EarthBound, known as Mother 2 in Japan, is a 1994 Japanese role-playing video game co-developed by Ape Inc. and HAL Laboratory and published by Nintendo for the Super Nintendo Entertainment System video game console. As Ness and his party of four, the player travels the world to collect melodies en route to defeating the evil alien force Giygas. It is the second game of the Mother series, and the only one to be released in the English language until its predecessor was released under the name EarthBound Beginnings in 2015 as part of Wii U's Virtual Console. EarthBound released in Japan in August 1994, and in North America the next June.