
Unraveling the enigma of Nintendo's Virtual Boy - technologizer
http://www.fastcompany.com/3050016/unraveling-the-enigma-of-nintendos-virtual-boy-20-years-later
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echelon
I knew the Gunpei Yokoi part of this story since it makes the rounds every
year or so. I'd never heard the Reflection Technology story before, though,
and it was thoroughly fascinating.

It's a strange feeling to project these tales of business, technology, and
marketing back onto simpler memories of my own naive youth. My younger self
had no idea that these people were trying to succeed in their careers and
life-long creative endeavors--I was content to play Mario Tennis to pass time,
completely ignorant of the human struggle and engineering effort backing the
hardware.

Now I'm especially conscious of this new narrative, of careers and adulthood,
yet simultaneously filled with the nostalgia of my own carefree youth and time
spent playing the Virtual Boy. It's strangely pleasant. I can relate to both
feelings, though one is all but a fleeting memory.

Getting old is so weird.

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knodi123
> Getting old is so weird.

Sure is. But it's better than the alternative!

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kethinov
Getting younger? I could go for that! ;)

~~~
ch4s3
or rather dying

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niix
Interestingly enough, I just recalled that I had one of these as a child. As
if it was some lost memory that has been found by reading this article.

I guess that means it didn't make much of an impact. I remember playing Mario
Tennis and getting headaches from it, but don't remember very much else.

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sopooneo
Anyone know why the mirrors in the displays oscillated instead of spinning?
Was it just a matter of it somehow being easier to keep the phase and
frequency correct with oscillation? Because it seems like it would be much
simpler mechanically to spin them.

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deelowe
Galvos were fairly common back on those days. For such a simple device (it's
just a voicecoil) you can get very precise alignment assuming it's well
designed mechanically (e.g. properly damped). Not sure about spinning mirrors
like those used in barcode scanners, but I'm guessing gavos were preferrable
at the time for things like this. Galvos were heavily used in laser light
shows back then which would have been very popular when this was being
designed. To be honest, when I heard single line LED display utilizing 2
mirrors (one for each eye), my first thought was "Just like a laser light
display." Clever, but relatively evolutionary if you know how existing tech
worked at the time.

The other reply below/above isn't correct about there being a pause between
scans. A common implementation for rotating mirrors is to use an octagonal
mirror [1]. With that implementation, there's no pause. The image just jumps
immediately back to the left/right. The issue is more likely controlling the
speed of the motors would be difficult to keep synced with the requisite
precision.

[1]
[http://cdn.iopscience.com/images/0034-4885/76/8/086801/Full/...](http://cdn.iopscience.com/images/0034-4885/76/8/086801/Full/rpp437052f02_online.jpg)

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thedaemon
I still have mine. It was not comfortable to play for very long and they never
really produced a great game. The best game that I had was the boxing one.

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benihana
> _Did it cause headaches?_

It did for me. I was 12 when it came out, and the local Blockbuster Video had
one and they let me play it from time to time that summer (I rented games from
there every weekend during school so they kind of knew me). I seem to remember
getting a headache and feeling queasy.

But what I remember most, and what articles about the Virtual Boy never seem
to mention is that the games were dull and boring. The 3D effect was
interesting, but I was a 12 year old kid used to brightly coloured characters
running around fluidly and responsively in a moving world. Playing the Virtual
Boy was dismal - it was all high contrast black and dark red. And making Mario
Tennis feel more 3D doesn't change the boring gameplay of Mario Tennis.

~~~
laumars
> _what articles about the Virtual Boy never seem to mention is that the games
> were dull and boring._

This article does mention that though. There's quite a few paragraphs
dedicated to discussing how Virtual Boy games were rushed; how Nintendo's IP
wasn't fully utilised; and how this console was designed in contrast to the
evolving arms race of the colourful high resolution graphics of that era.

~~~
jerf
If you can stomach his style, the Angry Video Game Nerd walked through the
entire library in this video:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OyVAp0tOk5A](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OyVAp0tOk5A)

~~~
Roodgorf
I remember a time when I enjoyed AVGN and his ilk, but man, I find it harder
and harder to stomach the obnoxiously over-the-top outpouring of anger over
such inconsequential things (e.g. the Pixels rant). It's particularly
frustrating seeing this sort of thing in contrast to the story of the
struggles the Virtual Boy developers went through.

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sanjaynegi89
cool

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dvh
Scroll down for actual article.

