After countless rumours, Nintendo GameCube is finally coming to the virtual console offered to Nintendo Switch Online members—or at least, those who pick up a Nintendo Switch 2. An app for Nintendo’s fourth home console will be available to download on the console’s launch day, June 5, for those who own the Expansion Pass tier of their subscription service.
The GameCube was an underappreciated gem, lost in the shinier shadows of its competition in its own time, but those who love the platform love it a lot. And luckily, the initial lineup of emulated titles is a fantastic start—The Legend of Zelda: Wind Waker, Soulcalibur II, and F-Zero GX will be available day one, with Super Mario Sunshine, Luigi’s Mansion, Pokémon Colosseum, Pokémon XD: Gale of Darkness, Fire Emblem: Path of Radiance, Super Mario Strikers, and Chibi-Robo! confirmed to follow at some point.
While this is a great start (and probably stronger than most people would’ve expected) it’s just the tip of the iceberg. There’s a strong library of titles that would be a great fit as well, so we’ve lined up the games we want to play on Nintendo Switch 2 in the near future.
(However, one word before we kick off: we’ve omitted The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess because… well, it and Wind Waker still deserve to have their HD editions from the Wii U brought over to either Switch system. Similarly, you won’t find the Metroid Prime games here, as Metroid Prime Remastered is a better way to play, and with Metroid Prime 4: Beyond finally imminent, we’re long overdue for Metroid Prime 2: Echoes to get the same remaster treatment. We’ve left these three off to save room for more titles.)
5. Eternal Darkness: Sanity’s Requiem
For such a colourful console, from a company with a pretty chipper vibe, the Nintendo GameCube had a strong horror scene. The Resident Evil remake, Resident Evil 4, and Resident Evil Zero debuted on it, then brought many of their siblings along for a re-release. BloodRayne offered a hack-and-slack angle on the genre, and even Nintendo got spooky with Luigi’s Mansion.
But the true darling of the horror genre on GameCube was Eternal Darkness: Sanity’s Requiem. Developed by Canada’s own Silicon Knights in CGMagazine’s home of St. Catharines, Ontario, and published by Nintendo themselves, this ambitious adventure leaned into eldritch, Lovecraftian themes (before they had their renaissance in the 2010s) and even Kojima-like tricks to immerse players in the psychological horror. With a sprawling plot focused on four specific eras spread over 2000 years, the way players explore these different storylines and the choices they make affect not only the plot, but the characters’ very sanity.
Granted, Eternal Darkness is rated M by the ESRB—Nintendo’s first time published a game with that distinction—or similar rankings in other parts of the world. That suggests Nintendo Switch Online would offer a separate GameCube app for M-rated games, like they recently did for the Nintendo 64 when Turok: Dinosaur Hunter and Perfect Dark were added. This would be a setback to adding Eternal Dark, at least until they can line up a few more games to make it worthwhile, but nonetheless it’s a piece of early 2000s history that should be made accessible.
4. Animal Crossing
It was surprising to see neither hide nor hair of Animal Crossing during the big Nintendo Switch 2 Direct, with New Horizons rife for an upgraded edition. There is one place where Nintendo’s Little Franchise That Could might flourish on the new console, however: the GameCube app.
The original Animal Crossing (or at least, the first as far as most of the world is concerned) was one of the GameCube’s more unique, long-shot exclusives. Much like the sequels it spawned, it was a life sim game where your avatar, a human, moves to a town inhabited by animals, gets indebted to a morally scrupulous raccoon, and spends their days doing chores and errands to buy new furniture. Just like real life, am I right?
Nintendo would be wise to lean in and offer this all-time great to the virtual GameCube roster and make it easy to see what the hype is all about.
Animal Crossing: New Horizons made the IP a household name after 19 years, but the original game might be a delightfully different surprise for Switch 2 owners who never experienced the earlier games. The characters are sassier, even reading aloud letters they’re sent; Mr. Resetti still tears you a new one for not saving properly; and you’re just an errand boy in the grand scheme of things—not the new mayor or designated Special Person. It wouldn’t have the charm of coming with its very own dedicated memory card to hold the massive save file of an entire village, and being integrated into the Switch Online emulator could raise some technical issues with the game’s 24-hour clock.
