Topic: Why Won't Earthbound Come Out on VC?

I was just wondering what the problem is.

It has never been localized and I doubt it will be any time soon.
It's a Japan exclusive for now.

From what I understand, it was a very controversial game, was it not? What with fetuses and creepy images. America is much more protective about what's released that Japan is.

Not exactly. Japan actually censors gore sometimes more than America. Don't believe me? Look at No More Heroes

It was released on SNES in North America.

I thought it was because Itoi refused to let them alter the game's music... : /

the real reason is copyright. I'm honestly amazed Nintendo got away with that stuff when it was originally released. I mean BEATLES references, and a blatant cover of a part of a couple of their songs. The copyright nazis would have a field day with that game.

The fact that the game was a failure in America didn't help. (although that's a terrible reason as the game has probably 10 or 20 times the fans it did 15 years ago).

Could the original Mother be released?

...maybe? I mean the American release was done, so it wouldn't be too difficult. I'm not sure about if the content would need to be changed for copyright reasons...

The English ROM of Mother was auctioned off before being placed on the internet as Earthbound Zero, so they'd need to translate another ROM. So it's possible, but we can't say if it would happen or not.

All I know is that this sucks because getting your hands on an Earthbound cart is really expensive. I've had so many friends tell me about how amazing the game is, and it really makes me want to play it.

Here's a really good article discussing the whole legal problem about Earthbound
http://earthboundcentral.com/2009/02/earthbound-legal-issues/
It's a shame too, cause Earthbound isn't exactly one of the cheapest games to buy for the SNES.

Man, I guess we may never see this. No Earthbound, and no Mother 1 or 3 either, as they both contain copyright issues.

Lots of music sound like copyrighted music, lots of images look like copyrighted things, in other words, to many people want money or won't say ok for this game to be released on the VC. Unless Nintendo completely changes the game you won't ever see it on the VC.

It's unfortunate for WHATEVER reason, be it Nintendo being stupid of genuine legal issues Nintendo is too cheap to pay out.

But at this point, it's pretty easy to play the game elsewhere. It would be nice on the console yes, but if you haven't played it yet, it's not hard to.

Well the copyright holders can sue and demand a cease and desist. This is most likely what Nintendo's afraid of

I think they could probably get away with releasing it on Virtual Console in Japan, but then the situation for other regions would get worse. Forum topics like this would be much more common, persistent, and annoying. Plus, "Operation Starstorm" definitely wouldn't be good news for NOA.
_{Oh no, what have I done? D:}

I don't know where all this Earthbound whooey came from, but it sure would've made EB sell a lot better in its day. It also would've confirmed EB64.

However, EB will forever remain a cult classic.

Remember at E3 06 when they revealed their plans for VC and even mentioned Earthbound as a possible release?
What Happened to that huh? Damn liars getting our hopes up for nothing.

Not only that but if everyone wants a piece of the pie so to speak due to copyrights it could end up costing Nintendo to much to add it to the VC cost which they would pass on to us. In other words the price of the download could be alot more than the price of a normal VC SNES games and that would cause another set of complaints.