The creator of the Mother series, known as EarthBound in the west, has politely asked fans to stop pestering him about an English release of the third game.
Mother 3 began trending online after Nintendo announced the game is coming to Switch Online, but only in Japan. Having launched there in 2006, Mother 3 is perhaps one of the most sought-after role-playing games of all time because it's never been released in English.
The Nintendo Direct announcement therefore sent western fans into a flurry once more, with many directing their complaints and requests at series creator Shigesato Itoi, who seemingly has no control over an English version.
Shigesato Itoi says fans need to talk to Nintendo about an official Mother 3 localization, not him.
He hasn’t been super involved in the video game industry for almost 20 years.
Leave the poor guy alone lol!https://t.co/tZYBYEIM3B
— Stealth (@Stealth40k) February 22, 2024
"Shigesato Itoi says fans need to talk to Nintendo about an official Mother 3 localisation, not him," read a post on X/Twitter from translator @Stealth40k. "Please talk to Nintendo about that, not me," read Itoi's post via machine translation.
The lack of an English version of Mother 3 is a well established joke in the video game business, with even Nintendo releasing a parody video showing former Nintendo of America president Reggie Fils-Aimé blowing up a journalist asking about it.
Last year, speaking as part of a documentary titled Earthbound, USA, Itoi finally opened up about the release of the long-desired sequel, saying he would "love for people in the U.S. to play Mother 3."
"I've talked about it with Nintendo before," Itoi said. "Apparently they were presented with the offer to use the translation, but they said it wasn't quite as simple as that. I think it'd be really interesting if they took up the offer."
The first two Mother games are available on Nintendo Switch Online in the west as EarthBound Beginnings and EarthBound. As for the third game, Fils-Aimé previously said the decision not to localize Mother 3 was "based on the business needs and the business situation at the time".
Ryan Dinsdale is an IGN freelance reporter. He'll talk about The Witcher all day.
