It’s 2026 and the Virtual Boy is sold out

I’ve long said that Nintendo doesn’t really let an idea go to waste — it either goes on the shelf for another day, or is revisited in some new or novel way. That’s now true for the shunned Virtual Boy. What was once a notable mid-90s flop, is now a sought after 2026 curio — that’s because the upcoming Switch accessory version of the once doomed virtual reality machine is sold out.

Now, Nintendo’s ill-fated 3D plaything only managed to shift around 770,000 units when it initially made its 1995 debut — making it by far the company’s lowest selling console ever. Nintendo had hoped to sell three million of the red virtual reality units by March of 1996 in Japan alone.

So, it was quite the surprise when Nintendo revealed last year that they would be revisiting the tabletop machine by way of a Nintendo Switch accessory. This imminent add-on lets players slide their Switch or Switch 2 screen into a new Virtual Boy accessory, making the limited library of games available to play once more via Nintendo Switch Online. An odd move perhaps, but it’s always nice to see games that would otherwise have slowly been forgotten to time reach a new audience.

Well, Gunpei Yokoi’s 90s failure may well be redeemed, as the ever excellent Bluesky account Nintendeal recently highlighted that the Switch accessory is currently sold out. The $99 device was up for pre-order on Nintendo’s official site — but U.S. orders are now currently unavailable due to high demand. Even the cheaper, cardboard only version of the accessory is unavailable. The people yearn for the Virtual Boy!

For what it’s worth, I’m part of the problem — I’ve preordered the tabletop accessory, and I’m curious to see just how long it will take before I get a headache from using it. But on the plus side, access to a Wario Land game I’ve never played before!

Hiroshi Yamauchi said back in late 1994 that the then upcoming Virtual Boy would “transport game players into a ‘virtual utopia’ with sights and sounds unlike anything they’ve ever experienced“. I guess we’ll find out come February 17 when the Switch add-on arrives.