So, for starters how about you introduce yourself, Grayfruit. I know you’ve done a lot of YouTube content for a while, I remember knowing about your channel back in the Smash 4 days, you mained Mr. Game & Watch and I want to say Jigglypuff but I don’t really remember haha.

Hi, I’m probably best known for Smash Bros. even though I’ve largely moved on to other games at this point. I started making Smash 4 montages about 4 years ago as a hobby and slowly gained an audience, then I started doing streams and highlights of the streams and people seemed to like that too, so when I started to get sick of Smash I decided to just branch out and do whatever I want basically.

We had a conversation prior to this interview about EarthBound and you said you had a lot of feelings about EarthBound. What exactly are those feelings? What about the game that makes you feel?

Well, I played the game for the first time on an emulator on my crappy laptop when I was 20, right around the same time I started the channel. It was a super striking experience to me just because of how nostalgic it made me feel: particularly weird because I technically have no nostalgia for it as I barely knew anything about the series growing up, but it made me realize that nostalgia has less to do with specific things you personally remember from the past and more to do with just creating a general feeling that resonates with how you’ve *felt* in the past, which felt like an important but subtle distinction. On top of being subversive and genuinely funny, it’s a great mood piece that I think could take anyone’s mind into a simpler time. Just a great piece of media in general; not personally a fan of the combat but that’s honestly not as big of a deal as it sounds.

Have you ever attempted making a ”””speedrun””” of EarthBound before, or streaming it? Maybe I’ve missed it before.

I haven’t streamed it yet, but I definitely plan to stream the whole series. Probably won’t be a “speedrun” as it’s quite a long game, but someone a while ago informed me if you plug in a second controller on the game, both players can control the game at once: thought it might be a cute/funny thing to do with Lark in the future or something(I haven’t asked him but I bet he hasn’t played it as he is generally an uncultured swine).

What started you on your YouTube/ Twitch career as a content creator? Has there been any struggles or stress involved with making this kind of content?

I just started it out as a casual pastime at first making Smash montages with replays I saved from For Glory battles. Like any job it has ups and downs, but overall I feel the ups outweigh the downs. Recently I’ve had quite a lot of tech anxiety, as I want my voice to sound really good for the stream and have a good video quality. There are other stresses associated with performance that still exist even though none of my audience are actually in the room with me… it’s certainly not the same pressure one feels in a concert hall but I still sweat over it sometimes, especially if I’m doing poorly in-game or feel like I’m maybe making dull/bad commentary.

In our conversation earlier, you mentioned you never played EarthBound Beginnings (MOTHER) and you only played a little of MOTHER3. Do you know why you never finished those games, or have you just never found the time to finish them. I’m interested to know, most folks I’ve spoken to have finished MOTHER2 & MOTHER3, but not just one game of the series.

There was nothing about Mother 3 that made me want to quit, I just got distracted with other games and then once I became a streamer I was like “oh ok, I’ll just stream it from the beginning sometime”. They’re on my list but my list of games I want to play on stream is VERY long, so it may take a while to get to this series.

Tell me about your Smash Brother’s life, what’s it like playing the game in Ultimate compared to Smash 4, do you go to tournaments or has this always been just online & with friends?

I’ve been to one official tournament as well as a few smaller locals that were a lot smaller but still decent size. The official tournament was Smash 4 and I instantly lost 2 games and got eliminated; I actually came out on top of one of the small Ultimate locals though, which was held just a couple days after Ultimate came out(when everyone barely knew how to play). I can dig tourneys when watching them streamed, but I don’t think it’s really my scene; I’m more of a casual player who just grinds online for the occasional flashy clip. Since the clips are so cherrypicked sometimes people take this to be a self-aggrandizing thing, like I was trying to seem better at the game than I actually was: wanting to clear the air about this was part of the inspiration behind my “Losing” series of montages.

Smash to me is most enjoyable with friends or random f***s online, even though the online is typically horrible. I remember quite enjoying Smash 4 for what it was and I got a lot of enjoyment out of Ultimate as well: however, playing a lot of Ultimate is what eventually got me truly tired of playing the game. Hard to tell if it’s just fatigue from playing the games so much and making so much content for them or if Ultimate specifically turned me off with its much faster, reaction-based gameplay(I’m really bad at dealing with anyone who spams moves efficiently; the fast gameplay did NOT help this at all).

Tacking on to a previous question, when did you first get introduced into the MOTHER series, was it because of Super Smash Bros, scrolling through some JRPGS you found, maybe you played it on WiiU or SNES Classic?

