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Encyclopedia Mother (Japanese: エンサイクロペディア・マザー, stylized as ENCYCLOPEDIA MOTHER) is a Japanese-exclusive supplementary guide for EarthBound Beginnings, roughly serving a similar purpose to the EarthBound Player's Guide. It contains expanded backstories for the game's events, exclusive character biographies for Ninten, Ana, Lloyd, and Teddy, alongside a player's guide with information on the game's locations, a list of items and PSI moves, a list of enemies, and developer interviews. Two versions of the book exist, with one being released in 1989 for the original launch of EarthBound Beginnings and the other in 2003 for the launch of Mother 1+2. Both versions are 166 pages long.
The cover of the 1989 release.
The book begins with a pull-out insert, with one side being a replica of a fictional Mother's Day newspaper, complete with articles detailing the events in the game prior to Ninten's journey, with the other side of the inset showing a full-scale map of the world of Mother in the style of a road-trip map. The book then begins with an introduction, which fleshes out George and Maria's first meeting and marriage, George investigating strange occurrences in Mother's Day and the couple's subsequent disappearance, and George's mysterious return two years later by himself and his strange study of psychic powers. It also details Ninten's courageous vow to protect his family and investigate the strange phenomena that has returned to the quaint town eight decades after it had first occurred. Along with the introduction, the english lyrics for [[Mother (soundtrack)|Pollyanna: I believe in You are provided above the second page of the introduction. The book then shows character bios for each of the four main protagonists, expanding their backstories and providing a photo gallery of their favorite things in each of their respective bios. After that, the book shows nine other important characters, including Mimmie and Minnie|Ninten's family, Pippi, Queen Mary, the Flying Men, Mick, and Eve.
The book's first chapter then starts out with an overview of Ninten's home and the town of Mother's Day, detailing maps, tricks, and information associated with each location whilst acting as a mock travel brochure. Canary's Village, the South Cemetery, Choucream Zoo, Magicant, its Underground, Thanksgiving, Sweet Little Factory, Duncan's Factory, and the Santa Claus Station are also expounded upon in the same fashion, with each location having maps, real-life photographs of people, vehicles, objects, and papier-mâché models along with in-game screenshots and interviews with people involved with the game. Comic strips based off of the game are sprinkled throughout the chapter and the following one as well. There are reviews by several people located throughout this chapter and in the next, detailing what they liked and didn't like about the game, ultimately showing their appreciation for Itoi and the development crew for creating the game. There are also several Artist Profiles throughout the book, detailing the individual artists for the book and their work and contributions for it. This chapter and the following one also end with an overall summary of the chapter and a checklist of the major events covered in the respective chapter.
The second chapter begins with a fictional guide to the departure times of the Santa Claus Station's express train before the next two pages provide the english lyrics for Jeb Milne/Jeb Million's The Paradise Line against a photograph of a loading train passing by a {{wp|Mesa}]. The book then covers Reindeer, Halloween, Snowman, Advent Desert, Ruins of Desert, Easter, Swamp Land, Ellay, Cave of Holy Loly, and Holy Loly Mountain, which all have the same layout as the locations in the previous chapter. The following two pages are dedicated to an english lyric set for the Eight Melodies song with an alternate lyric set nearby, overlaid against a photograph of a car driving near a mesa with billowing white clouds swirling over it, before ending with an overall summary and checklist for the chapter.
The third chapter consists of a Goods Catalog, which details every purchasable item (e.g. the Wooden Baseball Bat) and non-purchasable item (e.g. Great-grandfather's Diary) in the game, which are each represented by either real-life models or objects. It also details a list of every vehicle you can ride in the game from the Santa Claus express train all the way to the boat you use to access the underwater lab where Eve is located, with each being represented by papier-mâché models. The next page then details the most efficient way to maximize your weapon and item usage as you gain more powerful weapons throughout the game. After that is a list of every PSI move you can use against your foes, with a section on how you can use your PSI powers in battle and when you are not in battle. The chapter then ends with an interview with Shigeru Miyamoto.
(Add fourth and fifth chapter summaries later)