i actually got this game from a toys R us for like 5 bucks and ended up loving it. since the game cube was all i had it was the closest thing to halo i had. my friends nad i played the multiplayer all the time. so this video broght back some happy memories :) thanks. (also there was a bug on one of the collectables that you get to unlock multiplayer stuff, like extra maps and special characters. in a fridge on one of the last levels was one of the collectables that would not save or be counted no matter what, so in order to unlock everything you had to use cheat codes XD. it was unique in multiplayer because if your body was about to die yo ucould abandon it for another with a different weapon. but if the old body died you lost 2 points not just one. special characters were the chef that threw dish plates on one level, the naked girl with glasses she used a towl as a i hit whip. the actual old guy in the chair had a rocket launcher built into it with infinate ammo XD you had to possess a hiden cocroach in the muliplayer level to get to him. uhh lesse, there was a specail weapon that was those lil plasma spitfire things that acted as a flame thrower, and the main character had the God pistol that one shot everything. good times... goood times. also in the map that had the chef there was a mesh glitch you could do to get outside the map and snipe the bots or your friends if you jumped juuuust right XD
A guy I met like 10 years later, said the same thing. His take was that one of the founders of n-space went to college with the founder of the Metroid studio, and was looking to purposely drive Giest into the same kind of bleeding money situation, so that the studio would eventually be bought out and run by Nintendo, effectively giving them an exit. Though, my question to him was why would they do that with an original IP? Anyway, my experience with working on the game kinda felt like I was the supposed to be the fall guy on that project anyway. After my near firing, and a complete reshuffling of roles, Giest became a heavily Nintendo lead project. (just after the 2003 E3 build I think)
I remember reading a long thread about this game where someone possessed a rat and looked up a woman's dress and swore he saw her vulva. Someone in the thread did some graphics work to make the image more clear and it looked like he was correct. While trying to solve this mystery, it was eventually discovered that the woman used for the character model came from a large database of nude people used for digital modeling and they found the actual woman used for this specific character model. Turns out that the artists messed up and accidentally left her lady parts in the game.
If anyone is interested, it's a thread called "Am I crazy or did Geist have nudity" on NeoGAF. I learned a bit about how character models work in video games.
"They made Giest" Huh? Doesn't ring a bell "The made Heroes of Ruin" That's a thing? "They made Rugrats: Search for Reptar" OOOHHHH N-SPACE! Now that's my game!
The most memorable part about Geist was one of my lab instructors in college having done the box art. She was a very nice and helpful lady and I hope she's still making art for the industry.
@@thegaspatthegateway indeed it was. Had to dig through the comments a minutes as it was a bit down there. Thanks for pointing it out, kind of neat little connection with another random commentor.
@@EmperorSeth There should be a What Happun on No More Heroes. An underdog that continue to garner more praise with each new sequel. It was originally supposed to fail, right?
Geist definitely deserved better. It's a very hit or miss game. The second half being, honestly kind of bad but all the possession mechanics in the first half of the game were quite fun. The game is definitely unique.
It's one of those ideas that should really be tried again. With how first person shooters and puzzlers have changed and diversified since 2005, it could really be something special.
I was happy with it, at least for some $20 used. I remember a lot of "find thing to posess/press A/progress/repeat" nonsense, but possessing one guy to murder two others then seduko against his will was always cool. Things sometimes got creative and weird, too. A sequel (maybe indirect or spiritual) could have definitely worked. Definitely worth emulating for 0$ using Dolphin imho.
I think if they had kept the straight possession first person shooter aspect where your life bar is as frail when possessing as the mooks your shooting that would have been a fun interesting idea. Constantly jumping from body to body would have been a really cool resource management aspect. A boss fight with minions where you have to keep possessing the different minions as the boss shreds you.
There's an arcade beat em up by Technos called Shadow Warriors where you can possess any enemies beside a boss character and fight using their body/moveset
This is one of the more lowkey depressing episodes This game seemed like it had everything going for it and the team was genuinely passionate about it, and then just crumbled at the end
Saturday's at my job are a nightmare. Finding this series has made them bareable. Once I see the new episode uploaded, I take my break and watch it. I genuinely makes my day, I am never disappointed in a wha happun episode!
Dude you don't know how much I get you. I'm low in money an overtime with 16 hrs shifts is common now, I end up like a rock of how much stress I have, but as soon as I see a what happen I can feel my self melt back to reality. Damn this world, God bless wha happun.
I was hired in 2003 and put on Giest to replace a guy who's levels I had to eventually take over after he quit. It was hell. Hidden geometry, collapsed verts. This was a time of the wild west of studios. Defined roles like FX artist, Designer(scripter), and World builder were sometimes filled by one person (Hello). Things were being done with final UV, Textures, and Lightmaps baked before design was playtested by the target audience, our Nintendo upper management. I was put on the project to do a jump puzzle after you possessed the dog by scaring him with his bowl. That meant I was doing the room, the design, the lighting, and models. This was the build that was about to be sent to E3. We were doing 10 hour days for weeks and I was finally getting the handle on things like light maps and texel density. Then one late night, a programmer checked in a vision filter for the ghost mode, without testing it in game. For my entire level. The result, the game we sent to Japan (at like 3am) was , when opened, almost pitch black and completely unplayable. I was thrown under the bus at that moment. But curiously not fired. If you would like to know more, just ask me. It gets a little tin foil hatty.
Christ, Most people would get a heart attack if something like that happen to them. Also, how would you say the relationship between N-space and Nintendo is like? How often does plan change because big N said so?
@@MultiTheGamerman I was young and didn't know any better. After my near firing, and a complete reshuffling of roles, Giest became a heavily Nintendo lead project. (just after the 2003 E3 build I think)
I'm guessing you guys didn't have a proper version management control system in place to go back to the previous working version to hand off to be showcased at E3? It always seems like every single company fails in this regard.
@@KratonWolf version control was in place for code, art, not so much, just weekly backups. They just tweaked the vision filter and did another build the next day I believe, (full builds could take hours then). But the damage to my reputation was done, though the entire team was put on notice. I believe that was a misread cue that Nintendo wanted me out, but that is not the Japanese style of management.
