EarthBound Preview in NP #70

Pu?

Earthbound … The War against The Geek!

I have this and 73, 73s article is HUGE.

I totally agree. NP was basically my source for video game info before internet journalism broke out. I remember reading articles like this over and over, becoming more interested in certain games as I noticed more small tidbits with each readthrough.

EarthBound was definitely like that for me. Having a game set in a modern (albeit silly) setting with a hero that’s a normal boy that just happened to be my age? It’s hard to understand how a young RPG fan could not get excited reading those excellent NP articles back in the day.

I really miss Nintendo Power. Always had humor or something unique in their articles. Seems like articles today in game magazines are too serious or just straight to the point. Very bland compared to what we had back then.

Lol the geek, Pu, threek 😛
Interesting though 😀

so why did they change it from pu to poo? seems like pu would be a lot less mockable. in my mind some low level nintendo worker snuck in and changed it to poo as a joke and then no one ever spotted it

@Nooblet, can you scan and upload 73’s article for us? I’d liek to see it. Unless it’s already online someplace, anyone know?

It seems like they had very poor QC’ing back in the day, especially with EarthBound. Every time I see ads or coverage like this for EB, there’s always so many typos and misinformation. Maybe it was because EB was so unknown and the NP writers/editors knew next to nothing about the game at the time, so they just went with what they were given, and improvised what they weren’t?

That goes in-hand with the pre-production screenshots and early versions of names (Pu, Gyiyg), but I don’t understand the inconsistency? The Geek? I wouldn’t question it if the intro shot said “THE GEEK STRIKES BACK!”, but I really wonder who came up with that, and where they pulled it from.

Nintendo Power’s coverage of Earthbound is the whole reason I bought the game. I still have all those old issues, too.

I presume “the geek” is just a poor Anglicization of the character’s Japanese name, which is more-or-less pronounced “Geeg.” In fact, the final character of the Japanese name, “gu,” looks almost identical to the character for “ku,” so I can understand the error, sloppy though it was.

I think for my next playthru I am going to name Poo Pu. (I said Poopoo) 8}

Interesting article. Gives me a few ideas…

I like how they use the Japanese clay models instead of the horrendous U.S. versions. They should’ve stick to those.

Wait…Son of Welcome, what other American clay models are there? The only one I know of is Ness, which actually isn’t that bad.

I really like how NOA did the whole newspaper deal for these articles and the player’s guide. I know the Mother Encyclopedia and a Mother 2 guide had newspaper sections, but did Japanese magazines do creative things to promote the game, or did it just rely on SMAP promoting it and the fact it was a sequel?

I’ve always thought there were two sets of clay models for the four main characters, one for Japan and one for the U.S., the main difference being that the U.S. models had necks. I just checked the gallery on Starmen.net to show Fred the difference, and while it had U.S. and Japanese versions of all four models listed, only the Ness and Paula models were appreciably different. The U.S. Jeff and Poo models look exactly like the Japanese versions, as far as I can tell, except that the photos of them are from SLIGHTLY different angles.

Anyone know what’s up with that?

This is probably completely off-topic and in the wrong spot, so apologies in advance. I was out looking for random RPGs that’ve been released on PC and thought the last line at http://www.germware.com was very neat and obscure.

Just goes to show that there are people everywhere who loved (and still love apparently) this game. I know… kinda far out there, but thought I’d drop in and mention it.

Matt

Check-plus for the spoon-bending joke in Paula’s profile.

So…the screenshot says “Gyiyg Strikes Back”, but the artical says “the Geek”? Someone didn’t proofread that artical very well. I can’t decide if Geek was an early localization change, or just a sloppy mistranslation. Either way, very interesting.

Runaway Bros.? It looks like they hadn’t changed the Tonzura Bros.’ name yet.

