While Parish said "Mother" script was "as sharp as "EarthBound"", he felt that the original's game mechanics did not meet the same level of quality. "Mother" lacked the "rolling HP counter" and non-random encounters for which later entries in the series were known. Parish also found the game's balance to be uneven, as the statistical character attributes and level of difficulty scaled incorrectly with the game's progression. Rose Colored Gaming, a company that made custom reproductions of the NES cartridge, noted that the Japanese release's was more challenging than the unreleased English localization. "RPGamer" Ramos similarly found balance issues, with a high number of battles, difficult enemies, reliance on grinding, and some oversized levels. Parish wrote earlier for "1UP.com" that in comparison to "EarthBound", "Mother" is "worse in just about every way", a clone where its sequel was "a satirical deconstruction of RPGs". He wrote that the game's historical significance is not for its actual game but for the interest it generated in video game emulation and the preservation of unreleased games.