The VB has finally been unpacked and assembled, and I’ve been playing it on-and-off between work and school (busy schedule this semester). However, it’s sort of a “ghetto Virtual Boy”, because the previous owner tried to fix the broken tripod stand by soldering it, so it constantly favors one of the two legs and is prone to wanting to tip over. They also said that their VB came from a “non-smoking home”, but the eyeshield smells just like my great-grandfather’s house, and he smoked cigars constantly. His house reeked of it, and so does the VB.
Now, about the games…
Galactic Pinball is really addicting, and makes good use of the 3-D effect, especially with the background “zooming by” behind the playing fields. My favorite level so far is Colony. I actually videotaped my mom trying to play Galactic Pinball, and the results were hilarious. (Maybe I’ll put it on YouTube sometime.)
Nester’s Funky Bowling is fun, but the first thing I noticed is that it’s a lot less “three-dimensional”. More like “flat planes on different levels” (for lack of a better term). The character’s flat, the alley’s flat, and the only difference is that one’s closer than the other. With Galactic Pinball it actually looked like the pinball game “field” was tilted “away” from you. Also, it’s interesting how it makes use of actual “physics” of bowling, but there are so many different combinations of where to stand, where to tap on the spin and where to tap on the power meter that there are a myriad of different ways to get a strike (or more commonly, to mess up). I’ve never scored higher than a 130 because of this. I love the animations, however, especially the ones with the twins themselves in it. My favorite is when I nail a spare, and Nester points and laughs at me. It’s like “what did -I- do?”
I have yet to get around to Mario Tennis. That’s the only Japanese game I have so far. I also still have to get Wario Land, now that I have a little birthday money.
Hm. Is there a way to submit user reviews of games? I thought I saw an option like that, but maybe I’m having a false memory. I’d like to submit my own reviews for the games I have (actually, I kinda did above, didn’t I?)
The only thing I can think of that would have been really neat would have been a Mario Kart port. Yeah, those aren’t really favorably looked upon (ports, that is) but the SNES version was fun, and would have worked great with the VB’s graphics.
I have one, but the picture quality is really grainy and terrible, and the mini-games are very few and boring. I played it like crazy for the first few years after I got it, but I haven’t touched it since. I plan to keep it, though, as part of my current Nintendo collection.
It was for me during my first semester, back in Fall ’05. Having to get used to a whole new academic environment, the new rules and a huge building to navigate, not to mention the amount of homework surpassing even what high school had to offer. All you have to do is make sure the work gets done on time, and that you manage your time to make room for both work AND play. 🙂
I personally have no trouble with the red n’ black layout, but that was a very ingenious idea to offer an alternative for those who do. Good job on it too, it looks great.
I first heard about it all the way back in 1996, when I was only nine years old. I didn’t pay much attention to it at the moment, however, because me and my brother were hyped up about the upcoming Nintendo 64 (something I’d later realize that the VB suffered from a LOT; being in the shadow of the N64). It went out of sight and out of mind until 7 months ago, when I saw videos about the games on YouTube, and people’s videotaped reviews of how it works and the games that went with it. It sounded even more interesting than the Game Boy (to me, anyway), so I looked around on the internet for more information about this console (which is how I found Planet Virtual Boy). As a result of all this research, I finally decided to invest in one for my upcoming 21st birthday. So you could say PVB helped me make my final decision. 😛
Congradulations ! sounds like a good buy to me. not too pricey and those are some fun games. now all you need to hold you off for a while is Wario Land.
Congratulations !! Go for Wario Land is an ACE !!
Wario Land is on my list as well. There were only two copies, both mint and VERY pricey, when I ordered everything last Sunday. Thus, I’m waiting for an opportune moment when maybe a used one for a much more reasonable price will surface. 🙂
Because it’s an uncommon game, the price usually doesn’t go below $25. On eBay, I usually see it sell anywhere between $30 to $70. Usually, the cheapest ones are that inexpensive because something is missing (the box and/or the manual). With everything included, it usually fetches prices up into the $60s through $70s.
(VERY late reply, lol, haven’t been here in a few months).
I figured out it was infact the ROM after I downloaded one from one site that didn’t even start up, then got rid of that one and downloaded one from another site, which partially worked. Thanks for the tip. 🙂
