Red Alarm intro and gameplay on Nintendo Virtual Boy

[HooshIsASoup]

They ought to port Virtual Boy games to the 3DS. Either as full-on remakes (like Ace Combat Assault Horizon Legacy or Star Fox 64 3D) or at least on the Nintendo eStore as virtual console titles.

[VileIntentionsUS]

Man... this game rocked big time. I put so much time into this game that I probably permanently damaged my brain... but it was all worth it.

[bliglum]

The actual game is SOOO much less irritating to look at than this. Sure, it's still just red lines.. but they are flicker free, with genuine depth and much crisper and cleaner than this.... However, considering this is a vid captured from a vboy with a standard camera, it's not bad. And to those saying "oh it hurts my eyes" and just jumping on the ol' virtual boy hate train, it's no different then modern 3-d.. which gives SOME people headaches and stuff too.

[jiulio4aswomeX2]

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[xxashyy]

Weird thing about the Virtual bay is that it was 32 bit in graphics but the sound card was Gameboy standard.

[amunve]

never seen anything like it.

what the hell is the console?

not understand anything

[baahhhFATALITY11]

star fox would have been an intresting game to be released on this system

[pengywengyman]

Such awesome music on the intro and first stage!

[Relinque9]

Oh, thanks for this vid! Sweet memories.

I remember this game on the VB console, a friend of mine has brought it to me around 15 years ago. Disney's Tron era...

And this was a true 3D - you just should use some imagination =)

[Rinzo2]

This was actually one of the only games I had for this wretched console. I remember it being super fun, but I couldn't play it for more than an hour or so because the red would just mess with my eyes.

[1983parrothead]

Star Fox = polygons

Red Alarm = vector graphics (think Battlezone, Star Wars Arcade and Ekkusu).

[michaelisanowl]

For some reason, playing this game would scare the hell outta me. Probably still would, haha.

[gorezombiez]

What the hell was going on in the first part???

[NoliaM]

i had no idea what was going on for the first 38 seconds

[Tobey64]

That game looks cool. I should buy it on eBay.

[MishkaSky]

I dont even know who had the idea to create a console that uses only the color "RED". It just destroys your eyes lol

[snadwitch123]

Use some sense. Back when it was released, green and blue LED's were still in their infancy, whereas red was significantly easier to produce. Go figure ;/

[MishkaSky]

There is nothing to figure that playing for an hour with only the color RED in your face, will make your eyes bleed =)

[pooladden]

Is the font red or is that just the blood on my eyes obscuring the colours?

[Lichstralen]

lol I had this game and Mario Tennis on my Virtual Boy. I liked it, but I could never adjust the Virtual Boy for my height since I was only 10 years old. Gave me neck pain and induced blindness. HOORAY!

[keyjackdiamonds]

its been 10 minutes since i watched the video and my eyes still really hurt

[mnemo70]

To reiterate: When you look at a REAL Virtual Boy, the graphics are rock steady and NOT flickering or anything! It's my camera that messed up the video.

[ThInTrM]

mnemo70: Most cameras don't properly record Virtual Boy games, judging from other videos I've seen.

It's like trying to use a camera to record an older CRT computer monitor. It'll flicker in the video even though it doesn't to our own eyes.

The camera's just got a different perception of FPS than the human eye does, to put it roughly.

That's going to be lost on the people reading the Gamespot article, though.

[mnemo70]

It's even more complicated: The Virtual Boy uses a SINGLE horizontal array of LEDs for each eye that is reflected by a flipping high-speed mirror to look like a single image. It's not even a real display! Because of that it's no wonder cameras won't capture the image clearly.

[redrabbit65]

Sorry to say but this actually looks kinda cool, early forerunner of Starfox or something. Kinda awesome, but would definitely make your eyes bleed.

[MrGoosetube]

Looks great with 3D goggles.

[arashiku]

I liked the song though @ 0:45 - 0:56

[ShiggityBlam]

McVaffe did an awesome cover of the Red Alarm theme over at OCRemix! Check out "Red Dimension."

[vanishinglight666]

0:00-0:41 what

[gunstarlegends]

Looks pretty cool

[CHELSEA2041992]

hilarious game lol........the starships remind me of star fox's starships :P

[WhatsY0UTUB3]

This game looks sweet

[striferdrummer76]

ive most definitely played much worse

[poocrumbleking]

That guy from gamespots a tard! enter the matrix was fum and awhsome and this lookz hellah kickass!! retard dont know real bad games!!! i know fucking retarded games!

