It's my longest one of these yet... just can't help myself I guess. :p I've been working on this on and off for 3-4 months now, it's great to finally get it done!
I finished this within the last day after a lot of work, so I want to post it, regardless of the unpleasant little argument going on in that other thread.
My Thoughts on the Gamecube
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The Gamecube is the only TV console that I bought within the first weeks of its release, and it was the only 6th gen console I owned between when I got it in November 2001 and mid 2007. I liked the Gamecube a lot, and it's definitely my favorite 6th gen console. It's also kind of the end of an era that for me started in about '99 -- after the GC I started playing a lot more classic games than modern ones, and I didn't end up getting a Wii until 2010. And even then, I haven't played the Wii anywhere remotely near as much as I did the Gamecube. The Wii really is just as good or better, but... I don't know, I like older games a lot, and there were so many I missed! Now I have a 360 too, but I play that infrequently as well. I did play plenty of DS games though, but that's a handheld. But during the late N64 and GC eras I did have a current TV console. (The late '90s to late' 00s were also the time when I played the most internet multiplayer games on my PC; by the late '00s that had gone down a lot, and that has not changed much. Of course the GC didn't have that, though.)
But anyway, the Gamecube was a really great console, and I loved it then and still like it a lot now. I got my Gamecube the day after Thanksgiving in 2001, and only had the money for the system, a memory card, and one game, Star Wars: Rogue Squadron 2 - Rogue Leader. It was well worth it, because that's an amazing, and incredibly good looking, game. Oh, and I also got a new copy of Perfect Dark for the N64 that day at the same store for $10, so that was nice too. At Christmas I got a second controller and a few more games (SSBM and XG3). I was in college through the GC era, and so naturally I ended up playing lots of SSBM multiplayer; I was a Nintendo fan, not a shooter fan, so it was SSBM and not Halo for me. I'm not the biggest SSBM fan, but it is a good multiplayer game at least. Fortunately there were also plenty of other multiplayer GC (and N64) games to play as well; the GC doesn't have quite the variety of exceptional single-system 3+ player games that the N64 does, but it does have a good number of them, many of them great. The system has plenty of great single-player games as well.
As for design, the Gamecube is a sleek, modern looking system. Both of my Gamecubes are black; it comes in other colors, but the black one looks great. It doesn't have the style and sheer beauty of an N64, and at the time I thought it was as step down from the N64's design for sure, but it looks nice. The controller is similar -- it's a clear step down from the amazing N64 controller, in both design and function, but it's a good, solid controller which has served well for many games for a long time. I prefer the larger size, 3-prong design, better d-pad, and 6-face-button layout of the N64 controller, and the feel of (non-broken) N64 analog sticks, but the GC controller is a very good one for sure, even if it doesn't quite match its predecessor. They REALLY needed to do something better than that Z button, but otherwise it's a good pad. It is kind of unfortunate that it has only 8 buttons though, because many ports had to have something compromised to fit onto a controller with four fewer buttons than the PS2 and Xbox controllers have. Six face buttons would have helped with half of that problem, you know, Nintendo... but anyway, I do like the GC, and apart from those issues, it does have a great controller. The GC controller isn't quite as good as the N64 one, but it is extremely comfortable, and once you get used to it the GC's unique face button layout actually works very well. I don't know why Nintendo abandoned analog shoulder buttons after the GC, but the GC L and R buttons are great. I like the analog-with-click design, they should have stuck with it. The GC controller is my favorite 6th-gen controller. The Gamecube has many accessories as well. I've never owned or used a GC modem, but broadband and 56k modems exist. A few games had online play, but several do support system link multiplayer, which still works fine of course. I do have a Game Boy Player, a GC microphone with controller-hookup adapter, three sets of GC bongos, and something like three GC-GBA connection cables.
Probably the biggest problem with the Gamecube was Nintendo's strategy with the system. After the relative disappointment that was the N64 worldwide, and the horrible disaster that was the N64 in Japan, Nintendo wanted to do better this time, particularly at home in Japan. They failed to do that, but in the process took out their most important region in terms of sales, the US market. Thanks to Satoru Iwata of NCL (Nintendo Japan), now in charge under Yamauchi, Nintendo focused their Gamecube strategy on building their relationships with Japanese third parties, and mostly abandoned the Western partnerships that they had built up to such great success during the N64 generation. This may seem reasonable -- build relationships with the Japanese companies who have spurned us in favor of Sony, and get back more of our home market -- but it did more harm than good. This disastrously bad decision would set Nintendo's course for the future which they are still on, and now suffer for after the casual boom of the DS and Wii has faded. It also failed in its main goal, of getting the Gamecube to sell better in Japan than the N64 had. Instead, the GC actually sold worse than the N64 did in Japan; it was only a small drop, but it was a drop. Meanwhile, thanks to Microsoft's entry and Nintendo's surrender of the hardcore market to them, the GC crashed hard in the US and sold eight million fewer systems than the N64 had, only ~12 million versus ~20. So, with the N64 Nintendo lost the Japanese market, and then with the GC they lost the US market. Abandoning first and close third party partners like Rare, Left Field, Silicon Knights, and Factor 5, most importantly (there are also more), may have seemed to make financial sense at the time, but Nintendo replaced them with only Retro and nothing else. Retro is amazing, but they're just one team and can only make a game every couple of years. They can't do everything all on their own. The Gamecube, and Nintendo consoles since it as well, suffered badly compared to the N64 because of the loss of Rare particularly, but all of the losses hurt.
The loss of Rare particularly is tragic stuff, and as a result, the GC badly lacks in platformers compared to the N64. As I love the genre, this is a problem. The GC has a great library as it is, but its platformer selection is one of the weakest of any Nintendo console. Rare's founders, the Stampers, wanted to leave, and told Nintendo that either Nintendo had to buy the 49% of Rare they owned, or they'd sell it to someone else. Nintendo, unhappy that Rare was having a tough time with the 5th-6th generation transition, refused to do this, and the Stampers sold their share to Microsoft. MS then bought up Nintendo's majority share of Rare as well. In my opinion at least, the whole situation was a disastrous mistake. Nintendo of Japan had a very hard time with the 4th-5th generation transition, and then Rare stepped in and helped save the N64 with their consistent, and amazingly great, games. But when Rare struggled for a while during the next generation transition, Nintendo had no patience, and sold off Rare instead of giving them the time they needed. Losing Rare was a major blow to Nintendo, and I would say that Nintendo has still never recovered from losing Rare. Nintendo needed Rare. Sure, they got a lot of money from Microsoft for the sale, but the loss of key games was a major problem, and the loss has not been replaced. During the Gamecube generation, Nintendo handed Microsoft the Western hardcore console game audience which they had held on the N64 thanks to Rare's Goldeneye and others, and didn't even put up much of a fight. While they managed to find a replacement with the casual-focused Wii, the Wii U shows how losing the Western hardcore base was a big problem. With hindsight, the Western-centric N64 was the better concept, compared to the more Japan-focused Gamecube. Too bad. Had Nintendo kept Rare, Star Fox Adventures would probably have been better, Kameo and Perfect Dark Zero would have released on the Gamecube, and several other games would surely have released as well; perhaps a better 3d platformer instead of the disappointing beat 'em up Grabbed by the Ghoulies, because the action-styled design was partially inspired by the shift of platforms, and either the Conker remake, or some other new game instead; perhaps Conker 2?
Instead, Rare released games to commercial failure on a platform with an audience much less interested in their games. Rare's natural audience is on Nintendo consoles, not Microsoft ones, and they were not able to draw enough Nintendo fans over to Microsoft. Also, losing Donkey Kong, their best-selling platformer franchise, hurt as well. Rare would never be the same, and nor would the Gamecube. All of those games would have helped the Gamecube, and while Rare wasn't quite as great in the 6th gen as they had been in the 5th, staying on one platform through the generation would have helped. Also, I at least think that Kameo (and also Banjo-Kazooie: Nuts & Bolts) are great games, and show that Microsoft Rare still could make great games. With Nintendo, the games would have been even better, surely. This has to be one of the great "what ifs" in gaming, particularly if combined with a more Western-focused Gamecube strategy, as they had done with the N64! Try to fight back against Microsoft, as hopeless as the effort at slowing Halo's seizure of the hardcore market may seem. In the long run it was Microsoft taking the hardcore that really doomed Nintendo in the west, more so that Sony's unmatched success with the PS2. I know, as someone with a master's in history I perhaps shouldn't put as much focus on hypotheticals as I do, but I can't help but wonder what could have happened.
As far as the GC's game library goes, the GC has a reasonably-sized, and fairly broad, library. Its main weaknesses are that this system is from during the time when 2d games on consoles were dead, so it has very few of those, and that third parties largely stopped supporting the GC after its first few years. Many third-party games from 2002 are on the GC, but by 2004 few third-party games not aimed at kids came to the system, because the GC was Nintendo's least successful home console up to that point and sales were sadly not good enough. Also, Nintendo's first-party games are ... weird sometimes. The Mario, Zelda, Mario Kart, etc. games... there are some odd ones. The system definitely has a quirky, unique library. This is both good and bad, depending on opinion.
