Ever wonder what kind of connection the classic Japanese animation series Neon Genesis Evangelion has to EarthBound for the Super Nintendo? No?
Who cares! I've found a bone-shatteringly amazing connection between them that probably suggests a couple people on the animation team for Evangelion (which aired beginning in October 1995 on Japanese television) were playing EarthBound (known in Japan as Mother 2) while they worked on the famous cartoon. Mother 2 was released in Japan in August of 1994, meaning that it would be more than likely that animators of the geekier persuasions would have had more than ample opportunities to play the game.