Hello there !

Yesterday i bought a Virtual Boy in Akihabara, it’s not my first time in Japan nor the first time seeing a Virtual Boy for sale, the idea of getting one made it’s way since many years.
I’ve learned only recently that there was quite a cool homebrew scene on the VB so that might have hyped me up !

So here i am now, just saying hi to everybody.

I have five games at the moment:
-Red Alarm
-Teleroboxer
-Panic Bomber
-Galactic pinball
-Vertical Force
All complete in their boxes.

And i’m going to buy these ones before leaving Japan:
-Mario Clash
-Mario Tennis
-Warioland

Is there any titles you would recommend outside of these ones ? It seems these are the best ones.

Also, i have a line of pixels not showing on my right lens, and my VB is still in warranty for one week, do you think i should take it back ?
Hopefully they will exchange it with another one but at the moment it was the only one available, so i would prefer to keep it.
If i do keep it, would it be expensive to repair ? Because i don’t know if it’s related to the ribbon problem everybody seems to have.

Sorry for all the questions !
Hope i can contribute to the site in the future !

Greetings K-K Man,
Welcome aboard,
You gotta get a Flashboy from Minestorm.
Once you do that you gotta play Bound High and the Hyper Fighting demo.
You may have to wait a year for the roms but it’s well worth the wait.

Congrats on getting a VB and welcome to the forum. I wouldn’t bother returning it for the line missing on the display. Regardless of which system you end up with, you’ll want to get your displays soldered by one of our trusted display solderers here. All Virtual Boys are going to end up with lines eventually, the permanent fix is to get them soldered 🙂

Morintari wrote:
Greetings K-K Man,
Welcome aboard,
You gotta get a Flashboy from Minestorm.
Once you do that you gotta play Bound High and the Hyper Fighting demo.
You may have to wait a year for the roms but it’s well worth the wait.

Yes i definitely will get a Flashboy !
As a fan of Street Fighter and in order to play all those cool homebrews !
By the way i heard Hyper Fighting was only playable on a cart (the full version) is that right ?

speedyink wrote:
Congrats on getting a VB and welcome to the forum. I wouldn’t bother returning it for the line missing on the display. Regardless of which system you end up with, you’ll want to get your displays soldered by one of our trusted display solderers here. All Virtual Boys are going to end up with lines eventually, the permanent fix is to get them soldered 🙂

Yeah i saw that, so the dead pixel is part of that fix too.
I have region switched most of my pal 8/16 bit systems and backilghted some Gameboys already, the best thing i did was completely changing the caps of a Game Gear, which was kinda hard due to the lack of space inside.
I fixed my pinball machine and the monitor of my Killer Instinct cabinet too but that was so much time consuming that i would rather send the boards of my VB to repair.
Depending on the price i could try it though, i fixed a Gameboy screen once so i feel pretty confident.

If it is one line of pixels, you definitely bring it back, it most probably is a dead pixel which isn’t fixable!

Oh crap, I was thinking this was the connection issue, if it is in fact a dead pixel then listen to TheForce!

Yes Unfortunately the whole game of Hyper Fighting is only available in full cart form meaning you have to buy the cart to play Hyper Fighting.

Oh by the way nice gamming set up I love the KI arcade it adds a nice touch.

Yeah i know a dead pixel when i see one, and this one is pretty much dead.
So if it’s not fixable i’ll definitely bring it back, thanks for saving my money guys !

I saw one complete in box today, new and never opened in an obscure shop… the box has seen the sun but it was quite cheap for what it is, the guy also had Jack Bros and Mario Clash all unopened at decent prices. So if they don’t have one spare i’ll go grab that one instead.

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Morintari wrote:
Yes Unfortunately the whole game of Hyper Fighting is only available in full cart form meaning you have to buy the cart to play Hyper Fighting.

Oh by the way nice gamming set up I love the KI arcade it adds a nice touch.

That’s actually quite cool to see homebrews on carts, i’ll try to get it if i’m not completely poor by the time i come back from Tokyo.

Yes it does, that thing is LOUD, and quite massive too.
It’s one of my favorites gaming experience, whenever i play this game it just feels good, and i’m very happy that i bought it before the remake was even a thing because the prices are just too high now.

Yup, now I am a 100%, have seen dead pixels about 8 times now and this definitely is one. Would bring it back if I were you.

TheForce81 wrote:
Yup, now I am a 100%, have seen dead pixels about 8 times now and this definitely is one. Would bring it back if I were you.

