RPG teaches life lessons
Has anyone ever tried to say that video games are an art form? I know a few people who think that, and frankly I agree with them. I’m not talking about games like Modern Warfare 3 or Battlefield 3; games like that are the same concept rehashed ten-fold and shoved in the faces of every thirteen-year-old boy who has ever wanted to shoot a gun. I’m referring to games that tend to leave an imprint on some people. A good example of this would be the Super Nintendo game, EarthBound.
EarthBound was released in 1995 to North American audiences. Critics praised the game for its music and the bizarre humor present throughout, but consumers weren’t such a big fan, as they criticized the simple graphics and the gameplay. EarthBound was an RPG (role-playing game), meaning that it wasn’t quite like the platforming giants of its time, like Super Mario or Sonic the Hedgehog. Instead, you had to find your enemies weaknesses and fight them in a turn-based style of gameplay, meaning you would strike with your weapons, and the enemy would retort.
It was a bit different from the RPG giants of the time. In other games, you were travelling around a medieval-themed world battling dragons and saving the world from the evils of warlocks and witches. In EarthBound, you are a ten-year-old boy by the name of Ness who lives in Eagleland (a parody of the United States) and was destined with the task of saving the world from an alien named Giygas. On his journey to save the world, he meets an assortment of unusual individuals who help him out in his quest, such as the blues band The Runaway Five (a parody of The Blues Brothers), or an alien bee named Buzz Buzz.
While it may appear like nothing more than a kids game on the surface, EarthBound has some very mature undertones. The story and the dialogue in the game were written by a man named ShigesatoItoi. He was the mastermind behind the game and the reason why it was so successful: he was a well-renowned writer in his home country of Japan, and his fans were eager to see what he would do with a video game. People have speculated about the game’s deeper meaning for years, but there is one particular theory that I like more.
The theory states that EarthBound is much more than a story about defeating aliens; it’s more of a coming-of-age story. When you start the game, you are an average ten-year-old boy that has to travel across the world in his quest to defeat evil. Over the course of this, you overcome obstacles, fight evil people, eventually climaxing with a final battle with the terror that is Giygas. At the end of the game, you have to walk back to your hometown. All of the characters that you saw are now congratulating you and the world is finally at peace. When you come home, your mom gives you a hug, tells you that she is proud of the man that you have become, and flips through a photo album with you.
I might be reading too much into it, but I feel that EarthBound is a good example of the deeper meaning that can sometimes escape us when we are too wrapped up in the game. There are so many other good examples of this, but I feel that EarthBound gets the point across pretty well.