& Watch systems had a button for each action such as moving left and right or jumping. However, for the new system the team introduced the "cross" directional pad (D-pad): a flat, four-way directional control with one button on each point. The design was patented and later earned a Technology & Engineering Emmy Award in 2008. From then on, all major video game consoles since have had a D-pad of some shape on their controllers, until the Nintendo Switch in 2017. 1989-1990: Game Boy When the department started working on a successor to the Game & Watch series, Yokoi envisioned a simple and cheap system with interchangeable game cartridges. Development of the system, however, suffered from disagreements in direction, with assistant director Satoru Okada arguing for a more powerful system with third-party development and long-term support from Nintendo, emulating the successful business model that Nintendo R&D2 had achieved with the Nintendo Entertainment System, while Yokoi planned for a much cheaper, less powerful device with a shorter life-span, similar to its predecessor. During an interview, Okada compared the initial project to the Microvision. Eventually, Yokoi agreed to Okada's plan and the project would be known as the Game Boy. 1991-1994: Virtual Boy In 1991, Nintendo partnered with Massachusetts-based Reflection Technology, Inc. who had developed a 3D stereoscopic head-tracking prototype called the Private Eye. Gunpei Yokoi saw this as a unique technology that competitors would find difficult to emulate. Additionally, the resulting game console was intended to enhance Nintendo's reputation as an innovator and to "encourage more creativity" in games. Code-naming the project "VR32", Nintendo entered into an exclusive agreement with Reflection Technology to license the technology for its displays. Spending four years in development and eventually building a dedicated manufacturing plant in China, Nintendo worked to turn its VR32 vision into an affordable and health-conscious console design. Yokoi retained RTI's choice of red LED because it was the cheapest, and because unlike a totally backlit LCD, its perfect blackness could achieve a more immersive sense of infinite depth. RTI and Nintendo said a color LCD system would have been prohibitively expensive, retailing for more than . A color LCD system was also said to have caused "jumpy images in tests". With ongoing concerns about motion sickness, the risk of developing lazy eye conditions in young children, and Japan's new Product Liability Act of 1995, Nintendo eliminated the head tracking functionality and