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[FyreWulff]

Of course, but you also needed a special cable for the GameCube's 480p output and the Xbox's 720p output.


Less data means finding the data faster.
Also "no loading times" is a lie. Cube games HAD loading times. Most of them actually. First party developers were smart enough to either hide these loading times somehow or order the data on the disc in such a way that needed data is accessed more quickly.
Of course, these loading times are in absolutely no comparisons of the clusterfuck of loading time we have on current gen consoles...

This is true, Nintendo and more first party titles were just better at streaming and hiding the loads than most other developers on the system. But their dev kit also enforced the DVD loading times so the developers had a better idea of real-world performance.

Probably their best work in terms of hiding load times and maximizing streaming was Mario Kart DD.

 

[Fou-Lu]

The Gamecube is a fucking incredible machine for its size, it was like magic at the time. I hope the Nintendo that made the Gamecube hardware is making the Wii U hardware.

 

[Cow Mengde]

I heard the Gamecube is also incredibly efficient with very few bottlenecks compared to the other 2 systems.

 

[Speevy]

I hope the Nintendo that made the Gamecube hardware is making the Wii U hardware.

That Nintendo also went with 1.35 GB discs, so I'm not so sure you'd want that.

 

[DCharlie]

In the right hands it produced very very astounding graphics (Yes, one or two videos are Wii versions, but they are graphically the same).

lol, no offense but you can't go from a statement about PS2 doing 1080i and it being beside the point to videos of GC running under Dolphin emulator to show the very very astounding graphics with a straight face surely?!

I mean - i whole heartedly agree that the GC had some great looking games but Dolphin sure tidies them up a bit as well - just saying.

 

[Bjoern the Smexy]

There are no 5-6 second doors in Prime or Echoes. Things got slower in Corruption, but every door in the first two games will load in well under 2 seconds barring disc or drive failures.

Some doors in Prime 1 were a glitched mess though (at least on the PAL version). I had some doors that would open in almost no time. The very same doors would sometimes need several seconds to open up, which went so far as me getting killed by enemies because that fucking door didn't open up

Still love the game <3

 

[neptunes]

They all had their advantages,

It would have been difficult to port games that relied on each consoles specific advantages.

I.e ZOE2 for the PS2, Strangers wrath on XBOX, and Rebel Strike on the GameCube.

 

[Mandoric]

I heard someone explain to me that F-Zero GX couldn't run as well on the Xbox compared to what the Gamecube could do. Lot of techno mumbo jumbo. I assumed it was always Xbox > Gamecube > PS2

In raw power, yeah. The Cube and the PS2 both were really good at certain exotic functions that the PC chip in Xbox broke down on, a good example is the rain at the very beginning of MGS2.

 

[Fou-Lu]

That Nintendo also went with 1.35 GB discs, so I'm not so sure you'd want that.

Those 1.35GB discs delivered some of my favorite games of all time. Still, I do see your point, but I'm willing to take some hits for fantastic architecture.

 

[Coolio McAwesome]

The GameCube was a beast and was considerably more powerful than the PS2. The multitexturing effects were pretty advanced for the time, and the GPU could lay down eight texture layers in a single per pass.

Metroid Prime, StarFox Adverntures, Resident Evil, and F-Zero GX still look amazing to this day. Rebel Strike in progressive scan was arguably the best-looking game of it's generation.

 

[DCharlie]

The Cube and the PS2 both were really good at certain exotic functions that the PC chip in Xbox broke down on, a good example is the rain at the very beginning of MGS2.

you aren't just using the quality of the turgid Xbox port here for this are you?

Rebel Strike in progressive scan was arguably the best-looking game of it's generation.

I'm pretty confident that honour has to go to Double STEAL Second Clash. 60fps 720p and effects that wouldn't look out of place this gen. Though Rebel Strike looks fantastic indeed.

 

[SlipperySlope]

RE 4 alone tells you that GameCube was more powerful than the PS2. XBox was better than them both.

 

[GCX]

Playing Resident Evil 4 for the first time felt like I had entered the next generation or something. It really pushed GC to its limits.

 

[Tunic]

I still think it is quite remarkable the graphic level that the Gamecube was able to achieve during that generation. Wind Waker still looks amazing to this day.

