Games:

The most important aspect of a game system is the availability of good games. If a system is amazingly fast, has online support and fabulous controls, but no games that you want to play, the system is basically worthless. For example, the Xbox has nearly double the games available for it than the GameCube, but many of those are not very good. Despite have more options on the Xbox, I’ve purchased more games for my GameCube than I have for my Xbox, despite being a fan of both systems. Quantity of games is not necessarily important when compared to quality, and in this case the GameCube has the strongest line-up of exclusive titles of any system.

• Exclusive Titles: Exclusive titles are simply games that are only available on one system, and not the others.
  
  
• Delayed Release Title: This is a title that is released first on one system, and then released later on another, usually after a number of months. This gives the system that had the title first an advantage.

Each console has its own list of exclusive titles. For the Xbox, its forerunner exclusive titles are Halo and Halo 2, though the Halo franchise is a PC release as well. The PS2 tends to lay claim to a smaller assortment of exclusives, but a greater number of delayed release titles, the obvious being the Grand Theft Auto series. Nintendo, on the other hand, has a long list of big name exclusive franchises that revolve around characters they have developed over the years. These tend to be games based around Mario, Zelda, Metroid, Pikmin, Pokemon, Starfox, Animal Crossing, and Wario. While all systems have their fair share of good exclusive titles, there is no denying that in the last three years, Nintendo exclusives have topped the monthly game sale charts more often than either of the other two, despite having a much smaller population base (less people own GameCubes). Considering the price of a GameCube, and Nintendo’s willingness to take risks in their game line-up, I consider the GameCube an essential part of any serious gamers collection. In my case, Nintendo also has a nostalgic value; Nintendo characters are the ones I grew up with, and participate in many of my fondest memories. Despite Nintendo’s attempts to escape the image, the GameCube is probably one of the safer bets if purchasing a game system for a younger audience.

The other systems have their advantages in this department, too, though. The PS2 is backwards compatible with old PS1 games, and has been on the shelves longer than any other modern system. This makes the PS2’s game catalogue huge compared to either of the other two. For example, according to GameRankings.com, the GameCube has roughly 500 announced titles, the Xbox 800, and the PS2 nearly 1300. If you combine PS1 games with those numbers, the volume of titles that can ultimately be played on the PS2 falls around 2900 games. As far as I’m concerned, the number of titles available on the PS2 is the primary reason, perhaps the only reason, to own the unit. The Xbox, on the other hand, has one substantial advantage: Xbox LIVE.

Online Play:

The discussion of online play basically has to center around Xbox LIVE, which is a truly unique online gaming service for the Xbox that allows users to play many games against and with other Xbox owners. Unlike the GameCube or PS2, the majority of games on the Xbox now ship with some form of online support; Xbox LIVE is a prominent part of Microsoft’s gaming strategy. The only downside is that too many people bought into Microsoft’s initial advertising schemes, promoting “trash talk 101”, and the network is flooded with a high number of gamers that think the voice chat is really just an added way to mock other players. While some PS2 games have online support, they do not typically use a unified network, voice chat, or a slew of other features that Xbox LIVE makes standard in every supporting game. The GameCube’s online capabilities are not really competitive.

If you want to play games over the Internet, the Xbox is by far the most obvious choice. If, on the other hand, what you’re interested in is hanging with your friends on a couch, playing games on the same TV, most of the systems perform equally well, depending on the gameplay experience you’re after. This, again, relates back to what games are available for each system.

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