Earthbound, a highly influential title (although their intuitions wouldn't be applied until several years later) offered a creative take on JRPGs. Each facet, from its equipment, save points, shops, status effects, etc. was a quirky approach to basic RPG mechanics that was generally clownish and naive, but also subversive and erudite. Combat - while mechanically conventional, was enhanced greatly by cartoony enemy design and narration that mostly told exaggerated, bizarre parodies on ordinary life, running the gamut from strange to even disturbing. Dialogue shared the same idea, and even occasionally winked at goofy satire when it's not busy indulging in its strange sense of humor. Even outside these aspects, the gameplay was inventive - deconstructing past ideas and adding several new ones to the canon of JRPGs. Another major success lies in its soundtrack, that covered an impressive range of styles from skewed, awkward, demented tracks to desolate atmospheres, from simple pleasant melodies to even unsettling scores, most songs succeeding in its own niche while others stumbled around trying to make sense of the whole ordeal. Above all else, the few but effective horror-tinged moments represents the most important concept EarthBound introduced, that underneath the guise of harmless childish irreverence existed genuinely creepy themes. This bizarre and terrifying display gradually reared its head in the final hours, culminating in one of the most psychologically exhausting final bosses of all time. A triumph; very few JRPGs can boast such wild imagination within such a conventional framework.