with longer games, after a first playthrough, it tends to be harder to retain everything that happened even just immediately afterwards. there's a lot of games where i'll remember some big moments and then go 'oh yeahhhhh' when i come back to them later

so what really struck me about earthbound was how i could more or less list its entire sequence of events in chronological order, the pacing is quite relaxed but none of it feels like filler, there's a lot put into making ever segment something that stands out, the definitive game about some scrunklies going on an adventure

mother 3 retains this quality and then some, now with marked chapters that have names, and perspectives from different playable characters, particularly at the start of the game, chapter 1 makes such an impression juxtaposing lucas' introduction being a calm and typical day playing with his brother, with his father and the people of tazmily village dealing with a forest fire in the middle of the night, it's such a unique way to introduce the game's characters and the tragedy that befalls flint afterwards is so unexpected given the way game started out just an hour before. deftly balancing all sorts of light and dark tones has always been one of my favourite qualities of the series, and mother 3 might be the very best at it. there are instances where the game's humour crops up at inappropriate times, such as the funeral near the start having a load of puns on the headstones there, and i generally don't find it as funny as the first two games, but it also evokes some of the most euphoric joy and deep sadness in me out of all three games, and also most other games for that matter

there are so many parts of this game i know will be etched into my mind forever, chapter 3 starring salsa the monkey would be an amazing short story on its own, my favourite part of it is how in the combat, you're very weak on your own, and rely upon your abusive owner to get by in a situation that he's put you in, the way that dynamic comes across organically through gameplay is just really cool. i also love the part where you have to deliver the boxes, you have to find the recipients' houses yourself, and everyone other than them that you talk to sort of turn their nose up and want nothing to do with you, you're promised a reward of a 'luxury banana' if you can deliver them in under 20 minutes or something, and whether you achieve that or not, you're denied it once you return, and fassad proceeds to take one bite out of it and throw it away, it's great stuff and serves as a microcosm of the kind of place tazmily village is about to become

lucas never quite fit in, and still doesn't after the town he grew up in becomes a dystopian hellhole. (you have to pay for stuff) after losing his mother and brother, and growing distant from his father as a result, he's completely reliant upon himself (and his dog) and isn't led astray like the rest of tazmily, which ends up making him the hero, along with the rest of his band of misfits, a tomboyish false princess, and a handicapped thief

this theme of outsiders saving the world continues with the characters known as the magypsies, but they aren't nearly as successful at supporting it and are definitely my least favourite aspect of the game, with their designs and personalities all being based on stereotypes of crossdressers, and quite a few poor taste jokes made at their expense which can also come across as transphobic. as a trans woman myself i wasn't terribly offended personally but i was rolling my eyes at quite a few parts and it's probably the only caveat i'd mention when recommending the game

you experience firsthand the horrible mundanity the residents of tazmily now endure, with a day of backbreaking labour, pushing people molded from clay to go get electrocuted back to life after effectively dying from exhaustion, then being sent right back to work, and going to club titiboo at the end of the day which the workers seem to be addicted to, and then you go on to break into various facilities belonging to the pigmasks and discover the horrible experiments that are being conducted, the ones you see most often are animals being taken apart and combined with parts of other animals or machinery to make chimeras, under the juvenile premise that animals are boring and they're being made much more AWESOME now, and once you eventually you meet the man at the very top, you'll find that he views people in the same way

after you take a 'break' with a more traditional video game quest of finding the seven needles, returning to the now abandoned tazmily village, and then later being chauffeured to the nightmare that is new pork city becomes even more of a whiplash, and you discover that the source of all this is an old man, with the mind of a small, spoilt child, with all the time in the world and everything he could ever want, now acting only out of nihilistic boredom, the way this is all built up to and paid off is absolutely incredible, the final chapter of this game is simply just one of the best in a video game

i won't spoil any more of the ending than that, mostly because it's 1am and i'm very tired and feel like i'm rambling, but also because it'd probably be pointless anyway; the experience of playing it is far beyond the scope of any words i could write, mother 3 is every bit the game i was always told it was, and i'm very glad to have finally played it and count it amongst some of my absolute favourites