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Gamecube is the most underrated console while it was in circulation. (lemmy.world)

submitted 10 months ago by Jaes@lemmy.world to c/technology@lemmy.world

74 comments fedilink hide all child comments

No shit. I mean what console has survived as long as those OG Gamecubes. I have had mine for 20 years and the first issue came up this year. Turns out it's an easy fix I can do myself and nothing destroying the console itself I can still play while working on this fix.

Also the Gamecube had so many games that were moved from the N64 that and some of the rarest games exist on Gamecube. Sometimes I can't believe it was ever a flop for them because it was a childhood favorite. I'm so glad I kept mine and tried to take good care of it even when it was in storage for so long.

I don't think any console today or even back at the time in 99 or early 2000s would last 20 years with kids turning into adults and 5-6 moves without having a console breaking issue.

Ive had 2 PS2's go down, a PS3 Gen1 break, 3 Xbox 360, and very sadly an OG Xbox that did last from 2005 to 2015, an N64, and my PS4 Slim is getting there for sure. All (except the 64) gotten years (some a decade) after this Gamecube I still have today.

Thank my lucky stars my sister gave it back to me because it is my rock of a console. It should have done so much better than what articles and money say. It's a very sought after retro console and I'm glad I still have and take care of mine from 2003 when I was a youngin'

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[–] orclev@lemmy.world 8 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago)

You touched on a few good points, but I think ultimately reached the wrong conclusion.

What 12-year-old boy asking for a Christmas present is going to choose the cutesy purple brick that "only has kid games" over a sleek black PS2 that is seen as being adult, with action and fighting games?

This was literally Segas entire marketing strategy. Nintendo early on decided to lean heavily into the family friendly marketing for their consoles starting with the NES (or famicom, literally family computer) for various reasons but most prominently because of the videogame crash of the 70s.

Sega saw an opportunity to position themselves as an edgier option that would appeal more to the tween and teen demographic and so leaned very heavily into that in their advertising in the 80s and particularly the 90s. This tactic was rather successful and so Nintendo developed a reputation as the console for children. This image was further cemented by certain decisions by Nintendo around game content, most prominently by the rather shortsighted decision to force the Mortal Kombat series of games to recolor characters blood to green instead of the red it was on arcade and sega systems (this could be disabled using a hidden cheat code somewhat rendering the entire exercise moot).

When Sony and Microsoft came along they didn't really need to do anything special besides release whatever games they wanted, the damage to Nintendo's rep was already done. Nintendo then made things even worse for themselves by releasing a console in bright candy colors most closely associated with marketing towards young children that literally looked like a small childs lunchbox.

Then the Wii came along and went HARD on the family-friendly aspect, and just blasted off the shelves.

Nintendo realized that they wouldn't be able to shake the children's console rep they had developed easily and so decided to lean heavily into messaging that their consoles were also for adults. Much of the marketing for the Wii (in fact the majority of it) depicted the console being played by adults and the elderly. It was actually somewhat rare to see advertising for the Wii showing young children using the console, a stark contrast from Nintendo's previous marketing.

This was also reflected in the design aesthetic of the console and its packaging featuring a modern minimalist flat white color scheme with minimal light blue highlights. Compared with previous Nintendo consoles the Wii was downright drab looking. Its packaging looked more like a product from Ikea than a games console.

Nintendo further lucked out with the Wii in that it had a novel control system utterly unlike anything else in the market at the time and so had a massive novelty factor going for it. Additionally helping with this was that they positioned the console at the extreme low end of the market releasing it at a price point well below half the cost of their nearest competitor.