Best RPGs on the GameCube

The rpg games worth playing on the Nintendo GameCube start with Paper Mario The Thousand-Year Door, Tales of Symphonia, Fire Emblem Path of Radiance.

The GameCube and RPGs

The best-built console Nintendo made and the one fewest people bought. Its library is unusually experimental because it had nothing to lose.

RPGs are a solid rather than a defining part of this library — worth knowing, but not the reason anybody owns the machine.

Filtering to RPG means you want progression — a character to build or a party to grow — layered on top of whatever else you liked.

The RPGs Worth Playing

  1. 1. Paper Mario The Thousand-Year Door

    Follow the link for hand-written recommendations if you want more like it.

  2. 2. Tales of Symphonia

    Follow the link for hand-written recommendations if you want more like it.

  3. 3. Fire Emblem Path of Radiance

    Follow the link for hand-written recommendations if you want more like it.

  4. 4. Skies of Arcadia Legends

    Follow the link for hand-written recommendations if you want more like it.

  5. 5. Custom Robo

    Follow the link for hand-written recommendations if you want more like it.

  6. 6. Baten Kaitos

    Follow the link for hand-written recommendations if you want more like it.

What Makes a Good RPG Game

A reason to keep going after the novelty wears off. RPGs are the genre that reliably converts hours into feeling more capable.

Immediacy. Almost every RPG asks for a slow first few hours, and the systems that make hour forty good are the same ones that make hour one a menu.

Frequently Asked Questions

What is the best rpg game on the GameCube?

Paper Mario The Thousand-Year Door is the usual first answer, and there are 6 in the library we cover.

Was the GameCube good at rpg games?

It is a solid rather than a defining part of the library.

What is the difference between an RPG and an action game with stats?

Whether the stats are the point. In an RPG the build decides what you can do; in an action game with stats the build only decides how fast you do it.

Do I need to like turn-based combat?

No. The picks below span turn-based, real-time and action RPGs, and each one says which it is.

How is this list put together?

From the games this site covers on the Nintendo GameCube, matched against hand-mapped gameplay categories rather than a storefront's genre tag. A page only exists where there are at least four, which is why some console and genre combinations have no page at all.

RPGs on Other Consoles

More From the GameCube

Or browse the whole Nintendo GameCube library.