Let’s Play
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Let’s Play Every GameCube Game: The Finale
X-Men Legends (Raven Software/Activision, 2004) A multiplayer co-op brawler that would go on to be the basis for the better-known Marvel Ultimate Alliance. This original version’s graphics have not held up well at all. They went for a sort of half cel-shaded look that doesn’t hide the low-res environmental textures or iffy geometry on the…
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Let’s Play Every GameCube Game, Part 42
The penultimate post. Warrior Blade: Rastan vs. Barbarian (Saffire/Taito, 2003) A 3D arena fighter with destructible environments and transitions between different areas of the stage when fighters get knocked off of platforms. It was a Japanese exclusive on GCN and a PAL exclusive on Xbox, but the PS2 version came out everywhere to mixed reviews.…
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Let’s Play Every GameCube Game, Part 41
Ultimate Muscle: Legends vs. New Generation (AKI Corporation/Bandai, 2003) A wrestling game based on a manga I’ve never heard of. Several of the characters feature horrifyingly giant lips, but that’s a fault of the original artist rather than the game. Instead, the game’s main problem is that everyone has such ridiculous amounts of health. Attacks…
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Let’s Play Every GameCube Game, Part 40
Tony Hawk’s Underground 2 (Neversoft/Activision, 2004) Alphabetically last of the GCN Tony Hawk games. I still don’t have much I can say about it, but the environments look quite nice in this version. I also appreciate that you can get tomatoes and earn points for beaning random NPCs with them. No idea what that has…
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Let’s Play Every GameCube Game, Part 39
Tom and Jerry in War of the Whiskers (VIS Entertainment/NewKidCo, 2003) Further proof that no self-respecting media franchise could survive the period between 2001 and 2006 without a 3D arena fighter. This one defaults every player to Tom but does not bother to provide more than two colors or more than one intro animation per…
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Let’s Play Every GameCube Game, Part 38
Teen Titans (Artificial Mind and Movement/THQ, 2006) A co-op brawler in the story mode and a 3D arena fighter in multiplayer. I only tried the latter, and it’s a disaster. Starfire here can shoot green circles so quickly and with so much knockback that the other characters don’t seem to be able to do anything…
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Let’s Play Every GameCube Game, Part 37
Super Monkey Ball (Amusement Vision/Sega, 2001) SMB’s main mode is about navigating a monkey in a ball through what is essentially a ridiculous version of the classic wooden labyrinth puzzles. If you fall off the course before reaching the goal, you have to start over. For me, though, the real fun is in the party/mini…
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Let’s Play Every GameCube Game, Part 36
Star Fox Adventures (Rare/Nintendo, 2002) The messy development history of this game is far too much to get into here, but suffice to say that it wasn’t originally a Star Fox game and that Rare split from Nintendo soon after release. Primed for controversy, then. Even without all that, though, it doesn’t seem very good.…
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Let’s Play Every GameCube Game, Part 35
Sphinx and the Cursed Mummy (Eurocom/THQ, 2003) A platforming game starring knockoff Zidane Tribal and set in Egypt as described by the 5th person down the chain in a game of telephone. Surely it wouldn’t have been that hard for the devs to do 10 minutes of research and find a city name that actually…
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Let’s Play Every GameCube Game, Part 34
Skies of Arcadia Legends (Overworks/Sega, 2002) A reworked and updated port of the Dreamcasts’ Skies of Arcadia. I featured it on my top 100 at #55, so you can read about the gameplay there. Legends specifically added a few new quests, integrated the DLC, and improved performance. It also reduced random encounters, which is almost…