i understand that they’re rare, but how come nobody has dumped roms of space invaders, virtual lab or sd gundam? it would be so great to have those without spending thousands of dollars. if a site like this controlled the distribution of them they wouldnt even be all over the place, just here.

jojobean wrote:
if a site like this controlled the distribution of them they wouldnt even be all over the place, just here.

LOL! Once they got out, they’d be everywhere… there’s no way to keep them in one place on the internet.

I think the reason nobody has dumped and released them is because the people who have the carts spent the thousands of dollars to get them… why would they want to give them away for free? There’s been LOTS of discussions on this in the past… do a search.

DogP

Now we have LOTS+1 discussions about this 😀

I think it’s been mentioned in this forum before, but maybe we could all set up some kind of PayPal account and anyone interested in acquiring some rare VB games for dumping could contribute. If every person gave 5 or 10 dollars, eventually we could buy a game like Space Invaders, someone would dump it and then that same person could resell it on eBay and refund some of the money back to the people who contributed it. It would be like an investment!

i would do that. virtual lab is on ebay right now, too. if i knew how to dump stuff i would just buy it, dump it, and resell it right away. i think someone could make like $50 selling copies of dumps for those rare games. i’d pay it.

I think the 4 main rare japanese VB games are going to be highly collectible in their physical form, regardless of any roms that exist. Most people that have all these roms probably have the legit version in their homes. I also think that at this point the VB community has shrunk to a rather small number and the community as a whole would respect the Virtual Boy “entity” well enough to not distribute the games to people they didn’t know well enough. Also, dumping the rom image would help preserve the art form long past the eventual decay of the physical media it is on. I think it would be a safe bet to give the dumps to people that order the FlashBoy since they are obviously dedicated individuals. You could also just dump it onto a VB cart and not release the rom on the internet. Sure, its not the same as the real collectible, but the people that have the rom or bootleg version would understand that and full respect would still be given to those who have the physical copy. It just seems like a waste for these rare games to never be experienced by a large audience due to their large prices. If we really were to preserve the Virtual Boy community we would want the community as a whole to experience every aspect of the Virtual Boy.

I do believe all of the games have been dumped, just not released.
If you want the game that bad just bid on them the next time they pop up. Speaking of that anyone know of anyone that wants to get rid of a virtual bowling.

Im sorry, Its just not fair. I hate this argument and the direction it always goes in. There are so many people out there that dont make enough money to plunk down thousands of dollars on ultra rare virtual boy games. It just sucks to not be able to play a new game for this system.

One game I would like to bring up that didnt decrease in value when the rom was released was the coveted nintendo world championships cart. How come all the ones floating around arent worth $100 yet the rom has been released. And on top of that it IS the holy grail of video games.

You’re right about that world championships cart. The value of these games isnt really affects because at this level of collecting a ROM is nowhere near the same thing as the actual physical copy of the game. And what about prototypes and such? It is almost impossible for somebody to just go out and buy a copy of those, not matter how much they really want it. I wish I could go out and buy some of those rare games but I make little money, am a full time student, and spent 8 hours in the hospital yesterday alone. Medical conflicts dont make life very easy… : sad:

I do keep an eye on the rare carts all the time, though. Really wish I could just buy it for a month and sell it again, but I cant even afford to do that. I actually had to sell most of my somewhat valuable games just to pay rent a year ago. It sucked so bad. >:( >:(

Please search through the forums. I begun exactly the same discussion a year ago (when I was still missing SD Gundam and Virtual Bowling), you can find the topic in the forums. To be honest, I thought like you all at first, but after all the comments that were written in that topic and all the “I give you my respect, you give me your ROM image”, I really understood why the four rarest games ROMS nor the prototypes aren’t publicly available.

