11 Best GameCube Platformers

Super Monkey Ball started out in Japan as an arcade cabinet called Monkey Ball, played with a banana-shaped analog stick. Toshihiro Nagoshi, the head of Amusement Vision, came up with it. After Sega's Dreamcast was discontinued, the game moved to the GameCube as a launch title, and it became Sega's first game for a Nintendo home console. You steer a transparent ball through maze-like platforms with one of four monkeys sealed inside, and you have to reach the goal before the timer runs out.

Sega also slipped in some advertising: the billboards on one of its race tracks promote Spikeout, another Sega game of the time. There are multiplayer minigames too, so it works as a party game as well. Players expect to see it on any list of the console's best platformers.

I-Ninja is a 2003 platformer from Argonaut Games, and its hero can double jump and swing across gaps on a grappling hook. He carries a pair of katana blades, and cel-shaded graphics give the game a cartoon look that stood out from other platformers of the time. Some enemies leap into the air with him, anime style, and the fight carries on in a floating void until the foe goes down.

One reviewer said its charm and personality lift it above the fray of me-too titles. A sequel was in development at one point, but it was cancelled, most likely because Argonaut went into liquidation. So this one game is all there is.

Viewtiful Joe was one of the Capcom Five, made under director Hideki Kamiya, and it mixes 2D side-scrolling with 3D cel-shaded graphics. Joe is a movie fan whose girlfriend Silvia is kidnapped during a film starring his favourite superhero, Captain Blue. His VFX Powers slow time down or speed it up, for fights and puzzles alike.

You fight several enemies at once, and they come from all directions, including the foreground and background. Critics praised its unique visual style and gameplay. Its working title was Red Hot Man, until it ran into a copyright conflict with the Red Hot Chili Peppers. Players keep seconding it whenever someone asks for platformers.

Super Monkey Ball 2 was the first game in the series with a storyline, and the first made only for a home console. Its paths loop, spin and corkscrew, and switches that rewind or stop moving platforms push it further toward strategy and puzzle-solving than the first game. The bumps on beginner stage 3, Bumpy, turn out to be braille, and they read "Hi! This is Jamad."

Critics called the revamped minigames fantastic and singled out the level design. There are party games from monkey billiards to monkey golf, for one to four players. At Florida Hospital Celebration Health, surgeons played it as a warm-up before laparoscopic surgery. Players pick it as their favourite platformer on the console.

Vexx is a 3D platformer from Acclaim Studios Austin, spread over nine open levels where you hunt for wraithhearts, and you need 60 of them to face the final boss. He fights with the Astani War Talons, which can be charged to shoot flames for a short time. The levels range from volcanic islands to frozen citadels, and Brian Cox voices the villain, Dark Yabu.

Its lead designer named Banjo-Kazooie and Super Mario 64 as inspirations. It was nearly a game about Clip, a rodent, and Mischief, his reptile sidekick, until the pair sounded too much like Jak and Daxter. Development started in 1999 and was a strain, and plenty of features and levels were cut on the way. Players keep naming it when they list the platformers worth tracking down.

Heavy Iron Studios made Battle for Bikini Bottom, and its story is its own: Plankton invades Bikini Bottom with robots built by a machine called the Duplicatotron 3000. You play as SpongeBob, with Patrick and Sandy taking over in the sections only they can finish. The show's voice actors came back for it, apart from the voices of Mr. Krabs and Mermaid Man.

It has since picked up a cult following and a big speedrunning scene, and a remake called Rehydrated followed in 2020. Collect all 100 golden spatulas and the game ends with a cutscene of every character singing the theme song. Early screenshots show Patrick picking up a soccer ball, and in the final game it became a watermelon. Players still rank it with the console's best platformers, licence or no licence.

Billy Hatcher comes from Sonic Team, and it builds a whole platformer around eggs. Producer Yuji Naka picked eggs so players would feel the joy of caring for and hatching them. Billy can barely do anything on his own, but an egg makes him faster and gives him moves like egg dunking and slamming.

Every mission you finish earns an Emblem of Courage, and you need them to get the Legendary Chicken Suit for the last battle. There are 72 eggs to hatch, and a rooster call opens the ripe ones. The four playable characters are thought to be modelled on Sonic, Tails, Knuckles and Amy. Reviews were mixed at the time, but players keep pushing it on anyone who missed it.

Super Mario Sunshine is the second 3D Mario after Super Mario 64, and it sends Mario on holiday to Isle Delfino. A lookalike called Shadow Mario covers the island in graffiti, Mario gets convicted for it, and his sentence is cleaning up with a water pack called F.L.U.D.D. The team first came up with ten different nozzles for F.L.U.D.D., one for every situation they could think of.

It was Yoshiaki Koizumi's first lead directing role, it sold over five million copies by 2006, and it came back on Switch in Super Mario 3D All-Stars in 2020. Players reach for it first when someone asks about the console's platformers. Players named it more often than Rayman 3 or Chibi-Robo, but fewer of those picks drew backing from other players, so it lands at #4.

Chibi-Robo is a robot 10 centimetres tall with a power plug for a tail, and he works for the Sanderson family. You earn Happy Points by doing housework and solving problems for the family and the living toys in the house. Everything he does drains his battery, so you keep running back to the wall sockets to recharge. It is the only game here where vacuuming counts as progress.

It began as a point-and-click adventure and sat on hold until Shigeru Miyamoto took an interest and overhauled it. Critics praised the premise and the charming storyline. Two real Bandai toys make cameos, a Tamagotchi and a Primopuel doll. Players who found it still recommend it.

Rayman 3 is the third major Rayman game, and it sends him after André, an evil Black Lum with an army of hoodlums. He also has to find a cure for his friend Globox, who swallowed André by accident. Instead of permanent upgrades, he picks up cans of Laser Detergent, each holding one of five temporary power-ups.

It also came out on PlayStation 2 and Xbox. Billy West, who voices Murfy here, voiced Rayman himself in the animated series. The GameCube version also has a minigame of its own, 2D Nightmare, styled on Picture City from the original Rayman. Players count it among the platformers worth owning on the console.

Wario World was made by Treasure and published by Nintendo, and it is a 3D platformer with the emphasis on exaggerated combat. A sentient gem called Black Jewel has taken his treasure and his brand new castle, so Wario spins enemies, piledrives them and inhales coins like a vacuum cleaner until he gets it all back.

Critics liked how it played and complained that it was short. It still sold over 256,000 copies in the United States and came back as a Player's Choice title in 2004. The Japanese version came out later, which gave Treasure time to add a second phase to the Black Jewel fight, with new music. Leave it paused for 50 minutes and Wario stops grunting and says sorry. Players put it right next to Sunshine when they list the console's best.