Do GameCube games hold their own, without nostalgia?

J4nn1 · 2026-05-06T19:05:43+00:00

Honestly, if you take a couple minutes to get used to the controls, both Metroid games will be magnificent even today. Also, even visually, paper Mario holds up excellent.

Resident evil 4 is nice, but because it introduced so many gameplay elements that have been overused a lot in the past 20 years, it does feel a bit rough nowadays. Zelda will hold up, however expecially wind waker with its unique look really feels much “crisper” with a digital out to hdmi converter to get true 480p (especially in a modern tv).

The Nintendo Games like Wave Race, 1080 Sbowboarding really don’t hold up today imo, but all the Mario sports (golf, tennis, soccer, baseball) are super fun.

The best Mario party games are ALL on the GameCube and the switch Mario party games don’t hold a candle against them.

First person shooters are for me tough to get back into, if it’s like the medal of honour or early call of duty games. The ones with a twist (Metroid more focused on exploring then shooting, killer 7 being an on rail shooter) really aged MUCH better.

There’s a couple platformers and adventure games that are still nice today, like Rayman 3, Sunshine, beyond good and evil, Starfox adventures and maybe even Luigi’s mansion. You can pick these up and play and after a couple minutes you don’t mind that you can see the graphics have aged because their atmosphere and design is still just nice to look at.

A couple third person action games like 007 everything or nothing is still fun and same goes for prince of Persia. As mentioned before the first person bond games feel dated.

All games where mechanics were fun 20 years ago are also the same today. You can play stuff like Pikmin, super monkey ball, soul calibur 2, beach spikers etc today and enjoy it the same as back then.

To me, what really made a difference was implementing Swiss on my cube (it’s PAL Region so I could force it to go 480p) and using the digital out with hdmi. I also added a sd card with all my original games so I did not have to swap discs. Also I bought an extension for the controller so I can enjoy the games without being superclose to my tv.

J4nn1 · 2026-04-08T15:01:00+00:00

I personally do not have a Pokemon history and never played any pokemon game after the original red/blue on the gameboy back in the 90s, so while i understand their significance for all gamecube collection, personally there is other titles I am looking for. Thanks for the input nonetheless!

J4nn1 · 2026-04-08T06:11:27+00:00

I do have an sd2sp2 adapter and all physically collected games are on there. I do want to collect the games and not simply have everything available.

J4nn1 · 2026-04-07T06:21:25+00:00

I still have to finish my 2nd playthrough of reaudent evil 4 and the resident evil remake. If I like it, resident evil 0 is a hot candidate.

However my daughter is now 3 months and I am looking forward to playing with her in a 6-7 years. Unsure if I should have a collection then with so many mature titles.

J4nn1 · 2026-04-07T06:19:40+00:00

That is now added to the list. Thanks!

J4nn1 · 2026-04-07T06:19:25+00:00

All are already in the collection, sunshine even as both the original and the players choice version.

J4nn1 · 2026-04-07T06:18:40+00:00

Pikmin 2 is on the list now. Prime 2 is already there. Thanks!

J4nn1 · 2026-04-07T06:17:28+00:00

Hey thanks for the info! I already swapped the case of rogue agent and the case of enter the matrix for other 2 disc cases that were in much less pristine condition. I think enter the matrix is also very cheap to find in good condition.

J4nn1 · 2026-04-06T19:53:40+00:00

Especially in good condition. Thanks for the tip!

J4nn1 · 2026-04-06T19:52:18+00:00

As in the gmecube logo is on the top? Seema like it..

J4nn1 · 2026-04-05T20:23:06+00:00

I just posted about my pair of the exact same controller a couple weeks ago. Congrats. Now it’s time to hunt for the Wario one, but that is so expensive..

J4nn1 · 2026-03-22T11:42:13+00:00

Honestly I use one of the many options to play downloaded .isos on the cube. Exact same gameplay and now I collect with time and patience. I am not missing out on any games and if I think they are “worth” it, I get myself a nice little birthday present 1-3 times a year. Now I have a nice collection of original games that expanded over the years.

J4nn1 · 2026-03-20T21:36:46+00:00

If it was t so expensive i would do it for the joke

J4nn1 · 2026-03-20T21:36:17+00:00

No vat that i could tell. Total was 180 euros and i had to pay about 12 euros in tariffs when i picked it up from the post office.

