vb-fan wrote:
How long is the “edit” good for? Tried to add to the post…

I’m pretty sure that it has been said that it lasts for 30 minutes after you post. After that, your comment is locked in forever.

vb-fan wrote:

I presume the flashboy comes with software, or at least instructions.

FlashBoys used to come with a CD, but now you just get the FlashBoy Plus cartridge and a USB cable, so no CD or instructions. Essentially, the following page serves as the current instructions for the FlashBoy Plus, though it was written for the older FlashBoy:

http://www.planetvb.com/modules/hardware/?type=flashcarts&v=fb

This is most likely the page where you found the padder. You will also need to download the loader from this page in order to use the FlashBoy Plus.

jrronimo wrote:
Hudson Soft Virtual Boy lapel pin – $500 O_O; — I don’t think I’ve ever seen one of these before and way too high. Anyone interested? :p

How about 50% off and who knows how much more off the seller will accept?

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Nintendo-Virtual-Boy-pin-E3-2004-brand-new-in-sealed-package-/370622329435?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item564acff25b&_uhb=1

Guy Perfect wrote:

I’ve got a friend who’s studying Japanese, and he’s quite stoked to get transcripts made from the box scans. With his help, I should be able to produce high-res insert print-outs for the Japan-exclusive games just like the ones posted earlier in this thread.

Just to be sure, are you aware of the translations that I’ve performed on 7 of the 8 Japan only game boxes so far?

If you go to each of the games and click on the “Manuals” tab for each and then click on the “Translation” link, it will take you to that game’s translation section for the box and instruction booklet, where you will find all of the Japanese text on the box already converted into digital format.

Just letting you know in case that will save some time in the transcriptions, since solely the font would have to be changed to try to match the styles on the boxes.

The picture of that ad was most likely taken off of the scan of the magazine page on this site, which you can find here:

http://www.planetvb.com/modules/articles/?s050198001

If you want to make a full and better translation of it than the one that currently exists at the above link, I think many would appreciate it.

Also, all of the Dragon Hopper images that have ever been found appear under the Multimedia tab under Dragon Hopper. So starting at the site homepage, you select: GAMES => Unreleased Games => Dragon Hopper, and then click on the Multimedia tab to find:

http://www.planetvb.com/modules/games/?u004m

vb-fan wrote:

Tell me — they are “zip” files — will 7-Zip work?

That is not my area of expertise, but I am pretty sure that 7-Zip will work to extract them.

Remember, once you get your FlashBoy Plus, you will need to pad the ROMs using the padder on this site, before loading them to the FlashBoy Plus. Otherwise, you will get a blank screen when you try to play the ROM on your Virtual Boy.

If you need me to, I can send you padded ROMs of those two games, which will work on an emulator and the FlashBoy Plus. Just send me your e-mail via PM and I can get them to you.

If you can’t find a particular ROM here, Emuparadise is a good site to find all of the Virtual Boy ROMs.

vb-fan wrote:

Why would anyone buy replacement parts, when they’re just going to break again soon anyway? (He says, “Including the piece that is cracked on most stands” — there’s a REASON for that, Einstein!)

I am guessing that, most likely, a prospective buyer would not be buying these in order to actually use them as replacement parts but rather to have an interesting collector’s piece. Official replacement parts with official Nintendo instructions just never appear for sale, so this is a neat memento from the Virtual Boy market life era.

[Benjamin Stevens]

Japanese Magazine up for auction:

http://page9.auctions.yahoo.co.jp/jp/auction/k156944504

Used Games: 1998 Autumn Vol. 8

It says that it contains information about the Virtual Boy. Based on the seller’s description, it seems that there is a large article that deals with the tragedy of the system.

• This reply was modified 13 years, 5 months ago by Benjamin Stevens.

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TheForce81 wrote:
Looking good, I am eagerly awaiting my cases. This really gives us a great way to store our loose cartridges and since I almost only have loose cartridges this is ideal!
Thanks for the “previews” of what mine will look like 😉

You will be happy to know that your cases arrived to me from Nintendo of America yesterday. I plan to take them to the post office to mail to you on Monday morning, after which I will follow up with you then.

Lookin’ good, Guy Perfect!

I want to credit the person who gave me the original images for these. He is the one who started this thread at Nintendo AGE:

http://nintendoage.com/forum/messageview.cfm?catid=5&threadid=79852

He also has a handy guide for making the finalized cases there.

The last I heard, Richard still needs to cannibalize the carts solely for the connectors.

Hmmm… if he has a surplus of connectors without having a surplus of cases… then I’m guessing that more cases get broken during the making of FlashBoys, etc. than connectors.

