YMMV / Hallow's End

• Anticlimax Boss: Despite the fact that you're fighting one of the protagonists from EarthBound, Ness sure as hell feels this way, if only because the boss that immediately came before him is batshit insane by comparison!
• Arc Fatigue: The Meresti building. Though some argue it starts as soon as the suburbs, the Meresti building itself takes the cake. You'd think just going there and getting the sphere they were after would be easy after the suburbs? Nope. You have to go through no less than three Big Lipped Alligator Moments in the form of an artic warzone, a dark version of Poo's homeland, and then a (In-Universe) glitchy Onett. At no point during it is it ever explain why that ends up happening, a fact which the trio lampshades (Sally herself ends up getting rather fed up with it near the end there) and mostly seems to be there for Filler in an attempt to make the game longer. Even though it does have a meaning that's only revealed after beating the game, it still feels this way while playing through it.
• Best Level Ever: Hollyanna city. A smooth remix of Fourside plays while you wander around the surprisingly large city that manages to perfectly capture the mood of the idealized Nightlife life-style.
• Big-Lipped Alligator Moment:
  • The followers of Azathoth. The way things were going, it seemed like the plot was shaping up to be a Cosmic Horror Story out of the Cthulhu Mythos. However, once you punch out Azathoth, the first boss of the game, they disappear and are never heard from again for the rest of the game.
  • The Meresti building. While there had been some strange events going on before, they still kept a coherent plot to it all the way through. When you get to the Meresti and go up several floors however, your suddenly transported to a blocked in section of Twoson and going a bit further transports you to a outdoors war-zone that keeps randomly changing color while the Magicant music plays in the background, and the people are fighting an ice monster and seem to think Sally is their captain. Once completing said tasks, you return to the Meresti building, with no explanation for what happened. The trio is just as confused by all this as the player likely is by that point.
  • Immediately after that, you're teleported to a darker version of Poo's homelands, and then your teleported to Summers shortly after that, and then your teleported to Onett!
  • However, all these BLAMs are eventually Justified... since they're all an illusion created by the Mara Statue, who was slowly deteriorating away the trios minds.
• Breather Level: Hollyanna city. After confusing Cursed Woods full of Goddamn Bats and the Demonic Spiders on Dead Mountain, Hollyanna's enemies are far more tame by comparison. Besides being easier and less frequent, they are far more comical than most of the stuff that came between it and the cave that leads you to the Cursed Woods.
• Crossing the Line Twice: Despite how tragic her death is in Mother 3, the zombie that looks like an orange haired Hinawa manages to somehow be morbidly hilarious to some.
• Demonic Spiders:
  • The Emsleyan butterflies. They look exactly like the magic butterflies in the overworld, with only a very subtle "tell" to differentiate between the two. They are extremely powerful enemies when you first encounter them, dealing truck loads of damage and possessing a wide variety of PSI abilities. Better hope you don't end up accidentally mistaking them while in need of a heal or PP recharge...
  • The Glitch Pokémon in the Onett sanctuary location. DEAR SWEET GOD, THE GLITCH POKEMON! They always come in groups of at least two or three, and have a wide variety of devastating attacks, from exploding upon defeat to spamming ElectroShock, (which it's strikes NEVER seem to miss) almost always have power shields on them to deflect your attacks, and one of them even has a One-Hit KO move, that immediately sets the characters HP to zero, giving NO chance to heal that character before their HP scrolls down! Even if you're over leveled for that area, they still manage to be a big pain in the ass to fight.
• Difficulty Spike: The "glitchy" Onett in the Mereseti building. While the main part isn't so bad, the Sanctuary location is filled to the brim with Demonic Spiders that often come in swarms of three at the very least and contains That One Boss in the form of the "glitchy" Titanic Ant. Some enemies even have a One-Hit Kill move that doesn't give you the chance to use the game's scrolling HP to save yourself. It's often through sheer blind luck most manage to make it through that area. Afterward, the game's difficulty, while still a step up, better levels out... But then you get to the final boss. And, if you know not to trust the end screen, the True Final Boss...
• Disappointing Last Level: The Meresti building, or to be specific, the Onett portion of it. In addition to the difficulty flying off the rails, a lot of the humor and plot related things consist of poking fun at and hanging lampshades on the beginning of EarthBound while retreading the same ground, which is widely regarded to be the games weakest point.
• Fandom Rivalry: Shares one with the The Halloween Hack. Many people who prefer Hallow's End often cite it as "the Halloween ROM Hack done right", with humor and themes often more fitting of the original EarthBound compared to The Halloween Hack, of which people often compare to a bad fanfic pile of Narm, in addition to being far more balanced gameplay wise by comparison. Meanwhile, those who prefer The Halloween Hack often like how it tries to have darker themes than the original EarthBound, and point out how the end game of Hallow's End also devolves into bad fanfic territory as well, in addition to the difficulty reaching batshit levels. Really, there are many things people prefer when comparing the two games, and that isn't even going into how The Halloween Hack treats Dr. Andonuts...
