/vr/ - Retro Games

I would describe it as the single most famous niche game ever. Nearly everyone who is beyond just a casual gamer knows of it, but pretty much nobody else outside of that sector does.

Ness smashed the scalpers

>>4845432
It's truly the #1 example of a meme game

Remember when Nintendo btfo amiibo scalpers by re-printing a fucking shitton of them? That's probably why.

Earthbound represents a narrative experience that is completely inaccessible to people who grew up after 1996

that's why they don't stop bitching, to them it might as well be dragon quest, they can't perceive the difference

>>4845432
Because anyone with a brain doesn't buy amiibo and buys one of those programmable QR tags or whatever and spoofs them.

Surprised it was Ness, and not those awful peg warmer Animal Crossing ones.

>>4845496
this desu, even if you're just buying them for collecting value they're of pretty shit quality
that said mother *is* pretty niche

SSB made the game get noticed (again), and unlike Fire Emblem it wasn't popping out new games constantly so there's just the one isolated fanbase.
>>4845517
Liquidation distribution is wacky. One of the stores by me got a shit ton of only Revali, another was cursed with AC.

I think it hit peak fanbase around 2007 - 2010 when more started getting online and the Mother 3 translation was released. It seems that most who played it don't really see what type of message it conveys and most just go, "Omgerd, Giygas!1" I haven't finished it, but they seem to beg for a re-release or sequel of some sort when I don't think they truly get why Nintenda doesn't want to. This is literally a game that rewards you for beating up police very early on, as well as beating up Leftist Hippies. I really don't think most who play it catch onto this and seem kinda brainwashed like it's some faux-kawaii-desu shitfest that would get no media coverage.

There's an ominous presence about this game's existence, almost like most who play it think this is some kind of obtuse title that doesn't send the message they think they're looking at. You can almost hear what it would be like if people had actually known about this game to any length when it released, otherwise you wouldn't hear the end of it.

"They put brainwashing waves in the background to convince kids that they should beat up police with a baseball bat."

The concept is of some 1984-tier dystopian joke of 70's - 80's Murica's obsession with retarded, alien-themed movies where police are willing to pick fights with a 10 year old.

Do peeps really want this to be more popular? I'd love to see someone actually describe it for what it is as peeps advocate for a re-release that would somehow -not- get PETA's attention of beating up crows within the first 10 minutes of the game. There's so much about it that just screams IRL hysteria and lulz. Imagine the claims of how Alt-Right it is.

Like others have said, it's a niche game where most of its fans know about it because of the inclusion of Ness in Smash I first played the game shortly after the release of the first Smash on the n64 or they were one of the few kids to have seen NoA's lackluster advertisements for it in 1995, and played it back then. I think the reason why it's not that popular is because it's too bizarre and too American for normalfags who are used to Medieval/Cyberpunk settings and Bishonen protagonists when it comes to RPG's

the definition of a vocal minority

>>4845494
so no one outside of people who grew up in usa in the 20th century would understand it?

>>4845432
>buying toys past the age of 12

i seriously hope none of you guys actually do this

>>4845432
Anyone who's a real fan of earthbound played mother 3 years ago.

>>4845496
>enlightened savants like myself know how to cheat to save $12 on a children's game accessory

>>4845474
Yep, there are dozens of examples nowadays but this is the OG meme game

>>4847270
>enlightened savants like myself know how to spend $12 on a children's game accessory

>>4847075
I've always wanted to see a Lindblom style official translation of Mother 3.

>a series being popular means that everyone buys up every piece of chinese garbage shit produced under its license

Haha, no. Also, Earthbound is a terrible game. It solely appeals to the autistic Sonic crowd with its simple sprites and bright primary colors.

>>4845432
I agree, this game had zero real-life popularity

Me and all my friends had Super Nintendos but none of us had the game and it wasn't even mentioned in the hundreds if not thousands of video game conversations I had in school

Almost the entire Earthbound fanbase was comprised of “that kid” who believed knowledge of which game Ness in SSB was from made them superior to other kids.

>>4851434
dunno what the fuck you're talking about, most of the people who know about eb know about it because of ness's inclusion in smash

>>4851512
>Go to Target
>See Earthbound in an ad on the display TV
>Ask my mom for it
>"We don't have a Super Nintendo, and I already got you a Nintendo 64!"
That was my experience with Earthbound.