All of my GC games are US region. There are a few Japanese GC games I want to play, most importantly Kururin Squash, but sadly I don't have that game yet. I'll definitely get it eventually, because it looks fantastic. I only have 131 GC games; it's not one of my larger collections in numbers, anymore, but it's still in the top 10 anyway, and it ranks very high for nostalgia value for sure! Sadly Gamecube games aren't cheap; there never was a major price crash like there was with the PS2 or Xbox, so while with those systems I was able to buy up large collections for cheap in the last 4-6 years, that's not the case for the Gamecube. GC games are less common than PS2 or Xbox games, and when you see them they cost more. Unfortunate. It's worth it, though! The GC is a great, great system, and even though now I do have a DC, Xbox, and PS2, yes, the GC is still my favorite of the generation.
Here's my favorite games list. The top two are for sure, but the next two could be in either order, and numbers 5-10 could go plenty of ways... it's hard to choose, with so many good games!
Top 10 Favorite Gamecube Games
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1. Eternal Darkness: Sanity's Requiem
2. Metroid Prime
3. The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess
4. Skies of Arcadia Legends
5. XGRA: Extreme-G Racing Association
6. Fire Emblem: Path of Radiance
7. F-Zero GX
8. Star Wars: Rogue Squadron II: Rogue Leader
9. Capcom vs SNK 2: EO
10. Gauntlet: Dark Legacy
Honorable Mentions: Custom Robo: Battle Revolution, Defender, Super Mario Sunshine, Donkey Kong Jungle Beat, Geist, The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker, The Legend of Zelda: Four Swords Adventures, Lost Kingdoms, Mario Kart Double Dash, Mega Man Anniversary Collection, P.N.03, Ikaruga, Metal Arms: Glitch in the System, Midway Arcade Treasures, Naruto: Clash of Ninja 2, Mystic Heroes, Beach Spikers, Star Wars Rogue Squadron III: Rebel Strike, Sonic Adventure 2 Battle, SpyHunter, Tales of Symphonia, SSX 3, Star Fox Assault, Wario Ware Inc.: Mega Party Games, Super Monkey Ball, Wave Race: Blue Storm, XG3: Extreme-G Racing, Phantasy Star Online Episodes III: C.A.R.D. Revolution, Turok: Evolution, Super Smash Bros. Melee
Reviews: 139 summaries total. Three of these are for Wii "New Play Control" titles that I actually only own on Wii, but apart from controls the games are the same, so close enough. Well, four, actually, counting Metroid Prime 2 from the Trilogy collection. Players listed is the maximum number the game allows -- games support 1-x players unless noted. All games require Gamecube memory cards to save, so I won't bother listing that -- everything requires one. GC games also pretty much all support rumble, since it's built in to the controllers. I will list other accessories games support -- Bongos, GC-GBA link cables, the modem, the microphone, 16:9 widescreen (versus the usual 4:3), and 480p progressive scan.
1080 Degrees Avalanche - 4 players, broadband modem supported (system link only), 480p progressive scan support. 1080 Avalanche is the second and, unfortunately, final game in the 1080 snowboarding series that began on the N64. Developed by NST, the same team who made Wave Race Blue Storm, 1080 Avalanche is a short but very fun game that really surprised me -- I got this game several years after its release, and went into the game with only moderate expectations based both on reviews and my opinion on the first game on the N64 (it's good, but I don't love it). However, 1080 Avalanche is a great game! More fun and more approachable than the N64 game, 1080 Avalanche is a fantastic, good-looking, and extremely fun arcade-style racing/stunt game. The game won't take long to finish if all you want to do is just see all the content, but as with the N64 original, it has enough replay value to keep people coming back. This is a snowboarding game of course, and it's fast and well-designed. There are a good variety of characters to choose from, including the Wave Race and 1080 casts. The art style is similar to Wave Race Blue Storm, unsurprisingly. As the word 'Avalanche' in the title suggests, the game has avalanches at certain points in many tracks. These can be exciting, as you try to outrun the onrushing wall of snow. Tracks are all well-designed for both fun and challenge. If I have any issues with this game, it's the same thing as every snowboarding game -- I don't enjoy snowboard game stunt systems very much at all, and as with most snowboarding games, stunts are a huge part of this game. People who like snowboard or skateboard stunt systems should like the stunt system, though, as it's very similar to other arcadey snowboarding games from the time. As I've always quite disliked stunt modes in these games, though, I've barely ever touched this in halfpipe or stunt mode. And the short length is a factor; there aren't all that many circuits to complete, and once you're done replay value is all you have. At least it does support the broadband adapter, for internet tunneling play! Still, 1080 Avalanche is a very good, under-rated game that many people seem to have forgotten about. It's kind of tragic that Nintendo let such a great team as this one die off, as this game ended up being NST's last polygonal 3d game -- all they've done since is Virtual Console and Mario vs. Donkey Kong work. Project H.A.M.M.E.R. (Wii), it probably would have been good... ah well.
Alien Hominid - 2 player simultaneous in the main game or 4 player alternating in a minigame, 480p progressive scan support. Alien Hominid is a sidescrolling 2d run & gun game based on a flash game on Newgrounds (on that note, I find it impressive that Newgrounds still finds an audience, but I guess it does!). This is a run & run shooter, much like Metal Slug or Contra, about a cute little alien who got shot down on Earth, and now has to slaughter his way through threatening FBI agents, Russians, and more as he tries to get away from this place. As with artist Dan Paladin's other games, it's violent and somewhat misanthropic. The game has good cartoon-style art, but it still looks like a flash game; it's got that classic Flash look, which isn't one I've ever liked much. I was disappointed that this console game didn't improve the graphics more. It still looks good, thanks to the art design, but they could have done more. As for the gameplay, this console game is fortunately much better than the usual bad controls of a Flash game. The difficulty is VERY steep, however. This was no surprise, as I'd played Dan Paladin's flash games before buying this and they were also very difficult, but sometimes this game really is too hard. Worst of all is that you have limited continues. You can save, but once you run out of continues you'll have to get through some very hard part of the game without dying. I got this game back after it came out, and eventually had to give up somewhere in Russia, because the game just got too hard and unfair. I was hoping that this game would be like a Metal Slug game on the Gamecube, since SNK sadly did not support the GC itself and I really love Metal Slug, but Alien Hominid just isn't quite on that level; this is more of a B or C-tier Metal Slug/Contra knockoff with okay but very Flash-style graphics and nice art design. There's not really all that much to say about the gameplay here -- you walk to the right, shoot everything that moves, and try not to get hit because of course you die in one hit. Various weapon powerups give you better offensive capabilities, but you'll get hit sometime for sure and lose it. Argh. Wanting to see what crazy situation I'd be in next kept me playing for a while, but once the game got just too unfair, I quit. In addition to the main game, Alien Hominid also has a minigame with basic two-color graphics, where you get through small, single-screen side-view levels. There are many levels to play through, and actually it's pretty fun! I liked this almost as much as the main game, actually. Overall though, Alien Hominid is a decent to good game, but I found it somewhat disappointing compared to my expectations. After this game Dan Paladin went on to make two more retail games, the okay beat 'em up Castle Crashers and the fun platformer Battleblock Theater. Battleblock Theater is probably my favorite one of the three. Still, if you find Alien Hominid cheap, maybe check it out. Also on PS2, and Xbox as well in Europe only (though Europe did not get this GC version).
Army Men: Air Combat: The Elite Missions - 2 player co-op or versus. This game by 3DO is actually a port of the PS2 port of Army Men Air Attack 2, a 2.5d helicopter action game originally released on the PS1. While the Army Men franchise may have a bad name, the AMAC/AMAA portion of it was one of its highest-quality series. This GC version released several years after the PS1 and PS2 versions, though, and is pretty much a straight port of a dated game, so it got understandably poor reviews. I liked the first Army Men Air Combat for the N64 (aka Air Attack on PS1), though, and this game is more of the same. This is the best version of the second game in the series for sure; the PS1 version looks much worse, and the GC version does edge the PS2 one. Yes, this is ultimately a port of a last-gen up-port, and it does look quite dated visually, but the reviews that claim that it looks like an N64 game are inaccurate; this looks more like the early PS2 game that it's a port of. The games' music is okay, but it's nothing special. There are FMV cutscenes, just like in the PS1 version (which I cover in my PS1 thread), and they're the same just with higher-quality video, as expected. The main changes versus the PS1 original are in graphics and controls. AMAC: TEM has dated early-PS2 graphics, but they ARE better than the PS1 version's visuals. And in controls, the handling of your helicopter is simply much, much improved on the GC; I played both games one after the other, and there was a surprising improvement in controls and handling on the GC. The PS1 version controls okay, but this is better. I haven't played the PS2 version myself, though, so I don't know if this is the same as that one; my guess would be that it likely is, since in features the two are identical.
