About Motherlike Games & Inspired Projects
by: Kody NOKOLO on 6/8/2021
“‘The very lives you’re living now are MOTHER 4.’ I really feel that way. ‘Today we had lots of ridiculous thoughts, today we felt sadness, today we laughed a lot’. That’s what I had set out to do within the world of those games.”
– Shigesato Itoi to Satoru Iwata and Yasuhiro Nagata, 2/7/2011
There may not ever be a successor to MOTHER 3 in the traditional sense, but the MOTHER series lives on in so many other projects that continue the series’ legacy! These projects that we experience and live through now are, in a way, their own MOTHER 4s.
The following games and other projects have been cited as heavily inspired by the MOTHER series, or they reference the MOTHER games heavily. I sorted them all chronologically to create what I call the “MOTHER 4 Timeline” to showcase how MOTHER lives on in different, full-length projects today!
Just because they might have some MOTHER inspirations doesn’t mean they’re all the same, though! Each one is unique, and comes from a different place in its own right. MOTHER is just one small part of that. Almost anything a MOTHER fan creates might be able to be added to a list like this, so to narrow it down more, I tried to restrict it to projects that typically take more than just a few hours to fully experience. Anything that can be considered a demo or only part of a full product has not been considered either.
If you’re unfamiliar with a project, find out more about it and maybe it could be the favorite thing for your PSI someday!
And this isn’t all, there are even more MOTHER inspired projects being created right now! Check out what’s new in our most recent Mother Direct for more information!
MOTHER 4 Timeline
1996 – Pokémon Red & Green Versions
The first of the now world famous Pokémon series has evidence of inspirations by the first two MOTHER games. Shortly after Game Freak released their first game Quinty, Pokémon designer Satoshi Tajiri reviewed MOTHER in one of his columns from Famicom Winning Book 10/1989, where he wrote that he was interested in the setting and cinematic sense the game had.
Pokémon producer Tsunekazu Ishihara also was the producer on MOTHER 2 and CEO of MOTHER 2 developer APE Inc. Though no comments have been found from Ishihara connecting both projects directly, APE was restructured shortly after MOTHER 2 to become Pokémon developer Creatures Inc. and retained its staff from EarthBound, including MOTHER 2 composer Hirokazu “Chip” Tanaka, the president of Creatures until 2023.
Tajiri’s interest in the first MOTHER, Ishihara’s connection to both projects, Chip Tanaka overseeing the establishment of Creatures Inc., and the similarities between the games’ settings seem to connect Pokémon to MOTHER more than any other game series.
2009 – MOTHER: Cognitive Dissonance
Created and directed by MOTHER fan “Handish2000” or “Otherhand” in the year 2009, Mother: Cognitive Dissonance is a fangame that is a side-story and sequel to MOTHER 1 and a prequel to MOTHER 2, explaining what happened between the two games, hence the subtitle, “Between Two Times”. Starring a rag-tag group of aliens, the game chronicles their mission of keeping the Apple of Enlightenment out of Giegue’s hands.
Developed using RPG Maker 2000, the game is known and celebrated for being one of the first fully-completed MOTHER fangames. This game features an all-new cast of characters (some even becoming fan-favorites in of themselves), a completely original soundtrack featuring works from Bill Eager, Maximus_32, Quincy Pringle and more, and a compelling fan story that connects the events of MOTHER 1 and 2.
2020 – Mother Forever
