Original Post

Through various internet researches that I’ve performed in the past, I managed to figure out that Marushō Super Famicom (マル勝スーパーファミコン) Magazine is a Japanese magazine containing a nice amount of Virtual Boy coverage. To be clear, in the years 1995 and 1996, this video game magazine was separate and distinct from the competing video game magazine titled “Dengeki Super Famicom (電撃スーパーファミコン) Magazine.” So far, I myself have managed to find and purchase the following issues of Marushō Super Famicom (マル勝スーパーファミコン) Magazine:

Marushō Super Famicom Magazine: January 20, 1995 – Vol. 1 (マル勝スーパーファミコン 1995年1月20日号 NO.1)
Marushō Super Famicom Magazine: March 10, 1995 – Vol. 4 (マル勝スーパーファミコン 1995年3月10日号 NO.4)
Marushō Super Famicom Magazine: April 14, 1995 – Vol. 6 (マル勝スーパーファミコン 1995年4月14日号 NO.6)
Marushō Super Famicom Magazine: May 19, 1995 – Vol. 8 (マル勝スーパーファミコン 1995年5月19日号 NO.8)
Marushō Super Famicom Magazine: July 14, 1995 – Vol. 11 (マル勝スーパーファミコン 1995年7月14日号 NO.11)
Marushō Super Famicom Magazine: July 28, 1995 – Vol. 12 (マル勝スーパーファミコン 1995年7月28日号 NO.12)
Marushō Super Famicom Magazine: August 18, 1995 – Vol. 13 (マル勝スーパーファミコン 1995年8月18日号 NO.13)
Marushō Super Famicom Magazine: September 8, 1995 – Vol. 14 (マル勝スーパーファミコン 1995年9月8日号 NO.14)
Marushō Super Famicom Magazine: September 22, 1995 – Vol. 15 (マル勝スーパーファミコン 1995年9月22日号 NO.15)
Marushō Super Famicom Magazine: October 27, 1995 – Vol. 17 (マル勝スーパーファミコン 1995年10月27日号 NO.17)
Marushō Super Famicom Magazine: November 10, 1995 – Vol. 18 (マル勝スーパーファミコン 1995年11月10日号 NO.18)
Marushō Super Famicom Magazine: November 24, 1995 – Vol. 19 (マル勝スーパーファミコン 1995年11月24日号 NO.19)
Marushō Super Famicom Magazine: December 22, 1995 – Vol. 21 (マル勝スーパーファミコン 1995年12月22日号 NO.21)

After thoroughly searching through these issues of the magazine, I noted all of the pages containing Virtual Boy coverage and made high resolution scans of these pages, which I would now like to share on this thread. Among the ones I own, there is virtually no VB coverage until 1995’s Volume 11 issue, but since I am missing Volumes 9 and 10 of the year 1995, there is a possibility that some VB coverage could exist in these issues. Also, there is virtually no VB coverage in 1995’s Volume 21 issue, whereby it is possible that not much VB coverage will exist in the first few months of the year 1996 either; nevertheless, there is a small possibility that there might. Thus, missing issues of Marushō Super Famicom Magazine, which might have some nice VB coverage in them, are Volumes 9, 10, 16, and maybe 20 of the year 1995, plus any of the first several months of the year 1996. There might be an article for Virtual Lab in one of them, since no article for Virtual Lab appears in any of the ones I have right now, and there could also be articles and screenshots for any of the following known unreleased games, which do not appear in the issues I currently have:

Doraemon and Nobita’s Heart-Pounding Ghostland (ドラえもん のび太のドキドキ!おばけランド)
NikoChan Battle (ニコちゃんバトル)
Interceptor (インターセプト)
J.League 3D Stadium (Jリーグ3Dステージ)
Night Landing (ナイトランディング)
Out of the Deathmount (アウト・オブ・ザ・デスマウント)
Polygo Block (ポリゴブロック)
Proteus Zone (プロテウスズーン)
Signal Rat (シグナル ラット)
Star Seed (スターシード)
Strange Animal School (妖獣学園)
Sundays Point (サンディズポイント)
Virtual Dodge Ball (ヴァーチャルドッジボール)
Virtual Gunman (バーチャルガンマン)

So if any Virtual Boy enthusiast would like to help join in the search for the Virtual Boy information contained in these issues of the magazine, please feel free to do so! It doesn’t even have to be in the form of trying to find and purchase these issues yourself, so that you can create your own high quality scans or photographs of the pages containing Virtual Boy information. It could also be through inquiring among your network of fellow video game enthusiasts to see if any of them might already have one or more of these issues, in which case they could search for the Virtual Boy coverage and create high quality scans or photographs of the pages containing the Virtual Boy coverage and have them forwarded along to Planet Virtual Boy.

Over time, I will try to start making English translations of the pages containing the information that I find to be the most interesting. If anybody else can also help in getting English translations made for this information, that would be greatly appreciated, too!

Interestingly enough, the first Virtual Boy game given a small article in the magazine was the released game “Hee-Haw in the Maze of Jack Bros.!” (Jack Bros.の迷路でヒーホー!).

17 Replies

Marushō Super Famicom Magazine: July 28, 1995 – Vol. 12 (マル勝スーパーファミコン 1995年7月28日号 NO.12)

The first Virtual Boy game to land on The Hit Chart of Marushō Super Famicom Magazine was “Mario Clash” (マリオクラッシュ) in 1995’s Volume 12 issue.

The Marukatsu Attack Card page containing an image of the Virtual Boy appears not only in 1995’s Volume 12 issue but in practically every other issue of the magazine after that for the rest of that year. Nevertheless, I decided only to make a scan of the one appearing in Volume 12.

