Tiger Electronics, creator of inexpensive handheld games like Electronic Bowling (admit it, you hid one in your Trapper Keeper), have had plenty of hits and misses with their products over the years. One of their flops was the R-Zone X.P.G. Xtreme Pocket Game, a handheld gaming machine released in 1995. The games were craptastic, the design a little too clunky, and the red-on-black graphics were tolerable only if you closed your eyes and jabbed the corner of your sockets with your pinky. But hey, gotta try and oust the Game Boy, right?
The R-Zone was released in three versions during its lifespan: one with a traditional layout pictured above, a souped-up (and enlarged) model with a color screen, and a version with a headset and flip-down screen for your right eye that just-so-happened to hit store shelves a year after the Virtual Boy. And we thought hardware ganking was unique to this century!
Take a look at the original R-Zone Headset commercial after the break. Ready to rip into the R-Zone?
Hahaha I remember getting one of those headset things for Christmas at least 10 years ago. What a blast from the past. I played it for like 5 minutes before realizing it was total crap, and never touched it again. Plus, it made you look really dumb.
I had the headset! I had Batman Forever and Panzar Dragoon for it. Ya, looking back it was utter crap, but when I was a kid, I didn't care, I was all "oooh, virtual reality whoosh"
Wow I remember those. Even as a kid I was always eying the commercials with a good 'o fashioned WTF expression. then I worked at TRU for a couple years when this thing was on the shelves. We broke open one of them when they hit the clearance bin. Yep shittacular.
I remember seeing that commercial once at about 3 in the morning when i woke with the flu when i was a kid. For years i thought i had dreamed the entire product until i saw one at the sears outlet store and freaked out and bought it immediately. I played batman until the batmobile stage... and never cared to go further.
I still have that thing in my attic... with about a dozen games... it hurts like hell - you get the craziest headache between the headband and having to focus on the monochrome-red-on-clear screen bullshit they tried to pull...ahh... fond gaming memories...
I got the handset one for christmas with a Star Wars game. It was about the easiest game I'd ever played, and if you completed the first four levels the game would stop spawning enemies and leave you alone in a barren neon landscape.
