Regular readers of these pages will be increasingly familiar with the work of The Ben Heck Show, which provides some interesting engineering-focused videos. It does this, often, with a focus on gaming systems, including teardowns and customisations of iconic consoles from various companies, including Nintendo.
The latest to get the treatment is the Virtual Boy, an intriguing part of Nintendo history. In this teardown we get a good look at how these worked, and also get to see a clever fix for the common ribbon tape issue that can cause issues in these ageing units.
The next episode will be taking the parts of the Virtual Boy and creating an alternative device, so we'll keep an eye out for that.
Comments 22
why is tis news?
@Diamondhero Sponsorship?
@Diamondhero It's not news or sponsorship, it's just a video I thought was interesting. Lighten up.
@TossedLlama Glad you enjoyed it. Weird tech in the Virtual Boy, with mirrors etc, but very cool.
I also found it interesting. I found one at EBGames back in the day for the clearance $25. Though not the best machine out there, I found it intriguing to see where the tech was leading. I enjoyed it for what it was and would display it wherever I moved in college. I wished I still had it.
Another great video by Heck-san
@ThomasBW84 ok he dose do cool stuff
A friend I went to school with is behind the camera for the Ben Heck show/does the production as well. Max occasionally even gets in front of the camera or yells crap from off camera. As I have watched Ben's show grow and catch it's stride Max has officially become one of the people in my life who I am most envious of...
Always good stuff and fun.
This reminds me of my friend he had this when it came out and I remember he had a game called Jack Bros by Atlus. I always wanted it. I'm glad I could not be bothered. I wonder about that game though.
This video is making me nerd out and I love it.
Though I'm subscribed to the channel and wouldn't miss out on the video, I'm always glad to see Ben Heck's video-game-related videos featured here. I enjoy his stuff. I look forward to checking this video out later today.
I like these video's, had no idea how the virtual boy worked. I'm subscribed to his interesting channel
Ain't nobody tearing down my Virtual Boy!!! 😆😉
I wonder if using LEDs would actually be efficient in modern VR headsets... I'd guess that it would be possible to use similar tech, but with colors.
As an engineering student I was really fascinated by this video and instantly watched a couple more. My studies are focused on game engines and software programming but I'd like to know more about how the hardware works as well. I've gotten a glimpse since we have courses that delve into hardware as well but I barely got anything out of the first two courses.
The third course is awesome though, thanks to different teachers and how we get to combine hardware and software by programming a game for a microcontroller. It feels like making a game for Game Boy since it has a small screen and limited colors though this microcontroller is even more limited thanks to smaller resolution and how pixels can only be black or white. I'm sure the actual programming part is easier for this thing though since we can use C.
I ended up finding the Virtual Boy in a vintage store for $20...came with four games. I remember playing the demo in stores when it came out, and yeah...it really hurt the eyes after playing for a while. Eventually, I was going to get one, but then it was discontinued. I was going to pick it up at the vintage store just to keep it, but I still didn't really want it. Today, nintendo could try to bring it back, just changing the way the images were made, I thought there were a lot of lawsuits and complaints about it back in the day on its release, and that was the reason why it wasn't given the love it could have had.
@ThomasBW84 It was a good video. You'll have to see if they have other ones for some of nintendo's other consoles!
I liked the video up until the coment about imperial units. No s**t Sherlock, between the UK and US still enforcing them in industrial standards we will never get rid of them. I can't still fathom why in this day and age this countries still uses them.
The next episode is going to be amazing. Creating a streamlined VirtBoy?!? like a mini celebration of the NES mini classic. Cant wait
'I had a virtual boy originally
Red alarm was one of my favourite games
I sold it when my first son was born
I'm gutted I did it was a beautiful system 😪
The way it creates the image is so absurd...
One line of LEDs and mirrors?? No wonder it was headache inducing. The flickering sensation must be intense.
@darthstuey Did you ever find it nauseating to use?
"All hail the Virtual Boy!"
Tap here to load 22 comments
Leave A Comment
Hold on there, you need to login to post a comment...