Oh crap, I totally forgot about the American Paula figure. I always think it’s the first Paula figure that wasn’t used much.
Then there’s the recolored Lucky and Gorgeous figures. I’m still not sure why there are two Jeff figures. They just look like they were shot in different lighting.

lol Giygas being called “The Geek”. This is a pretty awesome preview of EarthBound though. Can’t wait to see the issue #73 scans though.

The geek lol

I would have totally begged my parents to buy this for me…
NP’s ads now are just boring walkthroughs.

I know this is a bit off topic, but it is about EarthBound. Did anyone else notice that while you go into Pokey’s house (right now, I’m playing through Mother 1+2, I made it to Twoson and I went back to Onett, IDK if it makes a difference `cause I didn’t check this out the last time I played EB), but the music if you listen to it for a while, a few bars of the Mario underwater theme loops. Just found that interesting.

Sorry, In dont have a scanner D>

God this is so awesome.

Kind of weird that they’d call him Pu when the picture above clearly says Poo.

I love the fact that on the title screen, its the Japanese one mixed with the US one. EarthBound: Giygas strikes back. XD

@mustangbrian
If you’re talking about the part of the song I think you are, that sounds more like the Outset Island theme to me more than the Mario underwater music.

I don’t remember seeing that shot of Paula jumping with arms up being in the game… anybody know where it’s from?

Vanasto: Possibly the naming screen?

thanks for posting this. my wife has all my copies of NP. it’s nice to have the articles again even if I don’t have them.

@Vanasto

I think Roo is correct

I should dig out all my old Nintendo Powers. I think I have the first hundred or so issues from when I was a kid.

That shot of Paula jumping is definitely from the naming screen; you can see the blue-checkered background.

Was that jumping sprite used anywhere else in the game, though?

uh, when you hit something during a teleport?
or does that only show charred sprites

I actually kinda like “Pu” as an alternate translation of Poo’s name; the same goes for “Gyiyg” being carried over as Giygas’s English name. That said, “The Geek”… ugh.

I actually remember reading about that and picturing a pimple guy with glasses and a pocket protector. I was thinking. that’s going to be the oddest boss in an rpg ever. and I was correct. he was the oddest boss ever… just not how I imagined him though. in fact I’m pretty sure anyone who has never seen giygas before hand. was shocked to find him how they did.

‘The Geek’…This made my day. xD

As for the models, I’m pretty sure some had a few different versions. Paula had 3 (or more) herself. There was an early one where her eyes were weird and her face looked like a goat. It’s used on some Japanese promo stuff like that poster with the TV on it. Then there was a better Japanese Paula model, and then there was a US Paula model that was missing her bow for some reason. I’m not sure about the others.

Yeah, but those are entirely different models. As far as I can tell, the same model was used for both shots of Jeff and Poo. And it’s not like the pictures are from entirely different angles (like the two images of Mr. Saturn); they’re only ever-so-slightly different. Weird.

I was always under the impression that the different EarthBound Ness and Paula figures were just the Japanese ones that had been graphically manipulated to have necks and look slightly different in other ways.

I had (and still do, somewhat) this issue, as a child when I read this, I thought it had the dumbest looking things ever (not a fan of claymation) and probably wouldn’t have gotten the game.

Today I look at the article as a treasure, and think of how stupid I was to judge this game based on its cover.

cooooool! it’s interesting with the journalist style.
i think Pu would havemade Poo get made fun of less.
what if the Dalaam girls found out its english meaning? would they still have a crush on him?

I have this issue!

@NP I need this issue 🙂

“The Runaway Bros.” Likely just another one those Japanese-English errors, mixing Tonzura Bros. with Runaway Five

in the preview, the title screen said “EARTHBOUND,” but on the actual game, it says “EARTH BOUND” (with a space)

I wonder why they put that space in…

So they had a kick-ass preview in Issue 70, but then 3 issues later had a preview that basically made you go from “This game’s gonna rock!” to “They said the game ‘stinks’…screw this, I’m getting Chrono Trigger.”? MARKETING FAIL.