{"id":190,"date":"2006-09-11T00:16:20","date_gmt":"2006-09-11T05:16:20","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.vintagecomputing.com\/?p=190"},"modified":"2021-08-19T15:32:52","modified_gmt":"2021-08-19T20:32:52","slug":"retro-scan-of-the-week-tigers-r-zone-a-lesson-in-how-to-look-dumb","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.vintagecomputing.com\/index.php\/archives\/190\/retro-scan-of-the-week-tigers-r-zone-a-lesson-in-how-to-look-dumb","title":{"rendered":"<span id=\"retro_color\">Retro Scan of the Week:<\/span> Tiger&#8217;s R-Zone &#8212; the Ultimate Eye Strain Device"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"linebreak\"><\/div>\n<p><a href=\"\/wp-content\/images\/retroscan\/rzone_large.jpg\" target=\"new\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"\/wp-content\/images\/retroscan\/rzone_small.jpg\" alt=\"Tiger R-Zone\" class=\"centered\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<div class=\"linebreak\"><\/div>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"\/wp-content\/images\/retroscan\/rzone_head_small.jpg\" alt=\"Tiger R-Zone Pimple Head\" class=\"alignright\" \/>Way back in the land before time (1995), when a little ole company you might have heard of called &#8220;Nintendo&#8221; was tinkering with its worst gaming experiment ever (<a href=\"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Virtual_boy\" target=\"new\">Virtual Boy)<\/a>, another company called Tiger Electronics (famous for its handheld LCD games, if you&#8217;ll recall), possibly tried [citation needed] to capitalize on the hoopla surrounding Nintendo&#8217;s red-headed stepchild.  Tiger introduced the R-Zone, a LCD-based gaming system that used red-tinted game cartridges and projected them onto a HUD mirror strapped over the player&#8217;s pimply  forehead (see picture).  An extremely uncomfortable-to-hold detached controller held the batteries, and the player plugged the cartridge &#8212; each containing its own LCD screen &#8212; into the headset.  It worked very poorly, as you might imagine; but what more could you expect for $30 (US) MSRP?<\/p>\n<p><em>(The main scan above is of the paper insert from the blister package that my original R-Zone came in back in 1995.)<\/em><\/p>\n<p><!--more--><\/p>\n<div class=\"linebreak\"><\/div>\n<p><a href=\"\/wp-content\/images\/retroscan\/rzone_2_large.jpg\" target=\"new\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"\/wp-content\/images\/retroscan\/rzone_2_small.jpg\" alt=\"Tiger R-Zone\" class=\"centered\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<div class=\"linebreak\"><\/div>\n<p>The game that came as a pack-in with my R-Zone, <em>Batman Forever<\/em>, was typical LCD game fare &#8212; that is to say, it was horrible.  No, make that <em>is<\/em> horrible.  I just turned it on again for the first time in ten years and it greeted me with the same screeching, unforgettable, unrelenting beeping melody that was long ago seared into my brain, never to be removed.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"\/wp-content\/images\/retroscan\/rzone_4_large.jpg\" target=\"new\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"\/wp-content\/images\/retroscan\/rzone_4_small.jpg\" alt=\"Tiger R-Zone XPG Kid\" class=\"alignleft\" \/><\/a>A couple years later, after the total obvious bomb of the Virtual Boy (and perhaps after realizing how completely uncomfortable the original R-Zone was), Tiger decided to distance itself from that concept and released a completely handheld projection player called the &#8220;X.P.G.&#8221; (Xtreme Pocket Game, in case you were wondering) that played the same LCD cartridges as the R-Zone.  Still, the change was too little, too late, and the latest LCD gaming gimmick was quickly tucked into the lint-filled back pant pocket of gaming history.<\/p>\n<div class=\"linebreak\"><\/div>\n<p><a href=\"\/wp-content\/images\/retroscan\/rzone_3_large.jpg\" target=\"new\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"\/wp-content\/images\/retroscan\/rzone_3_small.jpg\" alt=\"Tiger R-Zone XPG\" class=\"centered\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<div class=\"linebreak\"><\/div>\n<p>It should probably stay there too.<\/p>\n<div class=\"linebreak\"><\/div>\n<p><small><em>If you use these images on your site, please support &#8220;Retro Scan of the Week&#8221; by giving us obvious credit for the original scan and entry.  Thanks!<\/em><\/small><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Way back in the land before time (1995), when a little ole company you might have heard of called &#8220;Nintendo&#8221; was tinkering with its worst gaming experiment ever (Virtual Boy), another company called Tiger Electronics (famous for its handheld LCD games, if you&#8217;ll recall), possibly tried [citation needed] to capitalize on the hoopla surrounding Nintendo&#8217;s [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13,24,26],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-190","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-video-game-info-and-history","category-humor","category-retro-scan-of-the-week"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vintagecomputing.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/190","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vintagecomputing.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vintagecomputing.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vintagecomputing.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vintagecomputing.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=190"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.vintagecomputing.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/190\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3036,"href":"https:\/\/www.vintagecomputing.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/190\/revisions\/3036"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vintagecomputing.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=190"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vintagecomputing.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=190"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vintagecomputing.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=190"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}