It looked like a ton of work
Have you ever seen the “GameCube portable?” Well it was fake. Until now, I guess!
Born of out legend like all of those orb-based fake mockups, this is just one of a long line of made-up machines (it’s still happening, as recently as the PS5 and Switch). As far as the GameCube portable is concerned, it’s a reality now. Modder GingerOfOz took up the gargantuan task of creating the “fake GameCube portable,” which supposedly took discs and used a clamshell design similar to a Game Boy Advance SP. As far as the working system itself goes, it actually runs on a Wii, which “plays the entire GameCube library flawlessly thanks to the power of backward compatibility.” The only real negative is that it gets “super greasy,” according to the creator, and has about “an hour of battery life.”
GingerOfOz also gives us the added bonus of telling the story of the original fake portable image by tracking down the creator. Apparently it was a flight of fancy from someone studying digital art at university, and they wanted to practice 3D rendering: a skill they ended up taking to the gaming industry at several studios. You can find that discovery here, which GingerOfOz was able to track down via asking for help on Twitter.
You may recall several other “GameCube portable” projects of varying form factor. And it’s very easy to understand why the GameCube was chosen for so many modding projects: it’s an endearing system with a number of exclusive hits, but it also allowed people to rally around it given its small sales figures. The same goes for the Wii U and the Vita.
