Nintendo GameCube Announcement Recap

TOKYO - The announcement started with a brief introduction by the vice president of Nintendo, who began by speaking about the Game Boy Advance. He outlined the specifics of the system, release dates, price points, and so on. From this point, his speech branched off, and he talked about how he knew everyone was anxiously awaiting word on Nintendo's next-generation console system. He then briefly explained that the name "Dolphin" was just a code name Nintendo used for the system up to this point, and the console should no longer be refered to by that name. At this point in the presentation, two associates wheeled a giant box onto the stage and twirled it around while air jets blew fog all around it. Explosions then went off on the stage and five women stepped out of the box, each holding a Nintendo GameCube. The giant screen behind them displayed the name of the system as they paraded on the stage with the systems in hand.

The presentation was then handed over to Takeda Genyo, one of the lead hardware designers for Nintendo, who was a key member in the development of the N64. His presentation was similar to the one given on the Game Boy Advance, touching on system specs, peripheral specs, and release dates. Shiguri Miyamoto was then introduced, and he appeared on stage with one of the prototype Nintendo GameCube controllers in hand. Miyamoto spoke briefly about the hardware and then gave a brief demonstration of the controller. Miyamoto then went into a demonstration The demonstration started off with a few Mario characters on the screen, and it ended up with 128 Mario characters and 128 boxes. Miyamoto then ran through several visual effects on the fly, with all of the characters on the screen showcasing effects such as cell-shading, transparency, and blurring. Another demonstration was shown that featured a cast of Pokemon characters singing and dancing while the GameCube's controller was used to change the camera angle in real time. After that, the presentation concluded, and we were allowed to go and have at the Game Boy Advance.

In the end, the event was extremely exciting. I don't think anyone there expected such a dramatic showing of Nintendo's next generation system, now called the GameCube. I was completely blown away by the GameCube, as was just about everyone else who was in attendance.