 

[Waaghals]

Did't you need a special cable for that?

Yes, and I believe GT4 wasn't actually 1080i but rather 400x1080 scaled or something - still very impressive of course.

 

[FyreWulff]

StarFox Adverntures

Oh man. That game was pulling off stuff that Microsoft was advertising that only the Xbox could do. It's like Rare was "oh really?" and did stuff in that game just to spite them.

 

[Hobbestetrician]

Wait a goshdurn minute. Yer tellin' me that there was a time that Nintendo made hardware that not only could compete with the other consoles but, in some cases, could actually outclass them? And every review didn't say 'it looks good...for a Gamecube game'? I was under the impression that Nintendo loved making shitty hardware as long as it saved them a buck. Consider my mind blown.

/sarcasm. Had a Day One Gamecube and love the hell out of that system. An amazing piece of tech in that little box more than capable when compared with its brethren.

 

[Magicpaint]

Some doors in Prime 1 were a glitched mess though (at least on the PAL version). I had some doors that would open in almost no time. The very same doors would sometimes need several seconds to open up, which went so far as me getting killed by enemies because that fucking door didn't open up

Still love the game <3

I've never had this happen to me.

 

[Bjoern the Smexy]

Playing Resident Evil 4 for the first time felt like I had entered the next generation or something. It really pushed GC to its limits.

Considering it ran at a smooth 30 fps all the time I don't really think that this game pushed the console to its absolute limits.

I've never had this happen to me.

It only happened to me a handful of times either. But it happened. And it made me sad that one time I dies because of it

 

[MIKEAL]

Considering it ran at a smooth 30 fps all the time I don't really think that this game pushed the console to its absolute limits.


It only happened to me a handful of times either. But it happened. And it made me sad that one time I dies because of it

RE4 was the one that was pushing the boundaries of GC hardware

 

[Cow Mengde]

Say what you will about the 3rd party support for the Wii, but I think there are more games that really pushed the Wii than there were games pushing the GC. There are quite a few 3rd party examples, not just 1st party games.

 

[Guerrillas in the Mist]

Better than a PS2 graphically but had more audio compression. Not quite an Xbox in either sound or graphics.

Interestingly, the PS2 version of Resident Evil 4 had pretty bad audio compression, although I think that was due to RAM limitations.


I don't think I'll ever be as wowed graphically as the first time I saw Rogue Leader running. It looked fucking insane when it came out. Even the first time I saw Crysis at (near) max settings wasn't as jaw-dropping as playing RL in 2001.

 

[Dishwalla]

Going back through some PS2 games I'm amazed at how some of them have not aged well. Obviously it's not every PS2 game, but there's been some that look downright awful.

And then I play Melee and am taken aback at how sharp and clear it looks. A game that's more than ten years old and still that beautiful is insane.

 

[zoukka]

I thought the exclusives on Gamecube wiped the floor with their competition on xbox and PS2.

Halo 2 was on its own class though.

 

[Ridley327]

Interestingly, the PS2 version of Resident Evil 4 had pretty bad audio compression, although I think that was due to RAM limitations.

The PS2 port was incredible if only for the fact that they managed to port RE4 in less than a year to a less powerful system and it was recognizably RE4 at that. Once you started to see all the compromises they had to make for it to run (the massively gimped lighting and shader effects, horribly compressed FMV cutscenes and the drastic audio compression), it gets a lot less impressive, but the feat was still noteworthy just for the time they had to do it in. It's a lot like the RE2 N64 port, really.

 

[MIKEAL]

I thought the exclusives on Gamecube wiped the floor with their competition on xbox and PS2.

Halo 2 was on its own class though.

And above halo 2 was Chronicles of Riddick

 

[Argyle]

Did not like working on this system. Clunky devkit, less usable RAM than its competitors (only 24 mb was general purpose, there was 16 mb of slow memory you could use to stream things like audio and animation), smaller discs, one fewer controller button.

Granted, Gamecube was almost never the lead platform for multiplatform games so all of the above meant a huge pain in the ass for multiplatform development in that era.

Also serious LOL to the dude who compared the Xbox and Gamecube to the HD twins this generation...not even close.