Man, I loved this game when this first came out; it was rough around the edges but its concept and scenes were great and made for some unintentional laughs, like when you posses a microscope, and you move the specs so it says "DIE" to scare the scientist and then posses him.
@@PhyreI3ird And my favorite one; the protagonist 's best friend asking him to posses a bike so he can ride him. My friends and I just CACKLED at that one. This game takes itself so seriously but it's scenarios are hilarious!
This is one of the only games I can think of where the ideas brought by the publisher actually improved the game Obviously it was impossible but I think this game would have hit really well if it came out in 2003 instead of 2005
As the one Geist fan in existence I'm so glad to see this after ALL the times you kept referencing it. You don't know how long I've been waiting for this one, man.
With Kirby on the minds of so many people right now, I'd like to throw Kirby GCN in the ring as a potential subject for a future What Happened! It's got a super interesting history, both before and after its development, and it'd be really cool to see someone discuss its origins, development, and how its influence can still be seen in the series today.
@The tricky tick because that's what the game magazines and gaming sites used at the time. just like how some people use PSX and some use PS1 when talking about the original playstation.
@The tricky tick I heard a possible reason for that a while ago actually. Nintendo themselves came up with GCN, they didn't use NGC because that was already an abbreviation for 'National geographic channel' and Nintendo didn't want a lawsuit on their hands.
Poor geist was such a interesting idea but it couldn't haunt into people's hearts. I never thought it was a bad game but it had parts of being repetitive and it's shows that sometimes Nintendo wanted to much in games.
So far I had the impression that while the game didn't reach many people, it has a few people who really like it though. Obviously nothing commercially viable, but still.
I remember playing this game as a kid and thinking the possession mechanic was the tightest shit. I loved the idea of playing as a ghost trying to get his body back from a mad scientist and I think I beat it several times. It really sucks this story ended the way it did, I think they really had a gem here.
I love how so often Miyamoto just comes across like someone's weird uncle who shows up in the office and looks at what you're doing and just makes really weird and bizarre suggestions except they end up always turning out to be great.
Funny story. I listen to real radio 104.1 in Orlando. Tom and Dan just mentioned your video on air today! One of them had helped with the voice acting back in 2003. I was amused by world's coming together. Found the clip. Tom and Dan live's Fat Tuesday episode at 3:10:50
I still own a copy of Geist. Bought it back in the days when you could buy used GameCube games dirt cheap. Always just lost in the shuffle amongst the other western-developed Nintendo-published offerings. Should've hit up id Software at the time to do a Wolfenstein crossover, have BJ eat that possessed dog food.
Man I think this game deserves a bit more recognition, I mean it was Nintendo's second ever M rated game, after Eternal Darkness. Plus the multiplayer modes were actually really fun and hectic. Honestly I just have a soft spot for it.
Back when the sequel was in development, I remember reading something about how there were legal issues over who owned the name "F.E.A.R.", and so the developer went with calling it something along the lines of "Project Origin" (I want to say it was named after an in-universe thing but I've haven't played a F.E.A.R. game yet so) until they ultimately did get the rights to the name or something. With that in mind, it probably would have been a really generic name.
@@LonelySpaceDetective Yeah Project Origin is a big deal in the lore of the games, exactly what it's named after lol, (i've played all the games and I wish there was more lol)
@@Web720 Yeah, but it's not like you could get away with calling your PC title "Custom Robo" or something just because that series was only on Nintendo consoles.
Wait a minute, a shooter with possession mechanics, later cooperation with Square-Enix. You know this whole thing kind of reminds me of this other, much more infamous game with a similar mechanics and hopefully a much more insane production history. Now what was it again.... oh yeah MINDJACK! Looking forward to that one sometime.
I still have my Gamecube box that shows this game on the back. It looked cool but was just not interested enough to actually rent it to play. I hope someone suggests Rise and Fall Civilizations at War in the future. I remember that RTS being so unique at the time. Never knew what happun to it, but I remember you could directly control a Hero unit turning it into a third person shooter style gameplay.
Honestly surprised to hear that both companies were in good terms and both really wanted the game to be good, sad to hear it failed, though the concept of possessing everything is interesting it should've been on a different game then trying to be part of this game.
Geist was a wild ride, but wow someone else sort of remembers Danger Girl. I used to work at THQ as a tester, and one day they cleaned out an office storage room that was full of old games by letting the testers come and take whatever they wanted. I found not only a whole box of leftover copies of Danger Girl, but a giant Danger Girl poster that was autographed by the voice actresses of the three main characters. It had sat in that storage room for more than 9 years because no one wanted it.
For a future What Happened? episode, I would like to nominate Oddworld: Munch's Oddysee. Not only did it have a troubled production, it's also the game that derailed the original Oddworld Quintology and where things turned sour for Oddworld Inhabitants all together.
Some of the gunplay was pretty interesting, considering when you were in ghost mode the action would slow down to bullet time. At the end of the game you'd fight other ghosts that'd possess soldiers so it was surprisingly tactical in its best moments. But I recognized even as a young teenager that was hyped for the game that it was pretty under baked and unfocused in a lot of ways Split screen multiplayer was actually pretty fun though!
that's the biggest thing about the game: how most of it is just a bit undercooked. The visuals were pretty muxh just okay, the controls feel a bit clunky or swampy, parts are a bit repetetive, just a whole lot of things piled up to make the game easy to rate lowly. Which is such a shame, because I still love it to bits and was heartbroken at n-space closing after hoping for a sequel or something for a few years. Even n-Space stated they were interested in working on geist again, but sadly it never came to be.
3:42 - Well, it is very possible Mr. Shigeru Miyamoto san took a lot of inspiration from "Geist" (2005) when he and the Nintendo crew designed "Super Mario Odyseey" (2017). Considering he liked the possesion part of gameplay so much and gameplay have always been his biggest "look-at" when analysing video games combined with his passion for findning new innovations for new ways to play video games, it seems logic.