[deathpath]

Man, I read that too. This game actually looks good! I guess it's just cause it literally made your eyes bleed. -___-

[B0OM3R98]

LOL screw the gamespot article, i thought that was BADASS! Insanely hard to look at when the action starts, but BADASS.

[Fivestupidsins]

I thought the writer of the gamespot article was the creator of this video as in the article, when talking about this game I quote:'Seriously, just look at that video I posted' before giving a link to this video.

[mnemo70]

I can assure you I'm not him. :)

[countbleck35]

lol gamespot

[mnemo70]

Where's the Gamespot article? :-O

[countbleck35]

@mnemo70 it was a community spotlight thing, some member wrote it lol

[mnemo70]

Ah, thanks.

[solidwarrior]

MY EYE HURT IT"S NOT EVEN FUNNY !!!

[jdjd5883]

gamespot, haha jaja

[CABAOCW]

Okay, it doesnt seem that bad to me. On the first stage i could tell where walls where, what i was supposed to shoot at, and what not to. Its not as bad as you made it sound in my opinion.

[Avistant]

WTF WAS THAT?!!!!! It looks like Star Fox for the SNES in progress!

P.S. Gamespot brought me here too lmao

[Redeemer117]

"Good Luck" is right.... you don't even know what you are looking at.

[maverick49]

OMG!! MY EYES!!!

[djjoelz]

this seems like it would be very painful on the eyes..yup gamespot brought me here too

[GerardoPerez]

haha same here!

[Joeofthejungle24]

ugh the graphics are bad, but the sound? its ear piercing

[koolkeith19]

sadly I remember play that POS... for the 30mins it wasted my life for...

[skatercom]

is that fuckin gameplay?

[gctechs]

lol @ the comments, thanks to that damn GAMESPOT article :)

[ShiggityBlam]

Heh. This game seems to be a real "love it or hate it" thing. I bet that Gamespot article's all like, "look at this crappy game! Mock it!"

Check out MobyGames' list of press reviews for Red Alarm, though. It got some fairly good scores with some mags; one of the ones that didn't awarded it "Best Virtual Boy Game," according to WIkipedia at least.

[cursedswordsman]

Heh, Gamespot brought me here too xD

[lwwarrior1]

look at those amazing 1080p graphics

[nomcal]

I must be pretty unique, then. I totally loved this game when I was a kid. I even beat it at least 3 times! Took me maybe around a 100 hours of playing time to do so. :-P Thankfully, my eyesight wasn't compromised (unless the Virtual Boy can actually induce astigmatism, that is).

[ShiggityBlam]

... Wow. Watching everyone rip this game, I'm left to wonder how you all would react to the original Battlezone for the Arcade ...

[digitalshark]

Obvious answer. Battlezone was not RED, it did not hurt your eyes to play it, and despite using the same style to represent "3d" it was never confusing as to where you were going or what you were seeing.

[samtastic333]

it's ALL RED? whose idea was that?

[nothingelsetodoZ]

The Virtual Boy, the console it is for is like that, it's all red and black, search for other games like Mario Clash.

[ShiggityBlam]

Would've been nice if Nintendo didn't rush this console out the door like they did.

Then we might have had the full-color LCD display that Yokoi was aiming for when he was working on this thing.

[nothingelsetodoZ]

Pretty true, it was just poorly excuted, but could be a great idea indeed.

[Klagmar]

I least they're honest when they call it RED Alarm.

[Everincon]

looks better than Halo! :)

[NeedleGunner]

plays better too

[lol7578311]

their advice is "Good Luck" my reaction after playing the game is "all i get is LUCK, i need more than that to maintain my vision"

[DaftOcean]

Hily crap this game mafe me blind....(sry for the spelling couse i cant see anything i write XD)

[tremor32]

i'd give it a shot just to say i played it

[Spartan043]

Hell, I used to play Tiger handhelds that were ten times shittier than this. Bad video games just don't faze me at all. Not even Big Rigs.

[ThInTrM]

As mnemo70 (the video author) said, the quality of his recording doesn't exactly flatter the game.

I remember playing this on in-store demos. It was actually a lot better than it looks and sounds from this video.

One of those things that you have to play yourself to understand, I guess ...

[digitalshark]

I have to disagree - the only thing you will understand after playing it yourself is it is one of the most God awful games ever produced. It is NOT a lot better than it seems here, regardless of upload or capture quality. I'd argue playing the actual game is more headache inducing than watching this clip.

