Slashdot Mirror
When Consoles Lose, Everyone Wins
Ground Glass writes "Does the traditional knowledge that 'history is written by the winners' hold true with consoles? Perhaps, but there's more to it than that. Sometimes, systems that fail do so because their most salient concept was one no one was ready for - these provide future 'innovations'. Sometimes their loudest message was one only a niche group would ever want to listen to - they provide much needed perspective. In an early medium, the failures are the ones questioning what a game should be. It's no wonder the winners keep writing their ideas back in."
First to have online gameplay
Perhaps as a first party feature, but online gaming was available during the SNES/Genesis era. Xband was released in the US in 1994.
Well, the biggest problem with the virtual boy was the headache you got even after short periods of play. That's going to be a symptom of any oscillating mirror technology. I do have to say, it was a fully immersive experience which hasn't been duplicated again though. The other big problem was it was marketed as a portable system, and the games were essentially portable games, but it was a decidedly non-portable system.