After all the conversations I’ve had with many people in this forum, my conclusions from them are:

1.- It’s pointless to dream on playing prototypes, unless you can contribute to the Virtual Boy scene with something AMAZING which has never been seen before or you have enough money AND good contacts to buy them (I don’t have any, so don’t bother asking, I just gave up to playing prototypes).
1b.- Don’t worry, the known existing prototypes won’t be lost when the cartridge breaks. I firmly believe the “Virtual Boy Gurus” have already dumped them and they are very secure in their hard drive & backups & DVDs & etc.

2.- The ROMS of the four rarest Japanese games won’t be publicly available. Jojobean, as you said, we must respect the Virtual Boy “entity”. As a respect to such entity, it’s normal that people who own these games don’t want to release these ROMS. Imagine if it is difficult to own those ROM images, that I have the games but I don’t have the corresponding ROMS. In fact, I don’t even want to have them, because if someone was to eventually “leak” them, I wouldn’t like that the Virtual Boy Community could even think of me as the responsible for the leakage. I respect their decission of not making those ROMS available.
2b.- Don’t worry about losing these games when the physical media breaks. I know that the “Virtual Boy Gurus” have already dumped them and they are very secure in their hard drive & backups & DVDs & etc.

3.- If you are lucky enough to own a Flash Boy, enjoy playing the ROMS there are, which are more than enough. Think that you have 18 out of 22 is an 81,8% of all the games made, plus:

a.- Virtual Bowling is relatively similar to Nester’s Funky Bowling.
b.- Virtual Lab is a buggy game which is very similar to V-Tetris.
c.- SD Gundam is… well, it just IS, because it exists, nothing else.
d.- Space Invaders would be the only interesting game to get something different from what there already is, but as a bare cartridge it can be available at eBay for about $100, which is equivalent to 2 XBox360 games (1 game if you live in Europe because the euro is very strong now).
e.- YOU CAN PLAY SPACE SQUASH IN ENGLISH!!!!!!

I think there’s nothing more I can say. Of course, don’t misunderstand me: I’d love to play the protos in my FlashBoy, and when I didn’t own the four rarest games, I would have loved to have played them in ROM format to see how they were, but as things are now, I understand it’s impossible.

I think that the games being bad isn’t very good reasoning. It seems to only further support the idea that their value wouldn’t go down since people want to collect the actual hard copy of the game for its rarity, not its playability. That being said, I can somewhat understand where some of these people are coming from. I may be coming into some source code for a game prototype and the first thing that came into my head was, “wow! this is so rare! nobody else will have it!”. Its kind of selfish, but whatever, I think thats the whole point of collecting anyway. It seems people are all for releasing the games until they actually get them, then they start to understand how important the small numbers can be. lol.

You are wrong, but never mind. I was only giving you alternatives to play equivalent to the ultra rare games, but if you really think that is the reason, then do not become one of “us selfish” and release the proto game when you get it…

well, the thing that really changed my mind was talking to my friend that has a few really rare SNES prototype games. he’s the one that might be giving me the virtual boy one, but it depends on a few things. anyway, he was telling me what his collection meant to him and i could tell that it wasn’t just being spiteful to other people, it actually was important to him.

and i didn’t mean to offend by using the word ‘selfish’. i was just saying that i may feel a little bit selfish about it, but its not a big deal cause thats kind of what collecting is. you want something that is rare and nobody else has. its like my collection of stop motion movie figures. most of those are very very rare and nobody in the world has them but me. its kind of cool.

so sorry, i didnt mean to offend. also, i’ve been playing blox alot lately on the emulator.

No problem, don’t worry. As I said, everyone will have to cope with what there is, so it’s a “take it or leave it”. And the Virtual Boy Community here at vr32 is a real good bunch of people who are very helpful, trust me.

it definitely seems like a good group here. tons of resourceful people with a love for virtual boy! it is kind of sad that i’ll never get to play some of the rare games, but i’m trying to win a virtual lab thats on ebay right now and i may have something a little more rare coming my way.

*crosses fingers*

If someone wants to buy the rare JP VB titles, I can help source them but they really don’t come cheap.