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EarthBotched: A History of Nintendo vs. Starmen

shacknews.com — Shacknews editor Aaron Linde goes in depth on the history behind EarthBound journey to the Wii's Virtual Console.

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  • Ninten1, on 05/08/2008, -3/+44Great article.
    • indigit4l, on 05/08/2008, -0/+7Yeah, I actually bought this game the first weekend it came out. The huge box was a big selling point
  • currybunny, on 05/08/2008, -0/+69You know, I'm quite surprised Nintendo hasn't re-released Earthbound already.
    Honestly, they released Donkey Kong Jr. math on the virtual console, and it's fan-base and sales I'm sure are frigging minuscule.

    Point is, if they don't release Earthbound soon with all this recent hype about it going around,
    they are going to lose a lot of sales when/if they decide to later on.
  • haxr, on 05/08/2008, -0/+17In the end, this whole article is just an argument for distribution engineers. There needs to be a way to make money off something people want, and if you can get it to them at a cost that results in a profit, it should be done.
    • navster15, on 05/08/2008, -0/+2Totally agree with you. I'm assuming that the game already made a profit in Japan, so any NA sales would just be gravy to them. Sure they'll have to pay for translators and logistics to get the game here, but I highly doubt they'd lose money. At worst, Nintendo will have broken even on NA sales, but they will have gone a long way in building a positive relationship relationship with a devoted fanbase that can be parlayed into a future project.
  • NaziHatinChimp, on 05/08/2008, -0/+25Been going to starmen.net for years and years, ever since Mother 3 was a game for the 64DD. Love to hear some success,
  • Clugenheim, on 05/08/2008, -7/+42¡¢¿£€¥¦§¨©®ª«»¬¯♪º¹²³´µÞþ¶°¼½×±÷ГяЯюэьыъщшЩШчцхфутс
  • eyefone, on 05/08/2008, -45/+3SMRPG >>>>>>> Earthbound.
    • bbqsalad, on 05/08/2008, -4/+4lol.
    • DeathJux, on 05/08/2008, -2/+30BANANAS ARE BETTER THAN APPLES!!!

      Oh... wait... different people might prefer one over the other.
      • Clugenheim, on 05/08/2008, -1/+4Truer words HAVE been spoken, but this is still true nonetheless. :D
    • Zarokima, on 05/08/2008, -0/+8They're both thoroughly enjoyable, and neither one is ">>>>>>>" the other, just simply ">," and I'd probably have to give it to Earthbound for the quirky humour. But that's just because I'm into that sort of thing, although some people aren't.
      • evillawngnome, on 05/08/2008, -0/+5I'd give it to earthbound for being so radically outside the box, but again, i have to agree with you that neither one is FAR SUPERIOR, they're both outstanding examples of quality gaming from that era.
    • Nin10dude, on 05/08/2008, -0/+2Super Mario RPG is an amazing game, but I'd have to give it the #2 spot. EarthBound's still king.
    • farfromsubtl, on 05/09/2008, -0/+1Apple Kids to Orange Kids my friend.
  • PoopSalad, on 05/08/2008, -0/+48RIP buzzbuzz
    • Chebsi, on 05/08/2008, -0/+16BUZZBUZZ DIES?!
      • contradictator, on 05/08/2008, -0/+11Ok, nobody tell him about Aeris then, I don't think he could handle it.
      • Y2JCrisis, on 05/09/2008, -0/+1I believe he is mistaken for a dung beetle...
    • farfromsubtl, on 05/09/2008, -0/+1Spoiler alert!
  • bbqsalad, on 05/08/2008, -0/+52Mother 1+2+3 for DS and in english please. Save Tomato and Jeffman, Those guys are working very hard on something NOA should have done a while ago.
    • kelerian, on 05/08/2008, -0/+8Nintendo should make up for all of this by releasing this package to fans. That's the least they should do now.
    • kingofthisnight, on 05/08/2008, -0/+3I don't own a DS but if Mother 1, 2, and 3 came out I would go out and buy one right away.
  • scot333, on 05/08/2008, -19/+1buried for WGAF
    • evillawngnome, on 05/08/2008, -0/+4burying you for not knowing what's good
  • TobiasParker, on 05/08/2008, -2/+23I have a Earthbound tattoo.
    • Zarokima, on 05/08/2008, -1/+34Pics or you're lying.

