Mother 3

Mother 3 (called EarthBound 2 by some fans) is the long-awaited final installment of the Mother series. Fansites, such as Starmen.net, had been clamoring for a sequel to EarthBound for years (there are repeated references to a future one within the game), and this is the result. The game was originally going to be EarthBound 64 for the Nintendo 64, but that was cancelled. It is unclear if Mother 3 is an exact, 2D copy of EB64, but the two seem to share some similarities, such as the inclusion of the same characters. Mother 3 stars Lucas, who is the only main character of the series to not have black hair, a blue and yellow striped short, and blue shorts. Other members of his family, such as Flint, are playable, although Lucas is controlled the majority of the time.

There was a gap of almost twelve years between the release of Mother 2 and Mother 3 in Japan, whereas Nintendo has stated that they currently have no plans to release Mother 3 elsewhere. However, an unofficial fan translation patch has been completed and released.

EarthBound 64
Earthbound 64 was supposed to be the third installment of the Mother series and was originally announced as a title for the ill-fated 64DD back in 1997. Development was plagued by delays due in part to inexperience with programming a 3D game, the scope of the project, and a change to N64 cartridge in mid-development when it became clear the disk drive add-on would see limited release. It was finally canceled in 2000 to the disappointment of fans. Some pre-release screenshots were released showing the characters including Lucas and his father Flint.

Little is known about the game other than the story revolved around the Pig Army and it features Lucas, Flint, and a music group called D.C.M.C. similar to the Runaway 5 of EarthBound. This sequel was thought to be vaporware until Mother 3 was announced as being in development as a Game Boy Advance title in 2002. Whatever Shigesato Itoi had planned for the N64 version was scrapped and reworked into the new Game Boy Advance version.