It was a bad year for....

....the Gamecube

Despite a recent rally in sales, Nintendo's troubled console lags in the Number 3 spot behind Xbox and is seeing less and less support from third party publishers


This came out of the March 2004 EGM

What's reality is, and GC is in 3rd!

Just hope the new system offers hope! Three strikes and your out I suppose, right Sega?

This thread will be lucky if it reaches the second page.

reality sucks! Also I don't think this is console bashing- aLot of the usual adjective are missing.

Just laying out facts from EGM.

bah, who cares?
Since when is # of 3rd party publishers a measure of how well a system is doing? Dreamcast had more 3rd pary publishers than Xbox does now. I'm getting sick of the console race. I like nintendo and they will always be in first when it comes to fun games.

The questions is: who here has fun playing their 3rd place cube?

3rd party publishers = $$$

I now own all 3 systems and the Cube gets the most love. 2004 looks to be no different.

Fixed.

This can't be right. How many third parties were there for Dreamcast that aren't there for Xbox? More than a handful?

And even if there are, the presence of EA more than makes up for it, in most people's eyes.

As for when this has been a measure, the answer is "It's always been". From Atari 2600 vs Odyssey2 vs Intellivision through today (with the wacky exception of N64... the only time a competitor has used a different medium), there's still no better way to tell.

It was a great year for Game Cube in my book:
Zelda Wind Waker
Mario Kart Double Dash
Mario Golf
Mario Party 5

Who needs 3rd Party when you have Nintendo first party

I also own all three, but Nintendo has moments of usage (Metroid, and Zelda) but for the most part it's a dormant ornament on my A/V rack.

I've always felt that the 3rd party games were buffers between 1st party games.

you must have not understood. That $$$ means royalties for Nintendo. Nintendo is NOT in business to make video games, it's in business to make MONEY!

Oh yea

Gamecube game of the year is Legend of Zelda: Wind Waker

I plan on getting a GC once Unity comes out.

I don't own a XBox, yet, but I'm in the same situation. My GC hasn't gotten a whole lot of love from me lately. But then again I just finished FFX and that damned_NCAA Football 2004 made it's way back into my PS2.

Wasn't the N64 able to survive with basically no 3rd party support? Name a great game for the N64, and it came from Nintendo (or Rare, which was second-party at the time) They've been in this situation before, and have managed to succeed.

I was under the impression that Nintendo had just about caught up with XBOX maybe even caught it. Anyone know the current numbers? It seems to me no matter what it is always reported that Nintendo "lags" behind the XBOX, implying they are way, way behind. I think the perception is much worse than reality for the most part.

Third party support is another story. Despite the fact that some of the third parties that left really don't make that good of games, (Acclaim) the loss of developer support can never be a good thing. This is probably the thing that will hurt them the most in the end, especially as some games start coming out that would have been multiplatform, now just show up on PS2 and the XBOX. I think the tough part for Nintendo is that most people don't support third party games as much on the cube, many just buy it for the first party games. I know I have mostly first and second party games as of right now.

Anyways, I still enjoy my cube and I am looking forward to more great games and sequels on it.

Yep, I guess only Xbox will get the next crappy Turok game. Way to go MS!

Gamecube owned the holiday season November through December coupled with Mario Kart, recently going over 1.3 million strong. They recently made the announcement (last week after EGM had gone into publication) that they are in the number 2 spot ahead of X-Box. They don't seem to be slowing down either with Final Fantasy and Metal Gear Solid on the horizon.

What reality is, 2nd and 3rd are so close together its just pointless to decide on a clear winner. Unless your name is Sony.

That will not be so in a few months. Once a little game called Halo 2 is released (if it ever does )


Anyway, I'm looking over my GC collection and 90% percent is 1st party games....that's why I purchased a GC. But to have a GC alone is pointless. You'll be playing games every 3 months.

Don't forget those other little games for GC called Metroid Prime 2 and Zelda Wind Waker 2 which are also coming soon!

WWF No Mercy

Halo 2 isn't the only console seller game coming out for XBOX 2004.

The sky has been falling for the Cube since it was released. However, its still going strong. I sold both my Xbox and PS2 and don't regret it for a moment. As far as third party support, most of the games I wanted to play like Madden, Tony Hawk, Need For Speed, and Tiger Woods were on the Cube. Yeah, I have to miss out on a game or two thats only on the PS2, but I hardly have time to play all the Cube stuff anyway.

The best exclusives of any console make having a third place Cube pretty easy to deal with. Can't wait for Crystal Chronicles.

Nintendo had a pretty good year in regards to 1st party titles, but multi-console releases?

But it is an underpowered machine.

If a title is released on all three, I don't even consider the GC version. That has got to hurt Nintendo if I'm not the only one.

I think Nintendo thought they could undercut the other two by being so much cheaper but in the end, "Its the games, stupid".

I thought the machine was outdated the minute it hit shelves. I never thought that with the PS2 or Xbox.

Nintendo has one more chance to get it right in re: hardware, but they may have already lost me.

Zelda and Metroid were good but I expected much more from the Mario games (Super and Kart).
It looks like to me the GC was just an excuse for them to push their hundreds of cheap to make Mario Party games.

You do realize that the Cube is far more powerful than the PS2, right?

Since when does 3rd place mean that there is no profit? Number of console units sold is only one part of the equation. If Nintendo is making an overall profit from GC, then why would they stop just because "they're in third place?"

This "Nintendo is going under" crap is really a tired subject. I'm not a Nintendo fanboy, but all of the Nintendo haters are making me more of one every day.