      If you can provide pics you're one of the most awesome people I've ever met.
      • jjustice, on 05/08/2008, -0/+1Or a 'shopper. But I'll give TobiasParker's hypothetical pics the benefit of the doubt =]
    • leonhyral, on 05/08/2008, -0/+2Perhaps the only tattoo that could bring a smile to my face when I'm ninety years old and crippled.
  • beyondinfinity, on 05/08/2008, -2/+30EARTHBOUND starring...Ness the boy wonder, Paula the physic prodigy, Jeff the mechanical wizard, And Poo the expert martial artist.

    Any game with enemies including aliens, piles of barf, robots, and psychotic hippies must be a classic.
  • bbqsalad, on 05/08/2008, -0/+15Oh and may I add I thought the advertising for EB was great. It was the scratch and sniff ad in Gamepro mag that made me think about renting the game and then buying it.
  • KirbyMeister, on 05/08/2008, -18/+46This game stinks.
    • Sneakernets, on 05/08/2008, -1/+29heh, why are you getting dugg down? that's from the advert.
  • Black6x, on 05/08/2008, -0/+33Digging through trash cans for hamburgers never sounded better.
  • 4nikate, on 05/08/2008, -1/+44blew blew

    (I'm trying to learn how to whistle)
    • jDerek, on 05/08/2008, -0/+1HA
    • Bokista, on 05/08/2008, -0/+15I screamed 'cause I didn't know what else to do.
    • Elshender, on 05/08/2008, -0/+11Money, that's what I want.
      Money, that's what is hot.
      Money, that's what I want.
      Money, it's what we ain't got,
      'cept freedom, freedom, freedom is what we've really sought!
    • arobicha, on 05/08/2008, -0/+1That was my favorite part of the game. There was something to that cult I tell you... Blue blue blue...
  • Jenadae, on 05/08/2008, -1/+17Give me mother 3 or give me death!

    /croak
  • 1cor1313, on 05/08/2008, -0/+26I can see why the game has such a cult following. It was really quirky and fun. It's sort of sad that they've been ignored by Nintendo. I always figured Nintendo to be the type of company that listens to its fanbase.
    • coheedcollapse, on 05/08/2008, -0/+3Nintendo is just like every other company, they're just great with PR. Mother 3, while awesome in every way, would net them very little money and very little respect for the money they put into it. I doubt they'll ever let us in on it.

      I mean damn, putting Earthbound on there would be as simple as dropping the rom and they haven't even done that.
      • honeymustardn, on 05/08/2008, -0/+2How do you know it would net them very little money? Perhaps EB didn't back in 95, but it's 13 years since then, audiences have changed, the Mother series now has vastly more awareness due to its exposure in SSB/M/B.
      • evillawngnome, on 05/08/2008, -0/+1Coheedcollapse, did you or 1cor1313 read the article?
        "A source inside Nintendo revealed that the company conducted an internal "culture audit" late last year and found that it ranked in the lower 9th percentile among 850 companies for altering their business based on consumer feedback. "
    • arobicha, on 05/08/2008, -2/+1Then you'd be wrong. Nintendo likes "pushing the boundaries of conventional gaming" by releasing the same games over and over again with a new controller. Earthbound, The Squaresoft games, and the Enix "Soulblazer" series were hands down the best games on the SNES. None of them came from Nintendo's mind.
      • evillawngnome, on 05/08/2008, -0/+1man, for true. Nintendo has been TERRIBLE about that lately, but it seems like that's the general theme in gaming today. All the first class developers are comfy with their AAAA series, content to just put out a sequel rather than coming up with something new. We're seeing innovation less and less these days.
    • Andrwmorph, on 05/08/2008, -0/+3I like how they are in the bottom 9% for companies that listen to their customers. That is quite sad for a company that is so outwardly friendly. I guess its all about the monies.
  • TheBubbleMonkey, on 05/08/2008, -0/+23The single greatest game i've ever played. It's stuck with me ever since i first played it. The music in this game is perfect. This game better get released on the VC or I will take to the streets and rally with my new age retro hippies and cranky old ladies
    • Bokista, on 05/09/2008, -0/+1Seemed to have had an effect on your username.
  • coheedcollapse, on 05/08/2008, -0/+11Those ads were damn memorable. I remember two of them in particular - Ness at the end of his journey without bathing at all, and the mole enemy (it just smelled like grass).

