I’m too edgy for the purple one
The Gamecube occupies a nice little corner of my personal history when hormones were sabotaging any chance I had for a normal adulthood. As such, I view it with quite a lot of fondness. It didn’t have the massive library of the PS2, nor the substantial beef of the Xbox, but it did have one thing that gave it an edge over its competitors: a handle.
Below are five games that I picked out of its library to represent its best. You don’t have to agree, but if you come in here making claims that Pikmin 2 was the best game in its library, you’re wrong and should leave.
F-zero GX
There were quite a few games that I was super into when I was a teenager, but I think F-Zero GX might be the big winner. It was just really slick and had a lot to do. Just when you think you hit the bottom, you find out you can unlock the tracks and cars from its arcade counterpart: F-Zero AX. It felt a bit tighter than the N64’s F-Zero X and was magnitudes better looking. The fact that Nintendo hasn’t commissioned a sequel to the Gamecube title or even re-released F-Zero GX is all the evidence I need to be certain that they hate me, specifically, and want me to suffer.
It’s just too bad it didn’t have an X Cup. A bunch of horrible, randomly generated tracks would just be the cherry on top.
Chibi-Robo
Released at the end of the Gamecube’s lifespan, Chibi-Robo is unequivocally the best thing that ever happened to video games. I hope that by making hyperbole such as that, I will convince more people to play it.
The Legend of Zelda Collector’s Edition
The Legend of Zelda: Wind Waker is among my favorite titles in the series, and each time I replay it, I’m reminded of all the little things I love about it. However, it’s not my absolute favorite. The Legend of Zelda: Majora’s Mask is not only the best in the series, but it’s also one of my top game picks. You can play it on your Gamecube with The Legend of Zelda Collector’s Edition.
It was apparently not the greatest port and had a bunch of sound, graphical, and crashing issues, but even an inferior version of Majora’s Mask is worthwhile. Unless it’s The Legend of Zelda: Majora’s Mask 3D. I just couldn’t deal with the changes that were made.
NHL Hitz 20-03
As a Canadian, I’m perhaps a little more on the mild side of liking hockey. I don’t have a jersey. I don’t own a pair of skates. It’s okay, though. It’s not a dumb sport like, say, football. That’s fun to say, because I offend both people who enjoy American football and real football.
The NHL Hitz series is of the same Midway bloodline as NBA Jam and NFL Blitz. NHL Hitz 20-03 was the best one, with respect to Next Level Games’ NHL Hitz Pro. It was simply the series at its most ridiculous. You could set up a franchise, and there was essentially no limits to how bizarre your team was. Should everyone be dinosaurs? Yes. Perhaps snowmen instead? Also yes.
The biggest downside was that there was no cheat code to just unlock everything, so you actually had to play modes that you might not care enough to get into the real meaty strangeness.
Eternal Darkness
For a really long time, I used to say Eternal Darkness: Sanity’s Requiem was my favorite game ever. Then I didn’t play it for years. And when I picked it up again, it didn’t feel the same. Still, I don’t want to say that adolescent me was wrong, so I’m going to meet her halfway.
