for as much as video games have been arguably the dominant form of art today, my world with them has been distant. the most i have ever had was a wii and ds with a huge obsession with pokemon; games that were mentioned everywhere growing up, from friends to countdown youtubers like joshscorcher, seemed to be hidden treasure on a giant hill that seemed unable to be "conquered" by me. i do not have a lot of nostalgia for video games as a whole, save for pokemon, but from listening in on school convos and videos gave me the closest experience to capturing the magic that the medium had for a lot of people

stumbling onto earthbound felt like a fever dream come true; the place i live at recently got a snes that had pre-packaged games, one of which was, of course, earthbound. it was an opportunity i had to take before it might one day vanish in front of me. not counting a majority of the games i played as a kid, this felt like the first holistic game experience i ever had in my entire life

and i didn't know why for most of it! i deffo knew how it was considered one of the greatest games ever made, i knew a lot about giygas and his disturbing boss battle, i was familiar with mother 3, i was absolutely clicking with it, but something was missing to help unlock whatever "secret spell" it had cast over me. as the game's innocence started to become more and more wistful tho, it suddenly hit me like a freight train. beneath all the beautiful quirky weirdness was smth that directly talked to me about what it truly means to be a part of a video game. i'm sure you can find a lot of ppl saying the story is nothing special, and while they're right, it's the fact that the entire thing hones in on baseline fantasies, directly speaking to ppl about their lost sense of happiness and innocence as they get involved with ness' journey becoming a quest to destroy, what in essence is, the foreboding world of dark adulthood. giygas is the final triumph, a final boss so terrifying for such a colorful game that is perfectly out of place as the fear of facing off something an existential cosmic being wraps around the sweet homely portrait of ... well, home! the relief i felt at being freed from the nightmare of giygas' terror was something so powerful, making me discover for real why video games are such a wonderful medium of art like i was that bubbly kid who kept most of their despair at bay

it is honestly everything i could ask for as the first true gaming experience and the start of my journey in a medium i've neglected for too long