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Earthbound is fantastic all around, but Giygas alone is enough for me to call it my favorite game.
Giygas is a tragic character. I like to think his feelings are similar to the Cartridges from Made in Abyss: a confusing, cacophonous mix of horror, pain, and ecstasy. I can’t imagine what it’s like to lose yourself like that. but while I love him for being pure evil that’s in constant agony, he’s a lot more than that.
tbh more than any evil Giygas embodies in the game’s universe, I love him for exemplifying the fragility of traumatic childhood memories, how they fog up over time but never fully go away... doesn’t matter that Itoi was mistaken about the movie scene; the horror he felt when he saw it as a kid was true. and the point of Giygas isn't to simply portray the alleged rape scene, it's to represent and communicate how Itoi felt when he was traumatized by it as a child.
And the Giygas fight is a crazy tonal shift from the previously established quirkiness Earthbound used to deal with even its most serious subjects (Happy Happy Village...) because Giygas is personal, he was born due to true, real-life horror experienced firsthand by his creator. That's what he embodies more than anything.
Giygas was the reason I played Earthbound in the first place (he was discussed a lot in the nerdy horror circles I lurked around online). and like, despite being spoiled, he still caught me off-guard. I’ll never forget how blown away I was by that entire fight.
Giygas is cool. His design is cool. His story is cool. But the intricacies of his creation are the biggest selling point for me. Those stories of Itoi reading each character and "dot dot dot" out loud for Giygas's dialogue, driving the person typing to tears… like, this is heavy shit lol
Giygas is a tragic character. I like to think his feelings are similar to the Cartridges from Made in Abyss: a confusing, cacophonous mix of horror, pain, and ecstasy. I can’t imagine what it’s like to lose yourself like that. but while I love him for being pure evil that’s in constant agony, he’s a lot more than that.
tbh more than any evil Giygas embodies in the game’s universe, I love him for exemplifying the fragility of traumatic childhood memories, how they fog up over time but never fully go away... doesn’t matter that Itoi was mistaken about the movie scene; the horror he felt when he saw it as a kid was true. and the point of Giygas isn't to simply portray the alleged rape scene, it's to represent and communicate how Itoi felt when he was traumatized by it as a child.
And the Giygas fight is a crazy tonal shift from the previously established quirkiness Earthbound used to deal with even its most serious subjects (Happy Happy Village...) because Giygas is personal, he was born due to true, real-life horror experienced firsthand by his creator. That's what he embodies more than anything.
Giygas was the reason I played Earthbound in the first place (he was discussed a lot in the nerdy horror circles I lurked around online). and like, despite being spoiled, he still caught me off-guard. I’ll never forget how blown away I was by that entire fight.
Giygas is cool. His design is cool. His story is cool. But the intricacies of his creation are the biggest selling point for me. Those stories of Itoi reading each character and "dot dot dot" out loud for Giygas's dialogue, driving the person typing to tears… like, this is heavy shit lol
