???? – 1996retired
32X
“Project Mars never quite landed, but it gave the Genesis a brave, brief boost.”
“It saw the future in red, briefly, through a visor nobody else wanted to wear.”
The Virtual Boy was Nintendo's gamble on a future that hadn't arrived yet: a 32-bit console, developed over four years under the codename VR32, that claimed to be the first system capable of stereoscopic 3D graphics. You peered into a binocular eyepiece and saw everything in red monochrome, with parallax tricks conjuring genuine depth. Released in Japan on July 21, 1995, and in North America on August 14, it promised
The future, it turned out, needed more polish. Escalating production costs, health concerns about the display, and resources siphoned off toward the Nintendo 64 shrank the project down, and even Shigeru Miyamoto stayed largely at arm's length. Nintendo discontinued the Virtual Boy after roughly five months on shelves and just 22 games — but for those 22 games, it offered something no one else had.
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“Project Mars never quite landed, but it gave the Genesis a brave, brief boost.”
“Product of the Year 1993, gone by 1996 — even Time can't save you from a price tag.”
“Blow on the cartridge one more time, old friend — it'll come back.”