“Didactically speaking, seminal evidence seems to explicate the fact that your repudiation of entropy supports my theory of space-time synthesis. Of this, I am irrefutably confident.”
In 1989, the vision of Shigesato Itoi brought about the creation of Mother, a subversion and a pastiche of the incredibly popular Dragon Quest series, and birthed the Mother trilogy containing the cult classic Earthbound. Rich, Jon and Leah discuss the creator of the series and the impact Mother had on the gaming landscape of Japan, and the near 20 years that passed before the game made it’s way to western markets.
Music featured in this issue:
1. Pollyanna (I Believe In You) by Keiichi Suzuki/Hirokazu Tanaka
2. The End by Keiichi Suzuki/Hirokazu Tanaka
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In the sequel, Giygas is a vastly different being. He is no longer recognizable as a physical alien form. He is portrayed as a chaotic, powerful force of evil. This transformation is hinted at in the first game, as Giegue’s mental state deteriorates due to his internal conflict and the loss of his human mother. In many ways, Mother is not a perfect realization of what Itoi was trying to convey with this project. I would posit that he must have felt the same way as me, especially considering that Earthbound is clearly an attempt to revise and reproduce Mother. (Ness being identical to Ninten, etc)
It’s my opinion, as an indie game dev, that Itoi and his team were suffering under the illusion that their art-form wasn’t nascent. It’s easy to play games as monetarily successful as Dragon Quest, to think that you are experiencing high art, and then offer a myriad of obvious improvements as if you are a technical (or, in Itoi’s case, an emotional) genius. Hence, the million DQ clones that quickly followed, including Zelda and Ys.
I don’t know what my point was, with this comment, except to say that Mother is a novel in 3 parts:
Part 1- rough draft
Part 2- realization of intent
Part 3- high art