Editing EarthBound (section)

===English localization===
{{See also|Marcus Lindblom}}
{{multiple image
| footer   = Screenshots from ''Mother 2'' (left) and ''EarthBound'' (right). In ''Mother 2'', Ness walks naked through his dream town Magicant. In the U.S. release, this was changed to him wearing his pajamas without his cap.
| align    = right
| image1   = Mother 2 Ness Magicant.png
| width1   = 200
| image2   = EarthBound Ness Magicant.png
| width2   = 200
}}

As was traditional for Nintendo, ''Mother 2'' was developed in Japan and [[Game localization|localized]] in the United States, a process in which the game is translated into English for Western audiences.<ref name="Kotaku: Man Who Wrote"/> As it was the only game in the ''Mother'' series to be released in North America at the time,<ref name="IGN: top SNES"/> its title "''Mother 2''" was changed to "''EarthBound''" to avoid confusion about what it was a sequel to.<ref name="Kotaku: Man Who Wrote"/>

Nintendo of America's [[Dan Owsen]] began the English localization project and converted about ten percent of the script before moving to another project.<ref name="Kotaku: Man Who Wrote"/> [[Marcus Lindblom]] filled Owsen's position around January 1995.<ref name="Wired: Lindblom"/> Lindblom credits Owsen with coining some of the game's "most iconic phrases", such as "[[Say cheese|say fuzzy pickles]]".<ref name="Kotaku: Man Who Wrote"/> Lindblom himself was given liberties to make the script "as weird as [he] wanted", as Nintendo wanted the script to be more American than a direct translation would be.<ref name="Wired: Lindblom"/> He worked alone and with great latitude due to no divisional hierarchies.<ref name="Polygon: Quash"/>{{refn|group=nb|While working alone was standard for localizers of the era, later localization efforts had full departments.<ref name="Polygon: Quash"/>}} Lindblom was aided by Japanese writer Masayuki Miura, who translated the Japanese script and contextualized its tone,<ref name="Kotaku: Man Who Wrote"/> which Lindblom positively described as "a glass half full".<ref name="Wired: Lindblom"/>

Lindblom was challenged by the task of culturally translating "an outsider's view of the U.S." for an American audience.<ref name="Wired: Lindblom"/> He also sought to stay true to the original text, though he never met or spoke with Itoi.<ref name="Wired: Lindblom"/> In addition to reworking the original puns and humor, Lindblom added private jokes and American cultural allusions to [[Bugs Bunny]], comedian [[Benny Hill]], and ''[[This Is Spinal Tap]]''.<ref name="Wired: Lindblom"/> Apart from the dialogue, he wrote the rest of the game's text, including combat, prompts and item names.<ref name="Kotaku: Man Who Wrote"/> As one of several Easter eggs, he named a non-player character for his daughter, Nico, who was born during development. While Lindblom took the day off for her birth,<ref name="Wired: Lindblom"/> he proceeded to work 14-hour days<ref name="Kotaku: Man Who Wrote"/> without weekends for the next month.<ref name="Wired: Lindblom"/>

Under directives from Nintendo,<ref name="Wired: Lindblom"/> Lindblom worked with the Japanese artists and programmers<ref name="Kotaku: Man Who Wrote"/> to remove references to intellectual property, religion, and alcohol from the American release, such as a truck's [[Coca-Cola]] logo, the red crosses on hospitals, and crosses on tombstones.<ref name="Wired: Lindblom"/> Alcohol became coffee or cappuccinos, Ness was no longer nude in the Magicant area as seen in the image,<ref name="Kotaku: Man Who Wrote"/> and the Happy Happyist blue cultists were made to look less like [[Ku Klux Klan]]smen.<ref name="Wired: Lindblom"/> The team was not concerned with music licensing issues and considered itself somewhat protected under the guise of parody.<ref name="Kotaku: Man Who Wrote"/> Lindblom recalled that the music did not need many changes. The graphical fixes were not finished until March 1995, and the game was not fully playable until May.<ref name="Wired: Lindblom"/>