But it’s still fun to brush the cobwebs off the old GameCube memory card and check back in on this time capsule, and this time you’re guaranteed to have zero edgy notes from your past self hiding on the town bulletin board. That in itself is a win—and it would help hold us over for the next game, which we’ve been waiting for since the abrupt end of New Horizons‘ update schedule.
3. Mario Kart: Double Dash!
Mario Kart World is going to be the big draw when the Nintendo Switch 2 launches June 5, as a potential bundle title and the first new game in the massive series in 11 years. But if the GameCube is also gracing the new console, then Mario Kart: Double Dash deserves a place at the table.
Coming off the wildly popular Mario Kart 64, Nintendo did something very unexpected for the big GameCube sequel: adding another character to each cart. This added a whole new layer of strategy and challenge to both single-player modes (where one player controls both characters on a cart) and multiplayer (where players are each assigned to one character of a duo and expected to get along). And to the chagrin of many fans, they haven’t done anything this unique since, or at least until now, when Mario Kart World takes players off the road.
Having another Mario title on Switch Online won’t steal the wind from World‘s sales, and as redundant as they can be, people have always appreciated having more of these titles at hand. For nothing other than showing how the series has experimented and dared to change things up, diehard Nintendo fans would surely appreciate this double dose of nostalgia—and what better way to encourage fans to buy more of the special, era-accurate GameCube controllers in the process?
2. Sonic Adventure 2: Battle
A few months back in this column, I wrote that Sega finally seems ready to remaster or remake the GameCube era of Sonic the Hedgehog, where three of its best-performing 3D outings were born. Most of these would be Sonic Adventure 2: Battle, the lifeboat that the original game used to depart the sinking ship of the Dreamcast. The game that brought us Shadow the Hedgehog, dynamite tracks like “Escape From the City” and “Live & Learn,” and the definitive edition of the Tiny Chao Garden minigame is arguably the height of the Blue Blur’s 3D adventures.
Like the games I mentioned in my disclaimer at the outset, I would prefer to see a passionate team from Sega give Sonic Adventure 2 a true once-over before releasing it for the Switch 2, and the Switch Online versions are often just bandaids at best. (It was the game I bought alongside my own GameCube back in the day, which revitalized my love for the series.)
But if it’s not going to happen any other way, I’ll happy take Sonic Adventure 2: Battle on the Switch Online GameCube if it means the younger generations can enjoy it for themselves (warts and all). After all, we know Sega could play ball on these things, as they’ve allowed a host of Sega Genesis games to reach the subscription service with their own distinct app.
(Please find a way to simulate the Game Boy Advance Link Cable experience while you’re at it, though, Nintendo. Do right by the Tiny Chao Garden.)
1. Super Smash Bros. Melee
But of course, no GameCube game had a bigger impact that Super Smash Bros. Melee. This classic has almost single-handedly kept the market for GameCube controller replicas and adapters alive for a decade and is still considered the best entry in the series by many.
As much as I love Ultimate, Melee had a better approach to rolling out its content. Most of its roster was locked behind decent achievements—making a new character feel earned, and not rushed out too easily as in Brawl—through multiple game modes and minigames, and nearly 300 trophies could be collected for an in-game virtual Nintendo museum. Competitive players still prefer its particular mechanics and balancing over the most recent entry, even if the Switch version has a bigger roster that includes all of the same characters.
Super Smash Bros Melee will never die at this rate, so Nintendo would be wise to lean in and offer this all-time great to the virtual GameCube roster and make it easy to see what the hype is all about—especially if we never get another installment. The Expansion Pack tier has already gained a lot of value with the addition of select Nintendo Switch 2 Edition upgrades, and having this classic mascot brawler easily available would be a huge boon to the company and the players.