Marushō Super Famicom Magazine: August 18, 1995 – Vol. 13 (マル勝スーパーファミコン 1995年8月18日号 NO.13)

Released Virtual Boy Game Articles:
Mansion of Insmouse (インスマウスの館)
Virtual Fishing (バーチャルフィッシング)

Marushō Super Famicom Magazine: September 8, 1995 – Vol. 14 (マル勝スーパーファミコン 1995年9月8日号 NO.14)

Released Virtual Boy Game Articles:
Vertical Force (バーティカルフォース)
Virtual Pro Baseball ’95 (バーチャルプロ野球’95)
Red Alarm (レッドアラーム)
Pop-Out! Panic Bomber (とびだせ!ぱにボン)
Galactic Pinball (ギャラクティックピンボール)
Teleroboxer (テレロボクサー)
Mario’s Tennis (マリオズテニス)
T&E Virtual Golf (T&E ヴァーチャルゴルフ)
Mario Clash (マリオクラッシュ)
Space Squash (スペーススカッシュ)
Virtual Fishing (バーチャルフィッシング)
Virtual Bowling (バーチャルボウリング)
Mansion of Insmouse (インスマウスの館)
V-Tetris (V-テトリス)

Unreleased Virtual Boy Game Articles:
Virtual Bomberman (バーチャルボンバーマン)
Virtual Block (バーチャルブロック)
Virtual Jockey (バーチャルジョッキー)
Virtual Double Yakuman (バーチャルダブル役満)

Marushō Super Famicom Magazine: September 22, 1995 – Vol. 15 (マル勝スーパーファミコン 1995年9月22日号 NO.15)

Released Virtual Boy Game Articles:
Wario Cruise (ワリオクルーズ) [Virtual Boy Wario Land: Secret Treasure of the Awazon (バーチャルボーイ ワリオランド アワゾンの秘宝)]
SDガンダム (SD Gundam) [SD Gundam Dimension War (SDガンダム DIMENSION WAR)]

Marushō Super Famicom Magazine: October 27, 1995 – Vol. 17 (マル勝スーパーファミコン 1995年10月27日号 NO.17)

Released Virtual Boy Game Article:
Space Invaders – Virtual Collection (スペースインベーダー バーチャルコレクション)

Unreleased Virtual Boy Game Articles:
Bound High
Gulf Battlefront: Red City (湾岸戦線 RED CITY)

Marushō Super Famicom Magazine: November 10, 1995 – Vol. 18 (マル勝スーパーファミコン 1995年11月10日号 NO.18)

Unreleased Virtual Boy Game Articles:
Flying Henry (空とぶヘンリー)
New Japan Pro Wrestling: Fierce Fighting Legends (新日本プロレスリング 激闘伝説)

Marushō Super Famicom Magazine: November 24, 1995 – Vol. 19 (マル勝スーパーファミコン 1995年11月24日号 NO.19)

Unreleased Virtual Boy Game Article:
Virtual Pro Baseball ’96 (バーチャルプロ野球’96)

Marushō Super Famicom Magazine: December 22, 1995 – Vol. 21 (マル勝スーパーファミコン 1995年12月22日号 NO.21)

Marushō Super Famicom Magazine: October 13, 1995 – No. 16 (マル勝スーパーファミコン 1995年10月13日号 NO.16)

This issue has an article for the unreleased Virtual Boy game titled “Virtual Dodge Ball,” containing screenshots that, as far as I know, have never been posted online before.

Marushō Super Famicom Magazine: December 8, 1995 – No. 20 (マル勝スーパーファミコン 1995年12月8日号 NO.20)

This issue has an article for the unreleased Virtual Boy game titled “Out of the Deathmount,” containing screenshots that, as far as I know, have never been posted online before.

Thank you! Those new scans are, once again, super interesting. Besides the new scenes of Dodge Ball and Deathmount, also note the early prototype Wario Cruise treasure room and the complete set of prototype Teleroboxer fighter stats in issue 10/95.

Wow. And I thought other screenshots of OFTDM were completly lost. I hope there is screenshots of Protous Zone (howevever you spell it) in the future.

Can you get “bigger” pictures of the previously lost screenshots?

Nanis149 wrote:
Can you get “bigger” pictures of the previously lost screenshots?

I was planning to create higher resolution scans for those screenshots whenever I get around to making English translations for their respective articles.

For anyone who might find this thread and hope that I still have these magazines, so that additional scans of certain pages could be made for other systems, please note that I, unfortunately, had these magazines stored in a basement that had never flooded before, but about a year ago, it flooded, and all my Marushō Super Famicom Magazines got horribly damaged and had to be thrown away. I was thankful that I had already scanned all of the Virtual Boy-related pages, as that was the only reason why I had purchased the magazines.

Benjamin Stevens wrote:
For anyone who might find this thread and hope that I still have these magazines, so that additional scans of certain pages could be made for other systems, please note that I, unfortunately, had these magazines stored in a basement that had never flooded before, but about a year ago, it flooded, and all my Marushō Super Famicom Magazines got horribly damaged and had to be thrown away. I was thankful that I had already scanned all of the Virtual Boy-related pages, as that was the only reason why I had purchased the magazines.

It would’ve been cool to have Marushō Super Famicom Magazine scans available at Retromags, along with Jugemu, but sucks to hear the flood killed them… Oh well. I’m still thankful for you in scanning stuff from Jugemu that contained Atari Jaguar-related material i needed :)I owe you one…

 

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