EarthBound Central

Checking out Japanese Arcades

Mato — Wed, 08 Sep 2010 02:48:05 +0000

Today I came across some neat videos. This is the closest many of us will get to winning one of these plushes ourselves:

This next video is by Haruna Anno, who you might remember from this.

And I think this might actually be considered a rarity:

I think the Mr. Saturn plushes might still be in arcades, I’m not sure. The Belch ones are pretty hard to come by from what I hear. If anyone can confirm/deny any of this, let me know!

Different EarthBound Clay Models

Mato — Sun, 05 Sep 2010 03:10:27 +0000

The recent revealing of the upcoming MOTHER 2 figures probably has a few people wondering why some of the figures look different from their official EarthBound clay models. This is because Nintendo of America altered some of the clay models when they were localizing the game into EarthBound.

For example, you can see how Ness was changed:

MOTHER 2′s Ness on left, EarthBound’s Ness on right

And Paula had even more changes:

Prototype MOTHER 2 Paula on left, final MOTHER 2 Paula in middle, EarthBound Paula on right

I’m guessing that they changed the models to look older so they’d seem less kiddie to the teens and young adults that they were aiming the game at (reference). I don’t recall if the EarthBound Player’s Guide ever gave Ness and Paula an age, but according to various MOTHER 2 materials I think he’s supposed to be 11.

I haven’t really gone through and compared all the different clay models between the two games – does anyone know if any others were changed?

No related posts.

MOTHER Figure Prices

Mato — Fri, 03 Sep 2010 02:49:47 +0000

So the first set of MOTHER 1 and MOTHER 2 figures has been released, and some have started to hit eBay. Already from the start the asking prices are very high, at $100 for each of the MOTHER 1 ones. It seems like there’s always price gouging when it comes to this series’ merchandise, so it’s not too surprising.

Still, I’m curious to know what fans would consider reasonable prices for these figures. Is $50 better? Or would that still be too high? $25? Keeping in mind that they do cost a lot of money to win and that import costs add up quickly, of course.

I’ve posted a poll about this, so click here to vote!

MOTHER 2 Figures Preview

Mato — Tue, 31 Aug 2010 16:46:09 +0000

The new MOTHER figures have started to come out, and coming soon will be the MOTHER 2 ones. Banpresto recently posted a press release thing that includes a pic of some of the as-of-yet-unreleased figures:

You can grab a copy of the press release PDF here. It’s in Japanese and not especially interesting, but check it out if you’re a download maniac like me

Slot Brothers Board Game Scanned

Mato — Mon, 30 Aug 2010 19:04:44 +0000

A long while back I posted about the rare and mostly-unknown official Slot Bros. board game/dice game/card game, but at the time no one at the site had ever owned a copy, so the details were very sketchy. Then, many months ago, the ever-awesome neonix won one and scanned it all at very good quality for the rest of us to see!

I sat on the update for a while because I wanted to translate the rules… but months have passed and I still don’t have the time or energy, so for now I’ll just post the scans, which you can get here.

If someone with the skills can translate the rules, that’d help out a lot. Or maybe fans can make up their own games with it, I think that sounds cooler to be honest Anyway, if you’re interested, check it out – it’s a rare piece of official merchandise!

MOTHER Figures Spotted

Mato — Sat, 28 Aug 2010 03:15:54 +0000

If you don’t remember, a whoooole bunch of MOTHER and MOTHER 2 figures are planned to be released in Japan slowly over the next seven months. They’re only available via those crane games in Japanese arcades, though. For more details about that, see my old news post here.

Anyway, the first batch of figures, the MOTHER 1 figures, were scheduled to be released in the late August – and it’s now late August, so here’s the very first pic I’ve seen of them!

click to see larger version

It’s nice seeing the actual figure(s) like this, the images on the official site made them seem kind of meh. If I had the money and a place to put them, I’d definitely love to have a whole set of all these figures. I just wish that 1. they sold these in stores instead of this crane game nonsense and 2. released figures for ALL the clay models made for the games.

