Earthbound was my favorite game growing up. Its bizarre humor and twisted charm gave me peace of mind in the pre-internet era.
You walked around talking to unassuming locals and random pets while listening to a wide variety of moody tunes.
Hostile creatures will initiate a battle sequence upon making contact. Here you're greeted with trippy backgrounds and a unique battle system that helped bring a large chunk of the Western world over to the (J)RPG genre.
Those that stuck with it were treated to even stranger dialogues as you made your way through dozens of towns and villages.
It tauts my testicles every time I need to slip behind the pizza shop to buy bottle rockets and bombs from a shifty arms dealer.
Earthbound has so many dedicated fans that they translated the yet-to-be-localized sequel and re-balanced the Super Nintendo version with a patch called Earthbound Deluxe.
A lot of wisdom can be found in Earthbound, so go watch @jennyy stream her journey, and talk to everyone you meet.
Like real-time action RPGs better? Try Crystalis for the NES:
