This opinion has been changed to mark the one year anniversary of the GameCube. The main bulk of the opinion has not changed but I have removed the 'Incoming Games' section as those featured in it are now released. You can find major upcoming releases mentioned in the new section of the opinion 'One Year On' which focuses at how well the GameCube has performed both in commercial and personal terms.
|| Booting Up |
From the start the Nintendo GameCube must have been doing something right. I am (or was) a die hard PC Gamer and consoles were of little interest for me. The launch of the PlayStation passed me by. The Dreamcast held no place in my heart, though now I’m quite sad at its passing because it was a good console but killed off by the mundane and mainstream PS. When the hype that was the PS2 came it seemed cold and heartless as well as overpriced and with a poor line up on launch games. Even now developers are now only just getting to grips with the PS2’s architecture and making games that do it justice.
Then came along the X-Box and GameCube. I was in recent months, thanks to the readings of multi-format games magazines, becoming a bit more interested in console gaming. It was also helped by the fact that my newly purchased PC was not getting many new games installed upon it thanks to very little titles swaying me to bring out the cold, hard cash. The hype surrounding both the consoles was pretty big. The X-Box was touted to be the most powerful ever, and it is, yet it seemed too much like a ‘PC In A Box’ also the fact that the money grabbing Microsoft we’re developing it did little to win me over. The look and name of it was decidedly retro with its big, bulky black casing, it looked out of place next to the stylish consoles before it. The controller was fat and very, very ugly and seemed too unwieldy for someone with small hands (something that Microsoft found out in Japan). Yet its sheer power and its killer application Halo but a positive light on it as well as the potential for great games to be released on it.
But it was the GameCube that won me over. Named Project Dolphin during development it was kept very under wraps until around August 2000 when Nintendo decided to show it off. I followed the news of it off and on until around September 2001 when it picked up and more talk of it was going around. Though not as powerful as the X-Box its power lies in the graphics and they are stunning (more on that later) and a strong line-up of third party support for games. The design itself is compact and sturdy what’s more the controller is also well designed and fits into your hand perfectly.
|| Play |
The GameCube, while small, is perfectly powered. Its custom-made IMB ‘Gekko’ processor powers the machine and gives a processor speed of 485Mhz. This compares to the 295Mhz PS2 and the 733Mhz X-Box. To an untrained eye this would make the GameCube look fairly old next to the X-Box even now. However the clock speed, based on Apple’s PowerPC Technology can actually be pushed
ten times higher thanks to the 256k memory cache built onto the central processor. The same misreading can be linked to the polygon count too. The polygon count basically equates to the power of the graphics. The polygon count per second for the GameCube is 12million, compared to PS2’s 66 and X-Box’s 116. However the figures need to be put into context. While the X-Box and PS2’s figures are correct for raw data they don’t show the polygon count for the character animations, lighting and backgrounds among other things while the game is running, this is something the GameCube figure shows. If this was shown across the board all consoles would be around the 10-12million count.
The GameCube has a total of 40Mb of memory, comparatively weedy to the 64Mb of unified memory the X-Box has. However the 40Mb is used well, with it being broken down to be able to serve the player with fast speed and reduces the cost and physical space for memory. There are two slots for memory cards for the GameCube. At launch there is the Memory Card59 which holds a meagre 4Mb and 59 slots. This does seem fairly small and games with a lot of statistics such as sport titles will use it up quickly but Nintendo will release larger scale memory cards very soon in the future. However third party develops already have larger memory cards out at the moment.
As is now the trend the GameCube is built for Internet support. For now, however, it remains unavailable for now, but it is ready. The GameCube has two serial ports, one for a normal 56k modem and one for broadband. For now news on Internet connecting is sparse, with Nintendo’s main focus on new games at this years E3 show, but expect some main news to filter through soon.
A great additional feature of the GameCube is the link-up it provides with the GameBoy Advance. Buying a cable that can link the two systems together you can access bonus features in a GameCube game and bring them onto the Advance. At the moment there are not many games that take advantage of this, Sonic Adventure 2: Battle is notable in letting you raise creatures from the main game and port them onto the Advance, but other games do not offer much. However it is early days and future games intend to use it as much to their advantage as they can such as the future game Animal Forest which ports old SNES games to the Advance when they are found in the game.
The Cube itself is good to look at. It looks small but feels very sturdy and is quite heavy. A neat addition is the handle on the side of the Cube which will please and annoy people in equal measure but its great if your going to transport it from room-to-room. The GamCube has four controller ports so it makes multiplaying gaming easily done. It also has a slot for upgrades, such as hard disk memory boards, which Panasonic are creating. It comes in a variety of colours, just Black and Indigo for now with ‘Spice’ (read orange), Silver and others to follow. The discs are also compact as they come. They measure just 8cm across this does mean they are nice and small but it also means they cannot fit as much data on them as other consoles. This means some games will come on multiple discs (such as Resident Evil) yet this is no major trauma as it doesn’t take much to change a disc.
|| Cube Control |
The controller is another gem from Nintendo. In keeping with the consoles compact look the controller may feel fairly small in some people’s hands however I’ve had no problem with it while playing games and the controller is far more manageable than the behemoth that is the X-Box one. It has two analogue sticks. The main control one situated on the left-hand side and the new C-Stick located at the bottom right. This is used for changing camera angles or working with the Control Stick (as in Luigi’s Mansion). On the top right are the A, B, X and Y buttons. These are the primary buttons you will use in any game, with the A button being the most used one. There was slight concern over the size of the B button being too small but its size and position plays fine. On the left and right shoulder of the pad are the ‘L’ and ‘R’ buttons, which are used for additional functions in games. There is also an additional shoulder button on the right hand side the Z button. This is a fairly odd button in terms of placement as it would be better suited underneath but this depends what it is going to be used for as not many games so far have used it prominently in their games.
|| Shutdown |
So is the GameCube worth it? Well, basically, yes. Nintendo have produced a killer console and, judging by the sale figures, it’s proving to be so. The X-Box may have Halo and aim to be more ‘mature’ but it is the GameCube that offers some of the best entertainment around at the moment with some great fun games. Yes the colours, especially the Indigo, do little to dispel the ‘kiddy’ image Nintendo have acquired, nor will some of the games released on it. However don’t we all like to feel like kids at some point in our life anyway? And playing video games, no matter how serious its content, is still ultimately just for fun and this delivers.
Early indication also shows that Nintendo are taking the European market more seriously this time. Gamers in the past have been treated as just a second thought but things seem to be changing. Although we will still probably have to have lengthy waits for games to come to our PAL region from the US and Japan at least they are coming. Also with the dedicated European ‘Nintendo VIP’ website and the soon to be launched UK website things seem to be going well.
For what the GameCube is it performs well. It’s not meant to play your CDs or let you watch movies but there to let you play. It has a good selection of games and some great ones coming up. Its price (£120) cannot be argued with either and there are also some great bundles to be had if you look around. Cubism is back.
|| One Year On |
The little black box of mine has been sitting under the TV for a year today and I’ve spent many, many hours enjoying some of the fantastic games it has offered but it doesn’t mean to say it has had a perfect year.
Unless you’ve been living under a rock then you have been bound to notice the massive discounting of GameCube in stores such as Dixons (£99.99) and Argos (£78.99) when they were ‘dropping’ GameCubes position at their stores and as Dixons account for 20% of GameCube hardware sold then it didn’t look good. Nintendo were, as ever, fairly muted and offered no real comment back so it was left to people to make their own minds up – namely that the GameCube was the new Dreamcast and it was hurtling into oblivion. However, for now at least, the GameCube is staying on both of the stores shelves after a massive surge of interest but Nintendo have still yet to offer an official price cut of £99.99 and the price of £129.99 still stands (but now with a bundled game). Capcom have also thrown a spanner in the works by apparently ‘rethinking’ their plans for Resident Evil series to be GameCube exclusive thanks to lower than average sales of the games but have now confirmed that Resident Evil 0 and 4 will be exclusive to the machine. Then there are Nintendo’s online plans – or lack of them. Ironically the online facilities of the GameCube launched before the Xbox and PS2 but as so low key that it was bound to go unnoticed and Nintendo have claimed themselves that online gaming on the Cube looks highly unlikely. Lets us not forget a big problem of installed userbase. The GameCube may be second overall worldwide (though its getting close) but the Xbox has overtaken it in Europe thanks to a hefty price cut in time for Christmas and Nintendo not bothering to do anything at all.
