Mother 3 is one of the most unique games published by Nintendo for the Game Boy Advance. Since it’s initial release on 2006, this game is only made available in Japan with no international release.

Since then, multiple fan translated versions have been made available in the West, making it a cult classic. Fans have been demanding Nintendo to internationally release Mother 3, but for the most part Nintendo has ignored these requests.

While there has been no response from Nintendo for Mother 3, they quietly released Earthbound 1 & 2 for Nintendo Switch Online members on February through the subscription service.

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During a podcast with Kit & Krysta the producer of Mother 3 recently shared his own thoughts as to why the game has never been localized. “Personally, I think the biggest selling point of Mother 3 is Shigesato Itoi’s unique writing style; translating the charm and nuances of his writing into other languages is quite a challenge, and maybe that’s why it’s taken so long to consider international releases of Mother 3.”

In a recent interview, former president of Nintendo, Reggie Fils-Aimé also commented on why Nintendo has chosen not to release Mother 3 for the West. “It was all based on the business needs and the business situation at the time.” According to Reggie, Nintendo considered releasing Mother 3 on a newer system but just could not make the numbers work.

Fans speculate that themes such as heavy criticism of Capitalism, death and loss could have been one of the reasons why Nintendo did not want to take risks with an international release of Mother 3.

Here is a fan translated version of the game for those of you interested in trying out this unique and gripping story of Mother 3.