 

[Speevy]

Did not like working on this system. Clunky devkit, less usable RAM than its competitors (only 24 mb was general purpose, there was 16 mb of slow memory you could use to stream things like audio and animation), smaller discs, one fewer controller button.

Granted, Gamecube was almost never the lead platform for multiplatform games so all of the above meant a huge pain in the ass for multiplatform development in that era.

Also serious LOL to the dude who compared the Xbox and Gamecube to the HD twins this generation...not even close.

I remember buying the Gamecube version of Metal Arms: A Glitch in the System (RIP Swingin' Ape), and the cutscenes looked absolutely terrible.

If I could describe it, it was like converting a BMP file to a JPEG, just wretched. Was this a result of the small Gamecube discs? Was this your experience?

 

[sixteen-bit]

More powerful than PS2 but less powerful than Xbox.

 

[papersleeves]

It's the obvious Xbox > GC > PS2, but every console had its moment graphically speaking.

Honorable mention for GC : Rogue Leader, Rebel Strike. One or the other I think had the record for most polys per second, beating even the mighty RSC on Xbox (which had more polys on screen, but ran at 30fps instead of 60fps like Rogue Squadron games). Got beaten by RSC2 which also ran at 60fps while keeping its polys count.

Xbox : Well, it really was the king of them. 720p output on quite a few games, 480p on a truckload of games, programmable shaders, yadda yadda. Every time a multiplat came out, it was better 19 times out of 20 on Xbox. Best looking games on this platform was the Splinter Cell series (especially CT), Stranger's Wrath, Fable, Deadly Shadows, EFBB, Doom 3, Half-Life 2 (was a mess, but at least it ran on it), Far Cry, KOTOR, Wreckless and RSC series.

PS2 : Particle beast. Games like ZOE2 and Black really showed off the PS2 trump card. Surprisingly too, PS2 was the console with the most 60 fps games thanks to its ginormous library. Plus, honorable mention to GT4 and TT that somehow managed to run at (fake) 1080i, minus a slight screen jumping bug at the beginning of the race.

I loved that generation. You were a winner regardless of your console.

 

[riceandbeans]

I thought the exclusives on Gamecube wiped the floor with their competition on xbox and PS2.

Halo 2 was on its own class though.

The Prime and Rouge Squadrons games were fantastic graphically, but the Xbox's third and first party exclusives like Chaos Theory, Riddick, Doom 3, DoA:U, Otogi 2, NG, etc. were in a league of their own, literally with titles like Chaos Theory for Xbox being developed seperately.

 

[Betta Lines]

Not enough mentions of Rallisport Challenge 2 in this thread.

 

[papersleeves]

Not enough mentions of Rallisport Challenge 2 in this thread.

I mentioned it

 

[Platy]

Anyone can show me some pics of awesome Xbox1 games ?

Not trying to be sarcastic or anything .. is just that i never knew anyone that had a xbox1 ... so the only "omfg pretty" game i know was that riddick game, but then again, it was so dar that you barely could see anything =P

 

[TedNindo]

The Prime and Rouge Squadrons games were fantastic graphically, but the Xbox's third and first party exclusives like Chaos Theory, Riddick, Doom 3, DoA:U, Otogi 2, NG, etc. were in a league of their own, literally with titles like Chaos Theory for Xbox being developed seperately.

A big pro the xbox had was that most of its best looking games had normal mapping which I didn't see on GameCube and PS2. Doom 3 and Far Cry practicly started this trend on PC. Every developers uses it A LOT this gen.

 

[zoukka]

Anyone can show me some pics of awesome Xbox1 games ?

 

[kunonabi]

I'm always a little surprised when I pop in Beach Spikers for the GC. That game looks DAMN good.

 

[Theonik]

XBoX>NGC>PS2 Visually and power wise. Really not much contest there, especially for the PS2. Hell most PS2 games weren't even 480p.

XboX>PS2>NGC sound wise. PS2 supported DD and DTS but couldn't use them in gameplay as it couldn't encode them in real time so was limited to DD and PLII in gameplay. (I think some games had a DTS 4CH soundtrack though) XboX on the other hand supported all this and could encode DD in real time thanks to the nForce chipset it was based on so had real DD5.1 in gameplay. Gamecube on the other hand only supported PLII and had no real surround output in addition to no digital sound output at all (it was capable of the later though, never implemented) It also had lesser disk space that lead to NGC sound to be frequently more compressed.

