Wait, so if I choose slow text speed, then the HP of the characters will scroll down slower when they get hit, is that it? If so, then it's a great thing to know! Thanks for the tip!
I was so frustrated by the Giygas fight. Lucy (Paula) ran out of people and I t felt like his health was never ending. I was like, “This fight sucks!” And then I prayed again. Was instantly like, “Oh, that’s actually not stupid at all. That’s really cool” I like that the final boss and credits directly engage the player.
a funny thing with the Diamond Dog is that it can be affected by Brainshock. it has a diamondizing bite attack. it's not immune to diamondization, as you're not supposed to be able to inflict it on enemies yourself. if you confuse it, it has a chance to just instakill itself.
oh HECK YES ive been looking forward to this ever since i saw your mother 3 analysis!! i hope this picks up as well as that one did, it really is interesting stuff that's easy to get invested in! please keep doing what you're doing, it's great work!
thanks for watching! it’s been a whole year since i started making videos regularly, which is crazy! thank you to everyone for taking some time out to watch and leave comments, it’s been a lot of fun creating something people enjoy, while also getting the opportunity to talk about games with people. wishing you all a good 2022
I'm pretty sure the happy happy cult isn't meant to resemble the KKK. It's supposed to be a reference to a cult from Japan who also had an obsession with blue. In fact I'm pretty sure the development team took steps to try and distance the happy happy quotes from resembling the KKK in the earthbound localization
do you have a source for this? not that i don't believe you necessarily, but the clearly american based setting and the way the sprites were censored specifically in the US release (can read about that here earthbound.fandom.com/wiki/Happy_Happyism ) is what made me think they were based off, at least to an extent, the kkk
@@Nafan__ a lot of the same race-based animosity and cultural stigma that's really common in the west, particularly the United states, is just not on the radar of the Japanese audience. It's not like they're insensitive to it or anything but it's just not as amplified and culturally omnipresent as it is over there. That's why you see constantly and imported Japanese media things that we would consider racially insensitive here. Stuff like references to the KKK and blackface and other stuff like that a lot of the times they just aren't aware of.
@@vossboss220 just had a read into it and yeah i think you're right! i guess the localisation change and environment of earthbound made me assume it was referencing kkk, so thanks for pointing this out, it was definitely an interesting read :)
Great analysis! Having played Earthbound in 1996 I can tell you that, even then, Onett absolutely hit me with waves of nostalgiac feelings for when I was a young child.
50:00 personally I have always loved that first encounter with Dr. Andonuts. He is initially built up with a lot of intrigue. The kids at the boarding school hold him to such a high regard that they almost seem envious of Jeff. And then when you finally meet him that is subverted with awkwardness and an emotional distance. Dr. Andonuts, for all his status, just isn't someone who puts much into being a father for Jeff. When he ends the conversation with "Let's get together again in 10 years or so" it is a surprising hit you don't immediately know how to process. It is one of many examples of how Earthbound can put the fun whimsy to a sudden halt for something more serious. I think it does a great job conveying a lot about Jeff and his relation to his dad with very little.
I love all the music and pop culture references in the game, the first spot being "Giant Step" is hands down the best one to me. The fact you literally have to board a yellow submarine is just, lol my god it's great. But yeah, it makes me so happy to know the creators of earthbound are familiar enough with jazz to want to name the first stone after John Coltrane's Giant Steps. It's just amazing to me, they understand american culture better than you'd expect cuz that album was just a huge deal to musicians.
This video was an absolute delight, as was the Mother 3 one If I had one criticism, it would be that, while the idea of looking at the game as a standalone is more engaging, at times it seems to spin explanations in place where previous games had the actual answer, making the examination feel disingenuine. Lucas' status as a support character is said to be a conscious choice to highlight his character, but this ignores how Ness was slotted into the same role before with a decidedly more happy-go-lucky characterization, not to mention Lucas and Ness having high physical attack power and a devastating AoE attack. Earthbound's inventory system is defended as "trying something new", but Earthbound Beginnings had the same janky inventory, just with even less space, making the defense fall flat.
