Fan interest in the game has risen following the release of Earthbound and Earthbound Beginnings on Nintendo Switch Online, announced at the recent Direct. Mother 3, the most recent game in the Mother/Earthbound series, was released on the Game Boy Advance in 2006 in Japan only. Fans have been eagerly awaiting a Western release ever since. In an interview with Nintendo Everything, Mother 3 producer Shinichi Kameoka said he’d “also love to see Mother 3 released in the US and Europe”, further fuelling fan hopes and dreams. “As a lover of games, I will continue to wait for Mother 3’s worldwide release (in English),” he added. When asked if he had any fond memories of working on the game, Kameoka said: “I remember how Mr. (Shigesato) Itoi rewrote all the placeholder text that our staff had put in, and the atmosphere of the game changed completely. That was really eye-opening.” Mother 3 was released on the Wii U virtual console in Japan. Though a Western release was reportedly in the works, the game contains a number of controversial elements that have held it back. Along with its central theme of bereavement, as well as instances of drug use and animal cruelty, the game’s Magypsy tribe are a group of masculine presenting men who refer to themselves as women and reflect Japanese stereotypes of crossdressers.
