gamecube does NOT have online multiplayer yet. PS2's online adapter just came out in the US, and it works great. Xbox comes with an ethranet port, thus you can play through gamespy, but the lag is horrible. Even the fastest broadband connections play like dial up, and only a handful of games support it. Xbox Live! comes out in a few months, and that will be the first practical use of online play with xbox. If you're looking at a console right now purely for the online play go with PS2.