Whichever version you play, Army Men Air Attack 2/Air Combat: The Elite Missions is another EA (Desert, etc.) Strike-series-inspired flight action helicopter game. As with the first game though, this game isn't very difficult, quite unlike the real Strike series games. The game has 3d graphics and an angled semi-overhead camera, but like the Strike games, you play on a flat 2d plane -- you have no height control over your helicopter. This works fine, as your focus is on the enemies and your mission, not any kind of complexity in the flight model. As in Strike games, your goal in each mission in the Army Men helicopter games is to complete all of your mission objectives, which generally require destroying certain enemy emplacements, taking cargos back to your base, and such. Objectives and gameplay are not as complex here as in Strike games, of course, but there is more to it than just 'kill everything'. There are 20 levels in the game, in 10 environments, slightly more than the original PS1 release but the same as on PS2. One thing I very much like about the Air Combat/Attack games is that you don't have limited fuel; the limited fuel in Strike games can be frustrating sometimes. Here you can just fly around, shoot stuff, and pick up powerups, without worrying \about the details that are key to Strike games. The AMAC games are not as good as the 5th gen Strike titles (Soviet, Nuclear), but they are fun, simple arcadey shooting games, and that's more than enough for me to enjoy them. They really are fun games, and this one is no exception! Unfortunately, unlike Army Men: Air Combat for the N64, this GC game is two player only, not four, so the multiplayer isn't improved. That's too bad, because the 3/4 player multiplayer mode in Air Combat was quite fun! The various two-player modes in this game are good fun as well, but it'd be better with more players. Oddly one of the multiplayer modes in the PS1 version isn't present on the GC and PS2, and they added nothing to make up for that, but still, what's here is good -- there are still five multiplayer modes in this version, including two player co-op and versus types. Overall, MAC: TES is a decent game, but not a great one. The simple but fun basic gameplay is good enough to keep me going in this game, though it is unoriginal and very similar to the first one, so it's much less unique, and it feels more dated too since it didn't start out as a 6th gen game. Even so, I kind of like this game. It's okay. Also on PS1 and PS2 as Army Men Air Attack 2.
Baldur's Gate: Dark Alliance - 2 player co-op. Baldur's Gate: Dark Alliance is an overhead-style 3d hack and slash action-RPG from Snowblind, somewhat inspired by Gauntlet but somewhat more complex by that game. The game was a great success, and spawned a genre that was quite popular on 6th gen platforms -- from Hunter: The Reckoning to X-Men Legends to D&D Heroes and Everquest: Chronicles of Norrath and more, there are quite a few of this style of game on these systems. The GC has fewer games of this style than the PS2 or Xbox do, but it does have some, including this one that started it all. As a fan of both D&D and Gauntlet, I had to get this game back in the early '00s, and I bought it in '02 or so. I liked the game, but it's not perfect; the simplistic design and some porting issues hold it back a bit. Even so, I can see why the game was popular, and did have fun with it for sure. In BGDA, you play as one of several heroes who are off on an adventure to save the city of Neverwinter from evil forces. The game is broken up into three acts, each in a new area, so it's not all that long. First you're in the city, later a snow area, and there is one more beyond that. There is some replay value though, and unlockables, so there are some things to keep you coming back for a while at least. Gameplay, as in all of these games, is simple: Kill everything, collect the loot, and upgrade your character's equipment along the way. The monsters are all classic D&D foes, and there's a good variety of them in the game. Of course you start out fighting rats, but move up to gelatinous cubes and much more dangerous enemies later on. The controls are simple, with an attack button, potion buttons for your crucial magic and healing potions, and a block button that might be useful if you get used to how to use it well. I mostly played as a ranged character, though, but sometimes you will have to fight up close of course, since in single player this is a solo adventure. The game has some pretty nice graphics at times; I particularly liked the water effects. Thanks to the overhead view everything is small, of course, but the monsters and environments all look good. Music is fitting for the genre.
I did have a few issues with BGDA, though. First, it takes far too long to save your game! That progress bar really creeps along; it's like this is a PS1 game or something. Load times are sometimes too long as well. I imagine that the game was not too well optimized when they ported it over to GC. And yes, BGDA definitely feels like a quick port. Few third party GC games were actually designed with the GC in mind, and that is one of the things I dislike most about the Gamecube when compared to the N64, since that system has a much higher proportion of third-party titles actually designed for the N64. Ah well, at least this game released on the GC! Its sequel did not, sadly, and it's expensive too, so I have yet to play it. Also, while there is a challenging 'gauntlet' dungeon that you unlock after beating the main game where you play as Drizzt, famous Forgotten Realms hero, and higher difficulty levels to try, the short length of the main game was kind of disappointing. I'd rather see more new things, rather than playing through the same short-ish game repeatedly! Also, the simple hack-and-slash gameplay gets repetitive after a while. Whether it's in caves, town, or a snowfield, all you do is kill monsters and, occasionally, buy new items to kill monsters with. Don't expect much depth here, you won't find it. D&D stats may exist in this game, but they don't do much beyond the basics. Still, BGDA is a good game, and it's well worth playing for anyone who likes this kind of game. As a huge Gauntlet series fan I like real Gauntlet games more, but this style is good too. Also on PS2 and Xbox.
Baten Kaitos: Eternal Wings and the Lost Ocean - 1 player, 480p progressive scan support. Baten Kaitos was one of the relatively few Gamecube-exclusive third-party titles on the system. Nintendo apparently liked the game so much that they paid for a sequel to be made and bought the developer, Monolith Soft, but while Monolith Soft's Xenoblade is pretty good, I've never liked this game at all. Baten Kaitos is a JRPG, and, like many JRPGs from the time, it has a card theme. All of your items and skills are on cards too, and the game has a card-battle element to its combat. All of your items are also on cards, which is an interesting visual touch but doesn't affect gameplay all that much. You can combine items and the like. In battle, each character draws a hand of cards that you can use, so what you can do at any point -- attacks, defense, what have you -- depends a lot on luck. the card element adds some complexity to the game, but I didn't like the battle system all that much either; the card system has too high of a learning curve, and I wasn't having much fun even once I did get it. I like Lost Kingdoms and Phantasy Star Online III, two other GC RPGs with card systems, but definitely not this one. JRPG battle systems are usually too simplistic, but this isn't really better, it's just as bad but in a different way. The story and characters are worse. The main character, Kalas, is an unpleasant person I really do not like, and the rest of the cast aren't that great either. The game has some depth and plot twists, but this only makes the characters, Kalas particularly, look worse. This isn't my kind of story at all; it's dark at times, kind of serious, and the main character is kind of a jerk. Give me Skies of Arcadia over this any day! Baten Kaitos definitely does have great production values, though. The first thing most anyone who plays this game will notice is how great it looks! Baten Kaitos has polygonal characters on very nice looking prerendered backdrops, and the look works. The games' art design, particularly character design, isn't my favorite style of anime-style artwork, though. This is of course entirely a matter of opinion, but even though the graphics are good the art in this game isn't something I like as much as, say, Tales of Symphonia's or Skies of Arcadia's. The soundtrack is good for sure, though. Unfortunately the voice acting is quite bad, in English at least, and this is distracting at times. As far as the gameplay goes, honestly I never got all that far into Baten Kaitos; at first it seemed interesting, but the battle system didn't get me nearly as interested as I was hoping, and I really disliked the characters and story, which was a major negative. After playing the game a little, I was very glad that Tales of Symphonia was the GC Namco RPG I paid full price for, and Baten Kaitos the one I got cheap. Baten Kaitos Origins, the sequel, is supposedly a good game, but with how much I disliked the first game, I never bought it. Maybe I will someday, I'm not sure. What I do know, though, is that Baten Kaitos has a somewhat annoying battle system which relies too much on those cards, a very unlikeable main character, a somewhat disturbing at times story, and more. Other than the graphics, there's not much else I like about this disappointing game.
Battalion Wars - 1 player, 480p progressive scan and 16:9 widescreen support. Battalion Wars is a third-person shooter with some strategy elements, and as the name suggests, it's a more action-oriented spinoff of the Advance Wars series of turnbased strategy/wargames. I like strategy games more than third-person shooters myself, so I didn't get this game at release, and haven't played it anywhere remotely near as much as I did the GBA and DS Advance Wars games. Those games are amazing, but this one is just decent. Still, for a third-person shooter, this is an okay one.; this just isn't one of my favorite kinds of game. It is kind of nice to see all of the unit types from the GBA games in 3d, though, and the game has a nice cartoony graphical style that fits in well with the style of the GBA games and the first DS game. Battalion Wars has pretty good graphics and art design. This may be from Kuju and not Nintendo, but it got some Nintendo polish for sure. The game also has a story of course, and much like the GBA and first DS games, it's kind of ridiculous. The game tries to be funny, and often succeeds. It's funny enough, for sure. The characters are amusing caricatures, much like the ones in the GBA/first DS game. The main three are the "cheerleader" guy, the "drill sergeant" older guy, and the black air force guy. This games' developers were a Western team, and you can tell, but they did a good job giving it an Advance Wars theme and style. These people are all crazy warmongers... but that's the joke. At least this time it's more obviously crazy than the GBA games, which sometimes had some serious tonal dissonance between the story and gameplay. This silly style fits the series well.
Battalion Wars is a third-person shooter where you control a squad of units, and have to get them through the many levels that form the campaign. The basic unit type is an infantry unit, but you'll also be able to control tanks, jeeps, and more. Each handles differently, and the basic shooting/driving action works well enough for a console third-person shooter -- that is, thanks to auto-aim help it's playable. The strategy-game element in the game is that you can give some basic orders to the other units in your team, and also can switch between your units at any time. There's no overhead view though; you can just tell units to stay in place, or go to a point you can see. I've seen shooter/wargame hybrid titles before, but this game is not as complex as those; you're not managing a whole battlefield here from both first person and a zoomed-out strategic view, or building a base and commanding a large force, as in strategy/shooter hybrids like Uprising or Battlezone (PC&N64), but instead are just getting through some fairly linear levels with your squad of units. This is a simpler game. Even so, since you do have multiple troops to command, some strategic thinking will be required, and that's great. There is a bit more to this than your average third-person shooter, though, and the added strategy is welcome. I only wish the game required more of it, but it doesn't; you won't need too much in the way of complex tactics here, for sure. Overall, while this game is good for its genre, I'd rather play Advance Wars. I like that kind of game more. Still, Battalion Wars is a good game. The game has a sequel for the Wii, which is largely similar but added a now-gone online multiplayer mode. Sadly neither game has a splitscreen mode. Ah well.
