As of this writing, I've been jumping a bit around Nintendo Power, but I found that to be too awkward, especially as I would have go back and retrofit that anyway. Rather than that, I'm essentially "restarting" in September 2005 (Volume 195), when I bought a copy of the magazine at a newsstand and subscribed soon after, and continuing for a few years until I lapsed sometime around 2009-ish. (I had an older draft of this article likely dating to 2023 but like Volume 56, I basically redid all of it).

While Shadow the Hedgehog is on the cover (as a character), it's not exactly as a game because the Sega article actually talks about THREE games. Shadow the Hedgehog is neither covered in-depth nor reviewed. This is something that when Gail Tilden was editor, the magazine never would've done, and they said so (see Volume 49).

At the time I rather enjoyed the "new" Nintendo Power (this was its third issue, the redesign was Volume 193). I wouldn't say it was an objective improvement from what they had in the GameCube era (I wrote a bit on Volume 170, and as of this writing is the original 2023 version), but it just felt better, the same sort of "subversive" humor that G4 had at the time (maybe slightly toned down, and Nintendo Power still wasn't as crude as the other gaming magazines at the time)...but in reality the style of "wacky" humor of talking about Mr. T and Chuck Norris has aged horribly (and no, I'm not talking about the fact that Norris has since passed on).

I think I appreciated that there was a lot of new, modern stuff while (at the time) holding to the traditions of the old magazine, like Classified Information (now "Classified Info") or the Player's Poll Sweepstakes (as it had been named since 2002), with new content as well. The GameCube era may have been a bit of a bust but the Nintendo DS was starting to prove itself, and the Nintendo Revolution...well, that was a question! It certainly looked like the "real" consoles that Nintendo's competitors had.

There was a page that described some of the best sellers at the time, which had been reintroduced back in 2002. At this point, the GBA was still kicking (though had relegated itself largely to third parties) and still available (best-selling game was listed as Pokémon Emerald, followed by Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith and LEGO Star Wars). While there were still games to come, it would be effectively dead by the end of 2006 and none of the last-chance games it got Japan (Rhythm Tengoku, Mother 3) would make over in any capacity. The GameCube as well was effectively DOA, with Donkey Kong Jungle Beat listed as the best seller of the GameCube (and as a whole did terribly). (Number two and three at the time were Pokémon Colosseum and Super Mario Sunshine). The Nintendo DS had a start with Super Mario 64 and WarioWare: Touched! but was still in the awkward, experimental point of the console, and neither of those gmaes were number one (they were #2 and #3 respectively).

"Most Wanted" had also reappeared back in 2002 with the top games from each current system being listed: The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess, Fire Emblem: Path of Radiance, and Geist for the GameCube, Donkey Kong Country 3, Mario Tennis Advance, and DK: King of Swing for Game Boy Advance, and Mario Kart DS, Animal Crossing DS, and New Super Mario Bros. for the Nintendo DS.

I have to wonder what the modern "Power Charts" (with the aggregated lists) would've looked like in this time. Super Smash Bros. Melee would've topped the GameCube list this month (possibly every month), with a strong showing for Sonic Gems Collection and Madden NFL 06 in the Pros, and classics like Super Mario Sunshine, Resident Evil 4 (as badly as Donkey Kong Jungle Beat doing, Resident Evil 4 wasn't even in the top 10 for sales, so it would require Players and Pros to do the heavy lifting), and The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker from the player polls propelling them near the top. We don't have numbers but Pokémon Emerald outsold the #2 title, Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith on a 10:1 basis, so it takes #1 by a long shot. With it being #6 in sales and a popular title, I think I'd expect to see The Legend of Zelda: The Minish Cap on top as well. Super Mario 64 DS would be a shoe-in for the #1 DS title, though Kirby: Canvas Curse would be on the Top 10 as well.

The "News" section, which replaced Game Watch, talked about not just about games in development (Gun, Battles of Prince of Persia, and The Incredible Hulk: Ultimate Destruction, among several others), but also other bits and pieces. There were profiles of various characters in the Black Hole Army in the upcoming Advance Wars: Dual Strike, information on the Video Games Live concert symphony tour (produced by Tommy Tallarico, also known as the one-time owner of the Intellivision brand and the never-released "Intellivision Amico" or the creator of the Roblox "oof" sound effect...both of those come later), some dates of the games hitting in the next month (for instance, August 22, 2005, would see the release of both Advance Wars: Dual Strike and Nintendogs), an "article" on the upcoming "GameSac" by LoveSac, and a recap of what we knew about the Nintendo Revolution. The console had been announced to make games "for the hard-core and envisioning new experiences for the masses of casual and non-gamers" and that the new phrasing was that it will be "relevant to all members of a household". The Revolution would also feature an innovative controller (which "the likes of which the world has never seen") though it would be "compatible with GCN accessories" and was able to play (not freely) NES, Super NES, and N64 games. The Wii as we know fulfilled on most of these promises, maybe leaning TOO much into the casual concept...and the Wii games required the Wii controller.

