Nintendo GameCube

The Nintendo Gamecube marked Nintendo’s 5th entry into the home Video game console market. It was Nintendo’s first move into using optical media as its primary storage. However instead of using the standard full-sized disc’s, Nintendo chose to use miniDVD, excluding the console from being able to play standard DVD’s or audio CD’s due to the smaller size. This made it lack a feature its two competitors of the time, the Xbox and the Playstation 2, and that is simply to also be able to act as a DVD player. While a simple feature, it did add an extra element to a consumers decision on what console to buy, especially during a period where DVD players were costly.

The system had the ability to expand its hardware functionality via a port on the bottom of the console. This would only ever end up being used for the consoles Broardband Adapter which gave the console its network functionality, and also the Game Boy Player which allowed Game Boy games to be played on the TV with a GameCube controller.

While the GameCube was praised for having an extensive library of high-quality games, the console failed to gain the sales that its main competitors did. At the end of its lifetime, the Game Cube managed to make 21.74 million sales, falling short by 3 million sales to Microsofts newcomer, the Xbox. However both fell painfully short of the Playstation 2’s 155 million sales.

Despite the GameCube’s shortfall in sales, it still left a legacy thanks to its high quality games.