Ness (Earthbound)

Ness is one of the main protagonists from the Earthbound series.
== Charactah Account ==
Ness is a perfectly average boy living in Onett, Eagleland. Sets out to find the eight "Your Sanctuary" locations and to locate the other three heroes.
Ness is completely silent throughout the game, something that other characters frequently lampshade. This ends up being somewhat picked apart, as Ness' silence aggravates Frank when the two first meet, and a later attempt by Porky at making amends with Ness after Carpainter's defeat results in him mistaking Ness' silence for disdain, running off again as a result.
Ness has an extremely high offense and hit points, but is the slowest party member by far. Once he overcomes the evil in his heart and gains the power of the Your Sanctuary locations, his HP and PP increase to truly ludicrous levels and his speed improves, though he is still somewhat slow.
== Appearance ==
=== Cartoons ===
* Chibiverse
=== Manga ===
* Mother 2: 4-Panel Manga Kingdom
* Mother 2: Ness' Great Adventure
=== Video Games ===
* Earthbound
* Mother 1 + 2
* Mother 3
* Super Mario Maker
* Super Smash Bros.
* Super Smash Bros. Brawl
* Super Smash Bros. for Wii U and Nintendo 3DS
* Super Smash Bros. Melee
* Super Smash Bros. Ultimate
== Trivia ==
* Ness is the only main protagonist in the Mother series to not normally have the run ability. He can temporarily run with the aid of a Skip Sandwich or Skip Sandwich DX, though.
* Ness was originally planned to be replaced by Lucas as the character representative of the Mother series in Super Smash Bros. Melee; however, Ness reprised his role due to the original cancellation of EarthBound 64.
* Using the Don't Care naming option, possible names for Ness are "Ness", "Alec", "Roger", "Will", "Brian", "Tyler", and "Lane". In Japan, possible names for Ness are "Ness", "Takuya", "John", "Sarumaru", "Mario)" and "Chinchin".
** In America and Europe:
*** Alec is the name of Hinawa's father in the fan translation of Mother 3.
** In Japan:
*** Takuya is named after Takuya Kimura, a Japanese actor/singer.
*** John is named after John Lennon, an English musician and peace-activist.
*** Mario is the main mascot of Nintendo.
* In the overseas marketing for Earthbound, Ness's clay model was given a slight redesign, appearing slightly older and slimmer.
* Ness was the first Mother character to have his game released outside of Japan.
** Mother 1 was fully translated by Nintendo of America and was intended to be released overseas by 1991; however, it was never officially released until 2015 on the Wii U Virtual Console.
* In the Japanese version of EarthBound, Ness enters Magicant completely naked instead of dressed in his pajamas in the localization. Nudity is generally acceptable in Japanese culture, as it connects to a sense of purity (as long as it's not pornographic), whereas it is considered sexually explicit in the West, requiring it to be changed during localization.
* Ness' name may be due to the fact that it is a homophone of NES and an anagram of SNES, similarly to how Ninten's name may be based on Nintendo.
* A younger version of Ness appears in Magicant, saying "It's me… I'm you when you were younger. Hey, let's play ball. Do you prefer reading comics or playing games? What? You're busy?…".
* Ness' younger version's sprite is used for one of the NPCs in Threed.
* Ness is the only main protagonist to have a weapon for his first fight, since his mom tells him to get the Cracked bat from Tracy's room.
* In the commercial for EarthBound, Ness was named "NessA" for unknown reasons.
* In Super Smash Bros. Brawl, Super Smash Bros. for 3DS and Wii U and Super Smash Bros. Ultimate, Ness's Final Smash is PK Starstorm despite the fact that he never actually uses or even learns the move in EarthBound. However, it is stated in a trophy that, "Poo taught Ness the secret of the attack for use in Super Smash Bros. Brawl".
** On a similar note, the Subspace Emissary story mode for Brawl depicts Ness and Lucas knowing and even allying with each other, despite Ness and Lucas never even interacting once in their respective games (Earthbound and Mother 3), or appearing in each others games.
* In Super Mario Maker, there is a Ness costume that can be unlocked by completing 100 Mario Challenge on Normal setting or higher, or by scanning a Ness Amiibo. By pressing up on the D-Pad, the jingle for learning a new technique will play.
* Two Copy abilities in the Kirby series are both references to Ness: Yo-Yo and ESP. The former is implied while the latter alludes to him in the Copy Ability's description.
* Ness is implied by several NPCs to be overweight. This includes a cop in Onett calling him fat, and the bus driver calling him chubby. If talked to during the epilogue, Paula's mother mentions that he lost weight, which further implies this.
** Ness, however, appears to be fit in his North American clay model and the more recent installments in the Super Smash Bros. series.
* In the Earthbound inspired RPG Citizens of Earth, a message in the Police Station can be read alerting units to a "spiteful youth" who was seen "beating crows with a cracked bat". This is an obvious nod to Ness and the beginning portion of Earthbound.
* Ness makes a cameo in the Chibiverse episode "Doof falls for Gramma".
== Gallery ==
File:Ness Render 01.png
File:Ness Render 02.png
File:Ness Render 03.png
File:Ness Render 04.png
File:Ness Render 05.png
== External Links ==
* Ness at EarthBound Wiki
Category:Characters
Category:Males
Category:Earthbound