Failed Products of Nintendo

Oh Nintendo, I love you but sometimes you don’t make the best decisions. Every business has made some unsuccessful stuff and this giant gaming company is no exception. Today, I would like to discuss two Nintendo products that completely and totally failed.

Power Glove

Way before the Wii remote, Nintendo decided to let Mattel (that’s right, the huge toy making company) design the Power Glove. This accessory was to be a new way to play new games specifically designed with the Power Glove in mind and a fun way to play games consumers already owned.

Mattel designed the Power Glove in eight weeks, and it was released in 1989.

I have to admit, that glove looked pretty cool and very futuristic for the late 80s. The glove had motion sensors that hooked up to your TV. Using finger and arm movements, players were to experience a new level of gaming by connecting real movements to control characters and objects in the games.

However, the controls and sensors were awful. Anytime you tried to do something right, the sensors wouldn’t pick up your motions. If you actually wanted to know the moves, they were complicated. You had to hold your arm out the entire time, which caused your arm to get very tired after only a few minutes of playing. Don’t believe me? Watch today’s teens test out the Power Glove.

Warning: Some language.

Virtual Boy

Before the beloved Oculus Rift and other virtual reality systems made their way into the gaming world, there was Nintendo’s Virtual Boy. It had a lot of potential as Nintendo promised a full virtual experience. However, when consumers bought and/or tried out the system in 1995, they were not impressed. First off, the screen was black and red. It was an eyesore and players complained of dizziness, headaches, and intense eye strain. Nintendo had a manual included with the system and it had so many warnings, including one that said children seven years and older shouldn’t play Virtual Boy due to the intense visual side effects. Yikes.

Its starting price was $180, and five months later, the price was reduced to $20! Talk about a failure. Nintendo’s promise of a new and totally innovative system flopped.

So what went wrong? First, they didn’t have a lot of games for the Virtual Boy. Nintendo released about six games with the majority of them being Mario themed. It was a huge let down for consumers who were promised a vast amount of new games and experiences. Secondly, (and I’ve mentioned it before) the blaring red and black design was too much of an eyesore. Nintendo thought that the success of the green and black screen of the Game Boy would be the same for the Virtual Boy. However, green is a cool color and red is a warm color, meaning it takes more effort for the eyes and brain to focus on images entirely made of warm colors rather than cool ones. It’s no wonder people couldn’t play for more than 20 minutes at a time without getting a headache.

If you want to know more about it, here's a video!

The idea, yet again, was fantastic, but technology had not caught up to Nintendo’s innovative ideas.

I could go on and on about Nintendo and their failures. This is a company that pushes their limits and constantly gets bashed for it by the media. Well, I have news for you. I love Nintendo and so does The Gamer. In facts, hundreds of thousands of people love this company, which is not afraid to push the boundaries.

Despite the constant push for more mature and serious content to games, Nintendo stays true to its family friendly and fun games suited to excite the youngest of players to the oldest of fans. Nintendo reminds me that not everything you do will work out. Just because you have a few failures doesn’t mean you aren’t successful. They remind us to be patient, keep trying and things will turn out all right in the end.

We’ll see you next week!