Half-Masked

~The following is a collection of notes I made while playing through the closing act of Mother 3. Be warned. Spoilers aplenty await beyond the asterisk line.~

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For a game as interesting as Mother 3, it has a disappointingly pedestrian ending.

Dr. Andonuts, in the final confrontation with the evil Porky Emperor, tells him: “I’m not helping you anymore!”

That’s just great, Doctor, but it’d have been nice if you stopped helping him BEFORE you killed a little boy’s mother and brother when he was still a child, re-animated his brother into a killing machine, destroyed countless natural habitats, mutated native wildlife into horrible and wacky chimeras, forced technology and yuppy civilization onto a world that didn’t need or want it, and pretty much made sure that the evil emperor had everything he’d ever want to ensure the death of every living thing on the islands.

Dr. Andonuts, I value your words less than a hill of pig shit, you brainless, cowardly plot device.

Another thing that bothers me, but this is probably more a fault of the fan-translation than the game itelf: I knew going in that Porky was actually Pokey from Earthbound. That’s the whole twist that the game’s overhyped, over-cliched, under-developed story has. He is referred to as “Porky” the whole time leading up, and there’s a huge buildup to his big reveal. But then, when they finally corner him and talk to the real man behind the empire, he refers to himself as: “Porky”.

Swing-and-a-miss. Why would he refer to himself as Porky, and not his actual name?

“That’s right. I’m actually a character from a previous game, bitter with those events and taking out my frustrations on this world for my own amusement!”

…is a much better twist than:

“That’s right. I’m actually… THE PERSON YOU WERE INTENTIONALLY LOOKING FOR!”

It’s like if Darth Vader told Luke in Empire Strikes Back:

“No, Luke… I am Darth Vader.”

Which might explain why none of the main characters react, in any way(they don’t even respond visually, like with a surprised or upset pose. You don’t even see an exclamation point pop up over their heads. What is this, the 80’s?)

That’s another thing, I was hoping that since Lucas is mute(presumably as a reaction to the loss of two of his family members), that Kumatora and Duster would make up for his inability to communicate verbally. The fucking dog says more than these idiots ever do.

Oh, and how about the thing at the end where their dead mother tells her kids(beyond the grave no less) to remember a conversation between her and her husband when they were -newborns-? Their eyes aren’t even open at the time. They wouldn’t remember imagery, let alone an entire conversation, word-for-word, before they even understood language at that point. Especially when those two people talking aren’t even in the same room as these kids during the flashback. I think she’s asking a bit much at this point.

What pisses me off the most about this game is the cop-out “ending”. The last cutscene shows the islands being completely destroyed. Everyone dies(presumably). THE END…

But wait! At the obligatory black screen that says “End?”, you then -control- the word “End?”, and eventually you bump into things that speak to you in the pitch black. They’re supposedly the characters you play as and meet in the game, although almost no one is ever identified(which makes it hard to tell who’s talking). And they all say things like this:

“By the way, everyone made it out alive and lived happily ever after THE END LOL“. *insert jerking-off motion here*

This is sloppy stuff. It feels like something thrown in at the last minute by people who didn’t think we could handle a sad ending. They should have had the balls to give us something better than a “happy ending”.

I was enthusiastic for Mother 3. I had read a lot about it early on. Mostly praise from people who had played it. They painted a picture of a genuinely touching, interesting story. I assumed too much for it. I looked at the wacky things you must talk to, and the craziness of the monsters you face, and the overall tone of the game, and thought “maybe this will be a unique RPG”. Despite all that, its presentation is no more unique than any typical swords and sorcery RPG. If anything, I was surprised at how cliched the plot was, and how little there is to find in the way of storyline or character interaction. And it threw away great opportunities to provide a touching experience not easily found in video games.

I’m sure fans of Earthbound will be happy. I’m no fan of Earthbound, however. I see this as Nintendo’s Chrono Cross. Ultimately stupid and unrewarding, with a last-minute, feel-good twist at the end that comes at the cost of a dramatic presentation… but at least the soundtrack was good(I’m starting to see why the Mother 3 OST is the only official aspect of this game released outside of Japan)…

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~A.H.