Beach Spikers: Virtua Beach Volleyball - 4 player simultaneous, 480p progressive scan support. Beach Spikers: Virtua Beach Volleyball is the only console port of Sega's arcade women's beach volleyball game of the same name. Women's beach volleyball games got popular in the early '00s, probably thanks in part to the bikinis and in part to the sport reaching the Olympics, and Sega decided to make a volleyball game too. The basics of this game were taken from Virtua Tennis, except modified a bit to fit with a volleyball game. The result is that this game is really good! Beach volleyball games like Tecmo's DOA Xtreme aren't very good at all as actual volleyball games but instead are all about the scantily clad girl fanservice, but Sega's game 's core is its fantastic gameplay. Just like Virtua Tennis, Beach Spikers is a very good arcade-style sports game. Just like Virtua Tennis the controls are simple, but the game has depth. Each team has two players, and a symbol will mark where the ball is headed. One of the two team members has to get there and hit it up to the other player, who will then either hit it back for a return, or will return it herself. You can return the ball immediately, but that will be a much weaker hit sure to be returned. You can aim shots easily, and there are weak or strong hits as well. When serving to begin each volley, a standard power meter determines shot power. The games' controls and gameplay are fantastic, and are every bit as good as the best Virtua Tennis games. The games graphics are good, but it's easy to tell that this game was originally a Sega Naomi game -- this looks like the enhanced Dreamcast game that is essentially is. The Gamecube can do better than this, but still, it is a fairly good-looking game with that great classic Sega style.
You can either play a championship with a pre-created team, or create your own characters and go through a new more 'RPG-like' mode. In this mode you can only play as your character, and have to work with an AI ally, instead of switching between them based on context as you can do in the other modes, unless it's a 4-player multiplayer game, of course. You choose a country for your team, and can customize their looks in a character creator. You'll unlock many different bathing suit uniforms to choose between as you play. Both characters in this mode have RPG-like stats as well, and you'll slowly get better as you play more. This is both a good and bad thing, though, because your AI partner is TERRIBLE at the beginning of the game! Seriously, no matter where you put her stats at the beginning, she'll be near-useless until you manage to win some matches mostly on your own and increase her stats. And even when you do that, this mode is tough! Yes, Beach Spikers is not an easy game. Once you get farther into it the opposition gets strong, and managing to lay down some shots that land for points can be difficult and frustrating. In the 'RPG' mode, you also have to deal with managing your partner's mood too -- several times a game you can say something to your AI partner about how she's doing, and that can affect your team togetherness and thus how well she'll play. Guessing what's the best thing to say is hard and I'm no good at it, though, so this element isn't something I like that much. It's also kind of weird; how many other sports games have anything like it? Would they ever have had something like it in a sports game with guys, or is it an example of Japanese sexism at work? Probably the latter. Unfortunate. Apart from that, though, Beach Spikers is a great game I highly recommend to anyone who likes simple but fun arcade-style sports games. Enhanced Arcade port.
Big Air Freestyle - 2 player simultaneous, 480p progressive scan support. Big Air Freestyle is a dirtbike motorcycle racing game from Paradigm and published by Infogrames. It's decent fun, and looks alright as well. I didn't play this game before just before writing this, but I like it, and will return to this game for sure. Paradigm was an N64-exclusive developer the previous generation, and made their name based on somewhat simmish games like Pilotwings 64 and F1 World Grand Prix, but this game is quite arcadey and simplistic. That doesn't mean it's not fun, though! Sort of like another Paradigm game, Indy Racing 2000 on the N64, Big Air Freestyle is a fast and fun arcade-style racing game based on a real-world racing circuit, except it's a supercross and motocross (dirtbike) motorcycle racing game this time. This game is an altered version of MX Rider for the PS2, with supposedly simpler gameplay and no official licence this time. I haven't played the PS2 version, but I the way this version plays. Big Air Freestyle has simple controls and fun, challenging gameplay. There are three modes, Freestyle, a stunt arena mode; racing championship mode, the main mode; or Challenge mode, where you have to do specific tasks in order to win a variety of missions. Freestyle mode is in the title, but it's not too complex. Once you get used to pulling off stunts -- hold L, and then press the required buttons (or in one or two cases stick movements) in order and you'll do the stunt. So, it's not as complex as some games. I rarely find these stunt arena modes compelling, though; I've never liked these "hit specific buttons in the air in order to do stunts" games. Give me Rush 2049 car-spinning any day! As for Challenge mode, it's fun, but surprisingly isn't all that hard.
Race mode is the main challenge in the game. It takes the form of a traditional points championship, which is nice. Have the most points at the end of the fairly long season (~20 races) and you win. In races, the main challenge is simply staying on the track -- many jumps try to throw you off the track, and some memorization will be required to succeed. When you go off course you get reset on the track, but the pack stays unrealistically close together in this game, so even one crash will put you in 9th or 10th out of the ten-car field. Because of this I found the game somewhat frustrating, but otherwise the game would be far too easy because of the extremely simple driving model, so it's probably more good than bad -- at least this way, you have to work to win. You certainly won't be crashing much otherwise! Excitebike 64's driving model is many times more challenging than this one; Big Air is extremely forgiving. Actually crashing on the course is quite rare. If not for the jumps, it would be far too forgiving. Race mode has two different game modes, which you have to select between before starting, easy or realistic. There are multiple differences between them, but the most important ones are that in easy mode you only do a few laps per race and can reset races as often as you want, but in realistic, each race is a long 8 laps and you can't reset, so your only reset would be to reset the game and load your last save. You can at least save between races, though.
Graphically, the game betrays its PS2 origins; it looks only okay. However, the game does have fluid 60fps gameplay and progressive-scan support, which help a lot. You won't find those in the PS2 game, I'm sure! This game looks very sharp and smooth. The art design is decently good as well. As a result the game is sharp and clear-looking, and looks pretty nice, really. I may not often be able to tell the difference between 30fps and 60fps, but I can definitely see how progressive-scan makes a game look better! As with MX Rider, this game is set in Europe, though as I said earlier, without the official license here. Still, the tracks are all European. This makes little practical difference in the game, though, except for the many European flags flying along the courses, and the track names. As for the music, well, it has the same kind of music as every other motorcycle racing game of the era. Yeah, it's that same type of rock music they've all got. Very generic (and American, I expect) stuff. I don't like it of course, but you expect this stuff with motorcycle games, unfortunately. Ah well, could be worse. It reminds me a bit of Crazy Taxi's soundtrack, but not as amusing. Overall, Big Air Freestyle is a good game. I don't have MX Rider so I can't directly compare it to its predecessor, but the game has simple controls, a fair amount of challenge thanks to all those turns which throw you off the track if you don't moderate your speed, decent graphics, and it runs at a fluid 60fps with progressive-scan support too. This is a simple game, and it gets frustrating and does not have depth, but it's definitely worth a play for arcade racing fans, for sure. Big Air Freestyle is a fun, above-average game. It's too bad that Paradigm isn't around anymore. Gamecube exclusive, but it is adapted from MX Rider on the PS2.
Billy Hatcher and the Giant Egg - 2 player simultaneous, 480p progressive scan support. Billy Hatcher and the Giant Egg is a cute and somewhat original 3d platformer from Sonic Team. The game was made in between Sonic Adventure 2 and Sonic Heroes, and it's a good, and GC console-exclusive at the time, game. As with most of Sega's games at the time Billy Hatcher looks more like a Dreamcast game than a Gamecube (or Xbox, for their Xbox games) game, so that means dated graphics. As with all Sonic Team games from the time, this one also has the poor camera you expect. However, Billy Hatcher is a fun and somewhat original game. This is a Sonic Team 3d platformer for sure, and while that means graphical issues, short-ish length, and gameplay that's not quite on 3d Mario's level, it also means fun. Billy Hatcher is also an original title, which is a quite rare thing from modern Sonic Team; ever since Sonic Adventure, their platformers have almost exclusively been Sonic games, except for this one. Here, you play as, well, Billy Hatcher, a boy with a rooster hat who rolls around giant eggs. Naturally, you've got to save your world, Morning Land, from evil forces; only the boy in the chicken suit has the powers needed to defeat the villains! Yeah, it's a basic story, but it's good enough. The key mechanic here is those eggs; otherwise this would be a fairly standard game, but the giant eggs that are all over this game make it a bit different. This game isn't anywhere near as hard as Glover, another game with a character rolling around a ball, though. You will need to figure out some basic puzzles, but for the most part this is a simple game, and that's okay. You get eggs, roll them around, run over enemies with them, push them into places to solve puzzles, and with your rooster hat birth the baby chicks in the eggs. The game is mostly linear, with linear stages followed by occasional bossfights. It's fun, but not amazing. I don't love Billy Hatcher, but it is a average to good game and it's great to see a GC-only 3d platformer; the system had very few good exclusive platformers, unfortunately. Also on PC and Mac, both released several years later and only in Europe; elsewhere the game is GC-exclusive.
