Giftpia 

It is said that Pokkle from Nanashi Island grew up on his own. Kyappi won’t let you sleep tonight.

• JP release: 25th April 2003
• EU release: N/A
• NA release: N/A
• Developer: Skip
• Publisher: Nintendo
• NGC Magazine Score: ??
• Mods Used: Widescreen Hack

Gifpia is the first game from Skip Ltd, most famous for Chibi-Robo., and was sadly a Japanese exclusive. It’s an incredibly charming and funny game where you have to help others to fix a mistake you made. The biggest flaw it has isn’t even the game’s fault: because this game is greatly enhanced by its dialogue, it’s really annoying having to try and find the correct dialogue in an online translation or used Google Lens.

The game is set on an island and you play as Pockle, who landed himself in jail for oversleeping and missing his coming of age ceremony. He’s let out to raise money for his fine of 10,000 yen, which will let you out of prison garb and remove the blur from your face. This is just part of the game’s introduction as you do a job for the Mayor (repairing signs) and work out how to raise the rest of the money.

I think you’re supposed to go fishing at this point, but I accidentally sold my fishing rod. Luckily, I managed to work out that frozen mushrooms sell really well. It feels like a note story focused Harvest Moon without the farming – just the character interactions and quests. Once you’ve done this, the main quest begins: raise 5 million yen to pay for a new coming of age ceremony in order to become an adult.

The game has a day and night cycle and a hunger meter, the latter of which starts off really small and you have to eat heart pieces to increase (which play a Zelda sound effect when you pick them up). You initially can’t stay up that late, but it does sound like this can change later on in the game. The game doesn’t sound like much on paper – just walk around, pick up items and do chores – but even with the language issues there’s a certain charm to the game that puts a smile on your face.

I really wanted to play the game more, but having to look up or translate the dialogue was just too much of a deterrent. I hope some day that a better solution will come about so I can properly enjoy what it has to offer.

Fun

So completing the quest is most definitely not on the menu for non-Japanese speakers. We did have some fun slapping Pokkle’s dog (it bites his ankle), getting slapped by Pokkle’s girlfriend, and listening to the terrifying radio station that blasts out music of almost stomach-churning trippiness. There’s an English version on the cards (possibly US import only), so all may be revealed. Some day.

Martin Kitts, NGC Magazine #84

Remake or remaster?

It’s annoying that Nintendo are just sitting on this game. It would have been a great Switch release – even MySims are getting a re-release on the Switch and this would sort of be a new (for most) game with the relaxing vibe that seems to do well on the platform. Failing that, hopefully there’s a full translation patch at some point

Official Ways to get the game

There’s no official way to buy Giftpia.

Europe

Japan

North America

GameCube Games by Date

2001: Sep, Oct, Nov, Dec

2002: Jan, Feb, Mar, Apr, May, Jun, Jul, Aug, Sep, Oct, Nov, Dec

2003: Jan, Feb, Mar, Apr, May, Jun, Jul, Aug, Sep, Oct, Nov, Dec

2004: Jan, Feb, Mar, Apr, May, Jun, Jul, Aug, Sep, Oct, Nov, Dec

2005: Jan, Feb, Mar, Apr, May, Jun, Jul, Aug, Sep, Oct, Nov, Dec

2006: Jan, Feb, Mar, Apr, May, Jun, Jul, Aug, Sep, Oct, Nov, Dec

2007: Mar, Jun, Aug

gamecube life nintendo skip