After beating this masterpiece on Switch, I can safely say that Earthbound still holds up to this day. It’s flawed but full of charm, which is a very good balance. Great analysis!
fun fact, earthbound's rolling hp actually moves slower if you have a slower text speed. it's so people who for some reason want that don't get screwed over by their choice.
The fact this video doesn’t have 1k likes might be the saddest thing I’ve ever seen on RU-vid, this video is so well made and had so much effort put into it
@@Nafan__ are u planning on a earthbound beginnings episode? I know the original kind of sucks, but there are rom hacks that make the experience more pleasurable.
Thank you so much for making this video Nafan. I’m always looking for great in depth Earthbound videos and this quickly became my favorite Earthbound retrospective on RU-vid. Keep up the great work!
I literally just finished watching the mother 3 analysis today. I’ve been watching it in segments over the last 2 days and to my delight I saw that you just uploaded the earthbound one just a few hours ago. Loving this content man. Hopefully you have more analysis coming up. I would love anything from the paper Mario series. Keep it up though!
i'd have to play it first to see if i'd be into making a video about it. i'm not all that into nes jrpg's though, so if it does happen it wouldn't be for a while
Just finished my first playthrough of earthbound(age 33) and was one of, if not the best game I have ever played. I bet the producers, while struggling to develop the game, took mushrooms to boost creativity. This is trippy as hell but when I had a bad trip on Shrooms 15 years ago I saw the same images as in the background of Giygas battle.
I recently completed Earthbound for the first time and it was such an amazing rollercoaster and unique game especially with the point of the story of Ness and his friends becoming more mature, the goofy whacky yet pretty lovely deep drama of the story kept me going to see what kind of crazy things I get to see while piecing together of what the imagery means to the context for the characters and events, also I just love laughing out loud at some of the bizzare character/enemy designs even the text gets alot of chuckles out of me. It was also such a breath of fresh air to play a JRPG that isn't so dull, generic, constantly holding my hand, generic character designs, same old tropes we see too many times, not the same old generic jrpg like soundtracks trying so hard to be epic. Also Im used to bullshit hard and annoying rpgs so it's nice to play an rpg that is comedic and easy (for the most part) I plan to replay this game again and stream it on discord in a few months but right now im playing Mother 3 for first time while streaming it to. Earthbound is a solid S tier game in general.
is no one going to talk about how the lost underworld is literaly inside the earth and has vegetation along with light?It could be based off the hallow earth theory though
How TF does this only have 12k views????? This is by far the best video I've seen breaking it all down and contemplating symbolism (there are a couple others that are really good, but most don't go in depth on cool stuff - the bulk of the vids I've seen go over basic facts every earthbound fan already knows) Another thing to think about, Ness is literally 12 years old and giygas is ages old, or at least ages in development. It comes off to me like Ness and Giygas are both opposites and the natural conclusion is for Ness, the innocent child who represents so many positive and empathetic thibgs, to clash in a battle against giygas who just wants to destroy the entire planet that they both came from. Ness comes off like he was created by the planet as a sort of defense mechanism and came into being because earth has a virus of sorts (giygas) that has been attached to it's host, waiting until it can essentially destroy everything. Giygas in my opinion has the image of Ness because giygas is like the horrible counterpart to Ness in a way, they were both born of the earth but they want entirely different things. But everything has a counterpart, it feels to me like Ness and Giygas are one in the same. Idk I'm probably getting sidetracked and am not making as much sense as I wanted to but I am tired as hell so maybe I'll look back on this and reword some stuff later on. Edit: sorry, i guess I wanted to add a couple things - I suppose they never actually say *where* giygas is born/from, cuz the place you travel to is almost just a spiritual place rather than an actual space and time, but mainly I wanted to add that giygas almost seems to me like he exists naturally to end life as a part of a cycle, like a part of a code programmed into the system. His existence requiring millions of years to come into fruition really leads me to think *he* is the natural creation and that Ness is either the counterpart in every way, or that Ness is a deviation from the usual code. He was in development before time in a way, and Ness is like the current living world/universe/etc defending itself against a kind of expected end in a way. Ness was born around the same time the events of Mother 1 happened, so it's like when Giygas got away the earth created something in the need to defend against him when he returns. It's like a rebellion against the entire system and tradition almost. Maybe I'm reading too far into giygas and his origins, but just some ideas that came to mind for me. Buzz buzz seemed to target Ness - it could've been just by chance he picked Ness but we don't know which it is, maybe it would've been another human had Pokey not left behind his brother Pickey. It really all comes together so well though either way.
