I won’t be delving too much into playing this game. Animal Leader was a curious game that kept coming up in N64 Magazines. However, as it was nearing completion, Nintendo were deciding which N64 projects were going to move to the GameCube, and Animal Leader ended up being one of those, being renamed to Cubivore. I wonder if the whole cube aesthetic was what made them pick this game to be moved over.

A prototype N64 version of the game was found, and it was almost finished. As not a lot has changed between the two versions (other than making the cubes a bit smoother, like dice, and the main character’s head being more of a cube instead of having a snout), I’ll be playing that version properly, as it also happens to be in English. I think it’s still interesting to see which games were moved and working out why – some games (like Eternal Darkness and Dinosaur Planet) likely needed the extra development time, while Animal Leader was moved for other reasons.

The game has you controlling animals made up of blocks. You roam each level in order to kill animals and absorb a block from them that gives you a power, sometimes just affecting how you move. You’ll also need to find mates to produce more powerful offspring. It all seems fascinating, and I’m looking forward to trying out the GameCube version.

Fun

It’s difficult to get excited about Animal Leader based on static screenshots alone. But, in motion, this bizarre and hugely stylized cross between Pokémon and Silicon Valley is a truly bewitching experience.

N64 Magazine #52

Should it be finished?

It was, just on GameCube instead.