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The frequency of random encounters in the base game make it unplayable in my opinion. Even for the time it was incredibly high. This fixes that, and that alone makes this mod worth it. The graphical upgrades and dialog also improve this game tremendously, as well as all the other little touches. Nintendo should be offering this version alongside the original.

Less grinding, better graphics, better color palettes, better translated dialogue, a superior font, what's not to love?

Just one thing: The character sprites. They may be higher quality sprites, but it makes everyone look fat, and just not right. A good example of this is Queen Mary, who is supposed to be a beautiful and graceful queen, but almost just looks like a fat slob in this mod.

That minor detail could never even make me consider recommending the game without this mod though. This is the only way to play Mother, and anyone who doesn't play it like this is missing out on what this game can be.

9/10 Stars - Minor graphical issues.

Finally revising this review as I put my money where my mouth is and addressed both minor gripes I had about the patch with my own patches.

This patch, while not guaranteed to satisfy everyone with 100% of its changes, is a breath of fresh air for an obscure classic that serves as a fundamental foundation for patches geared towards giving players a definitive edition of MOTHER to play. The redone overworld, map, and art assets look amazing, all lovingly redone by hand to recapture the initial designs of the game. The retranslation, like so many other retranslations of classic games that were restricted (seemingly) by space and (realistically) the infancy of localization, better captures the essence of the story Itoi wanted to share with everyone who played his game.

The sprite rework, while admirable for all its effort, detracts from the soul and charm of the game, but there now exists a seamless patch to revert this. The streamlining of level-up text, while convenient, also removes a minor playstyle option for min-maxers such as myself, but there also exists now a patch to rectify this. Really, there are a great variety of optional patches that are compatible with this one or the fork (exclusive alternative patch), that any shortcomings are negligible.

Above all else though, this patch reignited my passion in reverse-engineering and coding for hobby, and for that Dragon and all who helped you on this project, I thank you.

Someone recomended me this patch as the perfect way for anyone who never played the game before. He was right. It doesn't feel slow or clunky, is more like a normal SNES game. The improvements in playability and graphics are way too good to get back.

I cannot deny that A LOT OF WORK went into this hack, from every point of view. But, while I applaud the intent, I can't fully recommend this hack for a very miny tiny thing (probably fully solvable with a very little addendum hack): THE CHARACTERS.

Why Nintend has sideburns, even if he is a kid?

Why they all look like tetramino blocks?

The original characters were drawn to clearly evoke the Peanuts-style (even totally ripping some designs). You can see that even in that peculiar walking animations (http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-WMfMLH-WnMA/Vd62WOOUEII/AAAAAAAAA3U/3a-sht5-Wc/s1600/Peanuts_1.jpg) in which you can see the shoes' soles wheen looking down.

This romhack totally botches that. Now the characters look... blocky.

This is one of the most complete hack I have ever seen, congratulations on the great work, it inspires me to become a great hacker as also! Great hack for beginners or for Mother game lovers! I just love it!

Try this patch for nice nes style graphics. Recommended for those who don't like the original graphics.

I tried playing the original Mother a few years ago and didn't get very far. Anyone who knows me knows I have a high tolerance for old-school difficulty, but the original Mother was ridiculous-I never even died that much in the original Dragon Warrior!

This hack fixes 90% of everything wrong with the original version, and then fixes a few things you didn't know were wrong in the first place! The game plays faster, the cheap difficulty is gone (although some parts are definitely still hard), but by removing all the artificial structural fluff that made the game longer in the first place, it does go pretty fast.

If you want to play this game and not get totally frustrated, you don't just want this hack, you NEED this hack.

My girlfriend and I played through EarthBound and Mother 3 together. I had read about how difficult Earthbound Zero was and how it wasn't as enjoyable as other two games. We liked that this game didn't require a lot of grinding and that it had changes that made it more evocative of the later games in the series. We didn't encounter any bugs. Good work and thank you for providing a wonderful first Mother experience!

