The GC and Wii have a supprising amount of overlooked and underrated gems

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themistermanguy

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I noticed how many overlooked gems and criminaly underrated games the Gamecube and Wii have. The Batalion Wars series, Viewtiful Joe, Red Steel 2, Murumassa, Kirby Air Ride (The most underrated Nintendo game IMO), Billy Hatcher, Sin & Punishment, deBlob, DK Jungle Beat. All games that either weren't as popular as they could've been, or were incredibly underrated. I'm pretty sure there are more examples, but those are the ones of the top of my head. Despite how much hate the two systems recived, I feel the Gamecube and Wii are great systems if your into niche, quirky and underrated gems.
 

Benpasko

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Lost Kingdoms 1 & 2 are a couple of great action-rpgs by FromSoft for the gamecube, they kick ass. It's like, my ultimate dream series to see revived, and the deck system could be handled entirely by the wiiu gamepad. FromSoft, plz. Also Cubivore is amazing, but I feel like anyone with a gamecube already knows that one.
 

Shoggoth2588

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I think a lot of people overlooked Star Fox Assault. I haven't played the other Star Fox game on the Gamecube but wasn't that one poorly received to the point that it hurt the Star Fox name? Wario World is another great Gamecube title that I'm surprised hasn't seen any new installments...or wait...wasn't there a Wario Adventure on the Wii? Either way, Wario World was a bit lazy with enemy types but the game itself was pretty fun. On the Wii side of things I was really charmed by Zack & Wiki make a Porno by Capcom. I didn't play too much of it though...still have it so I'll probably be getting back into it.
 

Twinrehz

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Shoggoth2588 said:
I think a lot of people overlooked Star Fox Assault. I haven't played the other Star Fox game on the Gamecube but wasn't that one poorly received to the point that it hurt the Star Fox name? Wario World is another great Gamecube title that I'm surprised hasn't seen any new installments...or wait...wasn't there a Wario Adventure on the Wii? Either way, Wario World was a bit lazy with enemy types but the game itself was pretty fun. On the Wii side of things I was really charmed by Zack & Wiki make a Porno by Capcom. I didn't play too much of it though...still have it so I'll probably be getting back into it.
The other Star Fox-game was Star Fox Adventures, developed by Rareware. It was originally meant to be an N64 title, and completely unrelated to the Star Fox series. But Rare is Rare and Rare makes delays. Since it was released in 2002, but originally planned to be on N64, that says quite alot about how picky Rare are in their making of games. I haven't read much about the game (I actually did play it, though), but its poor reception might have come from it being in the works for several years. It was also supposed to be called Dinosaur Planet, but I guess that was thrown in a ditch somewhere along the way as well.

It's all on wikipedia, except when the development of the game started.

As for unappreciated gems on the GC, I'd say The Hobbit, although not a fantastic title, was quite good. It ended badly, trying to capture the large battle that is towards the end of the book. There was something about a bear that you had to avoid, I suppose that was Beorn.

I had quite a few games for the GC, but I don't seem to recall any of them in particular. Oh wait, it was that weird sims game where you play as a huge friendly/evil giant. That was funky, I remember there was one of those villages on the island that didn't like me very much, because whenever I tried to help them, I ended up killing one or more of them.
 

Baralak

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I'll always bring up Onechanbara on the Wii. The 360 Onechanbara got bad reviews, but the Wii game is a FUN hack n slash with some good eye candy.
 

Poetic Nova

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Killer7, dispite having a PS2 port (which doesn't run nearly as smooth as the GC release). And Ikaruga, dispite having a Dreamcast and XBLA release.
 

Baralak

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0takuMetalhead said:
Killer7, dispite having a PS2 port (which doesn't run nearly as smooth as the GC release). And Ikaruga, dispite having a Dreamcast and XBLA release.
If you're going that route, don't forget Mega Man X: Command Mission!
 

Z of the Na'vi

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Metal Arms: A Glitch in the System is a game that I played quite a lot on my Gamecube that not many people seem to talk about. It's a third-person shooter where you play as a robot named Glitch who uses a wide variety of weapons through a quite substantial single-player campaign to overthrow a hostile robot empire. It had a fun multiplayer mode as well.

The game is/was a lot of fun, and I highly recommend it to anybody whenever given the chance.
 