I always remember this game as the one I'd see at the store when I went with my parents. I always wanted it, but never got around to buying it. I remember putting it on a few Christmas lists as well. The coverart was just so cool looking to me, even if it did also kinda creep me out.
This was one of the first games me and my dad really bonded over. The funny part is that we were never able to finish the game. The disk had a scratch on it that stopped us from playing past a certain point. I’m gonna get a GameCube and this game and finally play it fully with him
When I went to college the concept artist for Giest was a teachers assistant and boy did she say it was an experience lol. She liked the the opportunity to do concept art work but she said it was a nightmare altogether.
Full Sail right? I had her as one of my lab assistants and she was super awesome. This was back in early 2006 so not even a full year after the game launched.
0:37 I remember seeing a favorable review for Odama from Game Informer at the time and thinking it was such an interesting concept for a game. I still never bought it though, and in retrospect I'm sad to see the end of mid-end budget games with unique concepts that just never got the chance. You can spend the money to see a weird movie just to experience it, but games just cost a bit more and require more of your time to risk the investment.
I got to play this growing up and was surprised at it’s quality and general sense of fun. My brother and I played the PvP a lot, and it wasn’t balanced, but it was fun!
You got me with that Sakurai ending haha, great vid. I was very fond of Geist when it came out despite it not being a great game, it was fun for what it was and tried to make it's core mechanic interesting.
My friends and I used to play the split screen multiplayer and there are hidden characters like the Main Protagonist in maps. They are OP if you find them. I remember one map with a bunch of vents and inside the vent maze is Remi
I think if they consider a reboot of Geist, it would be nice to explore the ghost possession mechanic with a more open world and creative freedom aspect. With that in mind, it could be something to behold.
I enjoyed this game as a kid. Played and beat it quite a few times. It was rough around the edges but it was still solid with game play and game mechanics. Wish some type of sequel came to be
Geist got done dirty. I love this game, it's like a mod team had some tech and were just throwing shit at the wall to see what they could do. It had a free spirit about it, that really exceeded the technical abilities of the Gamecube or the engine choice. I appreciated it's novel approach to scenario and level design with the possession mechanics, and I hope another game manages to execute on that poltergeist concept with a greater degree of polish. RIP, NSpace, you'll be missed.
Im calling you out Matt Thanks for never whining for likes and subs. Your content is always, always fun and feels like a visit with a friend. Keep up the great work
Man I'm on gamer but it sounds like this game had a genuinely creative premise and concept that was sadly executed a bit shakily and undermined by development hell and poor promotion. Seems like it's at least remembered fondly as a nostalgic cult classic, which I suppose is better than being remembered for Battlefield Earth style awfulness.
I don't think you could call it development hell. The development of the game itself was smooth, just that it was an experimental game in nature, so it took more time to develop than your run-of-the-mill game.
Omg. You are in my head man! I will always remember this game as my first experience with genuine disappointment as a child. I guess this means I got to donate to your patreon now.
I’d love to see another attempt at this concept, honestly, there’s definitely a good game somewhere in there. I’m imagining something ioi Hitman-y, but 47 could BE the chandelier or electric cable. Or possess people instead of take their clothes. Could have ghostbuster gates and sensors and shit that require you to be stealthy and change tactics. Also I just remembered Murdered: Soul Suspect and now I’m depressed cause that game’s concept is SO MY SHIT but its execution was meh.
This genuinely made me want to seek a physical copy for my collection as it seems like something I'd be down to play in an afternoon or two, but apparently it's now a somewhat expensive game for a commercial and critical flop. It's like $40-80 online.
I would see this game on shelves everytime I’d go to whatever game store looking at it with mild interest but never got around to buying it cause I was always looking for something else. I do still want to play this game someday, one game on the N64 I grew up with was Space Station Silicon Valley that was kind of a similar concept just the theme was different, instead of playing as a ghost possessing things and people you were a computer chip or some shit that fell out of a robot and you jumped into the bodies of robotic animals to take control of them and solve puzzles. The game was very broken and showed a could signs of being unfinished including some collectables not being coded to be collected so it was actually impossible to 100% it without cheats but I played enough of it to have fun with it so I may or may not enjoy Geist to a similar degree.
Surprised you didn't mention the famous NoA meeting where Reggie asked a boardroom of people what they had to offer to make the GameCube more competitive in the market, and they all started blurting out marketing soundbites for Geist, which led to him putting his hands on the table and saying "Don't BS me"
Loved Geist. I remember the first time reading about the game in a Nintendo magazine and been blowed away by the premise of scaring people and the ghost mechanics. I mean yeah it has problems but it was memorable. Like when the evil ghost steals Raimi's real body shit was cash. ALSO the multiplayer was hella of fun ! JUSTICE FOR GEIST
I wouldn't even know about half of the games you talk about if it wasn't for this channel, and for that I am grateful for the What Happened videos for showing me how complicated, and fascinating video game development is.
Not sure if there's a juicy story nor even any documentation on this one, but would love to see a look into Lego Universe, the Lego MMO that got cancelled almost immediately after launch
I loved the beginning of the game, where it had a heavy focus on the adventure/puzzling bits. It lost me in the second half where it suddenly got SUPER focused on the shooting. It got boring and tedious real fast, in that the environments didn't feel like they were set up for said shooting and the possession just got in the way. If they'd have stuck with how it was at the start, it've been perfect (for me).
Honestly, hearing that the team stumbled onto the absolute banger idea of "playing a fucking ghost that can posess shit" and still wanted to just make a pretty normal FPS with it kind of explains how the game was kinda boring. They had no fucking creative juices in their heads.
Might be able to do a "What Happun" on Dirt Rally 3.0 cause of the recent news of them waiting to obtain the WRC title as well. Supposedly dirt rally 3 shelved because of it. After E.A buying Codemasters. Idk. I'm worried about the rally franchise. Aside from that appreciate your work. Always entertaining
....I Have a Bizarre one, What Happened to a Nintendo Gamecube game, "Go Go Hypergrind!"? I remembered playing this game, and all i heard it was it never sold very well.