On a personal note these problems have not really affected me too much. However Nintendo still haven’t got to grips with the Europe market. We still have to wait long periods of time for PAL releases (though granted it can take a while to translate text into all the languages so we can also blame our fellow neighbours) and sometimes not get games at all, such as the fantastic Animal Crossing. Christmas was, rankly, pathetic. While the PS2 and Xbox ran marketing campaigns and price cuts we didn’t get much from the Cube. An advert ran on TV with ‘The Legends are coming’ (tip: we want them now) and we got Starfox Adventures and Mario Party 4 to play on, hardly big games and we had to sit back and see Japan get The Wind Waker and the US get Metroid Prime. The lack of online potential is not too bad in my eyes as I can’t get Broadband in my area (well, my house can my phone line in my room can’t) and while it would have been fantastic to have Mario Kart Online we will probably have to wait until Nintendo’s next console. For online gaming Xbox pretty much has it sussed but it still doesn’t have quality Live games to warrant a purchase.
However for all those complaints GameCube, to me, is still my most played on console out of that and Xbox and, even if it does have the delay in games, it still has the best games on any system. While the PS2 and Microsoft shelves bulge with inferior games the GameCube, while having a smaller selection, has some of the best, Metroid Prime, Zelda, Mario, Pikmin, Smash Bros, Super Monkey Ball, Resident Evil to nam a few. In my year having it I have purchased eighteen games and all but two of them are games that can only be found on the GameCube. The only game coming close to that on the Xbox is Halo and possibly Dead or Alive 3 while the PS2 only has, in my eyes, the delights of Ico, Rez and the GTA series (though that doesn’t really blow me away too much). Eighteen games in twelve months, apart from being expensive, is testimony that for pure gaming pleasure Nintendo has everyone beat.
The future may still look shaky from a commercial point of view but from the gaming side Nintendo still has it strong. There is the prospect of Mario 128 (apparently it will feel a lot more ‘new’ than Mario Sunshine), Mario Kart (which, while not online, will be able to link itself to another GameCube for up to eight players), Pikmin 2 (which will offer a two player mode and more breeds of Pikmin), Starfox Armada, Metroid Prime 2, F-Zero GC and Resident Evil 4 to keep gamers more than satisfied. Then there is the GameBoy Player which will attach to the GameCube so you can play your GameBoy Advance games on the big screen. Nintendo has also struck deals with third party developers to add specific content to games that will use the GameBoy Advance and GameCube link capability.
It hasn’t been a perfect year by any means for GameCube but it is still the number one choice of console in my eyes and it looks doubtful to be shaken in this generation of consoles. Yes, the delays are awful and the Europe support lacking but when games do get here they are fantastic. Also, as shown with GameBoy Player, Nintendo still have the knack of innovation in hardware as well as games. If you are thinking of buying a console and want quality games then GameCube is still the way to go.
GAMECUBE IS
Small Cheap Powerful
GAMECUBE IS NOT
To be underestimated Cheap in a bad way A cube at all really
How helpful would this review be to a person making a buying decision? Rating guidelines
The cube's not dead, Nintendo are a good company and will keep things going (obviously needs help from GBA sales!).
This years sales in Japan so far (a month ago according to IGN):
PS2: 1,353,000
GC: 510,000
XBOX: Can't really remember but perhaps about 90,000
Now the XBOX really is dead!
feebleeona 03.10.2002 22:39
Fantastic op! My niece wants one of these for her xmas and i didnt know much about it or the quality or anything, so thanks for the info!
Cheers fee :0)
claires_cult 28.09.2002 23:29
this is a really good op. I really love my xbox though, so i wont be converted. Nearly though.... :)
Advantages: Fits nicely on top of my PS2, Games last ages, legendary game characters (Super Mario, Zelda, etc) Disadvantages: Nearly everyone's quit stocking games for it
duck1979 20.10.2005 (20.10.2005)
·
Read review
Ciao members have rated this review on average: very helpful
Review of Nintendo Gamecube
Jun 18th, 2002
(May 3rd, 2003)
very helpful by (98%):
helpful by (2%):