L___E___T wrote:

I think someone owning one copy and not telling anyone is unlikely, surely the thrill from the debated mentality comes from telling everyone that you have something they can never have? I don’t know, I don’t hold that mentality so I can’t realluy do anything other than guess.

I definitely conclude that in the case of Dragon Hopper, there is at least one person out there hoarding it, and he truly doesn’t desire to make himself largely known:

In reference to a copy of Dragon Hopper possibly being in private hands, on July 25th, 2005, DogP wrote:

“I’ve heard from a reputable source that there is a copy out of N’s death grip, but they won’t (let) anyone within a 100 yds. of it”

When someone replied to this statement by saying it could just be a rumor, DogP responded:

“I’m sure it’s not a faker… it’s not anyone that I’ve met online, and I’ve never heard of this person bragging about it… I’ve found out about it through some of my VB contacts that were trying to get ahold of it, but apparently the guy’s not interested in letting it out of his death grip 😛 .”

Source:
http://www.digitpress.com/forum/showthread.php?65530-Dragon-Hopper-(Virtual-Boy)

As I’ve mentioned on this site before, DogP revealed himself to be a person who knew a lot about unreleased Virtual Boy stuff, primarily because he had the only known working Virtual Boy dumper for a long time, and he had secretly dumped rare games for people while promising them that he would never release the ROMs. It also seems that there was a time when DogP was searching for people who had prototype carts of the unreleased games, so that he could dump the games for them to preserve the ROMs, so he very likely came across genuine contacts who had unreleased VB games, demos, etc.

Based on DogP’s above statements, I would say that he even knew the name of the person who had (or still has) Dragon Hopper, and I have no reason to doubt that he had full confidence of that person having the game. At the time he wrote the statements in 2005, it seems that DogP himself did not have access to the ROM of Dragon Hopper, but one just never knows what deals may have occurred in the time since then.

vb-fan wrote:

If he’s low on cases, where is he getting the connectors???

That’s what the donor cart, which you send him along with the payment for the FlashBoy Plus, is for. So long as he receives a donor cart with the purchase of every FlashBoy Plus, he always has the connectors for the next FlashBoy Plus that he will make.

jrronimo wrote:

Am I correct to remember that Space Pinball was the prototype for Galactic pinball and is largely the same? But it has a different table as well?

I definitely would not say that it is “largely the same,” other than the fact that they are both pinball games. Galactic Pinball has 4 tables and a hidden bonus table within the tables. Space Pinball has a total of 5 tables, and 4 of them are completely different from any of the four tables in Galactic Pinball, while the fifth table does look similar to the bonus table in Galactic Pinball, but it, too, is different in how it is set up and cleared. Thus, between the two games, you essentially get 9 different pinball tables to play. Also, Space Pinball’s tables all connect together in a sort of “adventure mode,” so you can progress from one table to the next and end up back at the first table, while Galactic Pinball only has 4 individual tables that must be played individually, without any connection between them. The unfortunate thing about Space Pinball is that it was never made into a finalized game, which leaves the fact that there is no pinball limit or high score table, but you can make your own pinball limit and keep track of your own high score for endless fun.

Thanks for this, UncleTusker.

I’m excited to see how my instruction booklet looks in its finalized form.

The thought of being able to envision what the final version of VB Faceball could have been and actually make it become a reality is so awesome. Thank you so much, thunderstruck, for all of your past, present, and future work on this amazing editor! I will have a blast making my own levels, I’m sure.

jrronimo wrote:
I just picked this guy up at the post office this morning.

Very nice. That box looks like it is in very good condition, a very tough find indeed.

jrronimo wrote:
Awesome! All these years and there are still things left to discover. 😀 I wonder if there were any prototypes for Red City or Henry made? Maybe those are the ones “we’ll never know about”, haha.

Here is a list of Virtual Boy games, for which I firmly believe that prototype carts exist with very playable versions of the games on them:

1. Dragon Hopper (I am confident that this game is 100% finished)

2. Mansion of Insmouse (North American Version): ASSEMbler at assemblergames.com has (or had) the prototype cart:
http://www.assemblergames.com/forums/showthread.php?2673-Virtual-boy-items-unreleased&highlight=insmouse

3. Polygo Block

4. Virtual Block

5. Virtual Bomberman

6. Virtual Jockey

7. Zero Racers

I do also now wonder about Wangan SenSen Red City and Sora Tobu Henry. I wish suzushu had provided higher resolution images of those pages. I can make out many of the Japanese characters for translation, but I don’t know if I’ll be able to determine all of them.

Perhaps if I can find and translate more reliable information from Japanese sources, I will become convinced that even more very playable prototype Virtual Boy games are out there somewhere.