This Month in Nintendo History: August 1995

By Shane Jury 01.08.2011 7

Image for This Month in Nintendo History: August 1995

This Month in Nintendo History: August 1995

Shane Jury :: August 1st 2011

Polar opposite to the cheery clear skies and serene sunlight that accompanies many an August is the barren release schedule of the gaming industry. Viewed by the higher-ups as a time when bums are less likely to be parked on seats for rigorous gaming sessions, somehow dismissing the potential for handheld title purchases to help with long holiday travels, publishers tend to fire their output all at the upcoming holiday season in one big mess of game releases instead. Nintendo once tried for the best of both worlds, a full console experience on what they considered more portable hardware, and on August 14th 1995 lucky US citizens met their new headache overlord, both for them and the Big N’s 3D legacy. Enter, Virtual Boy.
Image for This Month in Nintendo History: August 1995

ROB the Robot regretted getting on Sub-Zero’s spine-ripping bad side.

Emerging from the mind of a certain Mr. Gunpei Yokoi, the bloke that dreamt up Game & Watch, Game Boy, the Metroid series, and whom mentored Miyamoto-san, Virtual Boy was intended as a ‘third pillar’ device (sound familiar?); a stop-gap of sorts between the diminishing Super Nintendo / Famicom, and the looming powerful Nintendo 64. Due to the development resources that that hardware would demand, Virtual Boy was said to have been rushed to the market, and not in line with what Yokoi-san originally intended. For all of Yokoi’s successes, accomplishments and contributions to gaming as a whole, Virtual Boy would be his biggest failure, and soon after being discontinued he left the company; whether the two events were closely related has never been clarified, but widely assumed.

Like its spiritual modern-day descendant that is currently suffering a similar, but higher quality software drought, Virtual Boy delivered a glasses-less 3D viewing experience. That is, of course, if you consider having to glue your entire head to a viewing area resembling a periscope an aid-free endeavour.

Not unlike the green and black colour formation that Game Boy used at the time, Virtual Boy made use of monochromatic LEDs for the illusion of a three-dimensional virtual reality space with a red and black spectrum; an effect widely known as parallax, thankfully unrelated to fear-casting, giant-faced planet destroying activities. How it does this is technical nitty-gritty stuff, through the use of mirrors and individual light arrays being beamed rapidly into each eyepiece...making the unit a real noisy bugger. Nintendo’s advertising techniques made this readily apparent, and leaving viewers with little doubt as to how Skynet would take over a games machine:


 

For all intents and purposes the 3D effect worked, with one major drawback; or, as PR would put it best: ‘children under seven should not use this machine because of vision damage risk’. Even those of more mature age that could see the grey speck of dust at the top of an optician's eye chart found their peepers sore in a short space of time. As a caring business, and creepily similar to the systems of today, Nintendo included a automatic pause feature that would let you collect your thoughts after half an hour of play.

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Drastic measures were taken when the costume shop ran out of Geordi La Forge VISORs.

Being touted as portable hardware, the machine did indeed run on batteries; six AAs to be exact, which would say sayonara a few hours later and join six other buddies in the bin after their own separate stint in a SEGA Game Gear. Luckily, there was a power pack solution, though both it and the batteries were housed in the most unlikeliest of places: the back of the controller. Thankfully, the games themselves weren't housed here, but in the main unit.

The controller was an odd beast too, providing all the functionality of a Game Boy button set up with an extra D-pad slapped on for left-handers and back triggers on the underside, arranged in a familiar GameCube pad-esque ‘M’ shape for a relatively comfortable grip. The power pack sliding out due to too firm a grip was a rage-inducing issue however, and should you have gotten far in any particular game had potential to become a real "FUUUUUU-" inducer - though the novelty of a hidden projectile brick was useful to combat any obstacles to your game playing.

The machine itself was nothing to write home about, provided you still had the power of sight afterwards. But, as PlayStation Portable can surely attest, top quality games can redeem even the most awkward of hardware. If they had kept up the support, Virtual Boy might have limped away with a couple more gems.

Image for This Month in Nintendo History: August 1995

Three games you’re never likely to play in their original state. Weep with me.

Virtual Boy's Wario Land was the standout of the bunch, and as such is the strongest candidate for a 3DS Virtual Console revival. A new platformer entry into what was quickly becoming a standalone Nintendo series at the time, Wario Land made use of interchangeable hats and a 3D background plane not unlike that seen in the Paper Mario games, to deliver what was touted to be Virtual Boy’s best game.

