Topic: 15-year Anniversary of the Capcom Five ~ Never Forget

[King of Twitch]

We are gathered here today for the memory of our long-departed and flaky friend, the Capcom 5, whose initial announcement came on yesterday's date in 2002.


And what a splash it made! The site whipped out the rarely-seen "BREAKING NEWS" capslocked headline and gave a solid rundown of the sparkling innovation: Viewtiful Joe, RE4, P.N.03, Killer7, and Dead Phoenix (hat tip to a young and talented Jonathan Metts).

The director's comments describe the game as being all about action and the fluidity of movement; the goal is to make it feel like you're really controlling a superhero.

Director Hiroki Kato says he wants to create that "flying like the bird" feeling in this game.

The few quotations in the article suggest the Gamecube was a great tool to experiment with creative gameplay opportunities, an art that has long since died. You just don't hear developers talk about games this way anymore.


6 years ago, the site looked back on this solemn loss: Observing the Course and Wake of the Capcom Five


Zero Punctuation did a video last year:

Light a candle and think of the good times, share your memories in this thread, but never, ever forget :reggie:

[Order.RSS]

No joke, I was super hyped when this news broke in magazines. Memory may be off, but the gaming mag I read at that time seemed to usually have cover stories for Xbox or PS2 (like Tomb Raider, FFX, Splinter Cell). So naturally the Capcom Five thing was really interesting to me, particularly PN03 and Dead Phoenix (I was hella jealous GameCube never got Panzer Dragoon Orta).

In the end I bought PN03 and quite liked it, Killer7 I found very creepy, and I got both of the Viewtiful Joe games but only played those for an hour or so each. Never tried Resi4 haha, even though that one was the most anticipated release.

[Mop it up]

Wow, talk about a blast from the past.

I have never played any of these games. Am I part of the problem?

Looks like the Switch has the "Bethesda 3," hopefully that works out better...

[nickmitch]

I really like the VJ series and Killer7.  But this is such a great LOL to look back on.

[ShyGuy]

P.N.0.3 - Never played it, a little curious how it is. Capcom never mentions it.
Dead Phoenix - Capcom canceled it before it even got very far. The known screenshots don't excite me.
Viewtiful Joe - Really liked it a lot! Capcom got a desperate case of sequel-itis and somehow ran it into the ground before the new generation even started.
Killer7 - It was weird and a little too awkward to play. Suda later improved with No More Heroes, but Capcom had booted him out long before that.
Resident Evil 4: One of the best games of all time. If it came out for Switch I would buy it again.

[Khushrenada]

I guess it's actually the Capcom Four although, for some reason, I thought Viewtiful Joe 2 was one of the Capcom Five for awhile. Oh, to be young and naïve again instead of really young and jaded like I am now.

P.N. 03 - Finally made the plunge last week and bought it off eBay. Waiting for it to arrive any day now.
Dead Phoenix - Lived up to its name and died in development. I honestly forget this is a part of the Capcom 5 until an article or post like this comes along to remind me.
Resident Evil 4 - Never played it. I don't care for horror.
Killer 7 - Never played it. Just seemed to weird and visually nonsensical for me to ever want to try. Having played a couple other Suda games since and not really warming up to them either, I just don't think it's for me.
Viewtiful Joe - Played through the first levels or so and I think I beat the first boss but it was quite gelling for me. I remember being a bit confused about something and wanting to get a better grasp on abilities or check a FAQ for something but never getting back to it.
Viewtiful Joe 2 - As for my mistaken fifth Capcom 5 entry, I've never played it as my goal was to play through VJ1 before playing this one.

And that's the Capcom 5 for me.

[Order.RSS]

I mean, I suppose it ended up as the Capcom One ultimately right? Viewtiful Joe, Killer7 and Resident Evil 4 all quickly got PS2 ports. And Resi4 was subsequently ported to every platform under the Sun, I bet they were aiming for a WonderSwan release for a while there. Only PN03 stayed exclusive in the end.

Might as well consider Viewtiful Joe 2 as the fifth one, then. Did anyone ever play that Red Hot Rumble spin-off? I believe it's sort of a Smash Bros. clone, pretty sure it got GC/PS2 releases as well as a sequel on the DS?

[BeautifulShy]

I remember the news breaking and I was so excited about hearing about it. I mean at the time I think my mindset was these are 5 exclusive titles and from different game genres. You know beatem up, Flight, 3rd person shooter, horror and FPS.

I think I gravitated to PN03, Dead Phoenix and RE4 first of all. Killer 7 and Viewtiful Joe didn't really catch my eye till later on.

As to the games themselves I played 3 of the ones that were released.

PN03 I think I found a copy of it for it at a Software ect at my local mall for I think 10 bucks. I played through it multiple times and I think I managed to unlock all the suits and fully upgrade them.  I think I even used the Papillon suit and managed to beat the game on its hardest difficulty. The trail stages were a little bit different in the paths but it was hard to decern where you went and you needed to keep a mental map in your head to keep track.

Resident Evil 4 is probably one of my favorite games of all time.  So being a Nintendo gal the REmake for the gamecube was my first exposure to the series and I liked what saw and played from it. So when this was announced and having RE0 being moved from the N64 to the Gamecube I was like this is the perfect time to jump into the series. So I think the day RE4 came out for the Cube I grabbed it and saw from a gameplay perspective it was a little bit more advanced PN03 from just how you controlled the character so after a few initial early roadblocks (cabin in the village, Chainsaw guy after seeing Ada)I was on my way till I got to the castle and I was stuck for a while till I figured out what to do and also sold my initial weapons to better ones there at the castle.  Anyway it is probably my most played game just from how much I beat the game. Through the GC,Wii and Steam versions I must have beaten it more than 50 times. 20 plus of the GC version.

On to the last one I played. Viewtiful Joe. So I enter Sam Goody and I am looking through the bargin Bin  of GC titles and I saw Viewtiful Joe 2 in there and I grab the case and bring it up there.  I guess they didn't have the second behind the counter so I guess they snuck in the1st game instead. I get back home and open up the case and I see Viewtiful Joe instead of VJ2 and I was about to get upset and I tell myself to let me just try it and see if I liked it.  I think I tried it for 8 hours so that tells you something...

Killer 7 I think I saw in Nintendo Power and they did a few page article on it but never really played it.  Closest thing would be the Killer 7 gun in RE4.