I really liked Geist when it came out. Definitely had its problems but it was such a cool concept and had great ideas. It was honestly just unpolished mechanically.
I don't remember the game's name, but it was a PS2 game by the people that did Primal (Primal is excellent, btw - minus being too dark and the water levels)... OK so it's called _Ghosthunter_ (I've never played it), what a coincidence ^^ and I totally remembered and didn't just look it up (the possession thing isn't anything new or original, either... Messiah, Omikron the nomad soul,... etc.)
I am shocked SHOCKED that anyone else remembers Future Tactics: The Uprising. That and Geist were both a lot of fun, if a bit janky. Gamecube really had a lot of games that fit that description honestly.
I had this game circa 2007, and absolutely loved it. The game was interesting in it's mechanics, and felt is was something I hadn't seen before. Surprisingly, I still have the same feeling going back and playing it now. I feel the game was criminally underrated then, and completely overlooked now.
It's a shame this game didn't do well. I certainly enjoyed the heck out of it. It would be nice if this got a remake for the Switch but I doubt it will.
Man, I remember that game from Thesampleman who LPed it about 8 years ago. Despite its ugly Dreamcast-esque graphics, I loved it so much. This game should've had a spiritual successor. There aren't many games where you play as a spirit who can possess living things.
I really liked the concept of Geist. I’d rather it just kept it to possessing people, though, like a Quantum Leap game might look. Imagine the possibilities of no health packs, but jumping from one NPC to another before your NPC dies, so that you don’t become trapped intermingled with that soul forever. I mean, that just sounds like a really cool game concept to me.
sometimes the multyplayer woked like that. You could either run around and get health pickups or just disposess, leaving your host for 3 seconds before it despawns (if it's killed during that time you'll lose a point on to pof the nemy scoring) and pick the next host. On some maps and in some spots it was quite easy to circle around health pickups until you ran out of ammo and needed to refill, in other places switching hosts after battle worked out better. Just remember all of that with the somewhat lacking polish that permeates the game.
Every Nintendo entry on this show might as well boil down to the NCL guys (and frequently Miyamoto) going "imma let you finish, but..." to an American studio, the studio going "their suggestions were great and we worked them into our existing game and the styles play well together", then the Arrested Development narrator coming in and saying "They didn't"
I remember the arc of this being covered in Nintendo Power, and then it not reviewing that well. I'll still get around to playing it. On the topic of possession games...Second Sight was an amazing title on Gamecube/PS2/Xbox/PC
Genuinely one of my favorites despite its very obvious flaws. Unique mechanics, ESPECIALLY in multiplayer. Also love occult and supernatural shit in modern settings
I never thought anyone would talk about this specimen, I have feelings about this game for years, I'll play it occasionally (doesn't mean I like it), but man...it had so much potential back then...
Actually, I got this for my birthday years ago, when I was still in high school, and alongside Odama, on top of that. I thought it was quite alright, and I played it all the way through back in the day.
Metroid Prime had a really similar development to Geist, check that out here if you haven't seen it! - ruclips.net/video/tuc8X9qKePo/видео.html
i actually got this game from a toys R us for like 5 bucks and ended up loving it. since the game cube was all i had it was the closest thing to halo i had. my friends nad i played the multiplayer all the time. so this video broght back some happy memories :) thanks. (also there was a bug on one of the collectables that you get to unlock multiplayer stuff, like extra maps and special characters. in a fridge on one of the last levels was one of the collectables that would not save or be counted no matter what, so in order to unlock everything you had to use cheat codes XD. it was unique in multiplayer because if your body was about to die yo ucould abandon it for another with a different weapon. but if the old body died you lost 2 points not just one. special characters were the chef that threw dish plates on one level, the naked girl with glasses she used a towl as a i hit whip. the actual old guy in the chair had a rocket launcher built into it with infinate ammo XD you had to possess a hiden cocroach in the muliplayer level to get to him. uhh lesse, there was a specail weapon that was those lil plasma spitfire things that acted as a flame thrower, and the main character had the God pistol that one shot everything. good times... goood times. also in the map that had the chef there was a mesh glitch you could do to get outside the map and snipe the bots or your friends if you jumped juuuust right XD
@@Mankey619 VITA MEANS LIFE
N-Space will be missed. They made some good CoD games ma broskees! 👁️👄👁️👍
Asa fan of this game I gotta say, you'all missed out, it ended up being pretty sick
A guy I met like 10 years later, said the same thing. His take was that one of the founders of n-space went to college with the founder of the Metroid studio, and was looking to purposely drive Giest into the same kind of bleeding money situation, so that the studio would eventually be bought out and run by Nintendo, effectively giving them an exit. Though, my question to him was why would they do that with an original IP? Anyway, my experience with working on the game kinda felt like I was the supposed to be the fall guy on that project anyway. After my near firing, and a complete reshuffling of roles, Giest became a heavily Nintendo lead project. (just after the 2003 E3 build I think)
I remember reading a long thread about this game where someone possessed a rat and looked up a woman's dress and swore he saw her vulva. Someone in the thread did some graphics work to make the image more clear and it looked like he was correct. While trying to solve this mystery, it was eventually discovered that the woman used for the character model came from a large database of nude people used for digital modeling and they found the actual woman used for this specific character model. Turns out that the artists messed up and accidentally left her lady parts in the game.
If anyone is interested, it's a thread called "Am I crazy or did Geist have nudity" on NeoGAF. I learned a bit about how character models work in video games.
I swear the internet would've solved the Zodiac Killings by now if he hid some tits in one of his cyphers.
You're tellling me that quantic dream made a geist reference in beyond two souls?
Godspeed, you crazy man. Reviving an almost ten year old thread about bs in an obscure game. Gotta love the internet.
that was a wild ride
"They made Giest"
Huh? Doesn't ring a bell
"The made Heroes of Ruin"
That's a thing?
"They made Rugrats: Search for Reptar"
OOOHHHH N-SPACE! Now that's my game!
Their overall obscurity and stark lack of performance upon release makes me wonder if marketing failures were a big factor here?
The most memorable part about Geist was one of my lab instructors in college having done the box art. She was a very nice and helpful lady and I hope she's still making art for the industry.
