Having never played Earthbound before, but having heard so much about it, I started playing this afternoon. Played it for about 90 minutes, so these are very much just first impressions (with no spoilers).
Had a lot of difficulty getting past the character naming. Asking for one character name is hard enough… this wants FIVE 😱
I love the atmosphere of it. It feels like an 80/90s American highschool movie. Chirping insects, spooky music, great!
Combat initially feels simple, as expected, but I’m not deep enough in it yet to say more.
After following the obvious sign-posting, I found myself free to explore, then immediately got lost. No idea what to do next, in the way that old games tend to have. I think the key is to speak to everyone and interact with everything, and something will shake itself loose. Interesting to contrast how hand-holdy modern games are in comparison! Not sure which I prefer…
Overall, I’m enjoying it and excited to play more. I’m trying not to read a guide… we’ll see how long that lasts!