The weekly roundup of everything Gamecube.

Hello again, digesters, and welcome to yet another weekly edition of the Digest.

There's no hiding from the fact that this week has been, well, deathly dull from a games point of view, so we'll keep if short this week. Very short, in fact. It seems that the world of gaming have been on their mid-term break too. Anyway, on with the news�

Prince of Persia's long-awaited release on GameCube in Europe provided this week's undoubted highlight. In case you've been living in Saddam's bunker this last week, C-E celebrated the return of one of gaming's great icons during the week with a comprehensive look at the Prince's history and previous exploits- I know I enjoyed those games when I was much younger, that's for sure. But it doesn't end there, of course. Next Friday sees the launch of Ubi Softs' Beyond Good and Evil, an original title which has been garnering extraordinary praise from the gaming media. Another essential buy, frankly. (C-E will be on hand once again to promote it). A mere two weeks later, and Square-Enix's often stunning Final Fantasy:Crystal Chronicles comes to Europe. If you hadn't heard by now, it's a multiplayer classic. At the end of March, Konami and Nintendo release Metal Gear Solid: The Twin Snakes. No introduction required.

Well, what a month, eh? At the risk of sounding like David Gosen, there has never been a better time to be a 'Cube owner. The only problem now is finding money for all those games...

In other news, a Final Fantasy music concert is to be held in Los Angeles, America, on May 10th. It's the first concert of its kind to be held outside its native Japan. "I am overjoyed about the FINAL FANTASY concert to be held in Los Angeles," said series composer Nobuo Uematsu. "With this being the first FINAL FANTASY orchestral concert outside of Japan, it marks a very exciting moment in the history of the franchise. I am looking forward to seeing our fans at the concert in May."

Uematsu is regarded by many fans as a deity of some kind. Reminds me of how certain Nintendo fans regard a particular man in Kyoto.

Elsewhere in Japan, the Game Boy Advance SP continues to go from strength to strength, with a huge 99,000 units sold in the last week alone. The PS2 was a distant second with only half that amount being shifted. GameCube remains sub-10,000 units, while the Xbox, well, the poor thing would be classified as extinct if it were an animal. Which several C-E staffers happen to believe it is, incidentally.

Nintendo's Famicom Mini series for the GBA has gone down a storm in Japan, to the surprise of many. 3 of the retro titles, including Super Mario Bros., Donkey Kong and the Legend of Zelda, have made the all-format top ten. They could of course, have bought Animal Crossing instead....

Popular gaming website IGN, whose credibility I now doubt given their way-off-the-mark review of Mario Kart- but that's a personal thing- has reported from unofficial Japanese sources that Nintendo is touting a Spring release for Pikmin 2 in the Land Of The Rising Sun. A Spring release of this title would herald the end of months of delays for the sequel to the much-loved Pikmin. Pikmin 2 has been on release schedules for the best part of a year, and was originally due for release at the end of 2003- it was pushed back for unconfirmed reasons.

Until now it was believed that Namco's game Street Racing Syndicate was coming to the GameCube, but now it seems that the game will in fact be heading to PS2 and Xbox only."SRS will be available for PS2 and Xbox, not the GameCube" was the official, somewhat terse statement Namco gave.

Meanwhile, THQ have confirmed they plan to release a game for the Nintendo DS. No other news was forthcoming, unfortunately.

I could give you the rest of the week's news- like how numerous market analysts have gazed into their crystal balls and seen incredibly obvious stuff like that the next next-gen consoles will sell more than ever before, and that the sky is blue, or how pachinko company Sammy are slowly taking control of Sega. But it's not that interesting, to be honest, and it's not why you're reading this very article.

So, that's about all for this week, then.

Tot volgende week! (That's for all you Dutch out there)

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