BlowOut - 1 player. BlowOut is a 2.5d side-scrolling platform-action game. Clearly inspired by the likes of Contra and Metroid, and made for a very low budget at a time when there were almost no side-scrolling console games, BlowOut is an interesting, and fun, title. For a game that originally retailed for $10, new, this game is far better than you might expect! In BlowOut, you play as a cigar-chomping space marine who's in an alien-infested space station, and you're there to wipe them all out. So, in each level, you've got to kill the aliens, find your way through the stage, and ultimately defeat the boss at the end. Standard stuff for sure, but it's fun. Each level is a large mazelike environment, and you'll need to hit switches, find keycards, and go up and down elevators as you try to find your way to the boss. You've got full aiming control with one stick, so you can shoot in any direction at any time, and you'll need this power, because the enemies are numerous. There are several different weapons to use though, so you have some choices, and the controls are good enough. I like exploring through the levels and finding my way through. The game has simple, repetitive graphics with little variety, but for the price you couldn't expect more. What is here is modeled fairly well, though; BlowOut's graphics are simple, but okay. Just get used to that space station environment, because it's the only one you get in the game; all levels have the same tileset. Each one has a new layout, though, so that's okay. There's also plenty of challenge here, because your health is limited and the enemies are numerous. This is a tough game, but it's doable; the challenge adds to the fun factor. You won't just blaze through this game, but will have to think a bit. Overall BlowOut is a fun little game that most people have probably forgotten about, if they ever knew about it to begin with. This is a fun little 2.5d platformer/shooter which is well worth a couple of bucks if you find it sometime. Also on PS2, Xbox, and PC.
Bomberman Generation - 4 player simultaneous (in battle mode only). Bomberman Generation is the first of two very similar 6th-gen 3d Bomberman action games. These games may be the successors to Bomberman 64, but they pale badly in comparison to that pretty good N64 classic, unfortunately. Bomberman Generation is a game I got in the early '00s, and it seriously disappointed me. With an overly cutesey style, mediocre, linear gameplay, saccharine visuals and audio in the multiplayer, okay-at-best graphics, and more, Hudson didn't do a particularly good job in moving Bomberman to the 6th generation, unfortunately. Bomberman's 5th-gen outings got mixed opinions, but most of them are better than this, I'd say. Apart from Atomic Bomberman and especially Bomberman X360 the series has always been cute, but these GC/PS2 games go overboard in that department, and in a direction I found annoying. Kirby games or classic Bomberman is great, but this... not this. So, I don't like the character sounds or graphical design very much. As for the gameplay, this game is a much simpler game than the first Bomberman 64, unfortunately. Of course all of its sequels have been -- the other N64 Bombermans are all linear games as well, for example -- but still, it's unfortunate that after showing that they could do a solid Mario 64-style 3d platformer in Bomberman 64, Hudson abandoned that in favor of simpler things like this game. Bomberman Generations has plenty of levels to play through, but it's just not fun. In the main game, explosions are circular, Bomberman 64-style. Hitting enemies with low-power bombs is tricky, but you get used to it with practice, and some bomb powerups. The game is completely linear, and in each level all you need to do is follow the route around the stage, killing enemies and solving way-too-easy 'puzzles' along the way. It's all too bland, to average, and too uninteresting to be worth much time. Level designs are bland, 'puzzles' are barely there, and the story's nothing worth mentioning either. Bomberman stories never are, sure, but it sure doesn't help when the gameplay is so average too.
In multiplayer, this game goes for a more traditional, 2.5d classic Bomberman style. Bomberman 64's 3d arenas are gone, never to return. I like both classic and Bomberman 64 style multiplayer, so it's really too bad that they couldn't have included both styles. Otherwise though, this is perfectly decent, average 4-player Bomberman. It's fun, but there's no real reason to play this over any other classic-styled Bomberman game. Many of them are better than this, and many of them don't have annoying music and voices and blah graphical design, either. Overall, Bomberman Generations is a disappointing, completely average game that probably isn't really worth playing. Some people seem to like this game, but I don't at all.
Bomberman Jetters - 4 player simultaneous (in battle mode only). Bomberman Jetters is essentially Bomberman Generations 2. Same graphics engine and graphical style, same gameplay, same battle mode, just with some anime cutscenes in the style of the Bomberman Jetters anime, and new levels. So see that review above and read it again, because there's really nothing else to say about this game -- they didn't improve things over the first one, it's just more of the same. In fact, this game might even be WORSE than Generation -- Bomberman moves even slower this time (and he wasn't fast in Generation), load times are worse, and they added a mostly-useless character switching mechanic with Max which is badly handled as Max is mostly useless. Otherwise, it's the same thing again. And yes, the music and sound effects still aren't very good and get annoying. It's worth noting that in Japan this game released late in the same year as Bomberman Generation, which explains a lot -- in the US this released several years later, and it was confusing that it'd changed so little. The short turnaround in its original Japanese release explains that. Unfortunately that means that it's just as uninteresting as Generations is, or worse. Don't bother with this either. Also on PS2.
Burnout - 2 player simultaneous, 480p progressive scan support. The first Burnout game began a great racing game franchise, and it's still a very good game! Criteron's Burnout introduced some new ideas to the racing game genre when it first released, and while it has some issues, this is still a game well worth playing. It is different from its sequels in important ways both good and bad, but some essentials of the later Burnout games began here. Burnout is not a particularly great-looking or sounding game, but the fantastic gameplay holds up even if the graphics and music definitely do not. Burnout's graphics are quite bland and average; they're not bad, but not great either. The music is oddly bland and doesn't fit the game very well, in my opinion; this game doesn't have the expected up-tempo soundtrack, but something quieter and blander than that. The gameplay is the reason to play this game. Burnout is an arcade-style car racing game with very long tracks full of traffic as well as the cars in the race. The cars are all fictional, but are based on real vehicles, and many are identifiable. Central to the game is its then-original boost system. Your boost energy charges when you powerslide, drive in the oncoming traffic lane, or pass a car very closely without actually hitting it. If you do hit a traffic car, however, the game punishes you HARSHLY: you're forced to watch two replays of the crash (which you can save to a memory card!), and then finally you'll be reset on the track. The saveable crash replays are cool, but the long delay of watching them means that every crash sets you back a lot. Later in the series this would be entirely reversed and you get the ability to just smash traffic cars out of the way, but this game is the polar opposite from that. The long races are thus long minefields, full of constant danger as you try to build your boost meter and finish in as high a position as possible while crashing the least you can. Yes, Burnout is a difficult game, it wore on me after a while -- much like Star Wars Episode I Racer on the N64, having to redo nine or ten minute long races because of one or two little mistakes late in the race REALLY gets old. As a result, as much as I liked Burnout, I didn't manage to finish it. There are many races to win in this game, so Burnout will take a good while to beat, if you do manage to finish it. It's well worth playing, at least; Burnout 1 has a style all its own, and its sequels aren't quite the same as the original. As much as the graphics, sound, and action improved in the later Burnout games, the first Burnout still is a really great racing game and certainly one of the best in the series. Also on PS2 and Xbox; the GC version isn't considered to be the best, but it's the only one I have.
Burnout 2: Point of Impact - 2 player simultaneous (Race mode) or 4 player alternating (Crash mode), 480p progressive scan support. Burnout 2, the last Burnout game on the Gamecube, is similar to Burnout 1, but with better graphics, more modes, a removal of the multiple-replays-of-every-crash system, and many more changes. It's a very good game, and is another fantastic game from Criterion in this great series. Burnout 2's races are still very long, but with slightly easier play, more ways to get boost, no repeated crash replays after every crash, and more, it's not quite as hard this time. I'm not sure if I like Burnout 2 more or less than the first game, but most people probably prefer it. Either way, this is the last of the first style of Burnout game; with Burnout 3 the series changed, for a faster, more action-packed style. Those games are great fun as well, but the first two games are more challenging and require more serious focus to beat. For the most part the main game is similar to the first game, though. The tracks are all-new, but they are long again, and while there aren't multiple crash replays this time, you still need to pay attention because crashes will set you back for sure. Other than the main game, the biggest addition in Burnout 2 is Crash mode, a mode entirely dedicated to crashing! This mode would become quite popular, and was expanded on in later titles, but in its first form the way it works is that each player tries to do as much damage as possible based on a single crash into one of several pre-designed intersections. The challenge of trying to set up the perfect point to hit, angle, and speed, and the fun of watching the chaos that results, are quite fun, and I can see why crash mode was so popular. Crash mode is mostly just a multiplayer mode, though; it's not something you do in the main campaign. It'd have been nice to have some Crash stages every once in a while in the main single player game, but ah well. I have a few other minor complaints about Burnout 2. First, I wish that there were more shorter tracks -- three-minutes-per-lap races really are too long. Also, better music would be nice as it's still not improved. Also, it's disappointing that they never attempted a four player splitscreen mode. Better racing games should have that. That's about it, though. With more content, more cars, a great new mode, better graphics, and more, Burnout 2 is a great game that is absolutely still worth playing. I don't know if there's been a racing game quite like the first two Burnout games since. Also on PS2 and Xbox.
