This is the first half of my Tokyo retrospective (which I can do properly now the damned jet lag has worn off); I want to give an intelligent and balanced view of the place from a more personal and tourist-y perspective but a common view of Tokyo is that of a paradise for otaku, gadget freaks and lovers of Weird Stuff. While it’s indeed common to see people reading manga on the train (assuming there’s enough room to do so) the anime industry is still a niche interest next to the usual mainstream media, although it still enjoys a higher profile than in the West. The aesthetic is common and one or two titles are household names but it’s very dependent on where you choose to look. Wall of text punctuated by my favourite pieces of Engrish BTW.
A security barrier near the entrance to a shop in Akihabara
If it’s anime/manga stuff you’re after, or just anything electrical, Akihabara is the most obvious place to go. Elsewhere there are the chain stores: Tower Records and HMV are good for CDs, while Book-Off stock DVDs and graphic novels. My favourite spot is Yodobashi Camera which, as its name suggests, is an epic camera shop but is also a full-on department store for all things electrical, be it DVDs and CDs, toys, household appliances or computer parts. There are plenty of comic book shops that sell both new and used (the used stuff is actually very good value for money since it’s a lot cheaper but is in my experience in very good condition). Oh yeah, I’ll list the results of my shopping to prove that it’s easy to visit Japan on a budget but it’s also easy to spend a lot of money if there’s stuff you want to buy.
I wanted a number of thingsthat were either very expensive or difficult to import to the UK. I caved in on a DVD of 5cm per Second despite the fact that it doesn’t have English subtitles because I know the film back-to-front so don’t need subtitles in the first place; until the Western release emerges proper, this is the only way I can help finance the studio as a fan/customer. I would’ve bought the Blu-ray version if it weren’t for that damned region locking…
I picked up some nice OSTs that I can now enjoy on legal CD format instead of downloaded torrent files.
- One More Time, One More Chance (CD single) [NOTE: it's amazing that, despite packaged media allegedly dying out, the CD single of all things is still alive and well in Japan, and selling quite well]
- Place Promised, Beyond the Clouds OST
- Darker than Black OST
- Macross Frontier OST 1
- Macross Frontier OST 2
There are many shops that stock these and material from domestic artists. There were many Jpop/Jrock titles I had my eye on, although they are often relatively expensive. ¥3000 is what you should expect to pay unless you dig around for one of those lower-priced ‘nearly new’ second-hand items that are helpfully graded for their physical condition (A=practically new, B=slightly shabbier but still decent, and so on).
- Acidman: And World
- Boom Boom Satellites: ON
- Doriko featuring Hatsune Miku: Unformed [which I recently reviewed]
- Kalafina: Seventh Heaven
- Mad Capsule Markets: OSC DIS
- Mono & World’s End Girlfriend: Palmless Prayer/Mass Murder Refrain
- The pillows: Wake up! Wake up! Wake up!
- Supercar: HIGHVISION
Add to this a Boss BD-2 Blues Driver distortion pedal, a PSP with Macross Ace Frontier and a load of souvenirs for my family and you can see how expensive a holiday can be. Some things (such as the guitar effects box and the PSP) are noticeably cheaper when bought in Japan, while I knowingly paid more the DVD and CDs because the chance to get hold of them wouldn’t come up otherwise. I wound up getting a 1:100 scale model of a VF-25 from Macross Frontier to placate my inner fanboy too…it’s going to look really smart and shiny on display in my living room! ^_^
A restaurant in Machida, part #1
Walking around Akihabara I noticed that Macross is a favourite, although the Gundam anniversary thing eclipses it a bit. The enduring presence of Evangelion took me by surprise though: I expected a lot of advertising what with the second Rebuild movie coming out soon but you can’t walk the length of a shopping street without seeing a billboard or similar. It’s still very, very big business after all this time.
K-On! is also really huge. There was actually a girl cosplaying as Mio outside one of the shops…I ought to have got a shot of myself standing next to her or something. Purely because it was a Fender Jazz Bass she was holding… ¬_¬ The popularity of that show may be a ‘latest big thing’ type of effect that you see with every new season, as opposed to NGE‘s eternal place in otaku (de)culture. Haruhi Suzumiya is popular too of course: I only noticed the fact that the second season was out when I checked the anime blogs on my feedreader, however.
A restaurant in Machida, part #2
Haruhi’s re-appearance was a bit of a surprise, then. There were cardboard stand-ups, soundtrack CDs and displays for K-On! all over the place but the Haruhi merchandise that I did actually see could just as easily been regularly-replenished stock from when the first season, then the Youtube spin-offs, aired for all I knew. The marketing is well played on KyoAni’s part I think.
Priceless Engrish T-shirt is priceless
Trying to find the 5cm per Second disc was tricky, and the likes of Satoshi Kon movies are also pretty rare. There’s a lot of emphasis on new titles in comparison with the UK (where the DVDs are often reprinted and on the shelves for as long as the distributor holds the licence to them), so if it’s an older title you’re after, second-hand is your best chance. I asked one of my travelling companions if this was due to market saturation or the transient, fad-driven nature of the marketing machine but apparently there’s also a more practical factor at work here: Tokyo-dwellers are short on space at home so are quicker to sell on music and videos.
As is this. Larger version in case you can’t read the caption
I daresay there’s the issue of titles diminishing in popularity quickly but I can understand why fans are forced to sell their old discs when they run out of room when living space is at such a premium. Watch or listen to it, enjoy it, then sell it back to the shop and pick up something else: it’s an interesting theory that explains quite a lot of what I saw on my numerous shopping trips. Anyhow, that kinda spills over onto my less otaku-centric impression of the place so until then…
