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• 3D Brother of Nintendo 3DS-Virtual Boy(4)

  It’s interesting to compare the two. The most obvious difference is that the 3DS release is lighter on details, which are of course to be announced at E3, but there’s also the matter of overpromising: the Virtual Boy release manages to whip up a swagger (“the first virtual reality system developed and produced for the mass market”; “a 3-D experience not possible on conventional television or LCD screens”) that’s not present in the chipper, more straightforward 3DS release, which doesn’t seem like it’s trying as hard to prove something (“…on which games can be enjoyed with 3D effects without the need for any special glasses”). Keep in mind that as funny as it is to reminisce about today, the Virtual Boy was generally considered a pretty awful system in its day, with a very limited catalog and a headache-inducing goggle setup.

  Chalk it up to more sophisticated consumers (and media outlets), who aren’t as easily swept in by claims about what virtual reality is and isn’t as they might have been in 1994; to the 3DS release’s appearing on a Japanese site; to the painful lessons learned by having once released a product called the “Virtual Boy,” whose name must have come up in some meeting or another. But in any event, there’s more modesty about the enterprise now than there was in 1994, and that’s a good thing.