Party member: Difference between revisions

A '''Party member''', also referred to as '''party''' or '''playable cast''', are the characters that can be controlled by the player. The [[EarthBound series]] has various different playable characters with each installment having a new set of playable characters. Most characters are young kids or teenagers, although in [[Mother 3]] adults are playable as well.

==[[EarthBound Beginnings]]==

EarthBound Beginnings has four main characters that are playable in the game. At the beginning of the game, the player must assign names to each character, with a limit of seven letters for the name. If another character or enemy in the game uses that name, the player cannot use that name for the character (e.g. the name "[[Maria]]" can't be used). Below are the characters with their default names:

Pippi is a 7 year old girl who temporarily joins Ninten at the beginning of the game. Unlike other temparory party members, she is interestingly the only temporary party member who can be controlled by the player. Another interesting fact is her stats are identical to Teddy's, this isn't noticed easily at first because Teddy joins at level 18, unlike Pippi who joins at level 1.

[[Teddy]] has the potential to be permanently removed from the party, and the events related to him can be skipped entirely. Unlike Pippi, though, Teddy can be brought to the end of the game and has unique equipment only he can use.

[[Ana]] and [[Lloyd]] can also both be absent from or leave the party depending on the order the player's choices, such as using the [[Onyx Hook]] before the Fallin' Love dance scene on Mt. Itoi when Ninten is temporarily the lone party member, which allows the player to complete the game with Ninten alone. However, nothing ever prevents the player from allowing either to join the party again as what happens with Teddy.

==[[EarthBound]]==

As with EarthBound Beginnings there are four main characters. Like EarthBound Beginnings the player must name each character at the start of the game, however the character limit has been reduced to five. Selecting the "Don't care" key will assign a set of default names depending on the character. This time all four can be playable at once:

The four playable characters appearences in EarthBound have been noted to be very similar to the appearances of the characters in the predecessor (sans Poo and Teddy), and some fans consider them to be the same characters. Shigesato Itoi confirmed that he intentionally designed them to be similar to allow players to decide whether they're the same or different.

The equipment for the cast is relatively similar to the characters in EarthBound Beginnings: Ness uses baseball bats, Paula uses frying pans, Jeff uses guns, and Poo uses swords.

Unlike EarthBound Beginnings the ages were left vague by [[Shigesato Itoi]].

*The [[EarthBound Player's Guide]] and official UK website claims Ness is 13, however when asked about his age Shigesato Itoi said he never had an official age, and instead compared him to his daughter who was in 4th or 5th garde at the time, implying Ness might actually be younger than what the player's guide and UK website claims. Additionally most sources in Japan state Ness is 12 years old.

*the UK website says Paula is 11 years old.

==[[Mother 3]]==

There are four main characters and all are playable in the party starting Chapter 5 and onwards. Prior to this there are different playable characters depending on the chapter. At the beginning of the game the player names Lucas and his family (now with an eight characters limit) as opposed to all of the main characters, instead the  other main characters will be named when they're met. As with EarthBound the don't care option assigns their default names. The four main characters are: