Thanks for the comments, everyone! I appreciate all your posts!!
Benjamin Stevens wrote:
Kk-Man wrote:
These look totally awesome dude.
What are those exactly ? Was it used in stores to promote games ?In stores that kept all of their games behind glass, these cards were put outside the glass, so that prospective customers could look and see what was on the back of the game boxes, without having to get an employee to open the glass doors for them to look at the back of an actual game box. Of course, the VidPro cards were sent to stores before the games were released and shipped, so the Dragon Hopper VidPro card got sent to a store, even though the actual game itself never got commercially released.
Yup, that is correct. I have some great vivid memories about the whole VidPro card system and how it worked…
First, you would pick-out the card for the game you were interested in purchasing, if you made the decision to purchase the game, you would then grab a paper slip that looked like a receipt located in the card slot. This slip had a barcode on the bottom of it for a cashier to scan for purchase. The cashier would’ve then stapled the slip to your actual receipt, and you were now ready to head over to the redemption center to retrieve your game. The redemption clerk would’ve ripped the slip off of the receipt (or left it on) to grab the game from store stock. Then they send you off happy 😀
Benjamin Stevens wrote:
You know, if there is any correlation between a game being rated by the ESRB and the same game having had a VidPro card made for it, there could very well be VidPro cards out there for Zero Racers and Virtual League Baseball 2, traces of which have yet to be found.
That’s an interesting thought… What I find interesting though, is the fact that the VidPro display order form basically tells us that insert cards showing actual Virtual Boy hardware and accessories exist. That means there’s probably a card that shows the unreleased US Virtual Boy headphones in US packaging. The headphones are even mentioned a few times in the Virtual Boy’s manual.
The “Virtual Boy 1995 New Release Subscription” is most likely cards for all the games that were available at launch and for through-out the first year of the VB’s release.
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oh yeah….I FOUND THE F***IN’ DRAGON HOPPER CARD!!!!!!!!
What can I say about this one, it’s the Dragon Hopper VidPro card…
The only thing about this card that makes it different than the rest, are the numbers printed along the bottom white border. I’m not sure what all the numbers mean, but I’m pretty sure that the “0896” was its supposed release date.
So… What do you all think? Crazy shtuff, right?!
I now own two Panic Bomber cards. These are more like the VB VidPro cards we’re familiar with.
And then this Wario Land card…it has the same things going on with it as the above Mario Clash card.
Next up is a Mario Clash insert card. This one is very interesting as well, since it seems to be half way to its final design. This card has a normal front-side but shares the same early design on the back of it like the above Galactic Pinball card, and like the Galactic Pinball card, it also has a different game play image that differs from the retail version of the game.
It’s missing the model number above the barcode too.
Since we’re on the subject of Mexican Virtual Boy items here, here’s a picture of a Mexican Virtual Boy. It still has a promo tag on the front of the box, one could’ve purchased a new Super Nintendo and received a free Virtual Boy.
What a bargain! ; )
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Benjamin Stevens wrote:
Heh… I wonder if he realizes that if your offer wasn’t good enough, then probably no one else’s offer in the world will ever be better.
vuefinder83 wrote:
…I might give it another shot in the very near future, I’ll let you know how that goes…
Dude, I finally scored this thing!! And for far less than his asking price, and my first offer I ever made.
This is cooler than I thought, because it’s actually not made from cardboard as advertised on the seller’s ebay post. The only part of this display made out of cardboard is the stand for the display itself. The display is actually two thin pieces of vinyl with a spongy black material between them.
Let’s now reunite the entry form with the display it was meant to be attached to!! (3rd pic)
Lester Knight wrote:
this was really cool to see. thanks for posting.
Cool! Glad you enjoyed it.
Here’s another Toys “R”Us flyer promoting the Virtual Boy. I don’t own this one, this was a image I found online.
But I’ll be keeping an eye out for a copy, so I’ll post a better picture if ever I find one.
This one is a christmas flyer.
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vuefinder83 wrote:
what did vuefinder83 just find in one of his white-boxed USA demo units that might cause him to bump an old thread!?…
I decided not to bump/make a new thread, instead, I’m gonna make this one a twofer just because…
Are you ready for what I found!?
I
Found…
*drum roll*
Some AA batteries!!
*the sound of crickets*
No wait, don’t leave!! These are no ordinary batteries I tell ya.
These are Maxell Super Power Ace batteries, the same exact batteries that Nintendo packed in the box of brand-new GameBoy originals back in the day.
These were found in my “New” USA demo unit, wich has been in my collection for nearly 9 years. Every now and again, I like to check the contents of items that have been just sitting around on the shelves for years. But every single time I’ve checked the contents of this box it was always me just sliding it out, looking at it, then simply sliding the contents back in to the box. So this past weekend, I decided to check out its contents, but this time, I just so happened to pick up the controller and felt that it was very heavy…
My immediate thought was…”f***, the batteries must be corroded to death being in there for so long”. But to my surprise, when I opened the battery compartment there was what looked like a piece of rice paper in the shape of the opening to the VB’s battery compartment placed over the top of the batteries. So I then removed the piece of paper to get the batteries out, and it crumbled to dust (literally). After removing the batteries, wich happened to be in good shape, I had to blow out all the fragments of that crumbled paper, but everything in the battery compartment is still in new condition with no corrosion on the terminals whatsoever.
The batteries all have a manufacturing date that reads “07-95” on the bottom of them as seen in the 3rd picture, one month before the Virtual Boy’s US initial launch date.
This makes me wonder, if maybe these white-boxed USA demo units were used in tradeshows or maybe even used during the Virtual Boy Mall Tour promotion, where the VB would’ve been set up on tables, taken out of the box and after being set up all they had to do was remove that piece of paper from the battery compartment and stick a game in, and they were good to go…
The 4th picture is of an ebay auction for a “New” Game Boy original, many examples of these batteries being included with new game boys can be found all over the net.
So, thoughts!?
