Eeh where is the Virtual Boy?
The Virtual Boy is an incredible showcase of terrible design. In 1995, Nintendo decided to make their own "virtual reality" system. The problem is that virtual reality (VR) never caught on - it was a cool idea, but it was never practical or cheap enough to have any mass-market appeal. Even now, an entire decade after VR fever, nobody uses it for anything. We now have the technological ability to produce VR helmets that could plug into a 3D-capable game console or computer and could cost less than $300, but nobody wants them. There are a number of good reasons for this, but the most damning is simply the way you look when you're wearing a VR helmet. Nobody wants to look that nerdy. And because you can't share the experience with friends, like you can with a huge TV, everyone just watches you in your helmet and thinks you're an idiot. To see this phenomenon in action, pick a random gathering with friends, and try to socialize with a cardboard box on your head.
But VR wasn't a bad enough idea already. Nintendo decided to make the system portable. To the rest of the world, this means that it must be small, lightweight, and cheap, with the ability to run on batteries for many hours. When designing the Virtual Boy, Nintendo chose the unusual approach of ignoring all of these requirements. It's so large and heavy that gamers couldn't wear it on their heads, so Nintendo gave it a stand, requiring some sort of stable, flat surface to place it on while using it. Nintendo must have forgotten that its Game Boy, the most successful portable video game system in history, was mainly used in vehicles.
To give Nintendo credit, they probably knew that the flat-surface requirement wouldn't matter. Nobody could use it in a vehicle anyway, since it specifically prohibited use while in motion - the displays can be damaged if they're moved while operating. Not to be defeated by even stationary vehicles, Nintendo ensured that the system was as bulky as possible, at almost 2 pounds, and drained six AA batteries more quickly than the Game Gear.
Virtual reality!
What did gamers get for all of this trouble and $180? Red. That's about it. To keep costs down, Nintendo used high-brightness LEDs and spinning mirrors to make the pictures. But since high-brightness blue and green LEDs weren't widely available in 1995, Nintendo used only red. Games were strictly red and black. But don't worry, Nintendo clearly labeled the box and the Virtual Boy itself with prominent warnings that it could cause eyestrain and vision problems. That's a great way to get people to buy a product. Games would even pause a few times an hour to force people to take eyestrain-prevention breaks.
Only 14 Virtual Boy games were ever released - that's one less than the Jaguar CD. I can't find any other game systems, no matter how badly they sold in the marketplace, that had fewer games than the Virtual Boy. It had the shortest lifespan of any console I've ever heard of. And amazingly, this colossal failure was actually made by Nintendo. I gladly grant it the title of Worst Game Console Ever Made, and I hope that geek history never forgets this spectacular failure.
FAIL MUCH? (All info found on googlez)
Last edited by DarkHuntsBank; Feb 7, 2009 at 11:23 PM.
