Earthbound - The Rat Race is one of those weird, wonderful SNES RPGs that somehow feels like it shouldn’t work—but totally does. You start off as this kid in a bizarre, almost modern-day setting, fighting sentient piles of vomit and street signs with a baseball bat. The humor’s dry, the enemies are ridiculous, and the whole thing has this strange, dreamlike vibe that sticks with you.

What really gets me is how it plays with RPG tropes. Instead of magic potions, you’re chugging hamburgers to heal. Your party members include a psychic girl and a dude who fights with yo-yos. And the soundtrack? Absolute ear candy—jazzy, offbeat, and full of little musical jokes. It’s not just nostalgia; the writing’s genuinely sharp, even now.

Fair warning, though: the combat’s a bit old-school, with random encounters and that SNES-era grind. But if you can roll with it, there’s nothing else quite like Earthbound. It’s the kind of game where you’ll still remember specific lines or weird enemy designs years later.