Play Earth Bound Zero:Mother Online

Ever played an RPG where you fight with baseball bats instead of swords and telekinetic powers instead of fireballs? That’s Mother (or Earth Bound Zero, if you’re going by the unreleased English prototype). It’s this weird, charming NES game that never made it outside Japan—until fans dug up an old localization attempt and spread it online.

You play as Ninten, a kid in a small American town (think 1980s suburbia, not medieval castles), who stumbles into a bizarre adventure involving psychic powers and alien conspiracies. The combat’s turn-based, but instead of slimes and goblins, you’re fighting runaway taxis and hippies. The music’s got this dreamy, offbeat vibe, and the writing’s full of dry humor—like your neighbor casually mentioning his pet rock died.

It’s janky in places (random encounters, hello), but there’s something special about how it mixes everyday weirdness with cosmic horror. If you’ve played EarthBound on SNES, this is where it all started—just with more grinding and fewer quality-of-life fixes. Worth a look if you’re into cult RPGs with personality.