The worst Nintendo GameCube games of all time

The GameCube is home to some amazing games, but these ones aren't good.

Dave Aubrey | Sep 7, 2024

Nintendo GameCube / Evan-Amos via Wikipedia

The Nintendo GameCube was an incredible console, and it’s home to some of my most favorite games of all time. The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker, Twilight Princess too, Fire Emblem: Path of Radiance, Tales of Symphonia and, yes, even Super Mario Sunshine. The GameCube’s best games are some of the all-time best games, but they’re not all bangers.

The GameCube existed in a pre-digital world, and shovelware devs couldn’t just haphazardly publish any old rubbish – it had to be printed to a disc, and sold in physical stores. As a result, most of the true trash is licensed and based on whatever movie was coming out at the time. This wasn’t supposed to be a list of rubbish licensed games, but licensed games on the GameCube really are that bad, as you’ll discover if you scroll down below.

If you'd prefer to play a good game, check out our list of the 20 best N64 games ever.

Charlie’s Angels

Charlie's Angel / Ubisoft

Prepare to see a lot of licensed games on this list. While Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora and Star Wars: Outlaws aren’t setting any records or changing the world, they’re very competent and a lot of fun. Charlie’s Angels is the definition of junk. A three-hour beat-em-up with awful controls and rudimentary combat. It doesn’t even look nice. One of the GameCube’s biggest jokes.

Bad Boys: Miami Takedown

Bad Boys: Miami Takedown / Blitz Games

How about a game that has the worst celebrity impersonators you’ve ever heard, in addition to some truly awful third-person shooting? Yes, it’s Bad Boys. These impressions of Will Smith and Martin Lawrence are absolutely unforgettable for how far off the mark they are. And yes, the repetitive, incredibly loud, sound of gunfire will make you want to snap the disc in half.

Catwoman

Catwoman / EA

Most players in this game can’t figure out where to actually go, and even the game’s biggest fan won’t tell you that the combat is good. Still, somehow slightly better than the Catwoman movie that went along with it. Shame about what the movie did to Halle Berry’s career, but the game couldn’t have helped matters.

Dragon Ball Z: Sagas

Dragon Ball Z: Sagas / Atari

I can’t claim to personally be a big fan of Charlie’s Angels or Catwoman, but Dragon Ball Z? Oh yeah, you know I played this one – it was even developed by the same studio that made 2023’s Hogwarts Legacy, if you can believe it. Unfortunately, I can’t quite put into words the profound sense of disappointment I felt while playing this. It’s supposed to be a simple enough linear third-person adventure with some occasional combat, but everything feels bad. From attacking, to simply moving your character. This might be the worst Dragon Ball Z game of all time.

Pokémon Channel

Pokémon Channel / Nintendo

Pokémon Channel is barely a game, really. You click you through options with Pikachu and watch some animated shorts, all with the hope of getting a Jirachi for you to transfer to your Game Boy Advance at the end of it all. I mean, it’s better than Dragon Ball Z: Sagas. But not by much.

The Polar Express

The Polar Express / THQ

It’s an hour and a half worth of minigames that are about half as imaginative as a Temple Run clone. But set on a train, mostly.

Batman: Dark Tomorrow

Batman: Dark Tomorrow / Kemco

You will spend 50% of this game being knocked onto the floor and spending forever to get back up. The days before the Arkham games were dark indeed.

Aquaman: Battle for Atlantis

Aquaman: Battle for Atlantis / TDK

It’s a boring beat-em-up, but you’re underwater and swimming. Nobody’s defending this one.

The Scorpion King

The Scorpion King: Rise of the Akkadian / Universal Interactive

The visuals on this one are awful, but when compared to the other beat-em-ups in this list, it’s practically a hidden gem. I don’t recommend playing it, but worse things have happened. It’s definitely not The Rock in the game, mind.

Universal Studios Theme Park Adventure

Universal Studios Theme Park Adventure / Kemco

Despite having a fair few pre-rendered backgrounds, Universal Studios Theme Park Adventure might be the worst-looking game on this list. There are a handful of minigames to play based on rides at Universal Studios – well, they used to be – and other than that, you spend time picking up trash as Woody Woodpecker compliments you. The game is hideous, and when I was a child, I considered no game to be worse than Universal Studios Theme Park Adventure. In the modern day it’d be a free VR demo, and even then nobody would give it the time of day.

Published Sep 7, 2024

DAVE AUBREY

Dave Aubrey is an award-nominated (losing) video games journalist based in the UK with more than ten years of experience in the industry. A bald man known for obnoxious takes, Dave is correct more often than people would like, and will rap on command.