Capcom vs. SNK 2 EO - 2 player simultaneous. Capcom vs SNK 2: EO is the only Capcom fighting game on the Gamecube, and one of only two on Nintendo home consoles since the N64, the other one being Tatsunoko vs Capcom on the Wii. Yes, ever since the SNES died Capcom has mostly ignored Nintendo consoles as far as fighting games go. Fortunately, however, we Nintendo fans didn't miss out on this one! CvS2 EO is a great, great game, easily one of Capcom's best fighting games ever. The large number of playable characters includes equal numbers from Capcom and SNK, and quite unlike the Marvel and Tatsunoko vs. games, the Capcom vs. SNK games are traditional fighting games, more in the Street Fighter Alpha vein than anything. This is fantastic, and it's easily one of the best things about the game -- I love traditional fighting games like SF2, SF3, or SNK's games, but don't like the Marvel vs. games at all. In my opinion those games are all kind of awful, and I'm absolutely terrible at them. But this game, this game I love! CvS2: EO for the GC was easily one of my most-played games of the generation. And yes, it's entirely playable with normal Gamecube controllers, that small d-pad is fine once you get used to it.
CvS2's game engine clearly looks like something derived from SFA3, except this game has fully polygonal backdrops behind the mostly SFA-style sprite characters. While not all of the characters are in that style, most are. Capcom also chose a unified look for the special moves in this game; instead of using the animations from the games the characters come from, here all have similar white attack-swing animations. This is particularly noticeable when comparing characters like the Last Blade and Samurai Shodown characters to their original games; the white flashes in CvS2 just don't look quite as nice as SNK's animations in the Neo-Geo games. And because the game mostly uses SFA-style character sprites, many have less animation than characters in SF3, Last Blade 2, or other such games. Looking at Hibiki's sprite sheet she may seem to have as many frames of animation here, but there is much less actually changing between frames, and it doesn't look as good as it does in Last Blade 2. Capcom characters also in SF3 turn out even worse, since these are the Alpha versions. And a few characters, such as Morrigan most obviously, were not redrawn; Morrigan's old Darkstalkers sprite stands out badly here. But despite these issues, overall CvS2 looks pretty good visually. It could be better looking, but this is a good, solid classic 2d fighter. The music is not so fortunate; like most Capcom fighting game soundtracks from the early '00s, CvS2's music is an ear-bleeding assortment of mediocre and awful music. Overall SF3: 3S and MvC2 have even worse soundtracks, but that is not much in the way of praise, not with how bad some of CvS2's songs are! I've always hated the London song so much, for example, that I was always kind of annoyed when I had to fight in that stage because it meant being subjected to that awful song again...
Cel Damage - 4 player simultaneous, 480p progressive scan support. Cel Damage is a cel shaded-style car combat game. You choose a car, play the campaign or do a single battle, choose an arena to fight in, and go blow up some vehicles. I'm not exactly a big fan of this genre, but this one is fun. Perhaps the most unique thing here is that the cars in Cel Damage don't have health bars. Instead, one hit kills in this game. Between that, the high speeds the vehicles move at, and the small-ish arenas, this game is faster and more chaotic than many car combat games, and I like that about it. This keeps the game interesting, though the nice, cartoony, sometimes Looney Tunes-esque graphics help as well. You're constantly picking up weapons, blowing people up, and then getting destroyed. There are a lot of different weapons and abilities here, all comical in some way or another. The characters are all amusing as well, of course. Arenas are small-ish, but just large enough to be interesting. This is a very simple, straightforward game, but it's an entertaining one. The game has a few different game modes, including a mode where you win by getting enough points (that you score with kills), capture the flag (get all 4 flags and get to the goal), and a mode where you go to checkpoints around the level instead of just ...
Another barely thought out opinion... from me! :FuckYou:
Every few years, VR is "coming to revolutionize everything and everyone forever". There's the ol' power glove, the runnin' pad, the dance pads, the guitar thingies, wiggle and waggle via Wii controller, "Kinect" style "track your movement" games, and where are they all now? Well, the Power Glove was actually superior to the Wii in the degrees of movement (even if the tracking system itself was off), but it failed fast. All those one-trick addon controllers seem to have died a fad's death. The Kinect is so hated and reviled that removing it outright has been a boon to XBox One sales. (The PS4 camera seems to have been abandoned as well, now that all the weirdos can't use it to creep out kids any more.)
But what about 3D? Yes, 3D, the tech that just wouldn't give up. From the ol' red and blue glasses to modern 3D that's so revolutionary no one really wants to pay for it any more (and no one really notices the difference anyway), and from Virtual Boy's utter failure to impress, to the 3DS's 3D abilities actually confusing consumers into thinking the product wasn't even an upgrade (to the point they felt it less confusing to release a "2DS"), that doesn't seem to be doing so hot either.
But sure, the Oculus, that'll change everything, right? It's got motion controls AND 3D, all in your chair!
Well, I think that's the problem right there. No matter how much they try to put you "in the game", totally immersed and secluded from the outside world, you're still bound to a chair. Maybe at best, if you're rich and living in a 90's kid's movie about being rich, you get a harness or one of those giant human gyro thingies. You never really do get complete immersion, as your fat body sack still has to sit still and can't really move around on it's own, no matter how many neat gloves you have on, because in the real world you'll either run into a wall, or a busy intersection (there's really only two options in this scenario, maybe if you've got the battery life you might wander into a waiting tiger's jaws).
We all want to be "in" our games, but the weak link is that we aren't! I see people wearing an Oculus, turning their heads around to see, but still forced to use a controller or keyboard to actually move anywhere, like an ANIMAL! So great, my head can be used to rotate my camera, and it feels seamless. Nice job, but unless I am directly moving around, what's the point? It'll be a fun diversion for a few months to a few years, and then everyone sticks it on a shelf and goes back to the same ol' steadily sharper 2D screens they've been using.
The solution? Oh, nothing much, just DIGITIZE OUR BRAINS. That's basically all that's going to work. Of course, anything invasive enough to fully scan our current brain state is likely going to destroy it. I don't consider that a problem myself if it works, but we're so very, very far from anything close to being able to do that. In the future, this post might be read by ever-cluster #J21aSßé, analyzed for all historical context, and meta-laughed at for shortsightedness. Unfortunately, realistically, I won't live long enough to see that day. I have no problem saying this, because in the event I'm wrong, I'm PART of ever-cluster #J21aSßé and don't think a little thing like personal embarrassment's going to bother me at that point.
Yes, it's being called New Nintendo 3DS. Going for that Apple-style "New iPad" naming style that's trendy today, I see. Sort of like the GBC or DSi, this is a new system which is a relatively minor upgrade from the last one; the same basic system but with a faster CPU (this we know), probably twice the RAM, etc. It'll still play DS, DSi, and 3DS games. The system now uses Micro SD cards for storage, instead of reqular SD cards. There isn't a slot for this -- instead you have to take off the rear faceplate or something to get to the port, I think. That's also where the battery would be. The system will have interchangeable front and back faceplates, which is a nice touch. There will be two models, New 3DS and New 3DS XL. They get better battery life than the original 3DS models, which is nice.
As for the design, it looks like a DS-line system, for sure! Nothing too original here. Basically it's like they squeezed a Circle Pad Pro onto a 3DS/3DS XL. There' s a little analog nub on the right side now, called C (as with the GC's C-stick...). Also there are two shoulder buttons on each side of the system now, because the CPP had that, so there's L, R, ZL, and ZR. Oh, and on the Japanese model, the ABXY buttons are now colored red, blue, yellow, and green, in the same layout as on the Japanese/European SNES. They haven't officially announced this yet outside of Japan, so I don't know if they'll stick with those colors here for the buttons or not. Otherwise it's a DS/3DS. It launches in Japan in October. Western release dates yet to be announced. Price... likely to be similar to current 3DS prices. Shouldn't be higher.
It is also interesting that they did not announce a New 2DS to go with this. So they're going to stick with 3d and the DS form factor after all! That's nice, I was hoping it'd be another of the folding-style systems.
So, what do I think? Well, the 3DS will only be just barely over 3 1/2 years old when this launches, so it's pretty early to have a new system, but Nintendo has done this consistently with handhelds ever since the GBA, so it's not surprising. I mean, the GBA released 3 1/2 years after the DS; the DSi released 4 years after the DS; the 3DS released 2 years 3 months (in Japan; in the West, a bit under 2 years) 2 years in the US); and now the New 3DS is releasing 3 years 7 months after the 3DS's Japanese launch. They haven't had a full 5-plus-year lifecycle before releasing the new hardware since the Game Boy's nine-year life. Of course, Nintendo has sometimes supported those systems well after their successors released -- the GBA and DS certainly have gotten that -- but the GBC and DSi didn't as much, and neither had even three full years of first-party support. The DSiWare shop (and its presence on 3DSes) kept the DSi going a bit longer, but still... well, we'll see what happens with the 3DS. Will Nintendo ditch it soon and move over to New 3DS games by next year, or will we see games that support but don't require it, or will they mostly continue to make regular 3DS games and the ones for the new system will be fewer, as happened with the DS/DSi? We'll see.