Mother, Oh how I love you so. From it's quirky humor to it's memorable story and characters, there is a lot to love from the Mother series. And with it being the series' 25th Anniversary, this hack is the perfect present for a fantastic series. The Mother 25th Anniversary Edition is a hack of not the original Famicom Mother, but the unfortunately unreleased Earth Bound prototype that not only cleans up and improves the graphics and sprites, but also fixes a few other issues this game has. But enough with the praising, let's get on the review of the 1.0 patch of Mother 25th Anniversary Edition.

Story: No point in telling you the story, if you've never played this game, then you must play it. It's a story that shouldn't be spoiled.

Graphics: Holy hell, this hack looks beautiful. Not that I hated the old yet memorable graphics of the original, But this hack makes them look so much better. There is a heavy attention on detail, and I love every bit of it. All the sprites look fantastically done and the enemy sprites look way more better than before.

Music: The music was left untouched, which is great! This game already has fantastic music and I appreciate the fact that the creator left the music alone.

Gameplay: Oh boy, the gameplay. The gameplay is the same as the original, a regular RPG in a similar fashion to Dragon Quest (Dragon Warrior in the US). However, one problem I had with the original was just how hard it was to play due to how powerful the enemies were and how pitiful the amount of EXP you gained from each battle. This hack however fixes all those issues, making it a lot more fun and less "grind heavy". Although this game is still a bit challenging, it isn't hair-pulling difficult due to a lack of an efficient leveling system.

Script: This is a topic I don't touch on much, but since this is a hack with a newly written script, I might as well address it. Most of the English is still the same, but this translation seems to be much better than the original and fixes a lot of grammatical issues from the original. This is a solid translation that does a better job than the original unreleased translation. But then again, I don't expect any less from Tomato, the same guy behind the fantastic English translation to Mother 3.

Overall: The creator of the hack did what he intended on doing and did it beautifully. This hack reeks of effort, and it definitely shows. This took the original game and improved upon it, and it makes it the definitive version of Mother to play. If you can get your hands on a ROM of the Earth Bound Prototype, I highly recommend giving this hack a go. You won't be disappointed in the slightest!

Rating: 10/10

If you're going to play Earth Bound, play this version over the unreleased finished prototype.

While the unenhanced finished prototype is an amazing game, it is most certainly not a game for everyone. Although it broke many RPG conventions - being set in modern times, starring kids and not teenagers, and used real-world elements such as money, Earth Bound is still a product of its time, plagued by long hours of mandatory level grinding and frequently confusing progression goal markers leaving you confused on just where to proceed next.

This hack does a lot to improve the Mother 1 experience. For one thing, you now have a world map that shows your location in enough detail to allow you to navigate without getting lost.

The game's difficulty has been drastically improved, with the sudden spikes completely gone as long as you're not avoiding enemies altogether. At no time did I feel the game was unfair, as was frequently the case in the original version.

There is also a visual jump from the original - gone are the washed out hues replaced by darker - bolder - cartoon-like colors. Nearly all sprites in the game have been redrawn to more closely match the original clay models shown in official art. Some characters - especially the hero Ninten - look much better as a result.

The icing on the cake here is that legendary fan-translator Tomato has touched up the game's dialogue, making it sound more natural while ensuring NPCs give clearer hints on where to go next and better preserving the series trademark humor.

As much of an improvement as this Anniversary Edition is though, there are still problems present from the original, most notably the extremely limited inventory. Each party member can only hold 8 items, and same-items do not stack. This means if you have four loaves of bread, each bread takes up an item slot.

The original game got around this by storing unneeded items with your sister. This archaic system really should have been modernized with this hack. Hopefully there will eventually be a revision that does just that. If the space Ninten's sister has for storing items was moved to Ninten himself, this issue would completely vanish.

For now though, this is the definitive version of MOTHER.