By Andrew Liszewski
Nintendo-centric news site, Nintendic, recently published a look back at the company’s infamous Virtual Boy system. Believe it or not, the VB was created by Gunpei Yokoi who was also responsible for the Game & Watch, Metroid and the ridiculously successful Game Boy. That’s a pretty solid track record, but unfortunately as we all know, the VB wasn’t exactly a runaway hit.
Nintendo planned to sell 1.5 million Virtual Boys by the end of 1995, but the $180 system only ever sold about 770,000 units throughout its entire lifespan. As a result it was never released in Europe or Australia, and Gunpei Yokoi was ‘forced’ to resign from the company the next year. If you’re interested, you can head on over to Nintendic to read about the whole saga.
Unfortunately due to a broken clip on the legs, my Virtual Boy (which I picked up brand new for about $20 back in the day) still sits in the closet, waiting for the day when I get a hankering for some 3D tennis again. And if anyone has a pair of Virtual Boy legs in good working order they’d like to get rid of, please let me know.
Dang I remember my “VB” I had fun playing it everyday. I owned the wario game and the tennis game. I never stopped playing best part about it you can run on battery which was kinda cool. My parents would always take it away cus i got stuck playing. Would you happen to know where I can purchase another?
That thing hurt your eyes in a hurry. Could not have been good for the vision…
They had a few sports games. I think I had golf and baseball.
I sold my Virtual Boy on ebay about 2-3 years ago.
I was young maybe now it would hurt my eyes back then i could toast, bake, fry, or look into sunlight without a care in life.
I have a perfectly good VB with tennis and golf…are these things rare on the market or something?
no idea. i just miss it. it was fun back then. would be cool just to have as a collectable. know what i mean mang!
dang they are expensive.
amazon has it for 93.00 dollars used
someone on ebay is trying to sell it for 250.
bunch of homos lol.
You’re actually missing quite a few good games in there. 3D tetris is, understandably, the best 3D tetris out there. And Wario Land is fun to play. But the best game for the system, and arguably one of the best games that year, was Teleroboxer. A spiritual sequal to Mike Tyson’s Punch-Out, Teleroboxer was probably the last great 2D console boxing game. It is definitely worth picking up where you can.
Speaking of Nausea, does anyone else remember those backgrounds in Wario Land which independently scrolled on the horizontal axis, but not on the vertical one? I miss that little easy-bake nausea maker.