Red Alarm and Mario’s Tennis were generally less well received, but still notable among the remainder of the Virtual Boy catalogue. Red Alarm was similar in set up to Super Nintendo’s Star Fox / Star Wing, except with red wireframes and lots of black. Mario’s Tennis, a US pack-in with the machine, offered singles, doubles, and tournament play, with the 3D effect providing a useful reference for the behind-the-character viewpoint.

Image for This Month in Nintendo History: August 1995

Still got those old red and blue 3D specs? Now’s the time to use them! Or pretend that Mario’s having a seizure, either works.

Other notable games included 3D Tetris, Galactic Pinball, Waterworld (with a red sea - how about that, folks?!), and Mario Clash, a Mario Bros. pipes-and-enemies game with an extra layer of background. All in all, there were a whopping 22 Virtual Boy games released for the parents to pick up, but only 14 of them made it to the US of A. There was nowhere near enough support or sales - just 777,000 units moved worldwide - to even warrant the release of that multiplayer-supporting extension cable; ‘tis a shame.

Given its unsuccessful venture into the corneas of gamers in two regions, it would be understandable for Nintendo to want to forget about Virtual Boy. Yet, as with every recognisable bit of hardware they’ve made, those nostalgic demigods will chuck in a reference anywhere they feel like. Examples; the Japanese version of Super Smash Bros. Melee (change your settings in the options menu!):

Image for This Month in Nintendo History: August 1995

Sunflower A is not amused, Sunflower B is already blind, and the cactus thinks its playing Celebrity Squares.

As a Mario Clash micro-game in Game Boy Advance's barmy, bonkers, loony WarioWare, Inc.: Mega Microgame$! (play on an original GBA for full eyestrain effect!):

Image for This Month in Nintendo History: August 1995

A useful command for when a Go-Compare advert appears on the telly.

The unit even pops up for a peek-a-boo in Francis’ bedroom in Super Paper Mario:

Image for This Month in Nintendo History: August 1995

Shocking, huh? Looks just like my room - though mine has less colour and more questionable material.

Virtual Boy was an ambitious effort, meant to usher in a whole new perspective and feel for gaming, yet it not only signalled the end of Mr. Game Boy Gunpei Yokoi’s career at Nintendo, but set back 3D videogaming imagery for a decade. What few good games there were on the machine have been lost to obscurity, emulation, and obsessive collectors, with only the possibility of future Nintendo 3DS remakes and re-envisions providing hope to those wanting easy access to the games in their true forms. However, despite Virtual Boy being a torn page in the chronicles of Nintendo history, it is nonetheless an interesting chapter, and quite the contrast to the 3D equivalent options of 3DS and PlayStation 3 we have today. Just don’t stare too long, or it might turn into a mini-Terminator...

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Our member of the week

I agree that they should re-release VB Wario Land on 3DS. It's a shame that such a fine game in one of Nintendo's main franchises is lost on a hardware that gives you headaches.

Cubed3 Limited Staff :: Review and Feature Writer

I bought one of these freaks about 2 weeks ago, 2 days later an emulator for it got released on the homebrew browser. Paid alot of money to import a failed console to a country that was smart enough to avoid it. worth it!

ennan (guest) 01.08.2011#3

I imported one of these a few years ago and it's not as awful as people say.
Though the red visuals were a poor choice they've never given me a headache nor has the 3D effect. The main problem with it is comfort. It's very difficult to play the thing and be comfortable - you usually have to stoop down and strain your neck unless you're clever like me and build a rig out of 80's pirtate lego.
The controller is the exact opposite though - very comfortable. Really nice grips. I have to admit though that it's a little bit unnerving having the mains cable running right into your hands...
Whilst I don't think it was as bad as people say it is safe to say that it wasn't exactly great. Bad marketing, less than awesome visuals, uncomfortable design and lack of games = inevitable disaster.
Hope they release the games on VC though.

Frank Eivind Rundholt (guest) 03.08.2011#4

I've made a slideshow of some of the Virtual Boy games for 3D viewing on the Nintendo 3DS. It can be download from my blog: http://blogg.frankeivind.net/2011/05/17/virtual-boy-and-sega-master-sytem-3d-slideshow-for-nintendo-3ds/

Hope you guys enjoyed the read, I've got a real big one lined up for September's edition, and that's all I'm saying. Smilie

In the meantime, look forward to the second separate monthly feature from myself coming soon. Smilie

( Edited 07.08.2011 16:22 by Phoenixus )

Sugar (guest) 09.08.2011#6

Short, sweet, to the point, FREE-exactly as ifnormatoin should be!

AdamC3 (guest) 12.08.2011#7

The idea of the VB really sounded interesting. Shame it never got the support, though, or a Euro release. There were so many big name projects in development for it, like F-Zero and GoldenEye!

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