mixed up, some bosses are harder then other and some bosses are easier then others and same thing with all the areas, for the most part most of the game is pretty easy for the most part if you know what you are doing, but even in the end those who are experienced in this game are going to have to grind at least a little because you will get rocked if not, there are going to be some areas in the game where you will have to grind but there is never too much of it which doesn't make it bothersome, one great thing also is when you die the game still saves your progress or experience you have earned some might look at this as giving you a free pass but I think every RPG should be this way it's not fair when you die from grinding and lose all your progress and thank God Mother 3 does not do that. The gameplay in Mother 3 might not be for everyone but I think it's a lot of fun and if you ask me I think it works perfectly and is amazing.
(Spoiler Alert) The real story of the game really doesn't start to really progress into it's main plot until the fourth chapter, when you finally play as the main group you will play through the game and once you progress into the seventh and eighth chapter is where things really start heating up, some people might see the other chapters as filler because of this but they aren't in fact every single chapter is very necessary not just to the plot but it also helps a lot for character development and not only that but character progression also, and I think it is implemented perfectly, As you progress to chapter seven you learn that there is a dragon that has been put to sleep by the magypsy's(who are basically transgendered people... uh well thats a bit strange for a kids game lol) they sealed this dragon because the last time it was awakened it was awakened by a dark hearted person and wreaked havoc around the world, that is why they sealed it away. There is catch to this needle business if a person pure of heart gets the majority of these needles the world will heal itself Lucas must race to get the majority of these needles but he is going to need all the help he can get because a masked kid is capturing most of them. So the final progression of the plot tells us that all of this has been done by that damn evil kid Porky from Earthbound, I know most of you are probably thinking how is that possible? Well it turns out that Porky somehow was able to master hopping through universes which means that he is in a completely different universe then Ness now and not only that but somehow Porky has become immortal thanks to Giygas, the only way you beat him is by locking him in a magic ball that never opens(so now he is stuck in their forever I couldn't imagine a worse hell lol) Now Lucas must retrieve the final needle but that one masked kid is blocking it, before the battle Flint reveals that the masked kid is no one other then Claus so Lucas must fight the hardest battle yet the fight with his brother, As Lucas goes after him Claus shoots him with a lightning bolt and Lucas Franklin Badge deflects it back at him however Kumatora, Duster and Boney are down for the count it's just Lucas versus Claus now. The battle begins and what you witness is possibly the best boss battle in gaming and probably one of the most iconic scenes in gaming, and probably the most heartbreaking scenes in gaming also Claus will start the battle of firing away at you just hitting Lucas with his best attacks, but Lucas just can't bring himself to attack his own brother, in fact throughout the battle no matter how many times you command Lucas to fight Lucas he won't do it. As you progress slowly through the battle Hinawa somehow speaks to both her sons she tells them that they are brothers and that they love each other and should stop fighting as the fight progresses Clauses attacks get weaker and weaker and finally Claus takes his helmet off but even with the helmet off Claus is still being controlled by it, Lucas wont stop him so Claus has to so with one last bolt of lightning Claus strikes Lucas knowing that it will reflect back and kill him, This has got to be one of the most saddest parts in a game Claus dies in Flints arm while Lucas and Flint can do nothing but watch to think that we though Claus was already dead and to have to watch him die again is just heartbreaking. After this it is up to Lucas to pull the final needle and what happens? The world ends up destroying itself, I kid you not, what an absolute heartbreaking story I couldn't believe this, this is possibly the best story in a video game, this is why I gave this game a perfect ten, I'm sure you can probably argue that this game is not worth that score but you know what this is one of those games that will resonate with you forever, and to me that is what makes it so special, I truly love this game and it's possibly one of my favorite games of all time. One more thing I wanted to mention for this game was that there is a possible way of making the game continue after this, and it does show that everyone is alright, but to be honest I only think this was put in for kids who play this game just to tell them that everything turned out ok, I don't know I think it will be a different interpretation for everyone all I know is the story is flawless, it's just so damn perfect.
Overall Nintendo should be ashamed that they haven't brought this game to the west, what do they not like money? Look I get it their our some questionable things in this game for a kid, but rate it teen who the hell cares? Kids get their hands on mature games all the time you would still get a bunch of money for this(Oh the review?... right). Mother 3 is a game that all gamers should play it's pretty easy to play get the fan translation and play it this is a must play game, don't miss out on one of the best games ever made. The sheer pleasure of the story is enough for anyone to enjoy this game.