Earthbound

SNES

Ape Inc. - 199-something

Imagine any random RPG. Now take away the dragons, potions, wizards, castles, mystic amulets, and armor. Now, change the setting to an urban town in the U.S. of A., mid 1990s. And just for kicks, let's throw in a homicidal nextdoor neighbor, a time-traveling fly, cultists, LSD cake, and a guy named Poo. You've now created Earthbound.

Now, you may be wondering how a game this bizarre has managed to fly under the radar for all this time. Quite simply, advertising. The game was extremely successful in Japan, so Nintendo decided to run it in the states with the add campaign, "This Game Stinks!" Most people didn't realize they were referring the complimentary scratch-and-sniff stickers that came with the game. But I digress.

The general idea of the game is that a time-traveling fly named Buzz-Buzz (who is later killed by the main antagonist's mother) has come to an urban United States town called Onett to find "The Chosen Four", who are to save the world from the cosmic destroyer Gygas. You explore the world, finding the eight 'Your Sanctuary' locations in order to power up the Sound Stone, a relic given to you by Buzz-Buzz, in order to channel the power of the Earth to defeat Gygas. You'll battle enemies including aliens, nextdoor neighbors, cultists, hippies, deceased relatives, cars, fire hydrants, and basically anything you can imagine.

What the hell is with this game?!! Seriously. Areas of particular interest in this game are Saturn Valley, which is your typical town, except that it is inhabited by Kirby-esque aliens who are all named Mr. Saturn, have no hands, and all look identical. Another interesting place is Moonside, which is one of the most evil experiments into the human psyche ever developed by a video game company. Everyone will say the exact opposite they mean, you're being attacked by abstract art, and an invisible guy won't let you pass until you find someone with a unibrow. This game also features an LSD-tripped cake, a club for people who stare at a rock, a frolic through a pyramid, a bald architect, Thomas Jefferson, and an overweight nextdoor neighbor named Lardna.

What I liked: A nontraditional twist to what would otherwise be a traditional RPG.

What I didn't like: Graphics and sounds, and nonexistant side quests.

What sets this game apart from others in it's genre: I dunno, the 1990s, the baseball bats, the weird names. Take your pick.

Control: 7 - Typical RPG, but it can be a bit irritating to use field commands.

Graphics: 4 - Looks like a regular Nintendo game, but with more color.

Sound: 3 - For the most part, you'll want to mute. Plain and simple.

Style: 10 - Did you even READ the review?

First hour: 6 - This is... different.

Third hour: 9 - THIS GAME ROCKS!

Eighth hour: 2 - God, I hate Moonside.

Fourteenth hour: 9 - COME BACK HERE POKEY, YOU SON OF A #@%&#@!

Why I hate this game: I've been waiting about 8 years for a sequel. I'm still waiting.

Conrad

Counter Review

On the whole, I'd say I really agree with Conrad. However, there are two points on which I beg to differ.

The first is the sound. My god!! It's amazing! Conrad may have been thrown by the droning of the old-school SNES midi soundtrack, but not only does it fit the game perfectly, it's incredibly creative. I mean, the first time I played this game, I turned the sound off pretty quickly. But when I played it again, I tried it with sound. It was definitely worth it - One of the songs sounds as if it's being played over the radio, there's a really cracked out reggae song, and for my non-existant money, the Onett song takes any and all cakes. It fits the tone of the rest of the game: cracked, but fun.

Also, while I agree with Conrad on his style rating, I would reaaaally like to emphasize it a whole lot more. This game is style incarnate. While the gameplay isn't incredibly innovative, the lens through which the whole thing is done is psychadelic. If that doesn't make any sense, good. UFO's, psychic kids, new age retro hippies - it's all there. I have to say that this is still one of my favorite games.

So if I changed anything about Conrad's review, it would be -

Sound: 8 (Shockingly creative, but sadly still constrained to MIDI)

By FreeOhio