Awesome! I love these types of interviews. I like coming up with TTRPGs and trying them out and a lot of it is just interpreting ideas from these older games; there’s so much thought put into the mechanics. I mean it makes sense that modern games adapt from older games, but I like that because of technical constraints the mechanics are more prevalent in how the game functions. And I especially like the whimsy of earthbound/mother - it actually feels like it’s a game for kids (in terms of imagination/escapism) but with a significant amount of difficulty in both combat as well as questing/navigation.

That’s cool about initiative/sneaking up - I definitely prefer that type of noncombat/combat transition over something like the original Dragon Warrior games (or pokemon) where enemies just pop up. It makes sense constraint-wise to not have sprites everywhere; but the tactics of being able to get initiative are huge.

And the food/condiment system was such a fun surprise. I love that type of quirky mechanism. And just all of the flavor text in the game too for status buffs/debuffs; just so much whimsy. My nephew is almost old enough to have the patience to play this and I’m excited to get them into it; it basically feels like you’re in the imaginary play of a child- so I feel like it’ll really resonate