[VernianProcess]

Yeah it's one thing to watch a little screen that is all red and black, it's another thing to strap a giat frikking helmet to your face and have that god-awful red and black surround your entire vision!

[ThInTrM]

digitalshark: That's your opinion, and you are welcome to it--but remember that it is only your opinion.

Despite your statement that people will "understand that Red Alarm is one of the most God awful games ever produced" by playing the actual game rather than watching a video, there are actually fans of Red Alarm.

That's self-evident by some of the comments on this video (and other Red Alarm videos) and reviews elsewhere.

[digitalshark]

Thanks, but isn't that rather obvious? What exactly are people expressing in comments on youtube videos, other than their opinion? I could really care less if there are fans of the game - among the gamers I know, myself included, this is the kind of game you look back and remember how God awful it was - no rosy nostalgia like say for the early Sierra PC games or The 7th Guest or whatever. This was a horrible, gimmicky game that just plain hurt your eyes. IN MY OPINION, rabid fanboys.

[ThInTrM]

digitalshark: Rabid fanboys, hm? Interesting you'd insinuate that I'm a fanboy just because I said the game's graphics aren't as terrible as the recording makes them out to be. I never owned a Virtual Boy.

This video hadn't received any comments for over a month, yet over the past few days it's been swarmed by people bashing the game and calling it the worst thing ever.

Have you ever considered you might instead be a rabid hater, unable to accept that people might actually like this game?

[digitalshark]

I was referring to the people who felt compelled to rate my comment down because they could not accept exactly the point you were making - it is my opinion on the game. So apparently a positive opinion is the only one allowed here? I would have to argue, unfortunately, that with this particular game, which often turns up on many "worst of all time" lists, for my comment to be voted down so quickly and for the reaction to my comment to be taken so personally, it deserves the term rabid fanboys.

[ThInTrM]

digitalshark: Ah. Well, I'm glad you didn't mean me, then.

[ThInTrM]

digitalshark: Nevertheless, I don't understand why you're accusing me of painting a wounded picture of unfairness, when all your replies border on a tone of wild indignation.

It's as if I've personally insulted you by pointing out what mnemo70 said in the past, and by not joining everyone else in saying that the game is terrible.

You hate the game; that's fine. All I was pointing out is that the flickering isn't nearly that bad when trying the real thing, nor are the colors as muddy.

[randal00]

"Good Luck"...

[MasalaDog]

my eyes just melted

[XxMforzxX]

my eyes...hurt

[Maleficus100]

this game must taken 5 minutes to make...

[mazman3434]

Goddam, its not the gameplay that hurts you, its the F#$@ audio that hurts my ears. Its not even generic music, its a nail on a chalkboard. Make it stop!

[KrassoSzoreny]

I think I'd have more fun 'playing' the map screen in descent.

[wjofre1]

wtf!!

[Omnimorph]

I wonder how many kids had their christmas ruined with this :)

[stefman666]

no, their eyesight

[MrFreakHeavy]

I wonder how many kids comited suicide because of this :(

[nickste22]

ok WTF!?!¿

O__________________O

[MysteriBoi]

O_o

[im1rich1]

what a virtual ass kicking

[MrWhoopsiedaisy]

This is blasphemy! This is madness!

Madness.... THIS IS VIRTUAL BOY!!!

[jilliebean111]

What the fuck did I just watch?

[Leimyu]

its... its kinda awesome :( somehow

[bufandablanco]

woah....really?

[xXDa1CaptainXx]

.....AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH x(

[wormri]

Do a barrel roll?

The spaceship model is screaming Starfox.

[LegendAmongRebels]

wtf am i looking at???? is this one of the nine circles of hell??? x)

[Spartanjames170]

the virtual boy was crap

[fize4ever]

AHHHHH MY EYES

[GaudyMarko]

14 years later and Nintendo is still trying to win over it's audience with stupid gimmicks and crappy controls. glad we rnt burning our eyes out anymore tho

[djhenyo]

@GaudyMarko

They are number one right now. I would call that more than a try. After a system as unsuccessful as the Gamecube (by far the lowest selling of it's time) this can be called nothing but an epic win. As far as mobile gaming, forget about it. Sony isn't touching them at all and M$ offices wreak of Hershey squirts every time they contemplate that market. Don't worry, the Big N has some more good stuff cooking up. They better or they might not keep their top spot till the next gen comes.