Anyway though, it's a short-ish turnaround, but at least it's not GBC-GBA or DSi-3DS short! And yeah, I'll almost certainly get one of these. I don't have a DSi or 3DS, of course, and I've been meaning to get a 3DS... but with this announcement, I'll wait for one of these. Hopefully it releases in the US this year. :)
"The Untold History of Japanese Video Game Developers", by John Szczepaniak
This book was kickstarted last year, and the final book -- or rather, the first volume of it -- finally released recently to backers. The book will be available soon on Amazon, but right now it's backers only. I backed the kickstarter, and got my copy (Gold edition cover) a couple of days ago. The book is a collection of interviews with Japanese game developers; the author used the kickstarter money to go to Japan and interview as many people as he could. He had issues, and him and his initial interpreters have been having something of a war for several months now. I won't get into all of it, but if what he says is true they're awful, but he probably did not help the situation by so publicly criticizing them so harshly. Also, the project was originally supposed to be one book, but this volume is over 500 pages and it's only something like a third of the material. I just hope that future volumes cost a lot less than this one did... they should, with how the interviews are done already. I have not read the whole book yet, but I have read parts of all of the interviews, and have a reasonably good sense of the volume. I won't go in to detail about most of the interviews, though; that is best saved for the reader! Because this book really is a must-read for anyone interested in Japanese videogame history.
Fortunately, despite the problems between Szczepaniak and the interpreters, the book released, or this volume did at least, and it's pretty good! He mostly did a good job with the interviews. It's quite interesting, and I definitely will want to read the other volumes too. Some of the interviews are about games or things I know about and others aren't, but that is obviously the intent, to try to cover anything he can, and not only the popular stuff. That's great. Of course, I'm sure that people from today-popular companies would be less likely to be able to talk to the press like these people do... there are no Nintendo people here, and this does not surprise me -- Nintendo is, of course, infamously reticent about talking to the press, unfortunately. But he talked to everyone he could, and apart from some <REDACTED> segments (some of which could be quite interesting, such as the one about Vic Ireland... ah well), it's all here in the book.
So who is here? The main focus is on older developers who worked on games in the '80s and '90s, not more recent projects. This makes sense; the point is recording earlier Japanese gaming history, while the people who made that history are still here. It's a valuable and important effort! As some people in the book make clear, many of the Japanese themselves don't seem to consider recording this kind of thing to be as important as some Westerners do. There are some cultural reasons behind this, explained in the book, but also videogames are a recent medium, and many do not appreciate their importance. Many of the people interviewed also often don't appreciate that Westerners might be fans of them or their games; many of these developers know little of Western fans, even for popular series like Lunar. There are exceptions of course, like Megaman series creator Keiji Inafune who is a noted critic of Japanese game-industry insularity, but most of the rest of these guys are not like that. And it is all guys, unsurprisingly.
Most interviews are with Japanese developers, but one chapter is with a French guy who lives in Japan and runs a game preservation group, which is trying to make accurate backup copies of all old Japanese computer games. It's a challenging task -- making archival backups of floppy disks is no easy matter, and floppies do NOT last well at all over time, they're already breaking down. Also, huge numbers of games are created for computers, and it is not all well documented like it is for consoles. For console games it is easy to get a list of, or a physical collection of, a complete library, but computer games are an entirely different story. It's probably even worse in Japan than in the West, since computers never were as popular as they became here in the West. This means even fewer copies of the games, and trying to preserve all Western computer games before those stupid floppy disks all break down is an impossible enough task! But this guy is trying to do it, and that is very cool, and important. As he says, someone has to record those games while we can. As I said earlier, some of the interviews are with well-known people, like Inafune or ZUN (of Touhou fame), while others are with little-known artists or programmers who worked for various studios large and small. It's a mix, and that is great because this book is a real cross-section of the whole industry, not just of the popular console games. This is a much more interesting book than it would be if it was only bigger names.
I should discuss some of the core interviews, but that would be hard without writing far too much. Every interview has something interesting in it. I will say a bit about some of them now, though; I need to, that is the subject of the book! Jun Nagashima of Falcom discusses Popful Mail. He didn't know whether there had been a Western release, typically, and the conversation about development is interesting. Kouji Yokota of Shade (and previously Quintet) discusses The Granstream Saga,, as well as earlier titles. Good game. You'd think he'd know that the Quintet games have a popular following outside of Japan, but not really, apparently. His details about Lunar 2, and the characters he worked on who were changed for the worse in the PS1/Saturn remake, was also interesting; I love that game, of course. Katsutoshi Eguchi of WARP discusses Kenji Eno and his unique works. Yoshiko Kimura talks about UFO, Rule of Rose, Chulip, and L.O.L., all very unique games. The Rule of Rose development details are great. For the long conversations with Yasuhito Saito, Takaki Kobayashi, and Keite Abe of dB-Soft, they are interesting because they are mostly about old Japanese computer games, a subject about which I know little. are all interesting. So are the rest of them, though! Another great section are the interviews with Masakuni Mitsuhachi (developer) and Kohei Ikeda (co-founder) of Game Arts. Among other things, they discuss the classics Silpheed and Thexder. One of the developers of the original Silpheed actually came to the US to help Sierra work on their PC/Apple IIGS ports; quite rare, back then! As for Sega CD Silpheed, he describes how, indeed, the game is part-streamed video, and part-realtime polygons. Backrounds are mostly streamed, apart from destructible parts. There are also interviews with several more preservationists, including one man who has a huge collection of magazines and guidebooks for (Japanese) games.
There is one more interview I would like to talk about. It's not of a Japanese developer, but the short interview with Steven and William Rozner, makers of the PC Mega Man games, was quite cool. Szczpaniak says that the Inafune interview inspired him to look the DOS game programmers up, and they were willing to talk, something that previously was not the case! I got MM3 and MMX for the PC back in the early and mid '90s, and have always wondered what the story was behind them, MM3 particularly. This interview had more of it than I'd heard before. The detail about that MM3 was originally a different game with an early '90s eco theme made a lot of sense! I wish that he had asked some questions about the MMX and SSFII ports, but John only asks questions about MM1 and MM3. Fortunately the Rozners also talk about those later (1995) DOS ports, as well as the earlier original titles, but there were more questions about the PC ports of Mega Man X and Super SFII that should have been asked. Why the robot ride armor wasn't in PC MMX isn't mentioned, for instance. Ah well. Anyway, it's a very good book, get it!
The only real complaint I have about the book is that is that there are some spelling mistakes here and there; the book needed a bit more copy-editing. Perhaps the most unfortunate was misspelling Kenji Eno's job title on the "noteworthy Japanese developers who have died" page, but there are more. Oh, and why isn't John Szczepaniak's first name on the cover and spine, only his last name? It's kind of odd! It should say "Volume I" on the outside of the book as well, but it doesn't, unfortunately. Otherwise, though, it's good work. It was worth backing the book, regardless of the drama. Buy this book, and read it! It's very interesting.
Extreme Go-Kart Racing is a kart-racer themed, but drift-racer playing, super low-budget racing game released late in the PS1's life. The game is a budget game released for cheap, and you can very much tell. I got this game fairly recently, and beat the game quickly; somehow the challenge made me want to get through the game. The game is bad, and super low budget, but it is a little interesting. Yes, despite the title, this is a drift-focused racing game; it's not really a Mario Kart clone. The Japanese title has "Drift" in the name, which is a more accurate name than the US title. This game has no weapons, either. It is about perfecting perfectly timed, Ridge Racer-esque auto-drifts. It works just like in some of the Ridge Racer games: to drift, let go of accelerate, hit drift, then hit accelerate again when you're pointing in the direction you want to go. Also, the game has absolutely no analog support, insanely. The Dual Shock controller appears in the control settings menu, but the analog sticks do nothing, in the US release of the game at least; this game is d-pad only, shamefully for a game released in 2000 in Japan and 2003 in the US. That is, unless the Japanese version had analog and they pointlessly cut it out of the US version; the Japanese case back does have teh analog controller logo. I don't know if that version actually has analog or not, though, but I will try to find out. Anyway, this game does not look as late a PS1 game as it is! These graphics would have looked old years before this games' release, even for the PS1. There are seven tracks in the game, and no difficulty settings; seven races and it's over. That doesn't mean winning will be easy, though. This is a hard game, for both good and bad reasons, and beating the game will require a lot of practice in a game of quite questionable quality. Is it worth it? I'm sure many people would say no, but I had enough fun to stick with it, I guess.
Mode options are only the basics: two player splitscreen, single race, championship mode, or options (control settings and audio levels). You can also save here, but NOT during a championship; that you have to complete without turning the system off, annoyingly. You have infinite continues, but can't save your current circuit. Unfortunate. It does unlock tracks as a starting point as you reach them, but doesn't save your current game. Once you start a race, you'll notice how long the load times are in this game. As fitting with the general dated nature of the game, the loading times in the game are far longer than they should be, and are definitely irritating. Before each race there's an untranslated line in spoken Japanese about the upcoming track. Lazy localization work there. In championships, you progress to the next race by finishing at least third in each race, and though there are only seven racers in each race, this is a challenge. Championship mode doesn't really have an ending at the end, just credits with a generic (same for all characters) CG background. Disappointing! I was hoping for more. At least completing tracks does unlock them, so in the future you can start a circuit from any of the tracks. Still, with a game as frustrating as this one, I was hoping for better when I finally managed to beat it,and yes, finishing it was an effort. I'm not sure if it was worth it or not, but I completed it anyway, once at least; I'm not sure if I will again. Anyway, once choosing a mode, you then choose a racer. You start out with seven options, all stereotypical anime-kart-racing characters. There are four more unlockable ones, though I have no idea how to do that. The character stats do matter -- larger racers really do control differently from smaller ones, for example. So that's good, at least.
