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« on: May 28, 2003, 09:00:39 AM »
Very true stuff, I found myself doing the very same with the N64. However, it seems like a chicken and egg argument.
I tend to see which port is best on which system, I own a PS2 as well, before I go and buy it. Genrally GC ports seems to campare pretty poorly to their PS2 and XBox counterparts. Maybe developers put less time into the GC ports because of declining sales or maybe declining sales are being caused by poor 3rd party game ports.
A majority of games that are ported to multiple systems are designed to be handled by the least powerful system out there, generally the PS2. So when ported to GC and XBox you are essentially getting a PS2 quality game on systems that can handle way more. Every now and then I notice developers giving little extras to the XBox leaving GC fans out. I remember the port of "Spiderman: the movie" having slightly beefed up graphics and sound as well as an extra villian to fight on the XBox while the 'cube got exactly what PS2 owners got.
If you read Gamepro, I don't anymore because of this, you'll see games who receive average scores on PS2 and Gamcube due to "fun factor" or gameplay receive nearly perfect scores due to the graphical enhancements that the XBox can provide to ports. People read stuff like that. I can't afford to rent every game for both PS2 and GC to compare side by side to see which is better, so I rely on mags such as EGM to make decisions for me. Like "Enter the Matrix," I went with GC because the reviews state all 3 games are identicle. That being the case I went with GC, due to the better controller and faster load times generally asociated with the 'cube.
I remember a day when ports where all handled sepparately by developers to ensure each one took full advantage of the system for which they were being devolped. That way it was generally accepted that the SNES port would be better graphically and sound wise than the Genesis port due to the better hardware of the SNES, but little extras were thrown into the Genesis version to even it out and make all consumers happy. I see 3rd party support to be very weak on the GC due to a lack of this, most 3rd party support these days, however, seem to go toward the XBox.
If developers would adhere to the ethics they showed in the 16-bit days today, everyone would be happy, and a GC player could go out with confidence to purchase the hot new 3rd party game or port knowing they are getting the best possible product. Instead they are conditioned to respond to first party titles because Nintendo products are the only ones showing a consitency for quality. I, however, try to keep an open mind. I really want Nintendo to succed, but I feel a lot of it does fall into the hands of the 3rd party devopers not just the overly conditioned gamers.
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