Virtual Boy appreciation thread

[Vetusomaru]

Iwata Asks: Nintendo 3DS

Go behind the scenes of the development of the Nintendo 3DS.

www.nintendo.co.uk

Gunpei Yokoi x Kenji Eno – 1996 Developer Interview - shmuplations.com

This interview with pioneering creatives Kenji Eno and Gunpei Yokoi was originally featured in an "Eno-themed" special edition of Game Hihyou in 1996.

shmuplations.com

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ho7eawHlcoo&t=


Virtual Boy was a wasted potential because of its rushed release to focus at Nintendo 64's development and the false marketing as a high-tech virtual reality video game console while it should be marketed more like a gimmick toy. Even with 3DS' release, Nintendo missed their opportunity of releasing/remaking their Virtual Boy library to Virtual Boy. An opportunity they also missed with Nintendo Switch.

 

[WALFTEAM]

It's the one console I don't think I'll ever own, even though the games aren't actually half bad. Sad that Nintendo gave up so fast but I can understand given their intense, unparalleled perfectionism. It was always a huge space investment, but now, as with everything else, it's a huge cash investment on top of that. It was also a maintenance nightmare for some time, and of the few that were sold fewer survived in running shape.

 

[punishedgnome]

Wario Land VB is a fantastic game. Probably in my all-time top 20. It just has these huge, expansive levels loaded with secrets. Some of them are almost Metroid-like in structure. I've only played it on a real VB at a local shopping mall display a few times back in the 90s, but I've 100%ed it several times on emulators. I never understood why Nintendo didn't re release it for 3DS. I've read that none of the teams at Nintendo have any interest in the old-school treasure hunting Wario style games since R&D1 was disbanded, so maybe that's why.

 

[Sketch Relics]

It would probably require a good bit of effort to port any virtual boy game to the 3DS, you would have to write some sort of custom shell program to take the two images used by the virtualboy into the depth-split display(err, whatever it's called) the 3DS uses. Not to mention, this would be in the service of porting like 3 or 4 games, since Nintendo wouldn't own the rights to the others. It was probably just considered a waste of effort.

But hey, that's what emulators are for.

 

[punishedgnome]

It would probably require a good bit of effort to port any virtual boy game to the 3DS, you would have to write some sort of custom shell program to take the two images used by the virtualboy into the depth-split display(err, whatever it's called) the 3DS uses.

You're probably right. I've just always found it kind of odd this 2D Nintendo platformer that can stand up with much of their classic library is just trapped on such an obscure console and they've never tried to get it off there, even in the form of a remake with no 3d effect. Maybe they feel it stinks too much of failure.