The EarthBound player’s guide is available online, for those hopping in this weekend

Some helpful hints and colorful pages await

With both EarthBound and EarthBound Beginnings on the Nintendo Switch Online library, subscribers could be hopping into the classic RPGs this weekend. And if you’re one of them, you might want to pick up the EarthBound player’s guide before you do, straight from Nintendo.

Nintendo has put the full EarthBound player’s guide up on their site, freely available to peruse and download. Players have found it QR code linked in the app, and it’s also available at this link here.

Earthbound Player's Guide PDF is Free via Nintendo. https://t.co/ZcjLGxlX94 pic.twitter.com/tqktW5RbRm

— Cheap Ass Gamer (@videogamedeals) February 10, 2022

The player’s guide is not just a manual for EarthBound, but a pretty comprehensive guide to the whole game. At 135 pages long, it tracks the whole adventure from Onett on through the final battle. There are also guides and charts for weapons, food, condiments, Psi, and more. It’s basically a handy guide to everything EarthBound, available in PDF form.

Even if you’re not currently playing the classic RPG, the guide is interesting enough as a tome of game knowledge. It’s got a lot of style and charm to it, befitting the game it’s walking players through. There are fun little asides like the Onett Times sections, and little notes on different parts of the guide. There’s an appeal to it, a reminder of a time when large guides for deep RPGs were more common. I almost want to print this out, hole-punch it and stick it in a binder.

EarthBound has Nintendo Switch Online subscribers excited for a reason, after all. The off-beat RPG about four kids braving the world and trekking through a comical, psychic power-infused journey has stood out over the years. Now that it’s on Switch, there’s one more easy way to play it. Plus, anything that might boost up the demand for a Mother 3 port is a good thing.