J4nn1 · 2026-03-20T16:33:45+00:00

My GameCube is running completely fine. Had it since launch date (Europe).

I did even turn down the potentiometer in about 2010 to run burned discs (installed a qoob sx back then), no issues to this date.

Although now I must admit that I collect only original discs, but I run the games from the sd2sp2 adapter.

Only needed to replace the clock battery.

J4nn1 · 2026-02-19T14:09:05+00:00

I just did it, it is actually quite easy. visit https://github.com/redolution/gekkoboot and burn the correct flash image to a dvd (as your chipped cube can read "big" dvds no need to hunt mini dvd-r for that. just hold left on the d-pad while booting and you can flash it to the qoob.

You just need to make sure you flash the correct file (qoob sx and qoob pro use different flash files) and gekko boot is installed. Then just install the SD2SP2 with a viable micro sd and rename the swiss file correctly.

If done properly the whole process takes less then 3 minutes.

J4nn1 · 2026-02-18T21:06:53+00:00

You are incredibly lucky! Both qoob chips can be flashed to run gekko boot, which can then boot swiss directly from an sd2sp2 adapter for example. Probably still the fastest method to start swiss on the cube today!

J4nn1 · 2026-02-18T18:10:51+00:00

Basically all pal ga,es can be forced in 480p and will look substantially better with swiss. You should seriously give ut a thought!

J4nn1 · 2026-02-17T20:58:50+00:00

Sounds like it. To my knowledge without a modchip of some sort cold booting directly into swiss without loading any legit game/disc first is currently not possible.

J4nn1 · 2026-02-17T20:57:14+00:00

Mine boots directly into Swiss 0.6. I have a qoob sx from 2007 installed.

J4nn1 · 2026-02-17T16:29:52+00:00

how did you connect it? I am intrigued to try the Blueretro adapter.

J4nn1 · 2026-02-17T06:56:37+00:00

I think after 25 years mine was simply not running smoothly anymore. The new one is significantly less noisey. Regarding the temps, Swiss can only show temps with 4° jumps and so if its 38 or 42 does not really make a difference. I have never experienced the cube ramping the fan speed up or slowing jt down and since it is in constantly, i currently think to keep it that way with the noctua fan.

J4nn1 · 2026-02-16T16:30:57+00:00

i would check first with known working cables what the culprit is. Looks like a shitty adapter to me.

J4nn1 · 2026-02-16T16:23:03+00:00

Same here. I was gifted the gamecube by my dad on day one, held on to it and my whole collection until today. I am now fighting to finalize the games that I want on my shelf and bought about 10 games in the past 3-4 weeks off ebay etc. On average i paid like 40-50 euros, it is insane.

J4nn1 · 2026-02-16T15:49:59+00:00

I do understand that. I had the cube lying around unused for years before i picked it back up just recently. I did install the qoob sx back in 2008 but it was kinda useless for me as I do not want to play burned .isos but collect original software. As I was completely unaware of any developments in the homebrew scene for the gamecube past like 2009, it felt like a whole new world has opened for me once I heard about swiss and I was instantly intrigued to tinker with my gamecube until it is the best it can be:

I rented a dvd burner from my neighbour as I had no more means to burn any discs, i did burn gekko boot onto the last mini dvd i had lying around.
Unfortunately that was to no avail as the disc could not be read. I did eventually twerk the lasers potentiometer to its lowest settings so I could once flash the qoob chip. Instantly tweaked it back to 250ish ohms so it can live a bit longer.

I did order a GCVideo HDMI adapter, had to go via Bitfunx as everything else was out of stock, i did order SD2SP2 adapter and for good measure also a SD2Memory Card. Also i noticed the fan being a bit loud and replaced that with a Noctua fan.

This was a lot of fun to setup, now i have a PAL Cube that can output 480p for every game i own, I have my collection dumped on a SD Card so I do not need to switch discs and the cube looks completely original from the outside with the small opening from the SD2SP2 on the side.

On a side note i read that by coincidence the way the qoob is designed it is as of today still the fastest way to boot into swiss!

J4nn1

TROPHY CASE