Play Earthbound Battler Online

EarthBound came out for the Super Nintendo in 1994, developed by Ape Inc. and HAL Laboratory. It was a role playing game from that era that stood out because it was set in a modern world instead of a fantasy one. You did not fight dragons in castles; you fought strange aliens and street gangs in suburban neighborhoods and shopping malls.

You control a boy named Ness who sets out from his home to stop an alien threat. You explore the world screen by screen, talking to odd characters and battling enemies in a turn based system. A unique mechanic is the rolling health meter; when you take damage, your health points slowly drain, and you can sometimes heal or win the fight before they hit zero. Your main goal is to travel to eight sanctuaries and record their melodies on your Sound Stone. The pacing is deliberate, sometimes slow, and the game can be surprisingly difficult in spots, especially with random encounters. Playing it feels like taking a strange, sometimes funny, and occasionally melancholic road trip through a world that looks familiar but is full of secrets.