Early and Unused Scenes

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The script files reveal that a lot of changes were made to the game's scenes, as well as some that were completely removed later in development.

Despite most of these being unused, they were translated for the English release.

It should be noted that the pictures provided are mockups created by the Video Game History Foundation, with the videos being provided by Clyde "Tomato" Mandelin. These are just to give us an idea on how these scenes would've looked/played out.

Fighting the Police#

In the final game, the fifth police officer in Onett's Police Station gets scared and runs out the door. However, he was originally meant to put up an actual fight.

Japanese	English

Here's what he would've said before fighting Ness:

Here's what he would've said after losing to Ness:

Additionally, you would have the option of fighting the five officers in any order you want. In the final game, they each fight you one after the other, bar the 5th one.

Weakest Man in All of Twoson#

In Twoson, there was originally someone called The Weakest Man in All of Twoson, who you could fight. There's no mention on what he would've looked like, but it's possible he was turned into the Unassuming Local Guy.

Based on the fact he's identified as "lookout" in the files, he would've likely been encountered somewhere near Burglin Park.

Here's what he would've said when you encounter him:

After winning the fight, he would give you a ticket to the Chaos Theater, which would've been a key item. Here's what he would've said:

There's also text for if you tried to obtain the ticket without having inventory space for it:

However, the punchline to this fight would be that the ticket would be false, missing the watermark. If you showed it to the ticket taker, they'd call you out on it:

Upon returning to the Weakest Man after this, he would've said:

Burglin Park's Junk Vendor#

In Burglin Park, there's a vendor that sells broken items to you, and mentions that a scientific person would be able to fix them (this person being Jeff).

However, early on, he would not sell broken items, but instead sell you junk. Based on the files, he would've sold them "by the kilograms and by the tons."

These are actually the price options: The kilogram option would be up to $999, and the ton option would be up to $9,999.

It's not certain what the junk would've been, but likely would be random items or gadgets.

Checking Tombstones#

In Threed, you were originally able to check the tombstones for the possibility of getting an item. It's unknown why this was removed, but it was likely to prevent possible graverobbing.

There's a lot of related lines for this. If you didn't get anything, the game will say:

However, if you did find something, the game would say:

(The blank space is where the item name would go.)

Here's mockups of how they would've looked in-game:

No Item	Found Something

There's also a line for if you found an item when your inventory was full. It surprisingly has a lot of sass. Note that backpack is spelt with "pak", possibly to not have the text overflow:

There's one more line of text, meant for curious players:

Dragged to the Underground Prison#

Watch on YouTubeIn Threed, there's a scene where there's a mysterious woman standing outside the hotel. Upon getting close, she'd enter the hotel. Following her, she leads you to a room where you get abused by a group of Urban Zombies and Zombie Possessors while the woman looks on. The screen then fades to black, then fades back to show that Ness and Paula have ended up in an underground prison of some kind. This leads to Paula telepathically reaching out to Jeff in Winters, leading to his solo portion of the game and eventually joining the party.

However, after the black out, there was originally a scene of the group of zombies dragging you away to the underground prison while the woman watches on. However, this was cut for unknown reasons.

It was possibly cut very late in development, as the code is still present in the final game, however the scripting code that activates it was commented out. Further evidence of this comes from the fact that this scene was actually adapted as the final panel of the Mother 2 4koma strip that covers Ness and Paula's encounter with the mysterious woman.

The Gold Mine Excavator#

Watch on YouTubeIn Dusty Dunes Desert, you encounter a gold miner by the name of Gerardo Montigue, who tells you the gold mine has been infested with monsters. This leads to you going inside the mine to deal with the Guardian Diggers inside. After the Guardian Diggers are all defeated, Gerardo is grateful for your work, but nothing happens afterwards.

However, this is not how it was meant to play out. Originally, after thanking you, he'd go over to the excavator, get inside, drive it off screen, then enter the now non-infested gold mine. This scene helps sets up a later cutscene, where Gerardo meets up with you again on Fourside's bridge to give you the Million Dollar Diamond he found in the mine, letting you free the Runaway Five from their debt.

Much like the zombie scene, it's still in the final game, just commented out.

Interestingly, the excavator did move in the build shown in the Super Famicom Perfect Video, but it doesn't go completely off screen, possibly suggesting this scene was an earlier version than the one here.

Magic Cake or Oil Massage?#

In Summers, a woman by the sidewalk leading to the beach offers you some "Magic Cake", which leads to you having a vivid dream about a stranger named Poo.

Originally, however, the woman was not going to offer you Magic Cake. Instead, she was going to offer you a beach oil massage, which you would fall asleep during it and have the vivid dream. There's a lot of text relating to this.

In the Stoic Club, a woman would tell you about the massage:

A woman in the Summers drugstore would've also talked about the massage, while also giving the player a hint to find the woman:

(A masseuse, in case you're wondering, is a woman who provides professional massages.)

Someone in the hotel would've also mentioned the massage, along with the dream:

Later on, Jill was renamed to Martha, but still offered you an oil massage:

Sometime later, she was reworked into giving the player Magic Cake, and all the dialogue above was either altered to mention it or rewritten entirely.

However, she was still on the beach before she got moved to the sidewalk:

The line above was replaced by the final one on a date marked as 7/18.

Additionally, alongside having the dream in Summers, the player could also have the dream happen in the Scaraba hotel. It's not known what would've triggered the dream in the hotel, especially since in the final game you aren't able to go to Scaraba until after Poo joins the party.

Less Open Structure#

In the final game, after Poo joins the party, the player is able to tackle Magnet Hill and Pink Cloud at any time (though accessing the latter requires beating the former's boss) or continue onward to Scaraba and points afterward, though with the effect of Poo being temporarily removed from your party by the Star Master.

However, this relatively open structure was originally a lot more rigid: After exiting the pyramid, if the player did not complete both Magnet Hill and Pink Cloud, the Star Master would prevent you from continuing further into the desert, after which he'd teleport your entire party (including Poo) back to the Scaraba town so you can visit said Sanctuaries.