GameCube and the Golden Age of Third-Party Gaming 

The early- to mid-2000s were some of the best years in gaming. The Big Three of Nintendo, Sony, and Microsoft were knocking it out of the park with their respective franchise offerings. The best part is even if that’s all you played, you were in a good place. The console that got the most play from me during this time was the GameCube, Nintendo’s last traditional console.

However, the third-party games released during this era were, in my opinion, the best we ever got. From sports to RPGs, all bases were covered. And the first-party games didn’t feel like something the Big Three were living and dying with. Of course, the GameCube shared some third-party games with the other consoles, but there were games it had that made it my favorite of the era.

NINTENDO’S BIG RUN

I know people don’t think of the GameCube when we bring up Nintendo’s best consoles. But I truly believe, top to bottom, this console was their best. Not only that, but it ran these games very well — and one could argue better than the other two consoles. 

There were top-notch RPGs like the classic Tales of Symphonia, the criminally underrated card-battler Lost Kingdoms (which, by the way, was developed by FromSoftware), and one of my personal favorites: Lord of the Rings: The Third Age.

The sports games showed up big here too as this was the last console Nintendo really got full-blown third-party support. The NFL/NBA Street series could be found on the purple box, as well as the excellent — if a little shallow — Sega Soccer Slam. 

LOST FOOTING since the gamecube

We’ve come a long way from this era of third-party support on Nintendo consoles and just in general. I remember how big a deal it was to see three versions of Soulcalibur 2 with a character exclusive to each console. And how lucky were we to see Link in that game on the GameCube version? I never would have thought I’d see that.

The creativity of games like Viewtiful Joe got lost because no one believed in the Wii until it was too late. And when they did, it got some of the worst versions of the other games. Even the Switch suffered early from a lack of support up until very recently.

The power of the recent Nintendo consoles has been an issue in garnering support from third parties, but it shouldn’t all fall on that. Third parties have been dying a slow death in the AAA era. And that’s unfortunate because those were the bridge games to the next first-party game. Hopefully, there’s room for a resurgence in the future, because the industry needs it.