Did you go to the same school as the other person in the comments?
@@thegaspatthegateway indeed it was. Had to dig through the comments a minutes as it was a bit down there. Thanks for pointing it out, kind of neat little connection with another random commentor.
I find it weird that the game focused more on what Japanese Nintendo wanted, *only to end up not having a release in Japan!*
"Tested by yours truly!" Oh that's cool! That's cool having you finally run into yourself on this show! I hope to see more!
This might be the first time I ever saw Matt's real name.
@@EmperorSeth There should be a What Happun on No More Heroes. An underdog that continue to garner more praise with each new sequel. It was originally supposed to fail, right?
Matt's last name isn't McMuscles?! Fucking robbed man >:((((((((
As long as he doesn’t end up getting caught up in some nightmare development for months under a tyrant.
@@spiralgodking9877 its already a failure in japan lol
Geist definitely deserved better. It's a very hit or miss game. The second half being, honestly kind of bad but all the possession mechanics in the first half of the game were quite fun. The game is definitely unique.
Agreed. I enjoyed it. The puzzles were a little rough in places, but it was still a worthy play.
But does it have an FOV slider?
It's one of those ideas that should really be tried again. With how first person shooters and puzzlers have changed and diversified since 2005, it could really be something special.
I was happy with it, at least for some $20 used. I remember a lot of "find thing to posess/press A/progress/repeat" nonsense, but possessing one guy to murder two others then seduko against his will was always cool. Things sometimes got creative and weird, too. A sequel (maybe indirect or spiritual) could have definitely worked.
Definitely worth emulating for 0$ using Dolphin imho.
Fuck those end game bosses dude. Well except the true boss maybe. That was a cool idea in theory.
I think if they had kept the straight possession first person shooter aspect where your life bar is as frail when possessing as the mooks your shooting that would have been a fun interesting idea. Constantly jumping from body to body would have been a really cool resource management aspect. A boss fight with minions where you have to keep possessing the different minions as the boss shreds you.
Well then you're just playing Mind Jack and yeaaaaa, once was enough for me.
That description reminds me of "3rd birthday" on the PSP. And that game had plenty of issues of it's own.
Isn't that literally Messiah?
That's what that game is called, right? Where you're a cherub and have to possess people to do anything?
There's an arcade beat em up by Technos called Shadow Warriors where you can possess any enemies beside a boss character and fight using their body/moveset
Isn't that Prototype tho?
This is one of the more lowkey depressing episodes
This game seemed like it had everything going for it and the team was genuinely passionate about it, and then just crumbled at the end
Saturday's at my job are a nightmare. Finding this series has made them bareable. Once I see the new episode uploaded, I take my break and watch it. I genuinely makes my day, I am never disappointed in a wha happun episode!
LOL I’m taking 15 and watching it on break too
Watching it before work.
Watching these after work is a godsend. Makes getting through work THAT much easier
Dude you don't know how much I get you. I'm low in money an overtime with 16 hrs shifts is common now, I end up like a rock of how much stress I have, but as soon as I see a what happen I can feel my self melt back to reality. Damn this world, God bless wha happun.
I was hired in 2003 and put on Giest to replace a guy who's levels I had to eventually take over after he quit. It was hell. Hidden geometry, collapsed verts. This was a time of the wild west of studios. Defined roles like FX artist, Designer(scripter), and World builder were sometimes filled by one person (Hello). Things were being done with final UV, Textures, and Lightmaps baked before design was playtested by the target audience, our Nintendo upper management. I was put on the project to do a jump puzzle after you possessed the dog by scaring him with his bowl. That meant I was doing the room, the design, the lighting, and models. This was the build that was about to be sent to E3. We were doing 10 hour days for weeks and I was finally getting the handle on things like light maps and texel density. Then one late night, a programmer checked in a vision filter for the ghost mode, without testing it in game. For my entire level. The result, the game we sent to Japan (at like 3am) was , when opened, almost pitch black and completely unplayable. I was thrown under the bus at that moment. But curiously not fired. If you would like to know more, just ask me. It gets a little tin foil hatty.
Christ, Most people would get a heart attack if something like that happen to them. Also, how would you say the relationship between N-space and Nintendo is like? How often does plan change because big N said so?
@@MultiTheGamerman I was young and didn't know any better. After my near firing, and a complete reshuffling of roles, Giest became a heavily Nintendo lead project. (just after the 2003 E3 build I think)
Bro you're so fucking cool. Geist was a huge part of my childhood
I'm guessing you guys didn't have a proper version management control system in place to go back to the previous working version to hand off to be showcased at E3?
It always seems like every single company fails in this regard.
@@KratonWolf version control was in place for code, art, not so much, just weekly backups. They just tweaked the vision filter and did another build the next day I believe, (full builds could take hours then). But the damage to my reputation was done, though the entire team was put on notice. I believe that was a misread cue that Nintendo wanted me out, but that is not the Japanese style of management.
Man, I loved this game when this first came out; it was rough around the edges but its concept and scenes were great and made for some unintentional laughs, like when you posses a microscope, and you move the specs so it says "DIE" to scare the scientist and then posses him.
HOLY SHIT I forgot about that one!! XD
@@PhyreI3ird And my favorite one; the protagonist 's best friend asking him to posses a bike so he can ride him. My friends and I just CACKLED at that one. This game takes itself so seriously but it's scenarios are hilarious!
This is one of the only games I can think of where the ideas brought by the publisher actually improved the game
Obviously it was impossible but I think this game would have hit really well if it came out in 2003 instead of 2005
I remember this game being amazing when I rented it once but literally none of my friends had heard of it
As the one Geist fan in existence I'm so glad to see this after ALL the times you kept referencing it. You don't know how long I've been waiting for this one, man.
Make it two.
With Kirby on the minds of so many people right now, I'd like to throw Kirby GCN in the ring as a potential subject for a future What Happened! It's got a super interesting history, both before and after its development, and it'd be really cool to see someone discuss its origins, development, and how its influence can still be seen in the series today.
