Earthbound/Mother fans gathered on Twitter today for a monumental occasion that may see their most dear wish granted. In response to a Japanese Nintendo tweet regarding today’s Nintendo Direct event, series creator, Shigesato Itoi roughly stated (according to translations) “7 a.m. is amazing. It may be snowing.”
朝7時って、すごいな。雪が降ってるかもしれない。 https://t.co/TQk985WDqp
— 糸井 重里 (@itoi_shigesato) February 9, 2022
These few words left fans of the series more hopeful than ever that something new is coming very soon and will possibly be shown off at today’s Direct. Fans have spent years begging Nintendo for an English translation of Mother 3 and Shigesato’s statement has fans hopeful that’s finally happening. Of course, EarthBound fans are used to disappointment and many are still preparing for the worst despite this possible good sign.
The EarthBound series is one that many see as one of Nintendo’s most neglected due to a lack of series usage outside of the Super Smash Bros. Nintendo’s reasoning behind abandoning the series isn’t clear and many attribute it to the series’ past of walking on a thin copyright infringinement line. That still doesn’t answer why the series hasn’t made a comeback as Nintendo’s main traditional RPG series that fans recognize it as.
Renewed interest in a new installment popped back up recently when footage of a scrapped Nintendo 64 installment of the series, EarthBound 64/Mother 64, hit the internet. That led fans to joke about how an unreleased game in the series hit the internet before any word of an official Mother 3 release.
While it’s still unknown if Shigesato is truly hinting at a new entry in the EarthBound franchise or something completely new, it’s a good idea to remain cautiously optimistic, but keep expectations in check. Though, it would be a good idea for Nintendo to finally tap into one of its star series and see what potential it has for a new generation.
Acer’s Predator Atlas 8 finally has a US release date and price, several months after the company first showed off the handheld in May. The highlight is the Intel Arc G3 Extreme chip inside, which has been adopted by only a couple of other consoles besides the Atlas 8. This version will go on sale exclusively at Best Buy on November 1 for $1,299.99.
Acer originally said the Atlas 8 would arrive in North America in October, but left pricing open at the time. The launch came amid the ongoing DRAM crunch, which has made memory more expensive across the PC industry and complicated pricing for hardware makers.
Gaming laptops and I have a complicated relationship. One of my first gaming rigs was an Acer Predator that was already outdated when I bought it. I was a broke college kid, and that was the best I could afford. So trying out high-end gaming laptops is always fun. But ASUS' ROG Zephyrus G14 is a lot more than a laptop that can run AAA games. It is portable, so you're not lugging around a 2.5kg machine everywhere you go. It is built well, none of that plastic chassis, and can even function as a normal laptop outside of just gaming.
Google Play is borrowing one of the Nintendo Switch’s most useful little tricks. A new Sidekick tool called Playbacks captures a short clip after something interesting has already happened, sparing players from running a screen recorder throughout an entire game.
Playbacks is part of Google Play Store v53.8 and keeps saved clips on the phone. Google first announced it earlier this month, but the new Play Store update marks its arrival for players. Anyone who has watched a perfect win vanish because the record button came too late already understands the appeal.