So just to know, how rare this is ? Am i really unlucky ?
Because otherwise it looks really crisp.

[TheForce81]

It is extremely rare in my opinion, though happens more on Japanese VBs than USA ones. Just saw it on one USA display and 7 times on a Japanese display.

• This reply was modified 7 years, 7 months ago by TheForce81.

TheForce81 wrote:
It is extremely rare in my opinion, though happens more on Japanese VBs than USA ones. Just saw it on one USA display and 7 times on a Japanese display.

Okay then a last question, as i will be looking for another one fully working, is there any chance that the dead pixels can still happen with time ?
I mean, are those not working properly from the beginning ?
It’s kinda strange, i guess i would need an american unit but there is now way i can afford that.

You saw that on some off the systems i send you or not 😉

TheForce81 wrote:
It is extremely rare in my opinion, though happens more on Japanese VBs than USA ones. Just saw it on one USA display and 7 times on a Japanese display.

KK-man
i read you have buy it at Akihabara may i ask what the charge you for the system
i come there allot whas there in januari and in march this year
But prices are crazy high there for systems like this
did you buy at super patato or beep shop ?

mawa wrote:
KK-man
i read you have buy it at Akihabara may i ask what the charge you for the system
i come there allot whas there in januari and in march this year
But prices are crazy high there for systems like this
did you buy at super patato or beep shop ?

There was one in Super Potato last month boxed for not so much but i missed it, i remember it being close to 20.000yen but i’m not sure exactly how much.
The one i bought at Trader was 19.000yen, loose.

I saw one complete new in box in a shop, which i will not tell where it is located at the moment because it was clearly never found by any ebay scalper yet, at 25.000yen.

What are you opinions on this ?

I’d say if the new one doesn’t have any dead pixels to just go for it. I have 2 Japanese units that I’ve played quite a bit, and none of them them have lost pixels. As TheForce said, it’s very rare. The much more common issue is the “glitchy display” issue, which can be fixed by soldering them.

So i’m in Akihabara right now.
They refuse to refund my money, they say it is not part of the warranty as it was written on the package.
Which is funny because everytime i bought a game there they would mention if something was missing in the box “no manual” or if they weren’t able to say if the battery in the snes carts were good they would say “save batteries no warranty” but they didn’t say anything when i bought the Virtual Boy, so i didn’t even bother asking as they are always so nice.
I guess they wanted to get rid of it, and i can’t read japanese so they got me good.
plus, usually the things written there are just comments about the state of the product (like “label faded” or “box scratched”).

I need to get rid of it very fast because otherwise i won’t have the money to buy the other one.
Anyone is interested ? I’ll sell it the exact same price i paid, which is 20,500yen. I’ll put it on craigslist and if it fails i’ll bring it to another store to have at least some cash back.

That sucks and reeks of scamming if you ask me… Not interested in buying it, but you could swap out the display with a correctly working one, will solve your problem with less hassle I think.

welcome to akihabra
like i told i come allot there but never buy there
first prices are very high only beacouse all tourist comes there and will buy

iff i am correct 19.000 yen for a loose one you say thats really to high
25.000 for a new one will be oke but is there prove ?
test it in store iff they let you test it ( how can it be new then how many people have play already ?

Honestly i never buy from Akihabara before doing all the stores and comparing the prices. I always found the best deals that way, and for the things that are more pricey well some of those rare games are pretty hard to find outside of Akihabara.
So when i’m tired of looking, i just go to Super Potato or Retro Game Camp.

By the way i bought Golf and Virtual League Baseball for 750yen new complete in boxes today, which makes like 6euros for the two. When you know the good stores it’s all good !

I bought my Famicom AV modded at Super Potato, and also bought my Super Famicom there, no problems at all and very clean systems.
Though some things can be found for cheaper in Book-Off or in Nakano Broadway stores, like the AV Famicom i bought two weeks ago, you have to come there more often to find the deal which can be a hassle.

But yeah i’m used to buy at Book-Off stores from all around Tokyo and it is a lot cheaper (excepted the one in Akiba but where the hell would you find a copy of LSD Dream Emulator if not there, haha, i did).

The boxed VB i have my eyes on is not in Akihabara, i know for sure this is the kind of store that have games there from their launch still at their retail prices from 20+ years ago.

Anyway, i still love my VB for what it is, we’ll see what happens next.