The 15th Anniversary of Mother 3is fast approaching, while Western fans still haven’t seen the game officially localized. While it’s likely Nintendo will keep ignoring the franchise (at least internationally), could the company finally surprise its fanbase and make that long-awaited announcement for an English version of the game?

Mother 3 is the third entry in the EarthBound/Mother series. EarthBound is the name of the franchise outside of Japan, with EarthBound Beginnings being the international name for Mother and EarthBound the name for Mother 2. Mother 3 was initially planned for the N64DD, but it was eventually canceled and reborn as a Game Boy Advance title. Mother fans have been hoping that the N64 version of Mother 3 will come out in a future Nintendo Gigaleak, as it was shown at trade shows in Japan. Even though Mother 3 is regarded as one of the best JRPGs on the Game Boy Advance, it still hasn’t been released outside of Japan.

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Mother 3 was originally released for the Game Boy Advance on April 20, 2006. This means that the game’s fifteenth anniversary is only a few weeks away. Nintendo has gone out of its way to celebrate the 35th anniversary of the Super Mario Bros. series, and a similar celebration is going on for The Legend of Zelda‘s 35th anniversary, but the EarthBound/Mother franchise is generally ignored by the company.

How Nintendo Might Celebrate Mother 3’s Anniversary

So, how might Nintendo celebrate Mother 3‘s anniversary this year? The sensible answer is nothing. Nintendo might release a tweet mentioning the anniversary, but that’s probably all. It’s also possible that Mother 3 Spirits appear in Super Smash Bros. Ultimate, since that’s how the company celebrated the EarthBound/Mother franchise’s 30th anniversary. Nintendo will likely never release Mother 3 outside of Japan, especially as there is a high-quality English fan translation already available online that has yet to be taken down, which shows Nintendo’s apathy toward the project.

The main reason why fans think there could be a chance for Mother 3 is due to Fire Emblem. Nintendo released a translated version of the original Fire Emblem on the NES for Nintendo Switch, giving it its first international release (not counting remakes). This led to Mother 3 trending on Twitter, as fans believed that Nintendo was interested in localizing more of its old catalog for international releases. It’s certainly possible the port of Fire Emblem might have been a test run for similar releases in the future, and Mother 3 is easily the most high-profile retro game that Nintendo could bring to the Switch – so anything is possible.

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About The Author


Scott Baird
(2515 Articles Published)

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Scott has been writing for Screen Rant since 2016 and regularly contributes to The Gamer. He has previously written articles and video scripts for websites like Cracked, Dorkly, Topless Robot, and TopTenz.
A graduate of Edge Hill University in the UK, Scott started out as a film student before moving into journalism. It turned out that wasting a childhood playing video games, reading comic books, and watching movies could be used for finding employment, regardless of what any career advisor might tell you. Scott specializes in gaming and has loved the medium since the early ‘90s when his first console was a ZX Spectrum that used to take 40 minutes to load a game from a tape cassette player to a black and white TV set. Scott now writes game reviews for Screen Rant and The Gamer, as well as news reports, opinion pieces, and game guides. He can be contacted on LinkedIn.

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