>>4851537
>ad on the display TV
it boggles the mind as to why NoA made such lackluster ads for what could have been a player's choice game

>>4851591
I remember a lot of other 'gross-out' ads for games at the time and I remember thinking they sucked.

>>4851591
Yeah, Nintendo had some weird, out there commercials even for the tamest shit. (Dr. Mario's comes to mind)
But for the weird fucking game, they gave a half-assed commercial. I don't get it either, anon.

>>4851598
this was already discussed in another thread but what they should have done is make b-movie style ads with the weird enemies like giant moles, giant ants, killer trees and the starmen

Everyone has heard of it, you can blame Smash Bros. for making it popular. It's not even rare, it just sold poorly on release and then amounted high demand a decade later, and of course with everyone falling for the "Earthbound is expensive" meme, it shot up in price.

It's still not super popular but the internet has definitely given the franchise a popularity boost, especially in recent years. Given how difficult it was to legally play, especially if you weren't American, it's not very surprising that it's stayed relatively niche outside of Ness appearing in every Smash Bros game.

>>4851694
it's not rare, but it's not extremely common either. it's "there". I believe less than 200k copies were made in USA. So while that's far from rare, there's not a million of them.

No, thanks. I'm pro-life.

>>4851591
It boggles the mind when you weren't born yet.

>>4851826
/pol/ please leave.

>>4849057
Might be a meme game but it's still an excellent game. Too bad the fanbase is mostly insufferable autists.

>>4851796
I still don't understand this logic of "rare" vs. "common".
>game sells 1 million
>accounts for less than 1% of the total population
>"common"
>game sells 100k
>accounts for less than 1% of the population
>"rare"

Ya know, it's harder to find certain releases of PC games than this console shit, because no one has it, & no one buys it. I'm the only person within a 50 mile radius who owns "Street Fighter Series" for PC, and that's a fact.

>>4847072
4chan has an entire board full of such people in /toy/

I just realized something horrifying.
Undertale is probably more popular than Earthbound. Undertale definitely shifted more units in NA, guaranteed.

>>4854142
Who cares? UT doesn't even have a quarter of the soul and wit that EB does.

>>4854142
Most people played EB emulated, so I'd think ROM downloads are a more reliable indicator.
I don't mind otherwise though, in some ways it's a gateway game and in other ways it's good on its own right. There are plenty of RPGs more popular than EB released like every second, yet no one should worry about other games obviating the Mother series.

>>4854173
UT wasn't meant to be witty and quirky, it was meant to be a deconstruction of RPGs and people that play them, like Spec Ops: The Line being a slap in the face towards military shooters.

>>4854916
I think it's genre aware like spec ops was, but it's not a complete deconstruction of the RPG genre.
It's somewhere between that and how EB rolls, where the team definitely likes console RPGs and indulges in their conventions, but they occasionally want to point and say "Isn't this strange? Why do we expect this from these games?". The developer of Undertale seems to be a big fan of the whole genre of JRPGs aswell, not just Earthbound.

>>4855585
Not to mention that EB/Mother was created as a subversion/parody of JRPGs

>>4855594
Can you provide some examples? I've heard that many times but I didn't pick up on that when playing through.

>>4855643
It's pretty obvious to see EB's subversion of RPG tropes, primarily the 20th century American setting with the protagonists being children and the enemies being wild animals and crazy adults, as opposed to other JRPGs which usually have Medieval-Europe/Tolkien or Cyberpunk settings with Bishonen protagonists and the enemies either being Lovecraftian monsters or shit copied from tabletop games

>>4855643
The intention has been explicitly mentioned before by the director at some point.
The setting is the most significant aspect, since that was specifically chosen to subvert the ubiquity of fantasy settings. The name of series in japan (Mother) was also explicitly chosen because it didn't sound like the name of a video game.
Any other concrete examples are just speculation. Like the absurdity of the macguffins you collect in the game (Pencil Eraser, fish-flavored yogurt machine, a book on overcoming shyness, etc.). There's that gang member who'll deny you a membership until you've "beaten Earthbound". There's NPCs who'll break the 4th wall and draw attention to it, like the librarian, Ruffini, and the mole.

>>4851969

Because unlike the game you're talking about, people actually want to buy Earthbound. Just not for the asking price.

>>4845432
Nobody wanted it. Period.

>>4845432
many people have heard of it thanks to smash but few have played it

the whole "port mother 3" campaign is a fucking joke that few take seriously. english cartridges have been available for years

>>4855742
They're not official Nintendo products though