Learning to Love Mother 3, My Least Favourite Mother Game

 

After completing the all-time cult classic Mother 3, I didn’t know what to think. I found the things people often praise it for - namely the world building, narrative, and characters - disappointing, and that the game doesn’t feel as nuanced, well-written, relatable, and meaningful as its predecessors. However, after giving it some time in the hot spring, there is a redeeming element about the game I found, at last, and it relates to something I wish was the real, main focus of the game instead of all the unengaging, clumsily-written and presented conundrums of the plot: Lucas' relationship with Claus and what it means to be family. Let's dive right in.

Why It Didn’t Work

Let’s get this out of the way first: I did NOT enjoy the writing of Mother 3 when it comes to what happened in the story, what the game is trying to “critique” at large, and its final resolution.
The game had some clear cuts in its troublesome development when it comes to the lore and characters - Kumatora’s entire existence, Flint’s role in the game, the Egg of Light, the Needles and the Dark Dragon, Leder, etc. - the awful pacing, and the restrictive linearity in the game’s progression that makes the already miserable world of Mother 3 even more depressing to get through. However, all of this cannot compare to the disappointment I have with the “heart” of the game that earned it all the praise and legacy as a piece of media. I’ll try to not delve into the political aspect but more so from a writing style perspective though, as we all have different views.

In Mother 1 and 2, the people, animals, and even unanimated objects were “corrupted” and turned violent by the influence of Giegue/Giygas, and it’s true at least in Mother 2 that once you defeat the “source” of the corruption, be it the Mani Mani Devil statue or Gigyas himself, no more hostility is found in these individuals, and the trek back home after the final battle has no enemies and everything is at peace. However, shopkeepers didn’t suddenly stop selling items for ridiculously high prices (especially in Summers) nor start telling you clearly what an item does before you purchase it, and hotel receptionists didn’t just start offering you more reasonable prices or even free rent. Some police officers still regard you as a “pest”, and Porky’s parents didn’t get better and start to treat their children properly - their fallout actually happened during the peaceful endgame sequence -  and Ness’s dad still never showed up. The diva Venus in Fourside took on an additional, more questionable job of being a nude model even though she was almost assaulted live on stage during a performance by a rabid fan. In contrast, Mr. Monotoli - in the same city that is the game’s most damning critique of the capitalistic modern world - gave the mayor position back to his boss, Mr. Enrich, and resided to work as an elevator man inside the mayor’s building. The world becomes better, less evil, but it’s still the modern world with all its beauty and ugliness. The world is always driven by a desire for more - more money, more advancement, more self-satisfaction - but it’s always a beautiful world worth living in and worth protecting regardless. 

 

In Mother 3, a complete “doomsday” follow-up to the state of humanity after Mother 2, humanity had destroyed itself and had to settle on the isolated Nowhere Island. They (without their memory and experience of the previous world-ending event) went back to a more communal lifestyle where people help each other without expecting anything in return, and it is said that the village “knew not of sadness” until the blatantly named Pigmask army arrived. Despite their arrival at the town starting a literal wildfire and spawning animal-mechanical chimeras that killed one of the most beloved people in the town, Lucas’s mother Hinawa (and her innocent 12-year-old son), the town eventually, accepted the new way of life introduced by the Pigmasks: exchange of goods and services with money, industrial jobs, questionable entertainment venues, the joy of life by owning these so-called Happy Boxes that seem to serve no real practical purpose - a literal vehicle of consumerism.

Eventually, the people abandoned their modernized village for the grand life in New Pork City, which turned out to be a corrupted, polluted mess underneath its flashy exterior. And the solution? To give everyone their memories back and make a wish to reset the state of the Nowhere Island back to its non-materialistic and communal lifestyle. To go back to nature, as the new title screen after you complete the game indicated. There is no subtlety nor nuance here whatsoever. Capitalism is bad and the only way to fix humanity is to go back to a time when there is no technological advancement, no economy, no money - no “greed”. A drastic tonal and viewpoint departure from the previous games that, in my opinion, doesn’t feel like “Mother” I know and love. And it doesn’t resonate with me as deeply as the previous game’s narratives and messages, despite being more “mature”, supposedly.

