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In my daily poking around on the internet yesterday, I saw, much to my delight, that EarthBound was recently given an E rating by the ESRB . Its listed platform? Wii. If you’ve heard of the game, you probably know that this is HUGE news for EarthBound fans.

If you haven’t heard of EarthBound, let me give you a brief history:

Released in the US in June of 1995, the SNES RPG EarthBound (MOTHER 2 in Japan) came along during what I like to think of as the Golden Age of gaming, and was closely followed by games like Chrono Trigger and Secret of Evermore (both games that are near and dear to my heart). At the time of its release, EarthBound’s sales in the US were less than spectacular. This was probably due, in part, to the game’s simple graphics, coupled with some pretty stiff competition. Nintendo released a lot of really great games that year. Despite its relatively poor sales outside of Japan, EarthBound has a very large and dedicated fan base in the US, and around the world. Fans of the game enjoy its deviation from the traditional mold of medieval RPGs, and usually find its simple graphics endearing.

A sequel was in the works, slated for release on the Nintendo 64, under the name EarthBound 64. I remember how excited I was when I saw it on a future release list. But then, as the N64 faltered under the release of so many carbon copy sports and racing games (not to mention the failed 64DD project), the release date for EarthBound 64 got pushed back indefinitely. Still, even long after Nintendo stopped producing N64 games, EarthBound fans haven’t given up hope, or abandoned their efforts campaigning for a sequel. I can’t possibly do justice to the tremendous amount of time, effort, and raw talent that has been poured into that campaign, so suffice to say that it’s a lot. A whole lot.

Fast forward about a decade, and the fans finally feel like their voice has been heard: Nintendo is going to release the sequel. Unfortunately, two years later, it looks like MOTHER 3 is going the same route as EarthBound’s precursor, MOTHER, which Nintendo never released outside of Japan. Nintendo heard the collective plea of EarthBound fans, and responded with a resounding “No.” EarthBound’s dismal sales in America had preemptively crushed any chance of seeing MOTHER 3 in the US.

But EarthBound fans don’t give up. Recently, they redoubled their efforts and launched a campaign to bring EarthBound to the Wii’s Virtual Console, figuring that if it sells well on the VC, Nintendo might reconsider a US release of MOTHER 3. Initially, the response seemed pretty good. As far as anyone knows, EarthBound has been ready for release on the VC for months - Nintendo just hasn’t deemed it to be in their best interest (or maybe they just like stringing their fans along).

The recent news of EarthBound’s rating by the ESRB is a ray of hope for fans of the franchise. Maybe now that Nintendo has gotten all of the important games like Excitebike and Power Golf out of the way, they’re finally ready to listen to their fans. Given their track record, I’m not going to get my hopes up too much, but it would certainly be a pleasant surprise.

Other posts on Earthbound:

• Earthbound gets rated by the ESRB

• North American VC getting Earthbound soon

• Earthbound is Virtual Console Bound!

• Would you buy EarthBound on Virtual Console?