If not Kirby GCN directly, then maybe an episode on Kirby's Return to Dreamland?
Name Gube Cintendo
Gintendo Came Nube
@The tricky tick because that's what the game magazines and gaming sites used at the time.
just like how some people use PSX and some use PS1 when talking about the original playstation.
I wonder if Matt could unearth some new stuff about it; even if there are lots of videos on it, it’d be cool to see what he could find.
@The tricky tick I heard a possible reason for that a while ago actually. Nintendo themselves came up with GCN, they didn't use NGC because that was already an abbreviation for 'National geographic channel' and Nintendo didn't want a lawsuit on their hands.
Poor geist was such a interesting idea but it couldn't haunt into people's hearts. I never thought it was a bad game but it had parts of being repetitive and it's shows that sometimes Nintendo wanted to much in games.
So far I had the impression that while the game didn't reach many people, it has a few people who really like it though.
Obviously nothing commercially viable, but still.
I remember playing this game as a kid and thinking the possession mechanic was the tightest shit. I loved the idea of playing as a ghost trying to get his body back from a mad scientist and I think I beat it several times. It really sucks this story ended the way it did, I think they really had a gem here.
I love how so often Miyamoto just comes across like someone's weird uncle who shows up in the office and looks at what you're doing and just makes really weird and bizarre suggestions except they end up always turning out to be great.
Funny story. I listen to real radio 104.1 in Orlando. Tom and Dan just mentioned your video on air today! One of them had helped with the voice acting back in 2003. I was amused by world's coming together.
Found the clip. Tom and Dan live's Fat Tuesday episode at 3:10:50
I still own a copy of Geist. Bought it back in the days when you could buy used GameCube games dirt cheap. Always just lost in the shuffle amongst the other western-developed Nintendo-published offerings. Should've hit up id Software at the time to do a Wolfenstein crossover, have BJ eat that possessed dog food.
Man I think this game deserves a bit more recognition, I mean it was Nintendo's second ever M rated game, after Eternal Darkness. Plus the multiplayer modes were actually really fun and hectic. Honestly I just have a soft spot for it.
What about Conker?
Bro multiplayer had John inside the vents on one of the maps and if you found his body, you could possess it and use his weapon which is OP and so fun
@@LugiThePainDrinkerremember the chef ?? Holy fuck he was broken too. Infinite ammo one shot plates lmao
@@Ken-ru6or dude you just made me cum
@@Ken-ru6or I love how the Multyplayer doesn't take itself too seriously!
I’ve still got Geist on my shelf. I love that game. I can’t help but imagine a world where a studio like Respawn got a shot at remaking it.
Could you imagine what F.E.A.R. would have to be named if Geist got to have the name Fear?
E.A.R. maybe?
Back when the sequel was in development, I remember reading something about how there were legal issues over who owned the name "F.E.A.R.", and so the developer went with calling it something along the lines of "Project Origin" (I want to say it was named after an in-universe thing but I've haven't played a F.E.A.R. game yet so) until they ultimately did get the rights to the name or something.
With that in mind, it probably would have been a really generic name.
@@LonelySpaceDetective Yeah Project Origin is a big deal in the lore of the games, exactly what it's named after lol, (i've played all the games and I wish there was more lol)
They probably would've called it FEAR regardless, Geist was GCN exclusive, while FEAR was PC for awhile before coming to the X360.
@@Web720 Yeah, but it's not like you could get away with calling your PC title "Custom Robo" or something just because that series was only on Nintendo consoles.
Wait a minute, a shooter with possession mechanics, later cooperation with Square-Enix. You know this whole thing kind of reminds me of this other, much more infamous game with a similar mechanics and hopefully a much more insane production history. Now what was it again.... oh yeah MINDJACK! Looking forward to that one sometime.
And that Gameboy game
I was literally just thinking about this game and how it'd make for a good episode
I still have my Gamecube box that shows this game on the back. It looked cool but was just not interested enough to actually rent it to play. I hope someone suggests Rise and Fall Civilizations at War in the future. I remember that RTS being so unique at the time. Never knew what happun to it, but I remember you could directly control a Hero unit turning it into a third person shooter style gameplay.
Honestly surprised to hear that both companies were in good terms and both really wanted the game to be good, sad to hear it failed, though the concept of possessing everything is interesting it should've been on a different game then trying to be part of this game.
Geist was a wild ride, but wow someone else sort of remembers Danger Girl. I used to work at THQ as a tester, and one day they cleaned out an office storage room that was full of old games by letting the testers come and take whatever they wanted. I found not only a whole box of leftover copies of Danger Girl, but a giant Danger Girl poster that was autographed by the voice actresses of the three main characters. It had sat in that storage room for more than 9 years because no one wanted it.
For a future What Happened? episode, I would like to nominate Oddworld: Munch's Oddysee. Not only did it have a troubled production, it's also the game that derailed the original Oddworld Quintology and where things turned sour for Oddworld Inhabitants all together.
Some of the gunplay was pretty interesting, considering when you were in ghost mode the action would slow down to bullet time.
At the end of the game you'd fight other ghosts that'd possess soldiers so it was surprisingly tactical in its best moments.
But I recognized even as a young teenager that was hyped for the game that it was pretty under baked and unfocused in a lot of ways
Split screen multiplayer was actually pretty fun though!
that's the biggest thing about the game: how most of it is just a bit undercooked. The visuals were pretty muxh just okay, the controls feel a bit clunky or swampy, parts are a bit repetetive, just a whole lot of things piled up to make the game easy to rate lowly. Which is such a shame, because I still love it to bits and was heartbroken at n-space closing after hoping for a sequel or something for a few years. Even n-Space stated they were interested in working on geist again, but sadly it never came to be.
3:42 - Well, it is very possible Mr. Shigeru Miyamoto san took a lot of inspiration from "Geist" (2005) when he and the Nintendo crew designed "Super Mario Odyseey" (2017).
Considering he liked the possesion part of gameplay so much and gameplay have always been his biggest "look-at" when analysing video games combined with his passion for findning new innovations for new ways to play video games, it seems logic.