The Mother games have always been a mix of humour and darkness, childlike and mature. But they have always had an earnest writing style with deep yet subtle critiques of modern society instead of overt cynicism and forced “funny” moments to alleviate the tension of dark, tragic situations like most modern media. It’s always been what made the series different from the numerous Motherlikes/Earthbound-inspired games out there with much more forceful writing that feels like they were more inspired by Mother 3 than Mother 2 or 1. As a big fan of the first two Mother games, I couldn’t get over just how… un-Mother-like the third game feels as if it had missed the reason why the writing of its predecessors was so widely appealing and thought-provoking.

 A huge missed opportunity in Mother 3’s critique of modern society for me was in regards to the Tazmily nursery home established after the timeskip. Even though I failed to engage with the game’s many attempts at scrutinizing capitalism, the contrast between the beautiful, clean modernized town versus the run-down nursery home struck a chord with me. It’s not often that we see the poor family dynamic with elderly parents being highlighted as a problem in a capitalistic society. Typically, such narratives would be focusing on things like consumerism, corruption, child negligence, environmentalism, etc. like most of Mother 3’s critique, actually. However, there’s only 1 problem. The game reveals that most of the Tazmily villagers aren’t actually related. Many of these family members don’t even look alike, as noted by the NPC Nana in Chapter 2, and the fact that they were originally the last surviving humans and got their memories wiped to start anew on Nowhere Island just lessens the impact of the nursery home commentary. It was such an unnecessary endgame “plot twist” that does more harm than good for the narrative and message of the game, in my opinion.

In the end, however, it was Lucas and Claus’s relationship that made Mother 3’s narrative click for me as a poignant message to adults, in a way I don’t often if ever see anyone talk about. No, not just the emotional final battle between them, but the metaphorical journey they went through and how it can be a poignant message for a young adult growing up like the first 2 games.

Mother 3 and What It Means to Be Family

Despite being twin brothers, Lucas and Claus have vastly different personalities. Lucas was the gentle younger brother while Claus was the energetic older twin. This seemingly small personality difference between the boys was actually the cause of their downfall after Hinawa died: the timid Lucas failed to stop the rage-fueled Claus from running off to the cliffs to avenge his mother, which led to his ultimate, predictable demise. Porky and the Pigmasks might have unintentionally caused the death of their beloved mother, but it was by Lucas’s hands that Claus died a pointless death. It was by Lucas’s hands that the enemy got their slimy hands on Claus’s body and turned him into a mindless super soldier to carry out their nefarious plans. And Lucas couldn’t bear to strike Claus in their final showdown until the older twin strike their father, after which Lucas began his assault on Claus until the spirit of the deceased Hinawa begged them to stop lashing at each other. And the following 2 shots, with Lucas’s inaction in chapter 1 in mind, were what finally sold me on this highly disjointed journey, on the “heart” of Mother 3.

 

With the prominent political focus of Mother 3, the Lucas-Claus dynamic can be viewed as a more adult-oriented metaphor, like how the stories of the previous Mother games can be interpreted. The twin brothers have different personalities and ultimately, views on things. Lucas is the inactive one, becoming scared and eventually a shut-in after Hinawa’s death, wallowing in his own misery. Meanwhile, Claus the active twin is hellbent on bringing justice to his deceased mother. Because of his recklessness and Lucas’s choice to just “let him go”, Claus became a mindless puppet to be used by the Pigmask Army to achieve their goals, to the extent that he even struck down his own father. However, Hinawa beyond the grave reminded them of what being family is all about: “even when you argue, you have to help each other out when you need to as a family”.

It reminds me of how today’s families have been torn apart by different views, especially political ones. You see more and more stories of families arguing and refusing to look one another in the eye because of differing opinions. It can be devastating for parents and siblings to raise and grow up with a child only to see them embracing questionable values they might not even fully understand to begin with, becoming an entirely different person than whom they loved their whole lives. Hell, it almost happened to my own family as well. But if we didn’t stick by each other despite our differences, if we just idiotically “let each other go”, I can’t possibly imagine how miserable our lives would be today. Perhaps I wouldn’t be here writing these blogs with such fervent passion.