    I grew up on this game. It was (and still is) one of my favorite RPG's of all time. It's sad to see Nintendo ignoring such an incredible franchise.
  • keepinithamsta, on 05/08/2008, -0/+14Earthbound is still my favorite game of all time. I'd love to see the Mother trilogy in English in a bundle with a limited edition DS or even a GBA...
  • XenoSNK, on 05/08/2008, -1/+36NOA_ANDY: OK, I have a question here for ya ... Let's just get this one out of the way ...
    ZERO_13: Are there any plans to bring the MOTHER 3 game to USA?
    NOA_BILL: Was there a question Andy? Haven't seen one yet!
    NOA_RAMTOWER: Alan already answered it.
    NOA_RAMTOWER: He's got me beat for speedy fingers.
    NOA_ALAN: Mother 3 plans?
    NOA_NATE: What's Mother 3?
    NOA_ALAN: Um...
    NOA_RAMTOWER: There's a Mother 3?

    Taken from a transcript at Camp Hyrule I think in '06. I hate NOA.
  • ryleyleckie, on 05/08/2008, -0/+20best game ever
  • Schmapdi, on 05/08/2008, -0/+19As a big Earthbound fan, I'm hoping the inclusion of Lucas in SSB:B will help increase the popularity of the series enough for Nintendo to release Mother 3 stateside at some point. Ala how Marth and Roy in SSB:M helped get Fire Emblem enough recognition for them to test the waters here.
  • shertzerj, on 05/08/2008, -0/+24A tradition of mine (which started a number of years ago) is that a summer cannot go by without me playing through EarthBound. Every year I spend more and more time trying to get the Sword of Kings.
    • MewtwoReturns, on 05/08/2008, -0/+6Dugg up because I'm replaying the game right now, and I'm stuck trying to get the Sword of Kings before Ness hits 99, because I don't want to lose the huge Magicant stat boost you miss out on if he hits 99 before then.
    • AmaDaden, on 05/08/2008, -0/+1You too? For some reason EarthBound = happy sunny days in my head. I get desire to play it every summer.
    • acero47, on 05/08/2008, -0/+1I have like 4 other games I just bought, but now I'm considering replaying this too. I'm not sure whether to be happy or angry about that. There's so many games I want to play and so little time.
    • evillawngnome, on 05/08/2008, -0/+1I lucked into it my last playthrough. Jeeeeealous much? :D
  • Wronghead, on 05/08/2008, -0/+37Translating an existing game for a US release is a financial risk? How the ***** could this be any more of a risk than the hundreds of ***** titles that get released every year? Earthbound rocked. Nintendo is dumb.
    • coheedcollapse, on 05/08/2008, -0/+6The sad thing is that a lot people who picked up the Wii picked it up as their first system and have no idea (or don't care) about the difference between a good and a bad game. If you look at the sales, even super-ultra-***** games that are basically ports of PS2 games with crappy tacked-on controls are selling well. A lot of those people have no idea what they're getting into when they run to the store and pick up "Ninjabread man" or whatever.
  • nowisnothing, on 05/08/2008, -1/+15Earthbound is the one game I still pull out to play through about once a year since it came out in my childhood. Anyone I've ever come across who is familiar with the game (which is unfortunately not too many) seem to share the same affection for it. The VC release is cool, but after all this time drooling over EB64 screens and praying for mother 3 in the US, it's such a consolation prize it doesn't even peak my interest.
  • RobotBuddha, on 05/08/2008, -0/+14That was surprisingly touching. I've always really liked earthbound, and remember the community glee at the news of "earthbound 0". Really looking forward to returning to the story when the fan translation is finished.
  • melonhedd, on 05/08/2008, -26/+0I hope they never release it so all the fanboys keep whining about it.
    • theragu40, on 05/08/2008, -0/+5You're the biggest ***** on earth!
    • leonhyral, on 05/08/2008, -0/+4No one else on this entire site has ever been blocked as quickly as I just blocked you.
  • lik3n, on 05/08/2008, -1/+10I wouldn't leave my house if they released Earthbound for the VC for at least a week.
    • arobicha, on 05/08/2008, -1/+2Meh... I beat it last xmas in 3 days. Got my brothers, mother and dog hooked on it though. My mom still calls me asking for advice on how to beat the Mondo moles.
      • lik3n, on 05/08/2008, -0/+1I'm not saying it's not easy to beat. I've done it a few times. But the replay value on that game is better than any game I've ever played.