I always remember this game as the one I'd see at the store when I went with my parents. I always wanted it, but never got around to buying it. I remember putting it on a few Christmas lists as well. The coverart was just so cool looking to me, even if it did also kinda creep me out.
This game was awesome its really sad it didn't go over better
This was one of the first games me and my dad really bonded over. The funny part is that we were never able to finish the game. The disk had a scratch on it that stopped us from playing past a certain point. I’m gonna get a GameCube and this game and finally play it fully with him
Haven't seen the episode yet but just know I've missed this game for years. Shame there's no sequel. This video will probably tell me why lol.
How about a “Wha Happun” on the Phantom console. That would be an interesting episode.
When I went to college the concept artist for Giest was a teachers assistant and boy did she say it was an experience lol. She liked the the opportunity to do concept art work but she said it was a nightmare altogether.
Did you go to the same school as that other person in the comments?
Full Sail right? I had her as one of my lab assistants and she was super awesome. This was back in early 2006 so not even a full year after the game launched.
@@Unquestionable yup I had her in early 2007, she was rad.
@@thegaspatthegateway yup! It was Full Sail.
The multi-player for Geist was pretty fun
It sure was! Definitely in my rotation of split screen multiplayer games back in the day
I actually really loved Geist when it came out and I still love it today.
0:37 I remember seeing a favorable review for Odama from Game Informer at the time and thinking it was such an interesting concept for a game. I still never bought it though, and in retrospect I'm sad to see the end of mid-end budget games with unique concepts that just never got the chance. You can spend the money to see a weird movie just to experience it, but games just cost a bit more and require more of your time to risk the investment.
I got to play this growing up and was surprised at it’s quality and general sense of fun. My brother and I played the PvP a lot, and it wasn’t balanced, but it was fun!
Grenadelauncher-AR goes boom :D
Oh Geist I really liked that game! even if the game was a bit clunky I enjoyed the possesion mechanic and the multiplayer!
I only just realised how long I've been waiting for the 7:08 clip to appear in one of these.
You got me with that Sakurai ending haha, great vid. I was very fond of Geist when it came out despite it not being a great game, it was fun for what it was and tried to make it's core mechanic interesting.
My friends and I used to play the split screen multiplayer and there are hidden characters like the Main Protagonist in maps. They are OP if you find them. I remember one map with a bunch of vents and inside the vent maze is Remi
That ending bit is driving me crazy because could swear to God I remember a Geist Spirit in Smash Ultimate
I think if they consider a reboot of Geist, it would be nice to explore the ghost possession mechanic with a more open world and creative freedom aspect. With that in mind, it could be something to behold.
0:46 Oh my goodness I keep waiting for you to bring up Future Tactics
I enjoyed this game as a kid. Played and beat it quite a few times. It was rough around the edges but it was still solid with game play and game mechanics. Wish some type of sequel came to be
Geist got done dirty. I love this game, it's like a mod team had some tech and were just throwing shit at the wall to see what they could do. It had a free spirit about it, that really exceeded the technical abilities of the Gamecube or the engine choice. I appreciated it's novel approach to scenario and level design with the possession mechanics, and I hope another game manages to execute on that poltergeist concept with a greater degree of polish.
RIP, NSpace, you'll be missed.
This episode made me feel kinda bad for the developers
Im calling you out Matt
Thanks for never whining for likes and subs. Your content is always, always fun and feels like a visit with a friend. Keep up the great work
Man I'm on gamer but it sounds like this game had a genuinely creative premise and concept that was sadly executed a bit shakily and undermined by development hell and poor promotion. Seems like it's at least remembered fondly as a nostalgic cult classic, which I suppose is better than being remembered for Battlefield Earth style awfulness.
I don't think you could call it development hell. The development of the game itself was smooth, just that it was an experimental game in nature, so it took more time to develop than your run-of-the-mill game.
Omg. You are in my head man! I will always remember this game as my first experience with genuine disappointment as a child. I guess this means I got to donate to your patreon now.
I’m sorry.
Great episode Matt! Waking up after a night out to a What Happened and a Vfx artist reacts is an awesome hangover cure 🙌🏻
I’d love to see another attempt at this concept, honestly, there’s definitely a good game somewhere in there. I’m imagining something ioi Hitman-y, but 47 could BE the chandelier or electric cable. Or possess people instead of take their clothes. Could have ghostbuster gates and sensors and shit that require you to be stealthy and change tactics. Also I just remembered Murdered: Soul Suspect and now I’m depressed cause that game’s concept is SO MY SHIT but its execution was meh.
I think alive people are just bad at making games with ghost protags smh
@@thegaspatthegateway so you’re saying……. we need to hire a dead studio!
@@thechevyferrari9559 if being shut down and dissolved counts, it would be funny to get n-space on it again
This genuinely made me want to seek a physical copy for my collection as it seems like something I'd be down to play in an afternoon or two, but apparently it's now a somewhat expensive game for a commercial and critical flop. It's like $40-80 online.
I would see this game on shelves everytime I’d go to whatever game store looking at it with mild interest but never got around to buying it cause I was always looking for something else.
I do still want to play this game someday, one game on the N64 I grew up with was Space Station Silicon Valley that was kind of a similar concept just the theme was different, instead of playing as a ghost possessing things and people you were a computer chip or some shit that fell out of a robot and you jumped into the bodies of robotic animals to take control of them and solve puzzles.
The game was very broken and showed a could signs of being unfinished including some collectables not being coded to be collected so it was actually impossible to 100% it without cheats but I played enough of it to have fun with it so I may or may not enjoy Geist to a similar degree.
"Who the hell knew about Geist DS?"
-Scott "FUNNY MOMENT" Wozniak
oh man, this game. I played this so much back in the day, this hits close to home
Surprised you didn't mention the famous NoA meeting where Reggie asked a boardroom of people what they had to offer to make the GameCube more competitive in the market, and they all started blurting out marketing soundbites for Geist, which led to him putting his hands on the table and saying "Don't BS me"
Loved Geist. I remember the first time reading about the game in a Nintendo magazine and been blowed away by the premise of scaring people and the ghost mechanics. I mean yeah it has problems but it was memorable. Like when the evil ghost steals Raimi's real body shit was cash.