[madisson456]

@djhenyo

Nintendo is only winning in terms of sales figures due to their ability to target casuals (non-gamers). When it comes to having the respect of gamers and the gaming industry, Nintendo is dead last. Notice the lack of third party support the Wii has right now; for the most part when people talk about gaming, they are talking about either Sony or Microsoft.

[djhenyo]

Like I said, an epic win that Sony and M$ are racing to copy. Lack of 3rd parties was going to be a huge problem because of weak graphics. N didn't have the dough to bet big this round, but jackpots obviously do happen. Respect-wise, you discredited everything you said by bringing up M$. If Sony was the pioneer of buying the video games market, then the green guys are the Bill Gates of...oh shit...yeah, you get the point. You know how Walmart moves in and the stores supporting the community die?

[IIPacKyII]

economically, mom and pop stores going out of business is a good thing. You waste less valuable and limited resources delivering supplies to many small stores. Meanwhile, Wal-Mart moves in and saves everyone the trouble. That is a hindrance to economic growth.

Source- Business/Entrepreneurial Major

[KrassoSzoreny]

Yes, you also end up with vacant, economically unproductive urban commercial spaces leading to blighted districts, while replacing domestic competitive diversity with a retail mono-culture that's dependent on cheap foreign goods for its existence...'Not to mention that Big Box stores encourage and enable automobile dependent sprawl, which is in itself a huge waste of 'valuable and limited resources' Mom and Pop' stores going under is good for Wal-Mart. In the short term.

[robinhoodOO7]

I'm impressed! You justed kicked the "Business/Entrepreneurial Major's" butt. Well, I guess they are a dime a dozen these days.

[WarriorOfWoW]

I've never had a meaningful conversation with anybody in a Walmart. Ever. Mom and Pop stores, however...

[KrakenKid]

@madisson456

Thank you so much for pointing that out. I agree 100%.

[GaudyMarko]

and thus the fanboy wars begin

[stunt296]

Thats funny XD

[WHEATIESLOL]

Jeez, this really does hurt. It looks like it would've been really awsome for the time, though. I can't even sit through a 2 minute video of it, though. @.@

[mnemo70]

To clear this up: When you look at a Virtual Boy yourself the picture is NOT flickering like in the video! It's a problem of the refresh rate and the camera used for filming.

[shotgunn111]

it does hurt but its funny and the intro music is kinda creepy

[SlNNESLOSCHEN]

It hurts.

[p4p4mik3]

damn it does hurt my eyes just watching this video, is it really bad for your eyes?

[akumie]

nope, not more then being in the dark for 1 hour and then looking at a ligh for 10 sec...

[alphathewolf]

lol. good point lol

[reeltoreelmaster]

cool game

[alphathewolf]

Atari 3D?

[ICanHasCookie]

Dont know why everyone hated the virtualboy it had some good games for a failed system. i just bought one on ebay.

[sisoymolesto]

they should made it on black n white, like first game boy, they sound was bad, it sounded worse than an Snes.

[highchampking]

i think the sound was just as good as snes, but the speakers sucked. that's my take on it.

[bloodfoxtrue]

congrats... what games did u get?

[alphathewolf]

Well i think it turned out to be more disappointing than it was hated. It seem as if the few games developed for the system was more focused on 3D gaming more than the Virtual Reality aspect.

I guess in a way the Nintendo Wii actually has more Virtual Reality to it than any console in existence.

[adog262]

It's a Starfox copycat somewhat, but it's pretty good. :)

[zcmrrd]

Man that was a great game. I'd be tearing it up, at least until I got to a boss- then I'd end up fighting until I ran out of fuel

[SuperWaffle35]

It's like (sort of) portable star fox

[supergodzilla1]

Good times. I might play this game again.

[nicklang319]

this was probably the best game on the virtual boy

[EdmacZ]

The music is awesome.

[Sharpshooter413]

Holy crap, I still have this in my closet somewhere! Thanks for reminding me.

[zcmrrd]

When I borrowed a friends Virtual Boy and Started playing Red-Alarm, I couldn't put the thing down!The Wire-frame Graphics were fine with me.

[HunterKiller88]

O_o my eyes are startin to hurt

XD

[akumie]

I agree what I saw on another video, sometime u cant see if its a wall or the right way

[figment1988]

one reason i like this game is because it's so much like star fox

[NESZapper]

I know everyone hates the Virtual Boy, but I personally love this game in some weird way >.>

[DjGizzo]

red .........i remeber virtual reality head set type game things they were ok but the graffics were not at least you can see what your doing on this

[Benco97]

Looks fantastic, thanks.

[ken131]

Thanks this is exactly what I was after.