There was also "The Big News. In Short." which was a paragraph of various game and game-adjacent news written in the style of a gossip column and with an eye-catching graphic that incorporated the features, like the announcement of the Viewtiful Joe anime coming to Kids' WB, though it only aired for three months) or a game based on the World Series of Poker set in Rio Las Vegas, owned by Harrah's.

I had never been to Vegas but I was somewhat familiar with Harrah's, having passed by the Lake Charles resort a number of times on Interstate 10 on trips (this being around the time it permanently closed from Hurricane Rita damage). While at the time I didn't know the parent company was a corporate spinoff of Holiday Inn, I'm sure at least at some point I wondered about a gambling game set in Lake Charles.

The section concluded with the Game Watch Forecast. The 2005 redesign had three dots distinguishing between an announcement of a game, a game in development, and release imminent. One new feature of this issue was that once again games have an indicator of when they were added to the list (they were removed when the magazine was redesigned). Upon closer inspection and comparing previous editions, there were games that were new but not red, like Crave's Sky Dancers. Released as Sky Dancers: They Magically Fly! in 2006, the game would be a continuation of the animated series based after the toy, you know, the ones that got recalled because kids kept hitting in the face with them, THOSE Sky Dancers. Given the fact that the cartoon and the toy had long since disappeared and it was released in September 2006 I can't imagine the deal being that good for Crave. But Crave's games were awful. Other games like StarCraft: Ghost are STILL on the forecast. By this point, the GameCube version had been cancelled.

Another new section was "The Family Tree", a joke column for "tracing the lineage of games"...well, just see just see for yourself.

After the poster for Advance Wars: Dual Strike, there's the "Preview" section, which were more descriptive columns for games that were closer to release, starting with Prince of Persia 3 (Prince of Persia: The Two Thrones, not Prince of Persia 3D) and concluding with Dance Dance Revolution: Mario Mix (a real case of "too little, too late" when it came to DDR and Nintendo consoles). There was also Metroid Prime Pinball in the section as well, another title that no one talks about.

The modern Nintendo Power's articles mostly had full written articles instead of strategy (often focused around interviews). So they had "Sega Goes Hog Wild!", covering not just cover feature Shadow the Hedgehog but also Sonic Rush, and Sonic Gems Collection. The interview was with Simon Jeffrey, who led Sega of America at the time.

Next, there was an article on Nintendogs ("Man's Best Friend") for the DS. The game came in three versions all with different breeds (so more accurately, there was Nintendogs: Dachshund & Friends, Nintendogs: Lab & Friends, and Nintendogs: Chihuahua & Friends). I wasn't that interested in Nintendogs but it was another innovative, experimental title that the DS was getting at the time. There was "The Agony and the XD" (Pokémon XD: Gale of Darkness, but only two pages), "Bros. of Summer" (Mario Superstar Baseball), "Help Wanted" (Trauma Center: Under the Knife), a few pages describing the demos of The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess at E3, "Inside Zelda", a monthly column interviewing people involved with aforementioned game (this time Koji Kondo, discussing, among other things an anecdote where he composed music for Cool, Cool Mountain in Super Mario 64 before he actually saw the gameplay).

George Sinfield's article "Out of Bounds?" follows next, describing open-world games (like The Incredible Hulk: Ultimate Destruction or True Crime: New York City), which was a relatively new and novel concept at the time. (By the time Zelda got around to it, it was an old, old concept). However, there's just no strategy and/or maps like there was in the old days, with only "Six Points to Reach the End Zone" (two pages on Madden NFL 06) and "Break the Curse!" (four pages on Kirby: Canvas Curse). Classified Info, which had been "promoted" in 2002 to cover game tips to help replace Counselor's Corner, has a chart for unlocking planets in Meteos, some easter eggs in Pac-Pix for what you draw, and some classic codes for the games in Sonic Mega Collection.

