Conceived by Gunpei Yokoi, the Virtual Boy was a headset mounted on legs that used a system of mirrors to produce the illusion of depth in games. This allowed developers to use a third dimension to great effect, with characters rushing in and out of the background, and polygon graphics letting you feel like you were travelling into the screen. The system was released in 1995 in both Japan and the United States.
Bad press dogged the system before it hit the shelves. The system could only display games in black and shades of red, and this caused eye-strain, headaches and nausea in a number of people. The battery life was short, and it was too unwieldy to carry anywhere, negating its portable nature.
The system flopped at retail, and after a very short amount of time the system was pulled from the shelves worldwide, even before the European release! The Virtual Boy has since become a highly sought-after collector's item.