ALSO the multiplayer was hella of fun !
JUSTICE FOR GEIST
I wouldn't even know about half of the games you talk about if it wasn't for this channel, and for that I am grateful for the What Happened videos for showing me how complicated, and fascinating video game development is.
Not sure if there's a juicy story nor even any documentation on this one, but would love to see a look into Lego Universe, the Lego MMO that got cancelled almost immediately after launch
I loved the beginning of the game, where it had a heavy focus on the adventure/puzzling bits.
It lost me in the second half where it suddenly got SUPER focused on the shooting. It got boring and tedious real fast, in that the environments didn't feel like they were set up for said shooting and the possession just got in the way.
If they'd have stuck with how it was at the start, it've been perfect (for me).
You beautiful bastard, thanks for putting a name to the memory I had of Future Tactics.
Honestly, hearing that the team stumbled onto the absolute banger idea of "playing a fucking ghost that can posess shit" and still wanted to just make a pretty normal FPS with it kind of explains how the game was kinda boring.
They had no fucking creative juices in their heads.
Might be able to do a "What Happun" on Dirt Rally 3.0 cause of the recent news of them waiting to obtain the WRC title as well. Supposedly dirt rally 3 shelved because of it. After E.A buying Codemasters. Idk. I'm worried about the rally franchise.
Aside from that appreciate your work. Always entertaining
....I Have a Bizarre one, What Happened to a Nintendo Gamecube game, "Go Go Hypergrind!"? I remembered playing this game, and all i heard it was it never sold very well.
I really love that game. The soundtrack of this game is really amazing and I still listen to it to this day.
I really liked Geist when it came out. Definitely had its problems but it was such a cool concept and had great ideas. It was honestly just unpolished mechanically.
I don't remember the game's name, but it was a PS2 game by the people that did Primal (Primal is excellent, btw - minus being too dark and the water levels)... OK so it's called _Ghosthunter_ (I've never played it), what a coincidence ^^ and I totally remembered and didn't just look it up
(the possession thing isn't anything new or original, either... Messiah, Omikron the nomad soul,... etc.)
This game was the first game where my brothers and I made our first ever inside joke with each other, I absolutely love this game
[John Raimi:You stole my concept.]
[Mario:Jealousy in your WAHOO. Envy in your NINTENDO.]
Finally, I’ve been waiting for this for so long.
I am shocked SHOCKED that anyone else remembers Future Tactics: The Uprising. That and Geist were both a lot of fun, if a bit janky. Gamecube really had a lot of games that fit that description honestly.
I remember really liking Giest when it came out. Bought it day one, infact. I was a big fan of Messiah at the time as well so maybe that explains it.
Giest's fist name: F E A R
F.E.A.R: You gotta be fucking kidding me.
I had this game circa 2007, and absolutely loved it. The game was interesting in it's mechanics, and felt is was something I hadn't seen before. Surprisingly, I still have the same feeling going back and playing it now. I feel the game was criminally underrated then, and completely overlooked now.
I will absolutely save this episode for later. Geist was so underrated! ❤️💪🏿
It's a shame this game didn't do well. I certainly enjoyed the heck out of it. It would be nice if this got a remake for the Switch but I doubt it will.
That Mr. Burns laugh between breaks was beautifully done.
Man, I remember that game from Thesampleman who LPed it about 8 years ago. Despite its ugly Dreamcast-esque graphics, I loved it so much. This game should've had a spiritual successor. There aren't many games where you play as a spirit who can possess living things.
I really liked the concept of Geist. I’d rather it just kept it to possessing people, though, like a Quantum Leap game might look. Imagine the possibilities of no health packs, but jumping from one NPC to another before your NPC dies, so that you don’t become trapped intermingled with that soul forever. I mean, that just sounds like a really cool game concept to me.
sometimes the multyplayer woked like that. You could either run around and get health pickups or just disposess, leaving your host for 3 seconds before it despawns (if it's killed during that time you'll lose a point on to pof the nemy scoring) and pick the next host.
On some maps and in some spots it was quite easy to circle around health pickups until you ran out of ammo and needed to refill, in other places switching hosts after battle worked out better.
Just remember all of that with the somewhat lacking polish that permeates the game.
Hey y’all, Scott here…
I just lost my copy of Geist on the GameCube and IDK what to ****ing do.
Every Nintendo entry on this show might as well boil down to the NCL guys (and frequently Miyamoto) going "imma let you finish, but..." to an American studio, the studio going "their suggestions were great and we worked them into our existing game and the styles play well together", then the Arrested Development narrator coming in and saying "They didn't"
Please ,make the "Dantes Inferno - What Happened?"
Uh, that games dope
I remember the arc of this being covered in Nintendo Power, and then it not reviewing that well. I'll still get around to playing it. On the topic of possession games...Second Sight was an amazing title on Gamecube/PS2/Xbox/PC
Magical Mystery Mall just unlocked a core memory, lmao. My sister played the shit out of that game back in the day.
Genuinely one of my favorites despite its very obvious flaws. Unique mechanics, ESPECIALLY in multiplayer. Also love occult and supernatural shit in modern settings
I never thought anyone would talk about this specimen, I have feelings about this game for years, I'll play it occasionally (doesn't mean I like it), but man...it had so much potential back then...
12:13 Oh, wow. What a nice plot twist. He was emotionally attached all along!
All those SG towers really bring back good memories
One of my favorite Blockbuster rentals
Awesome, I remember suggesting this awhile ago, I never thought I'd see it!
1:18 the “He doesn’t even know I’m alive” of that cover of Mary Kate & Ashley’s Crush Course caught me off-guard, it looks like a shitpost.
Actually, I got this for my birthday years ago, when I was still in high school, and alongside Odama, on top of that. I thought it was quite alright, and I played it all the way through back in the day.
Just heard Real Radio’s Tom and Dan talking about doing the voices for this! Crazy stuff.
Geist was always the game I heard about but never actually knew how it got developed.