StormDragonZ

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Skies of Arcadia Legends. I don't think I need to say anything more. It may have been an original for the Dreamcast, but the updated version for the Gamecube added so much to an already great game.
 

Sould1n

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Funny enough, I'm hoping to make a post regarding such a topic when I get the free time. I'm hoping by next year I'll be starting a Youtube channel series wherein I find, review, and discuss overlooked and under-rated Wii games. The Wii did have a lot of shovelware as it were but there were a lot of gems amongst it's vast collection and they deserve being pointed out.

I'm happy to hear of your mention of Muramasa: The Demon Blade, one of my top 10 favourite video games of all time, and there were indeed a lot of amazing Gamecube games that many missed. I too missed quite a few which nowadays I wish I obtained (I do have a rather trustworthy market stall I can visit to look for such games, but I've only just lately been able to build up money to purchase on older games, and shall be focusing on Wii for now as it ties in with my plans).

Twinrehz said:
As for unappreciated gems on the GC, I'd say The Hobbit, although not a fantastic title, was quite good. It ended badly, trying to capture the large battle that is towards the end of the book. There was something about a bear that you had to avoid, I suppose that was Beorn.

I had quite a few games for the GC, but I don't seem to recall any of them in particular. Oh wait, it was that weird sims game where you play as a huge friendly/evil giant. That was funky, I remember there was one of those villages on the island that didn't like me very much, because whenever I tried to help them, I ended up killing one or more of them.
Ah, I remember playing The Hobbit on the Gamecube. I never got far, got stuck at some point where I couldn't find the way to proceed, but it was a fun experience. As for the life sim game involving a giant you're talking about, I believe you're referring to Doshin the Giant; a Nintendo IP originally released for the Nintendo 64DD but then remade for the Gamecube.

kyosai7 said:
If you're going that route, don't forget Mega Man X: Command Mission!
That was such an amazing game, and kind of terrifying in how good it is. My older brother hates turn based RPG's and yet he played that game near constantly for weeks, got further than anyone else in my family with it.

Z of the Na said:
Metal Arms: A Glitch in the System is a game that I played quite a lot on my Gamecube that not many people seem to talk about. It's a third-person shooter where you play as a robot named Glitch who uses a wide variety of weapons through a quite substantial single-player campaign to overthrow a hostile robot empire. It had a fun multiplayer mode as well.

The game is/was a lot of fun, and I highly recommend it to anybody whenever given the chance.
Me and my little brother love Metal Arms: A Glitch in the System. An absolute blast to play!
 

Twinrehz

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Sould1n said:
Ah, I remember playing The Hobbit on the Gamecube. I never got far, got stuck at some point where I couldn't find the way to proceed, but it was a fun experience. As for the life sim game involving a giant you're talking about, I believe you're referring to Doshin the Giant; a Nintendo IP originally released for the Nintendo 64DD but then remade for the Gamecube.
Yeah, that was the name of that game. I got stuck in The Hobbit at one place where I was suddenly faced with a whole band of undeads, some of which fired exploding arrows at me which did tons of damage. Eventually I got past it, but it took a bit of patience.

As for Metal Arms, is that the one that Jim Sterling mentioned in one of his videos, about the IP being owned by Activision, who refused to sell it, but also didn't want to to anything with the IP?
 

Tanis

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I rarely, if ever, know of anyone online or off that's played (or even heard of) Cubivore.

It's a solid 'B' level game that's like Pokemon, but with a bit more...uh...sex PG/PG-13?
Weird, truly, one of Atlus's better 'what da hell is this' games I've played.
 

ccggenius12

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"Cubivore: Survivor of the Fittest" was just great. You're a cube monster that eats other cube monsters, and evolves based on the combinations you eat. The goal is to discover all of the different permutations, and climb to the top of the food chain. There's a button dedicated to pooping, and it serves a mechanical function. Do I need to say more?
 

TheWorstMuppetEver

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The first Battalion Wars for Gamecube is one of my favourite games of all time. The second one? Not so much. I attribute this to the shifts in controls. While the 2nd one handled well, I was so in love with how the controls were first time around that it kinda messed up my enjoyment of the game overall. Plus, it became impossible to win conflicts online. The people I'd play against would have their strategies down to a T, and I would get my ass handed to me in a matter of minutes.

