http://www.gonintendo.com/s/239936-europe-nintendo-grabs-trademarks-for-virtual-boy-polarium

well this is certainly interesting!

Any thoughts?

I think this is only a renewal. At first I was hoping that this might mean that Nintendo is preparing grounds for Virtual Boy games on Virtual Console, but a trademark search reveals that Nintendo filed for trademarks for Virtual Boy in many countries in 1994, as they were initially aiming for a worldwide release:

https://www.tmdn.org/tmview/basicSearch.html?q=%22virtual%20boy%22#

Some interesting details there:
* The US trademark is not valid?!
Current trade mark status: Registration cancelled
Status date: 2003-03-08
* Nintendo filed “VIRTUAL BOY (VERBALE)” in Italy in April 2014
* There’s an Italian trademark from 2001 for something called “My Virtual Boy” that has nothing to do with Nintendo, but I swear I have seen that logo in the context of the Nintendo Virtual Boy…

ah shoot! that makes sense since I remembered reading an article about SEGA doing something similar with the Dreamcast as well.

well there goes my hopes of seeing a few virtual boy games on the virtual shop!

if you look at KRISSE’s link, you’ll see that someone named Preston J. Walker successfully trademarked the term “Virtual Boy” in 2010, long after Nintendo’s expired. Any ideas?

VirtualChris wrote:
if you look at KRISSE’s link, you’ll see that someone named Preston J. Walker successfully trademarked the term “Virtual Boy” in 2010, long after Nintendo’s expired. Any ideas?

He is one of the founders of a band called Virtual Boy: http://www.alphapuprecords.com/artistpage.php?ArtistID=162

thunderstruck wrote:

VirtualChris wrote:
if you look at KRISSE’s link, you’ll see that someone named Preston J. Walker successfully trademarked the term “Virtual Boy” in 2010, long after Nintendo’s expired. Any ideas?

He is one of the founders of a band called Virtual Boy: http://www.alphapuprecords.com/artistpage.php?ArtistID=162

WTF? So basically a band called “virtual boy” actually trademarked the name? Does this mean that Nintendo doesn’t own the “Virtual boy” name anymore or am I wrong?

thanks