Masahiro Sakurai managed to talk about Kirby Air Riders for 45 uninterrupted minutes last week, and I loved every last second of it. What I didn't notice until it was pointed out to me - probably because I was so locked in listening to Sakurai talking about that second button - were the references to characters from the Mother series during the Direct's multiplayer section.
The references were spotted by Game Spark. While Sakurai is showing off Air Riders' 16-person lobbies, you need to look at the names of some of the players joining him in the upcoming sequel's City Trial to pick up on the Mother/Earthbound connection.
Paula, Jeff, and Frank are all in the lobby. They might sound like standard English names the Air Riders' team picked at random to fill the lobby, all three of them being core characters in Mother 2, known as Earthbound outside of Japan, makes it seem likely that their use for the Direct was an intentional reference.
If you're still not convinced, there's also a player called Lucas in the same Air Riders lobby. Not only the protagonist from Mother 3, but also one of the only Mother characters to have...