Again like Ridge Racer, this is a catchup-centric racing game, not one where all the racers start at the starting line together. You start at the start line with two other racers right in front of you, but the other four opponents start far ahead, just like in classic Ridge Racer games. This way there are fewer sprites to render at once! Catching up to the leading four requires good play and practice. You can get a fast start with proper timing of the accelerator button. Hold the accelerator from the moment the game finally finishes loading, let go just as "1" appears on the screen, and then hit the accelerator again when the race starts. This should start you at top speed right out of the gate, an extremely useful advantage. Learn the timing for this. I often would just restart a race if I messed it up and spun out instead of got the turbo, because that delay would be hard to make up for. One of your two rivals at the line quickly falls behind in last, but the other one tracks you and is your toughest opponent. In each game you'll have one other racer as your rival throughout the circuit, but who it is is different each time. This racer is also the one who appears before races, giving you some little hints. The text is always the same, though; only the racer pictured changes. I never finished in the top three in a race on my first try, it always required spending time memorizing the track, because you need to learn the turns -- which should you drift on? Drifting is faster than slowing down, of course, but mess up and you might need to restart the race; you cannot make many mistakes and do well. I finished the game, but I don't know if I ever even SAW the person in first place; I mostly moved on with third-place finishes, and a few in second. Winning would require even more practice, and this game is not anywhere near fun enough to be worth it.
During the race, your primary task is to memorize the course. Most of the seven tracks are too narrow, and so not hitting the walls is frustratingly difficult. As I will describe, walls are a major threat in this game. Sort of like Mario Kart on the SNES, tracks are entirely flat; this game does not have any hills on the courses. It's quite dated in that respect. Each track has a different setting, at least, mostly in kart racer-style environments. My favorite was the last track, which was inspired by Rainbow Road, of course; the gameplay may not be Mario Kart at all, but the graphical design very much is. The last track is fun because it's wider than the others. It has no walls, but the wider size makes it more manageable. Tracks are littered with Turbo powerups, each of which gives you a different amount of turbo. Once you build up enough, you can use a turbo. You can't store more than one at a time, but once used turbos last a reasonably long time and significantly increase your speed. Drifting and turbos are the keys here, but both must be PERFECTLY timed, because one of the games' most frusrating design choices: if you ever touch a wall, you spin out and lose almost all of your speed. Touch one wall and you lose a LOT of time, and likely a position or two as well. So, turbos can only be used in very specific locations! This is really a key point: you need to learn where you can use turbos. Some tracks mark spots where you should use turbo with signs that say "Turbo" on them, but also try to find other spots you can use turbos. Some tracks have them. The hardest thing in this game would be trying to make corners while at turbo speeds. So far at least, I've found that near-impossible; you can barely turn normally while in turbo, and while you can drift, you'll need to start the drift even earlier in order to make it at high speeds. And of course, if you mistime it, you'll hit the wall and waste the whole effort.
On the whole, Extreme Go-Kart Racing is a pretty awful game. The description above may not sound too bad, but the controls are not very good. Car control is touchy, and getting used to the controls takes time and doesn't work as well as it should. Drifting is also frustrating because of how narrow most of the tracks are; it's far, far too easy to hit the sides over and over. Also, of course, I haven't mentioned the graphics much yet, and that's because they are bad. This game has some of the worst polygon-seam-popping issues you'll find! Sure, all PS1 games have polygon issues, because the hardware does not have perspective correction, but better games try to cover over the problem. This game, however, doesn't do a thing, and so visible broken polygon seams can, and often do, appear between every single polygon in this game. The polygon count is low, too, and characters are sprites, not polygons. Environments don't have much to them. The game doesn't have popup, as you can see to the horizon, but with environments this low on detail, that isn't saying very much. The PS1 can do far better than this. When combined with the frustrating controls and lacking featureset, this game is not very good at all. With practice you can get better at the game, but the question is, is it worth it? No, it probably isn't. On the other hand though, the music is nice. Music does play during races, and it's reasonably catchy stuff. I didn't remember any of it afterwards, but none of it was bad either. Decent work.
So, overall, this is a pretty awful game, and I wouldn't recommend playing it, but it was just playable enough that I stuck with it to the end despite how poor and frustrating a game it is. Extreme Go-Kart Racing is a budget game, clearly made on a miniscule budget. This game appears to be a cute kart racing game at first glance, but it's really more like Ridge Racer crossed with Power Drift, or something like that. Unfortunately, being different doesn't mean that it's any good, of course. With only seven short tracks, few options, long load times, no analog controls (in the US version anyway) in a game that needs them, frustrating crashes whenever you touch almost anything, and not-so-good gameplay, this game won't last long. On the positive side the music is okay, graphics are decent (for something from years before its release), character designs are solidly drawn and amusing, you do eventually start to get used to the poor controls with practice, and the game is playable and definitely requires some skill to master. Just finishing a circuit with all third-place finishes won't get you everything in the game, either; and even though I finished the circuit and saw the credits, it didn't unlock any of the four unlockable characters. My only guess is that you have to get first (or maybe second) place finishes in most or all races? I don't know; the manual doesn't explain it, and despite searching I don't see anything about it online. But still, even if I almost never finished above third, I did complete the championship and see the credits, so that counts as a win! This game was hard; each track took a lot of practice. You basically have to be near-perfect in order to actually finish in the top three, and I almost never managed to even SEE the person in first. Perfect those perfectly-executed drifts! Or don't bother, and pass on this subpar budget game. That would probably be the better approach. This game had potential, but it was not realized. 6.8/10 (D+).
Here is a video of the game. It's running in an emulator, so the graphics are better than on a real system, but it's the only video of the game I can find. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=clR2aGwjm2M
By now I'm sure everyone knows what this is all about, but just in case...
This is a very interesting "demo" for the PS4. Don't have one? Maybe get one, because this thing is pretty good. It's survival horror in the style of something like Amnesia. You walk down a hall, enter a basement door, and end up at the start of the same hall, only things have changed... and again and again and again this happens.
Well, again this isn't too much of a spoiler at this point: It's Silent Hill. It seems that Konami has become rather frustrated with the tepid responses to their most recent offerings, all provided by outside studios, and have gone ahead and taken the series back. Sort of...
See, Team Silent has dissolved, but some of those original team members are in Kojima Productions now, and that's who's making it. That's right, Kojima's in charge of this. It's hard to say what to think about that, considering his history. What I can say is the Pan's Labyrinth guy is ALSO on this project (that guy's also doing an American version of some Japanese show called "Monster" about a serial killer who manipulates people's emotions, so there's that). THAT gives me some hope, because that guy can be downright terrifying.
Also, for some reason they're making a big deal about an actor from The Walking Dead being in the game. Okay then...
Anyway, this demo is very claustrophobic, taking place in ONE section of hallway the whole time, and it ramps up the tension slowly but unhaultingly. I'd say they know what they are doing. The music is well done, with the unnatural breaks one expects in the series. The puzzles are also very creative (the last one is far too obtuse, but on purpose as it was meant as a "the whole internet works together" sort of social thing). There appears to be zero actual combat in the game. Frankly, this might be a welcome change. Combat in Silent Hill has always been pretty terrible, and taking out combat entirely (leaving monsters and danger in, but taking out physical means of self defense) is probably the shot in the arm the series needed. Yes though, this demo has a jump scare or two (avoidable in all cases), but I'd say they earned it because they ramp up the tension and there's plenty of clues to make you fully aware of just how bad things are going to get pretty soon. Plus, there's no real consequences to dying, as you just reenter where you left off. Still, you don't want to by virtue of not wanting to die of a heart attack. It's tense, and my friends and I tried everything we could (playing together, joking constantly) and it was STILL freaky deaky.
Some of the symbolism is a bit "on the nose" perhaps, but there's a LOT to read into this character's MAJOR issues from this thing, so it's a return to symbolism as character development instead of the more recent game's "symbolism of the stuff we learned in psych 101" nonsense.
Frankly, this demo gives me hope by way of despair. I recommend giving it a play. Heck, it's so good on it's own that, as it has no relation to the final product except in terms of teasing the SORT of game it'll be, I think I'll keep this game around.
Yeah, Activision has decided to resurrect Sierra as a new label for games which will mostly be digitally-distributed only. They announced the details at Gamescom this week, and the first announced games are Geometry Wars 3, being made by Lucid Games since Bizarre Creations is dead, and a new King's Quest game from The Odd Gentlemen. I haven't heard of that team before, but apparently they've done some adventure games, so we'll see. As for Geometry Wars 3, it's not a Sierra property, but it is an outstanding one! It's great to see it return, I just hope it's good... I really liked the first Geometry Wars a lot.
I know this isn't the real Sierra, that died when the Williamses retired young, but still, it's cool to see some kind of Sierra back. I wonder how long it lasts this time?
Oh... and this Sierra is called Sierra Games, not Sierra On-Line. So the name is slightly different. I love that Sierra logo animation on the site, though! Very nice.
Have you noticed that most of the best series on TV are all about, like they CENTER around, complete and utter despair and disappointment? It seems like the modern theme of TV is "Nothing in life ever goes the way you plan. You will DIE and every dream you ever had will dissolve in the wind! No one you ever loved actually truly understands you, and once they die you won't even be a footnote in history!"
Basically, it's all gone French... or Russian... yeah probably something between those.
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