I’m sure the first I heard of EarthBound was in Smash Melee as a kid, but barely paid Ness any mind because I thought he just looked like a boring kid character. I think later on there was a Zero Punctuation review of EarthBound that inspired me to pick it up and play it. I tend to have similar tastes to Yahtzee Croshaw so I trusted his endorsement.

Do you have any favorite parts in EarthBound, any music tracks or things you can remember vividly about the game that makes it so special to you?

I just love all the cute little details and specific moments. I don’t even consider the actual overarching story to be that great, it’s kind of a meandering JRPG plot that serves as a good backdrop to the whole game but doesn’t have a lot of depth besides all the thematic stuff about home, and motherhood, and nostalgia(which I love, and also think is super cohesive design considering how comfy and homey the game feels tonally). But what really comes to mind when I think of the game is just a list of specific moments that are simultaneously quirky but vaguely emotional, I guess I’ll just list the ones that really stick out in my memory:

-Listening to the trumpet boy’s song on a cliff in Onett

-The flashbacks Ness has about remembering home when he defeats a sanctuary guardian(some of these really gave me chills, the good kind), as well as the guardians’ speech

-The moles that are confused as to who their actual levels of power and all thought they were the 3rd strongest

-Getting attacked by the circus tent

-Using fly paper to trap zombies

-The black and white sesame seed love story in the middle of the desert

-Moonside (particularly fighting the demonic statue at the end)

-Saturn Village and the trashcan Saturn that heals you

-Riding on Tessie’s head

-Giygas

And in terms of the music, it’s very hard to choose. It’s an amazing and truly stacked soundtrack. I guess Battle With a Weird Opponent or Your Name, Please are typically ones I closely associate with this game’s aesthetic.

It’s just a game filled with charm and clearly made with actual artistry in mind… even now just thinking about it makes me nostalgic. All the little details add up to be more than the sum of the parts, truly.

You’ve mentioned EarthBound a bit here and there on streams before, and I was wondering if you’d ever stream EarthBound or any of the game series again. I know I’d enjoy it, but just food for thought I suppose.

Yep! I’ll stream all 3 someday.

There’s been a lot of commotion recently regarding the Hobonichi Project, and some fans are believing the series is being resurrected haha, what’s your thoughts on Hobonichi’s MOTHER Project? You think any of that new material would find its way to the West?

It’s certainly cool: from what I know, it’s just a script book (has this ever been done before for a video game? It’s a cool idea) at the moment and the promise of more news later. I doubt there will be more Mother games, although it could certainly be a pleasant surprise. I think the most likely thing is a port of Mother 3 to the west, although that might be wishful thinking… I know it’s been the subject of much discussion and speculation already, but it just seems weird to me that a series that seemingly borrows so much americana and might even be considered pandering to Western audiences, wouldn’t get full releases in the West. Even more baffling is the fact that they DID translate the original Mother for English semi recently, which I can only imagine was a significantly less requested thing. Perhaps it is just a sign that 3 is coming soon as well? Will they call it EarthBound 2? Who knows.

Do you struggle with the Ness/Lucas matchups in Super Smash Bros. Ultimate and or know anyone in the community that is very good?

I don’t really know anyone who mains them… they’re quite infamously annoying to fight but there are certainly more spam-friendly and annoying matchups. Mr. Game & Watch’s bucket helps a lot with all their energy projectiles so maybe I don’t struggle as much with them as others do. Their recovery is also very exploitable, and as someone who loves to get fancy ledge guards, that’s good news.

What about Mr. Game & Watch that you like so much? I recall from your tutorial on how to Mr. Game & Watch you mostly said he’s a wacky, weird character but is that how you genuinely feel about the character?

It is! I always liked him even when I was a kid playing Melee at my friend’s house. He’s very surreal and strange, like a cave painting. I’m just drawn to simplicity and cartooniness I guess, and the 2D gimmick helped make him feel super unique. I was also quite drawn to Judge as a move when I was younger, which may have significantly biased me towards him. Incidentally I thought the direction they took with his animations in Ultimate was amazing. I adored the redesign. Incidentally, actual Game & Watch games are pretty insanely dull from a modern perspective, as cute as they are.

That’s about all I can think of for some questions for you, Grayfruit, but I do want to ask if you have any final thoughts on this interview or with the MOTHER community.

I’m not really that familiar with the community… good interview though! Thanks for having me 🙂