wow, your video game writing is so spot on! this is clearly a project made with love and respect for earthbound, and a pleasure to watch. maybe i’ll pick up my 3rd playthrough again :)
The treasure hunter in the beginning is pronounced Liar. When you say his entire name out loud it becomes Liar Exaggerate. Giving a not so subtle hint about what kind of person this is.
this is not an anlaysis it is mostly a summary. I think when people click on a video that has "analysis" in its title, they expect to watch your commentary on something. Nevertheless I really appreciate the work you put into
How? Like, sure there is summary there, but it's just facilitating the analysis. There's plenty of commentary throughout the whole thing, definitely more than there is summary.
It’s Pokey* btw. We all know it’s supposed to be porky but pokey is the name we grew up with and calling him that shows reverence to the original generation that brought this game to the light. It’s a respect thing. Calling him porky is fine but signifies that you’re not from the original generation nor paying reverence for it
Thanks for the wonderful video. I never got the chance to play earthbound, and when before I got to I was kind of spoiled a lot so I couldn't bring myself to start it. Watching your analysis from the beginning to end made me feel like playing alongside, and I may have not fully experience it but I now kind of get why the game is so good.
In terms of their purpose and actions, yes, but it's undeniable that their design is meant to harken to the kkk. This is especially true with the HH on their hoods in the Japanese. Personally, I think that it's both.
Anyone have a links for the Earthbound game roms? all I can find are the anti pirating versions that make it impossible to to get out of the starting area(s)
Don't feel bad about playing with the Casey Bat for hours, I accidentally played with it past Magicant before I realized what the hell was wrong and why the gameplay was suddenly insanely hard
does that invalidate what i said at all? Regardless of the intent, the typography does (to me at least) impact how you view / see the mr saturns. It acts as a point of characterisation even if not heaps of thought was put into it. Also, from what i can find, the japanese version of the font was created By Itoi himself, but inspired by his daughters handwriting. So it's not as though there was no conscious creative intent behind its design legendsoflocalization.com/earthbound/saturn-valley/
I would have call it "Earthbound guide" because this video does such a good work to explain how to walk through this complex game. Happy the algorithm bring me here.
Earthbound is my favourite game of all time. It's the game I've most consistently returned to year after year with rhe exact same smiles, tears and joy as if it was the first time I played. It's a work of pure love and imagination. The game is annoying and obtuse and sometimes drives me crazy. At times I can't believe how deliberately tedious it's design can be, and in spite of that it's the only game I can think of that has helped shaped me as a person.
Watching rn but I love how you mention the bumper controls because I have such fond memories playing this game with one hand on the wii u gamepad while eating dinner
Just recently found your channel and I love the videos, man! Would love to maybe see an Omori video if you ever get the chance. Looking forward to continuing to watch what you put out!
41:50 "The two sanctuary guards have had the same background animation" proceeds to show two different battle backgrounds with two different palettes and two different animations. the thing that's the same between them is the two actual background layers. the animations aren't too terribly different, with them being more-or-less a 90 degree turn of the other, but like... come on dude, we're watching, did you not expect us to notice?
feel like it's pretty obvious i was referring to the similarities in layout and the actual frames/style of animation itself. but i apologise for not precisely spelling that out, listening and learning over here 🙏🙏
I dont think that I have ever watched a video that long from start to end while paying attention all the time. I love your way of analysing and staying on topic. Really gret job!
