Between now and the release of the Twilight Princess is a lot of time. Games like Chibi-Robo, Odama and Naruto: Clash of Ninja might help pass the time, but even these releases probably won’t keep a Gamecube owner busy for a couple months. Inspired by the Xbox 360 achievements, we thought of a couple “Cube Challenges” for some classic Gamecube games. So while you’re waiting for the Revolution and the next Zelda, dust off your old Gamecube library and give these a try. Spoiler warning: some in game secrets are spelled out in this article.
Naruto: Geiktou Ninja Taisen 4 – Unlock Nine Tails Naruto
Nine Tails of Kyubii no Naruto is likely the last character you’ll get in Naruto Geiktou Ninja Taisen 4, but before you can even get to him you’ll have to unlock Cursed Seal Sasuke level 2 first. That requires doing 120 ninja missions and don’t count on your game data from Naruto: Geiktou Ninja Taisen 3 to help you out, all that does is unlock the omake mode early. Then you have to wait for Nine Tails Naruto to randomly appear and challenge you to a battle. Once you’re in combat you have to beat him without using a continue. It’s a long road to unlocking him, but if you do give yourself a pat on the back.
Protip: Sakura randomly offers missions to you on the main menu screen, the fastest way to make her do this is enter and exit the screen.
Ikaruga
Treasure’s unique shoot ‘em up, Ikaruga, is one of the hardest games to beat on the beloved Cube. The game requires quick reflexes, fast thinking and the ability to focus while thousands of monochromatic bullets flood the screen. Beating Ikaruga is pretty tough, but half of the challenge is just finding the game. Atari, who published the game, released only a few copies in circulation. You’re going to have to trade with another collector or snag the game off eBay.
Protip: Once you log in seven hours you’ll gain unlimited continues. Sure you can beat the game if you just keep continuing, but can you complete it with just a single continue?
Tales of Symphonia – Obtain the “I hate gels title”
During the forty plus hour quest in Tales of Symphonia you can obtain titles for each of your characters. Some of these are story based and some are rewarded to you when you complete a long combo. However, the “I hate gels title” for the apprentice mage Genis is probably the hardest one to get. To earn this achievement you can’t use any healing gels until you get through 50% of the game. That means no recovering HP or TP (the Tales equivalent of MP) when you’re at low levels. Prepare for lots of saving and reloading to complete this quest.
Protip: The title restricts you from using gels, but you can still eat food to recover HP/TP after every battle. If you’re in a jam and need TP when battling a boss let a character die. Then use a life bottle, which also recovers TP
Super Mario Sunshine – Collect all of the shines
Sure you can take the easy route and beat the game by netting about fifty shine sprites. Or you can go for completion and seek out all 120 shines. To do this challenge you’ll have to complete all of the episodes in each level, find all the blue coins and collect 100 coins in each stage too. The best part about this task is you get an in game reward, a new ending screen after the credits.
Protip: Don’t forget to actually beat the game without collecting all of the shines. The final shine requires players to beat Bowser and then return to Corona Mountain.
Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker – Pictobox pro
One of the main side quests in the Wind Waker is modeled after Pokemon Snap. Link can take photos of faries, moblins and townsfolk with the Pictobox then bring these photos over to Carlov who makes figurines out of them. These figures go into your Nintendo Gallery where you can view the efforts of your hard work. To complete this quest you’ll have to snap everything, including bosses before you beat them.
Protip: There are some things Link can’t take pictures of. Instead you’ll have to speak to Lenzo and purchase them from him. Also it takes one day for Carlov to make figures, use the song of passing to speed his working up.
Super Monkey Ball – Unlock master mode
When Amusement Vision designed Super Monkey Ball they must have known that the masses wouldn’t see all the game has to offer. In concept rolling a monkey into a goal is simple enough, but the level designs in expert mode are devilish. You’ll have to maneuver through narrow ledges, corner around tight turns and with a little survive the bumper madness in level 36. There are fifty expert levels plus ten bonus stages and you can’t use a single continue throughout the entire task to get master mode.
Protip: Get every banana you can, one hundred of them nets you an extra life and you’ll need lots of lives for occasional “accidents”.
