As an owner of a small library of Virtual Boy games acquired solely in my adulthood, it's my opinion that the Virtual Boy is pretty freaking cool actually. Sure, it was a commercial failure because it was marketed as the next Game Boy, carried a scary health risk label (probably a first at the time...it sure scared me from buying it as a kid) and it was released at a ridiculously high price point between the tail end of the SNES and before the release of the N64, but I think most people haven't even owned a VB or played VB games long enough to formulate any legitimate hate for the Virtual Boy. Pretty sure that more than a few of the occasional naysayers that comment negatively on it are just bandwagon jumpers.
@Johnbrianr: No, you're not the only one who loved the Virtual Boy. Even if Nintendo themselves may have scrubbed their history a bit, I truly feel sorry for those who knock the Virtual Boy without trying it for themselves.
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With all due respect, keeping in mind I haven't played it personally, to be fair, I have heard alot of negative comments about it from people who really have played it themselves, and it all seems to be on pretty solid ground.
In all honesty, though, the system really had no place in the industry, IMO. It was advertised as a GB successor, despite not being portable, the price tag was very steep, it had many design flaws (even back in the day they were reported upon), and the red and black wire-frame designs simply were not appealing.
I'd just like to take this time point out that there have been various cameos from the Virtual Boy in several games over the last decade. Particularly within the WarioWare and Animal Crossing series. Just tossing that out there.
Edit: It also serves as the precursor to our current handheld the 3DS.
Honestly, none of the games on the system/handheld/whatisthisidonteven really interest me in the slightest, aside from Wario Land and especially Teleroboxer. Those two alone look as though they have a good amount of effort in them.
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I love my Virtual Boy.... It was way ahead of it's time and therefore shunned because of it. VB is one of my favorite "Why did it flop?" consoles, right next to the Dreamcast
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I used to go to Blockbuster just to play Mario Tennis on there... I played the heck out of that thing.. I never got one.. but I would not mind having one.. I thought it was pretty cool honestly..
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Face it. It was ahead of its time. And it sucked. They could've at least put a strap so that you could move around while playing. A great little console but it's not worth any money at all.
Because Nintendo rushed it out the door. They didn't want to wait for non-red LEDs or whatever to become affordable. They were the dominant console maker at the time and probably thought they could get away with it (I don't think very many people predicted Sony would've gone from primarily a shovelware publisher to badly kicking their butt soon after ).
And like the SMB Movie, they learned their lesson afterwards.
(I say that even though I kind of like the SMB movie. It's awesome-bad.)
I thought the Virtual Boy was Nintendo's one mistake bigger than the N64 sticking to cartridges. It's the reason why Gunpei Yokoi left the company in the first place.
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@WaveBoy Yes, I think the eyestrain risk was really what killed it. The games weren't awful or anything. It's just that there weren't that many games and many people couldn't play it for any longer than ten minutes without getting a headache.
i would love to try the virtual boy. never seen one in real.
i guess it was doomed to fail, because of the things that have already been mentioned in this thread. but that doesnt mean it was a total gaming failure.
the virtual boy shows that nintendo is to big to fail. and that it something, right?
Face it. It was ahead of its time. And it sucked. They could've at least put a strap so that you could move around while playing. A great little console but it's not worth any money at all.
...and that was the problem. It wasn't a Game Boy. The regular-joe consumer would assume that any nintendo product named ~boy would be portable and affordable. The Virtual Boy wasn't either--in fact it was the complete opposite! It wouldn't surprise me if people were just happy to play Mario Tennis for a few minutes at blockbuster, and then go home. I was 15 at the time and even though I thought it was awesome--even the red/black screen--I didn't even bother asking my parents for one. It was just ridiculous! You'd have to have been filthy rich at the time to even consider getting one. ...and never mind the fact at the time, that the arcade game "Killer Instinct" had already hinted at the coming of the ultra-64. You'd rather save your pennies for that than the Virtual Boy.
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Topic: Am I the only one who LOVED the Virtual Boy?
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