        That may just be me, though.
  • zapconquest, on 05/08/2008, -6/+2I put this game on my DS (SNES Emulator) and I have to admit, I like most of it but hate the battles. The humor and the scenery is awesome but the battles remind me way too much of pokemon, and just like in pokemon, there are way too many of them.
    • charleyfeher, on 05/08/2008, -0/+5Did you know that the company Ape, Inc. that developed Mother & Mother 2/EarthBound became/changed it's name to Creatures, Inc. which funded and did the original concepts for Pokemon in addition to owning 1/3 of the Pokemon copyright?

      I only know this because I read through Wikipedia articles and assume all the information found there is 100% valid.
  • chiliwilli, on 05/08/2008, -0/+5hahah this game rocks. I totally forgot about this scene

    http://terror.snm-hgkz.ch/mirrors/thegia/sites/www ...
    • Neopublican, on 05/10/2008, -0/+1I love how this game mixed off-the-wall humor with a deadly serious story.
      Scenes like that are what made this game legendary.
  • 8BitGaming, on 05/08/2008, -0/+16Say "fuzzy pickles'
  • Atheno, on 05/08/2008, -0/+13All hail the Eraser Eraser!!
  • gossipninja, on 05/08/2008, -0/+9I am simply amazed nintendo has dropped the ball to this degree. Earthbound was a fantastic game and really deserves all the attention it gets. I can not believe nintendo won't/can't port all the 3 mother games to the WII. They green light so many crap games for the wii, yet wont take already made games and translate and release them. Especially boggling since Earthbond/mother has a built in fanbase, unlike cooking mama, or escape from bug island, (or almost any other wii game)
  • patbingsoup, on 05/08/2008, -0/+6i was definitely into this game, totally awesome
  • evillawngnome, on 05/08/2008, -0/+10Jeffman doesn't get enough credit. He spearheaded the translation project a whole YEAR before Tomato and Reidman were willing to commit for various reasons. When they finally decided to translate it, rather than join Jeffman's project, they started a duplicate project. It was several months before they (Tomato's team) realized how stupid that idea was and joined forces with Jeffman.

    Fortunately for everyone, this project has snowballed and picked up a couple more hackers along the way. This translation is going to be one for the record books - probably the most professional looking fan translation ever because of the quality people working on this (Tomato is a professional translator).
    • MatoSan, on 05/08/2008, -0/+11I also agree he deserves a ton of credit for the hard work he's done. He kicks ass. Though you're off on a couple other things there. There was no drama as you describe it, either. There are also only really two hackers, me and Jeff. It is coming along great though :)
      • evillawngnome, on 05/08/2008, -0/+3It's more fun to dramatize things though. :D