Next was the Player's Poll Sweepstakes, featuring six games for 26 lucky winners--Pac-Man World 3, Pac-Man Pinball Advance, Pac-Pix, Pac 'n Roll, and both the GameCube and GBA versions of Namco Museum 50th Anniversary. The grand prize winner (one of those 26) also got Namco's 25th Anniversary Arcade Cabinet. (This was the last time Namco was an independent company, their merger with Bandai would be finalized by the end of September 2005, with Bandai Namco-published games appearing in the coming months).

"Smash Planet" is an article that talks about Super Smash Bros. Melee, a game still widely enjoyed today...and then it goes onto the reviews. Reviews (now just "Reviews" instead of "Now Playing") included GameCube, Game Boy Advance, and Nintendo DS games. Headlining the entire review section was EA's Madden NFL 06, which Steve Thomason gave a 9.0 to. Already by 2005 we're at the era where 8.0 or above scores are given out to just about any game. (George Sinfield has a "Counterpoint" but he still gives it a 8.0...and Steve is no Rob). Other GameCube games include Natsume's Harvest Moon: Another Wonderful Life (the female version of Harvest Moon: A Wonderful Life), Global Star Software's Charlie and the Chocolate Factory (based after the 2005 film of the same name...this one got a 2.5), and Sonic Gems Collection (Sega). They don't really talk about the games inside of Sonic Gems Collection, noting that they liked Sonic CD and the first home version of arcade title Sonic the Fighters but disappointed that Streets of Rage didn't get in the U.S. release. For some reason, the West got really stiffed when it came to Sonic Gems Collection. Four whole games were removed from the release (Streets of Rage, Bonanza Bros., Streets of Rage 2, and Streets of Rage 3), while the PS2 version didn't get a U.S. release. In Europe, the PlayStation 2 version was released (also missing the four games) while the GameCube version wasn't released there.

The Game Boy Advance games covered included Sigma Star Saga (Namco), Charlie and the Chocolate Factory (Global Star Software, this only scored marginally better than its GameCube counterpart), Harvest Moon: More Friends of Mineral Town (Natsume, this was the female version of Harvest Moon: Friends of Mineral Town), Disney's Kim Possible III: Team Possible (Disney Interactive), and James Pond: Codename Robocod (Valcon Games, and its not even a faithful port of the Amiga original).

Finally, the DS games include the deeply flawed GoldenEye: Rogue Agent (Electronic Arts) and Nanostray (Majesco).

Another 2005 redesign feature was the last archive of the last twelve months of reviews. But despite being able to average the stars into the new numbering system these weren't exactly one-to-one reviews. Cabela's Big Game Bunter 2005 Adventures, reviewed in Volume 189, got between 2.5 stars and 3 stars, depending on the reviewer, so if you averaged them it would 2.7 stars, or 5.4 (even if you converted the stars to points it would be the same output). But instead, it gets a 4.5 (I don't think that's a typo, there weren't any reviews that were anything other than x.0 or x.5). Crave's Trigger Man reviewed in Volume 186, would've been 2.5 in the new rating system but was marked as 1/10 here. Star Fox: Assault (Volume 189) would've been 8.4 but got bumped down to 8.0. Meanwhile, Resident Evil 4 kept its perfect 10.0 score (more than they gave The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time).

The "Community" section features a section on cosplayers, the first time I had heard such a term, with several photos from "Pikmin Link". A few issues later they refer to Pikmin Link as "Liz" (in contrast to this issue, where Pikmin Link is referred to as "he"). This 2009 interview suggests that Pikmin Link/Liz is biologically male, but it seems that "Li" identifies as female these days. In any case, he or she has the skill and looks to pull off a good Link cosplay. (Tangentially related to cosplaying, I learned what a "furry" was within a few months of this issue).

Other features in Community include Pokémon Monthly (winning teams in the "Pokémon Emerald Ultimate Frontier Brain Battle"), profiling the band The Advantage, the winners of the "Touching is Good" art contest, some "Sage Reviews" (on the Nintendo Power Internet forums), and after that came the Power Quiz (featuring Sonic the Hedgehog trivia), information on back issues and Player's Guides (the most recent one was Fire Emblem: The Sacred Stones, with the three most recent before that being Pokémon Emerald, Star Fox: Assault, and The Legend of Zelda: The Minish Cap), Contacts, and Next Issue (which we have here).

Community would end up being a bit like how Reddit was in those days but in a way it feels like a bit like the old NES Journal (though "News" shares part of its duties).

Written September 27, 2026

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