 

[Spieler Eins]

I remember when PS2 didn't anything for me. Then Star Wars Rogue Squadron and Luigis Mansion came among others and blew my mind. Not even the jump to HD has me impressed me as much as this back in the day :lol

 

[Speevy]

Anyone can show me some pics of awesome Xbox1 games ?

Not trying to be sarcastic or anything .. is just that i never knew anyone that had a xbox1 ... so the only "omfg pretty" game i know was that riddick game, but then again, it was so dar that you barely could see anything =P

 

[behem0th x]

Anyone can show me some pics of awesome Xbox1 games ?

Not trying to be sarcastic or anything .. is just that i never knew anyone that had a xbox1 ... so the only "omfg pretty" game i know was that riddick game, but then again, it was so dar that you barely could see anything =P

Some of my favs were: Ninja Gaiden, Panzer Dragon Orta, Crimson Skies, Otogi, dead or alive ultimate (or that volley ball game), Splinter Cell Chaos Theory, Riddick... probably a few other lookers that I'm forgetting.

 

[papersleeves]

A big pro the xbox had was that most of its best looking games had normal mapping which I didn't see on GameCube and PS2. Doom 3 and Far Cry practicly started this trend on PC. Every developers uses it A LOT this gen.

Yes !

Normal maps, pixel shaders 1.1 (yes, pixel shaders, good old term), its noticeable pool of RAM and its Hard Drive are what made the Xbox closer to a powerful pc than a console when it comes to graphics and overall experience. People doesn't give enough credits to Xbox. Everything about it was fantastic. Xbox Live and PGR2 rocked my world.

Anyone can show me some pics of awesome Xbox1 games ?

Not trying to be sarcastic or anything .. is just that i never knew anyone that had a xbox1 ... so the only "omfg pretty" game i know was that riddick game, but then again, it was so dar that you barely could see anything =P

I am really sorry for the shitty quality, but it still give an idea.

This video both serve to demonstrate the difference between PS2 and 360's graphical capabilities and to show off what the Xbox could do.

Comparison between Splinter Cell Chaos Theory PS2 and Xbox:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HkHoDEh0FWc

 

[Argyle]

I remember buying the Gamecube version of Metal Arms: A Glitch in the System (RIP Swingin' Ape), and the cutscenes looked absolutely terrible.

If I could describe it, it was like converting a BMP file to a JPEG, just wretched. Was this a result of the small Gamecube discs? Was this your experience?

Yep. Basically you had to get your game to fit in less than 1/3rd the space (assuming you used a full single layer DVD - it's even worse if you were using a DVD-9 on PS2 or all the sapce on the Xbox DVD) or use multiple discs.

 

[P90]

Anyone can show me some pics of awesome Xbox1 games ?

Not trying to be sarcastic or anything .. is just that i never knew anyone that had a xbox1 ... so the only "omfg pretty" game i know was that riddick game, but then again, it was so dar that you barely could see anything =P

http://image.com.com/gamespot/images/2002/xbox/panzerdragoonorta/pan_screen018.jpg

 

[Speevy]

I was just thinking that time has really not been kind to Panzer Dragoon Orta.

And the Xbox 360 BC messed up the colors in the game.

 

[Nemesis121]

I always though the PS2 was shit in terms of power until i played MGS3, i would have love to seen that on Xbox and if they could have drastically improve it's graphics...

 

[TedNindo]

Anyone can show me some pics of awesome Xbox1 games ?

Not trying to be sarcastic or anything .. is just that i never knew anyone that had a xbox1 ... so the only "omfg pretty" game i know was that riddick game, but then again, it was so dar that you barely could see anything =P

I'm still pretty impressed they got his to run on the xbox
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xfdGVPGZRMk

 

[speedline]

Xbox spoiled me last gen with the graphics, PS2 spoiled me with the huge library, GC spoiled me with the Nintendo first party line-up. Last gen was a good gen.

 

[chickdigger802]

Is there a reason why gcn exclusive games tend to have really good load times?

 

[ChuyMasta]

Is there a reason why gcn exclusive games tend to have really good load times?

Effort.