What do you think? Are you going to try to get any of these upcoming figures? I haven’t seen any on any auction sites yet (Japanese or other), I hope they won’t be a huge pain to get. If anyone manages to collect them all over the next few months, send some pics my way!

EarthBound, ROM or Cartridge?

Mato — Thu, 26 Aug 2010 02:46:45 +0000

Just a very simple poll today – whenever you play EarthBound, do you play using an actual Super NES cartridge or do you play it on an emulator?

I was wondering about this earlier, I’m curious to see what the results are. Also, if you play it on an emulator, what emulator do you use?

Click here to vote!

Ness and Jeff, Sitting in a Tree

Mato — Tue, 24 Aug 2010 03:07:23 +0000

An old lady in Twoson will usually comment on how Ness and Paula make a good couple… but what happens if you only have Jeff in your party?

Fanfic writer squad, activate!

I think a lot of people know about this little oversight already – you can get it to happen after Paula gets kidnapped in the Fourside department store – but I like to document little things like this on the site anyway.

Thanks to Karl151k for posting about it on the Starmen.Net forums the other day!

MOTHER 3 Cockney Mice

Mato — Fri, 20 Aug 2010 20:48:19 +0000

In MOTHER 3 are some mice living in an attic who speak very strangely. If you’ve played the game, you’ve probably talked to them and said, “What????” If you haven’t seen them yet, here they are:

Originally, these mice spoke in an incredibly difficult-to-understand dialect of Japanese, I think it was a Nagasaki dialect but I can’t remember off the top of my head. Anyway, I wasn’t sure how to handle this in translation, but eventually felt that Cockney gave off a similar vibe in that it was technically English but almost impossible to understand if you aren’t in the know. It also seemed the most fitting for an old mouse couple living in an attic.

Anyway, if you’ve always been curious as to what they’ve been saying, their text goes something like this in standard language:

@Squeak?
(Huh? That you, Alfie? Where’ve you been and what’ve you been doing? You never came back for Thanksgiving or New Year’s, so Grams and I were so lonely.

Well? You must be hungry, right? Here’s some Nut Bread for you.)

@Squeak squeak squeeeeak.
(You should show your face around here more.)

@Squeak squeak.
(Oh. You can’t hold any more stuff. Come back to get it later.)

@Squeak squeak-squeak?
(Oh, it’s you, Alfie. You came back. Come here to talk us out of more spending money, did ya? Well, that’s okay. Grams has no better use for this. Keep it secret from Gramps, though.)

@Squeeeeak squeak.
(We’ve been waiting this whole time, wondering when you’d come back.)

@Squeeeak.
(Oh. You can’t hold any more things. That’s no good. Come back later, then.)

@Squeak squeak-squeak-squeak. Squeak squeak-squeak squeak.
(Just because me and Gramps are up here doesn’t mean we can welcome just anyone. We need to live long lives, you see. We need to be careful. We need to be careful. Do you understand?)

@Squeak?
(Right, Gramps?)

@Squeak squeak-squeak-squeak. Squeeeak squeak-squeak squeak.
(Grams is absolutely right. An old-timer like me would freak out like crazy if someone found out we’re living here. The Johnson family three doors over got exterminated that way, so you need to be careful, too. You need to be careful. Understand?

@Squeeeak?
(Right, Grams?)

Side note: the original Japanese used “Takashi” and “Yamashita” instead of “Alfie” and “Johnson”. And one of the holidays mentioned was a big Japanese holiday called “Obon”.

Anyway, I don’t know Cockney, so I asked around for some help. Zinco was kind enough to study up on the dialect and convert it for me. I would’ve liked to have advice from a native Cockney-speaker, but in the end I think the effect is more important than real-life authenticity, so I’m okay with how it is. I’m curious what real Cockney-speakers would think of it, though!

“We Miss You” on Guitar

Mato — Wed, 18 Aug 2010 20:12:12 +0000

Came across this nice version of the love theme from MOTHER 3:

Nice and relaxing