Animal Crossing – Create the model town
In Animal Crossing you can collect a lot of junk like TVs, furniture and the master sword. But did you know that you can pick up models to create a model town in your basement? Collecting these models is no easy task because you can’t purchase all of these at Tom Nook’s. Instead you have to wait until specific days like your town’s celebration in July or Halloween eve. You’ll also have to complete the museum, please the HRA and have nearly 1 billion bells in your bank account.
Protip: You don’t have to wait until October to collect Katrina’s Tent Model. All you need to do is reset the internal clock of your Gamecube forward to snag it. Just be aware that if you skip time to far forward weeds will appear and all of the residents will think you’ve skipped town for a couple of months.
Super Smash Brothers Melee – Fill the trophy room
The trophy room was one of the neatest additions to Super Smash Brothers Melee was collecting Nintendo themed trophies. You can score these by spending coins in the lottery or by finding them randomly in adventure mode. Some trophies have special requirements like the fighting female wireframe trophy requires you to beat 100 opponents in endless mode and all-star trophies can only be unlocked by playing 301 versus matches with a character.
Protip: Don’t forget to get a Pikmin save on your memory card if you want to complete this task. That is the only way to unlock the Captain Olimar trophy.
Fire Emblem: Path of Radiance – Unlock Ashnard
Beating Intelligent System’s Fire Emblem: Path of Radiance requires thought. There are 29 different chapters to complete, which can take a gamer twenty hours for a playthrough. Now if you do this fifteen times you’ll be able to play as Ashnard on the trial maps.
Protip: There’s no real trick to unlocking this faster other than beating the game fifteen times. At least with each time through it you’ll get better and should be able to beat the game faster.
Resident Evil: Zero – Kill the leeches
Completing Resident Evil: Zero opens up the Leech Hunter mini game. This time around you’ll be controlling Billy and Rebecca on a quest to collect 100 colored leeches. Spotting the leeches is hard enough, on top of that players will have to deal with angry zombies and limited ammunition. Completing this mini game gives you another surprise, unlimited ammo
Protip: It’s probably easier to dispatch all of the zombies and hunters first. This way you can take your time to spot each of the leeches.
Mega Man: Network Transmission – Beat Bass
After you beat the game you can re-enter Lan’s world. Search around Global Area 3 and you’ll stumble upon Bass, the game’s hidden boss. Bass can easily defeat Megaman in after a few shots. So you’ll have to spend time to make sure you have the right battle chips like Invis chips to defend against his attacks.
Protip: The Z-Cannon program advance is your best bet to beating Bass.
Metal Gear Solid: The Twin Snakes – Earn the “Big Boss” ranking
Only Metal Gear Solid experts will be able to attain the title of Big Boss. To get this you have to beat Metal Gear Solid: The Twin Snakes on the hardest difficulty (extreme mode) under three hours, without using a continue and using only a single ration.
Protip: Save often, you can save up to 80 times and still earn this ranking.
Paper Mario: The Thousand Year Door – Take on the 100 trials
Late in the game you can attempt the Pit of 100 trials, one hundred floors of constant battling for Mario and his party. The pit even throws Mario a curve ball with some all new enemies and a surprise boss at the end. It’s going to take the right combination of badges, high level characters and a few life shrooms to beat this challenge.
Protip: Carry some extra coins for the mover. When you find the mover you can skip a couple of floors by paying him to use his secret passage.
Final Fantasy: Crystal Chronicles – Artifact hunter
Unlike the other Final Fantasy games you don’t level up. Instead your character grows by collecting artifacts scattered in each of the levels. However, you can only keep a single artifact each time you beat an area. This means players will have to replay stages again and again to earn every artifact. After this task you’ll have the most powerful character you can get in the game.
Protip: Some artifacts can only be obtained by earning enough bonus points in a level. To do this follow the instructions like “avoid damage” or “defeat an enemy with spell fusion” to maximize your chances.
Resident Evil 4 – Earn the Chicago Typewriter
To even get a chance to buy the Chicago Typewriter you’ll have to beat the game. Then beat all of the missions in Assignment Ada. On your next play the Chicago Typewriter can be purchased at the lofty price of 1,000,000 pestas. It’s going to take a lot of work, but once this tommy gun clone is in your hands the rest of the game should be a breeze.
Protip: Conserving items and selling everything you own to the merchant is the best way to earn the money for this extra.
Are there any challenges you can think of? Or are you a game master and completed all of these? Post your thoughts in a comment.