• Fanon Discontinuity: Many people feel the game ending with the Mara Demon to be the game's true ending, thanks to several factors dealing with the true ending and True Final Boss. For starters, it comes completely out of nowhere, and the plot surrounding it verging into bad fanfic territory. Namely, Anna coming through a portal and giving the kids their powers back, then confirming something about there being a multiverse and needing their help to defeat the last remnants of the illusion world. While it tries to tie into the plot, it feels completely out of context and nothing like the rest of the game. The fight using the Dummied Out Giygas Claus sprites from Mother 3 doesn't help, either.
• Goddamn Bats: Dark Fobbies in the cursed woods. They have a high spawn rate, come in trios of three, are far more durable than the normal variety in EarthBound, and have a high probability of poisoning a character, and considering the cursed woods is a maze, which makes it hard to get back to a rest area, having to waste PP on healing beta to cure it when it will be needed for the bosses in the area is rather big annoyance.
• Good Bad Bugs: Apparently, the menu 'bleep' when you move the cursor around in it changes in the cave just outside the starter city because of how the area was programmed. Since the lower key and generally more 'creepy' tone to it fits the theme of the area, many people thought it was cool; to the point the hack developer decided to not bother attempting to patch it out.
• Rewatch Bonus: There is a surprising amount of Foreshadowing for The Reveal that you'll only notice after seeing the ending. For example...
  • In Hollyanna city, there's a fat man walking the streets who, if you talk to him, gives you unintelligible text. Most players would likely think this is a glitch and gloss over it... Turns out that's old man Gantt, who's trying to get through to the trio who are trapped in the Mara Statue's illusion.
  • The Random Events Plot nature of the game can seem a bit odd at first, but most players would think this is just the hacker writing as he goes along... Turns out this has to do with the Mara Statue too. It was creating illusions seemingly at random in hopes of chipping away at the trios mentality.
  • The Glitched Pokémon. With the slew of shout outs the game had so far, you'd think it's just yet another one... Turns out it was symbolically showing the Mara Statue finally starting to deteriorate the trios minds.
  • For that matter, a lot of the shout-outs are this too. Early on one of trio makes a comment about going home and playing an Xbox, and the trio having to describe the Mother trilogy and other games just seems like Breaking the Fourth Wall... Except said games actually are just games to them, much like they are to us in the real world. All the seemingly random shout-outs and Whole Plot References are the Mara Statue creating illusions based on the trios memories of said games.
• That One Boss:
  • The "Glitchy" Titanic Ant fight. DEAR GOD. Just to get to it, you have to go through an entire level filled with Demonic Spiders, which likely means you're either going to be low on PP or recovery items, or worse, both, and the boss of the level doesn't let up, either! Not only can it call more of it's demonic glitchy kin to aid it in the fight, who in turn can either poison you, put you to sleep, or disorient you (the games mushroomized status), and also heal the entire group your fighting. If that wasn't enough, the boss itself is nuts, from spamming ElectroShock (which ALWAYS hits when he casts it, sometimes on a single character in a row), to even using PK STARSTORM ON THE PARTY! Even if you're over leveled, that attack will always either deal mortal damage, or at least leave the characters close to zero HP. Even if you have the PP to put up power shields, it'll mean nothing since, not only does ElectroShock break shields, but the boss and it's cohorts have attacks specially to break power shields! On top of all that, it has a crap ton of HP! Pretty much a lot of this fight will come down to if you're lucky enough to get enough smash attacks off and how generous the boss feels like in regards to PK Starstorm.
  • The Mara Demon can also be a major pain too, although the fact that it's the Final Boss, it at least makes since. While not as crazy as the above since it can't break shields, this is likely because you're going to need them for this fight. It has an attack that drastically decreases the trios attack and defense, and can attack the party in in a row, sometime attacking each of them twice. He even has a variation of this move that always gets smash attacks on the party if you don't have a shield up. If you don't have a party healing item on your fastest character, this will result in a Total Party Kill. Other attacks include an attack that damages you and drains your PP, and an attack that temporarily stuns a party member. On top of all this, the boss has three different forms, each slowly more harder than the last and all max out to a crap load of HP. Thankfully, the Monster Town just before him at least has a lot of good healing items and the best possible equipment for each character, because trust us... you're going to need it!
  • The End of Hope and the End of Dreams, which on top of coming out of absolutely nowhere, winds up being the most grueling fight as it takes place directly after the Mara Demon. It is also a three form boss battle that has devastating attacks and a tremendous amount of health. It has one attack that hits the party for minimal damage but hits for approximately a minute straight, so hope you don't get criticalled. Thankfully you have Anna to help you out but the sheer length of the battle, especially after getting off of Mara Demon, will wear on people.

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