Anyway, more focused with the topic, a few other underrated/overlooked games that I've had over the years that I enjoyed playing were as follows:

Gamecube
- Tales of Symphonia If I knew how rare it would become in Gamecube form I woulda kept it after finishing it! The shame!
- Ty the Tasmanian Tiger My first game for GC, so perhaps nostalgia blinds me. Fun little 3D platformer! Awesome boomerangs like the multirang, where you could throw several boomerangs at once, were one of my favourite parts of the game.
- 007: Nightfire Yeah, Goldeneye's good, but hey! Multiplayer in this is pretty good, too! Spent most of my time with friends shooting rockets at each other in Skyrail.
- Chibi-Robo Last game I got for GC before mine broke down. Love it so much. Pretty much Toy Story: The Game.
- Peter Jackson's King Kong: The Official Game of the Movie The game based on the movie! Yeah, it was short! But that was the first time I had played a FPS! Was good while it lasted!
- Ultimate Spiderman More people prefer Spiderman 2 over this, and I would agree. But there is something cool's about racing the Human Torch through town or having a bar fight with Wolverine, then exploring the city. Carnage is a flippin' ***** to fight!

Wii
- Kororinpa As soon as I saw the cover, I wanted to buy it. I mean, it's so cute [http://cdn-static.gamekult.com/gamekult-com/images/photos/00/00/81/16/ME0000811609_2.jpg] I can't stands it! Fuzzpigs aside, the mechanics were cool. I liked Monkey Ball and this was very much in line with that!
- Wario Land: Shake It! Dang! This game looked good! To this day, I regret trading it in. I think that falls to becoming bored of 2D platformers. Still, even if the controls weren't great, I enjoyed looking at things! That counts for something! Right?
-Boogie First dance game I enjoyed! (Mario Dance Dance Revolution was too short.) Good bunch of songs (at the time). Cool 'Alien' concept.
-Heatseeker Despite not being that interested in planes, I thought this was a pretty fun air-combat game! I particularly liked being codenamed 'Touchdown'. Awesome. And the slowmo rolls you could do to avoid missiles? Pretty cool.
-Little Kings Story I got Little King's Story at a time when I was obsessed with Pikmin. This seemed like an ideal supplement before the inevitable Pikmin 3 (this was in 2009). It was a fun game with good controls. I was sad to hear the company shut down.
 

EHKOS

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I really dislike Final Fantasy, but only due to the battle systems. Crystal Chronicles changed that, and I love that game.

I also really enjoyed Starfox Adventures, although I will concede you could have put almost anyone as the main character and it would have worked.

I think those are the only two I have on my shelf that haven't been mentioned. The only other two I currently own are Super Mario Sunshine and Skies of Arcadia...I should really grab a gamecube again, they're only $25 right now and I've always wanted to play Billy Hatcher and the Giant Egg.
 

Poetic Nova

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ccggenius12 said:
"Cubivore: Survivor of the Fittest" was just great. You're a cube monster that eats other cube monsters, and evolves based on the combinations you eat. The goal is to discover all of the different permutations, and climb to the top of the food chain. There's a button dedicated to pooping, and it serves a mechanical function. Do I need to say more?
Would love to own this game myself but it never got a release in Europe.
 

NoeL

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Sphinx and the Cursed Mummy is a pretty decent 3D platformer for Gamecube.

For the Wii, both Excitebots and Speed Racer are fantastic racing games. Dokapon Kingdom is also freaking amazing, though it was released on PS2 as well.
 

Poetic Nova

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kyosai7 said:
0takuMetalhead said:
Killer7, dispite having a PS2 port (which doesn't run nearly as smooth as the GC release). And Ikaruga, dispite having a Dreamcast and XBLA release.
If you're going that route, don't forget Mega Man X: Command Mission!
Touche, however I should've mentioned that the 2 I named are insanely hard to find for the GC, Ikaruga even more due to it's limited release. Dreamcast version never left Japan and the price for the GC version cna gett quiet hefty. Still Finding either one of them is worth it. I shouldn't be rambling on about it ohwell.
 

Elijin

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I'd argue its less about them being underrated, and more about Nintendo having a terrible Marketing department in the West.

I think its a Japanese based thing too, because I always found lots of really good games by Japanese developers which had made zero effort to push into the western market. By which I mean they released them in a 'fire and forget' fashion. Throwing the game out into the wild, with zero marketing to aid it.