Regrettably, Virtual Reality has been responsible for more misadventures than most, not least when you look at the noble, if ill-fated, efforts of Sega, Nintendo and Atari in that area.
Admittedly, Sega and Atari shelved their Mega Drive and Jaguar VR headsets before they could be given the kicking that was coming their way, but Nintendo forged ahead with its Virtual Boy to a deafening chorus of "WHYYYY?!"
Indeed, Sony was the first console manufacturer to get VR right, when it bunged-out the PSVR in 2016, but few remember that this wasn't Sony's first visit to the Virtual Reality buffet table...
Read on, moist rajah, for the important details.
The Visortron offered two non-stereoscopic screens inside a headset, with no motion tracking, as a way of watching films, TV and (with an adaptor) even video games. Described as being like watching a "33-inch TV from four feet away", it was an important first step.
Though never released commercially, the Visortron signalled that Sony had its lusty eye firmly on the VR cherry.
Though again mostly a way of watching films without anybody knowing exactly what film you were watching, Sony's Glasstron family featured no motion tracking, but at least one game was developed with it in mind; Activision's Mechwarrior 2, when running through a Glasstron headset, could be played from a first-person perspective.
Neatly, the fifth and final Glasstron model featured LCD screens which could be switched off, allowing the viewer to see through them. However, even with the novelty of being able to intermittently bear witness to your surroundings, sales were sufficiently lacklustre that Sony cancelled the Glasstron range just a few years after launch.
Yes: a whole 14 years before the PSVR.
The snappily-named PUD-J5A not only allowed you to watch video content - as per the Glasstron, with stereo sound and that - but featured full head-tracking, and was compatible with a half a dozen or so actual games.
Players had full control of the camera, so they could wander around said models to view them from any angle. If you so wanted, you could even pretend you were sniffing them!
Unfortunately, even with this overt appeal to the desires and wallets of sex pests, it wasn't enough to prevent the PUD-J5A from lapsing into obscurity.
Sony clearly realised that the potential of the PUD-J5A was limited, and never promoted it heavily, released it in stores, or - indeed - anywhere outside of Japan.
When most gamers were asked if they'd had their "PUD" - they thought they were being asked about dessert!!!!!!
That never once happened.
Consequently, the PUD-J5A remains one of the rarest gaming peripherals ever, and an odd curiosity on the boulevard that ran towards Sony's relative success in VR.