        Regarding the additional hackers, I know Byuu was doing some stuff in regards to the assembler, and i thought i remember you mentioning *another* hacker contributing some code from a half-birthed attempt at a hack of this game (or M1+2)
    • Andrwmorph, on 05/08/2008, -0/+1I bet that Nintendo is going to sic their legal teams on them as soon as the project nears completion.
      I'm hella bitter
      • evillawngnome, on 05/08/2008, -0/+2They don't have a legal leg to stand on; the final product is provided as a patch. It is up to the end user to buy the game, dump the ROM, patch it, and play it. Some of these things are less legal; the ability to dump and patch the rom is debatable. However, because the starmen.net team is only providing a patch, there is no copyrighted code included in the distribution, and thus no infringement.
        • RobbleRobble, on 05/09/2008, -0/+0Blizzard doesn't have a legal leg to stand on telling a programmer to stop making a bot that allows users to possibly break the EULA. That hasn't stopped them yet.

          Pardon my cynicism. Trust me, I want to play Mother 3 very badly. I HOPE Nintendo doesn't give in to the Litigious Side...
    • bbqsalad, on 05/12/2008, -0/+1completly agree.
  • skaldicpoet9, on 05/08/2008, -0/+3Really a great article. It's great to see fans so passionate and resilient. I hope they see their release. I'll be looking for this one as well :)
  • jinxation, on 05/08/2008, -1/+6Yea....I run it on homebrew. I purchased the game when I was 10. Now my snes is dead. Eat Me.
  • MrGreen108, on 05/08/2008, -0/+4if earthbound 3 doesn't get released in north america and nintendo doesn't release the games on the virtual console, im sure they will eventually release something to make the fans happy. maybe the next title will be the Mother 25th Anniversary edition on the next generation nintendo console in 12 years.
  • Zihuatanejo, on 05/08/2008, -0/+6Poo
  • Deku, on 05/08/2008, -0/+2Have faith, EB will come. I don't know why they hesitated with the amount of crap on the VC.
  • tehjarvis, on 05/08/2008, -0/+14___terday was a Beatles Song

    Yes No
    • eazhar, on 05/08/2008, -0/+1No...

      BBZZZZZZ wrong! Noterday? try again
    • timpanik, on 05/09/2008, -0/+0where's that? i've never seen it!
  • rayefrenzy, on 05/08/2008, -0/+7I refused to buy a N64 until they released mother3 (they were calling it EB64 at the time)

    I still haven't bought an N64
    • MRCAB, on 05/08/2008, -0/+3yeah, I remember "Project Reality" LOL
  • demnos, on 05/08/2008, -0/+5I have spent many years playing video games since Earthbound came out and I would still have to say that it is my most favorite game of all time! Hear us NOA! We want more Earthbound!
  • cbrunet, on 05/08/2008, -0/+4"At times like this, kids like you should be playing Nintendo games."

    How I miss thee EarthBound. Seriously Nintendo, just take my money already.
  • MRCAB, on 05/08/2008, -0/+1Great article!
  • Andrwmorph, on 05/08/2008, -0/+3So they put Lucas into SSMB but they can't be bothered to release the actual game he came from?
    • cbrunet, on 05/08/2008, -0/+2That was NoJ's decision to have Lucas/Ness in Brawl/Melee, not NoA. The issue here isn't Nintendo as a company, but its apparently very stupid American headquarters. Seriously Nintendo, how many times do I need to say it? TAKE MY MONEY!!!
  • dannylewis, on 05/08/2008, -0/+2I think it will come out for the VC. Why would Nintendo bother with getting it rated by the ESRB in the first place? Also, the platform it is listed under is Wii.

    I guess they could have done it to piss in the fan base's eye.
  • barinelg, on 05/08/2008, -0/+1A great article. I'm playing through this game now actually. I was a little too young at the time of this game's release to be overly aware of it, but have since become a big fan and am eying the Mother3 translation project.

    Hopefully hype and news will continue to spread and Nintendo will open their eyes. According to that article, Reggie has noticed it and if people continue he may push it himself. Keep those emails, phone calls, and blog posts coming!
  • Rhythmthief, on 05/08/2008, -0/+1I find it funny that you can play as Lucas or Ness in Smash Brothers Brawl, yet no mother games have arrived on the virtual console yet.
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