In this way, I can finally see how Mother 3 at its heart still carries the themes and values of its predecessors, despite its radical departure in tone and more juvenile resolution to the story of its world. In Mother 1, Giegue was tasked with destroying planet Earth as a response to George stealing the PSI technique from his alien race, so that no humans could abuse this power. However, he couldn’t bring himself to do it and was forced to retreat when Ninten - the grandchild of George and Maria, technically his human nephew - sang the Eight Melodies of his human mother’s lullaby to him. In Mother 2, Giegue now returning as a senseless, confused Giygas was once again defeated by the warm human emotions of hope, kindness, and camaraderie from all the people Ness and his friends helped along their journey, as well as from his mother and sister. And once again in Mother 3, Claus, the brother you “abandoned” when he needed you most, who is now a mindless, heartless killing machine that can only be stopped by the love and forgiveness he received from his family. Even though Claus wasn’t lashing out for a personal, ideological reason like Giygas did to the humans who betrayed and stole the secrets of his race, nor was he a fleshed-out character at all, there is still heavy emotional weight to the twin’s confrontation. 

 

 

To me, this aspect has always been at the heart of the Mother series, and even though 3 strayed away from the more nuanced and earnest writing style of its predecessors, at least this spirit is still kept intact. Even if the characters are much less developed despite the game being purposefully made linear unlike the previous entries to allow for more characterization. Even if the critique and bigger societal message of the game were lost on me.

Final Thoughts

Itoi has previously stated that the Mother games are best enjoyed at different stages of your life, in gradual order as you age and become an adult. Mother 1 as a child, Mother 2 as a teenager growing up, and Mother 3 as you become a young adult, and that’s why he will never make Mother 4 as it’ll be the real adult lives of the players. Many have praised Mother 3 as the most mature and resonating game in the series for an adult, but for me personally, I’m glad I played Mother 3 first as I found its message to never give up on your family and the loss of family Lucas suffered more relatable to my younger self rather than the current adult me, as I too went through the same thing when I was about his age too.

After 3, I went back to play Mother 1 (with a patch to increase money and EXP gained while reducing the encounter rate for a less “grindy” experience) and I found its message of empathy, never losing oneself, and remembering the love and values your mother taught you to be deeply moving. Appropriately enough, this was the life lesson I needed to learn during my transformative teenage years. Finally, I finished the trilogy by playing Mother 2, another game where the protagonist’s dad isn’t around, and as an adult, its themes of overcoming your inner darkness, forming bonds with other people, the relief of having others, trumping over the inexplicable evils of this world with the meaningful bonds you have in life, and simply just… appreciating and protecting this beautiful world are deeply touching and poignant to me. I played the games out of order, perhaps not really in the “recommended” way gameplay-wise either, but I found this unorthodox journey with the Mother series to mirror my experience growing up perfectly as well.

Mother 3 was certainly no masterpiece, “the closest video games have ever come to art”, nor was it a great game to end the Mother series’ legacy on, in my opinion. But it was, in its own way, a Mother game at heart, and underneath all its verbose storytelling and complete lack of subtlety and nuance is, a core familial theme and message not too dissimilar to the incredible entries before it that can touch the heart of anyone, child or adult. Even though I didn’t have the greatest time, I’m still glad I played Mother 3, and I’m happy to have experienced this franchise in whole, as Mother 1 and Mother 2 are now in my list of top 10 favourite games ever.

It is my dream that one day Mother 1 will be officially remade by Grezzo using the same clay-like artstyle like Link’s Awakening, but for now I’ll settle with the fan remake and reimagine, Mother Root and Mother Encore. I truly hope more people will give the first game a chance with these modern fangames, as for me, it strikes the perfect balance between the quirkiness of 2 and the more serious, plot-driven narrative of 3 without going overboard on either end of the spectrum, while also offering plenty of great gameplay ideas of its own that were unfortunately lost in its sequels. And it still has the most iconic soundtrack in the series for me, so I’ll close this post out with my favourite song from the game. Cheers!

https://youtu.be/-X74HshyTYI