The Sapporo Snow Festival is in underway in Hokkaido, Japan. These are some of the best snow sculptures on display. Have a look! The Japanese military pitches in to build the most massive of the snow sculptures The 2019 Sapporo Snow Festival runs until February 11.
This fall, Japan is getting its first Nintendo Store. Called Nintendo Tokyo, the official shop will be located in the brand new Shibuya Parco building. Like the Nintendo New York, Nintendo Tokyo will be packed with merch, games, hardware, demo stations and more. Nintendo says it will also use the new store to make announcements…
When Mario Kart Tour was first announced last year, it was slated for release on Android and iOS sometime before March 2019. Now, in Japan, the smartphone game has been pushed back to summer. Nintendo of America has yet to announce whether or not the U.S. release has also been delayed. This article will be…
To celebrate her newest single “7 Rings,” pop star Ariana Grande got a kanji tattoo. Unfortunately, it’s wrong. Update January 31 – 4:30 am: Ariana Grande got her tattoo “fixed,” but at best, it’s still an odd kanji tattoo. At worst, she’s made the tattoo worse. Japanese can be read in vertical columns going right…
Last year, a Hello Kitty theme bullet train service began in Japan. This year, an airport express train does likewise. As Japan Trends reports, the train is a Hello Kitty-covered Haruka Direct Express train that transports travelers from Kyoto to Kansai International Airport. The outside is Hello Kitty themed and inside walls are tastefully decorated…
One of the problems with game-themed food is that sometimes, but not always, it looks clumsy. Recreating stuff with food is hard! Why have the edibles do all the work? As Yukawa Net reports, Japan’s Kirby Cafes current menu is getting a new array of additional meals. The food previously served looked good, but the establishments…
Earlier this week, Naomi Osaka fielded a question from a Japanese reporter who wanted the tennis star to reply in Japanese. “I’m going to say it in English,” Osaka replied. The reporter said kongurachureeshon (congratulations) instead of omedetou gozaimasu, Japanese for “congratulations,” before going into a question about the difficulty of playing the left-handed player…
Today in Japan, it finally happened. Kingdom Hearts III went on sale in Japan. What better way to celebrate that than with lovely fan art? On Twitter, Japanese fans have been posting their celebratory art and writing omedetou (おめでとう) or “congrats,” among other well-wishes Here are some of the standouts: Expect the game to be…
Last year, US Open champ Naomi Osaka signed a deal to appear in Nissin Cup Noodle commercials. The latest one, an anime version, has been criticized for whitewashing the biracial tennis star. Prince of Tennis manga artist Takeshi Konomi drew the ad, which also features fellow Japanese tennis player Kei Nishikori. Update January 25 –…
A 39-year-old man has been arrested in Ibaraki Prefecture, Japan for allegedly customizing and selling an unauthorized customized anime figure. According to The Sankei Shimbun and Mainichi (via ANN), the man allegedly took the head from a Love Live figure of character Nico Yazawa and put it on the body of a Darjeeling figure from…
Manners in Japan are tricky, complex and sometimes hard to follow—even for Japanese people. Over the weekend, I flipped through a book on Japanese manners I purchased here in Osaka. The book is divided into several sections, such as the correct way to perform rituals at Buddhist funerals (as well as Christian and Shinto services),…
This is Taka. He’s really into fighter planes and has figured out how to up the immersion factor in Ace Combat 7: Skies Unknown Taka turned his PS Vita headset into a Joint Helmet-Mounted Cueing System and mounted it on a helmet Brilliant! According to Taka, he spent around 200,000 yen ($1,825) ordering the gear…
Wonder what Switch games were downloaded the most last year in Japan? How about which download-only games did well? Let’s find out! Nintendo has released its 2018 Switch download rankings. There are no publicly revealed figures so we don’t know how many times the games were downloaded, but Nintendo did put them in order. Here…
Starting this March, the Disney Ambassador Hotel at the Tokyo Disney Resort is rolling out special Kingdom Hearts themed rooms. And yes, you can open the door with a Keyblade shaped key. The rooms are limited to three adults and come with two regular sized beds and one trundle bed. Prices are from 46,100 yen…
The new Netflix series Tidying Up with Marie Kondo is a reality-show version of tidying guru’s best-selling book. Something as innocuous as reducing clutter finds itself at the center of a backlash from booklovers As our colleagues at Jezebel pointed out in 2015, the backlash against Marie Kondo and decluttering is not new. Years later,…
When Japanese politicians visit the Yasukuni Shrine, the country’s most controversial Shinto shrine, it causes an international incident. The same is true for Pokémon developers. In Japanese, the first Shinto shrine visit of the year is called hatsumode. People visit Shinto shrines that are close to either where they live, or if they are going…
Titled 24 Japan, it’s set for broadcast during the 2020 fiscal year. The drama will be a remake of season 1 but adapted for its new setting. Livedoor is reporting that TV Asahi is handling the remake, which will follow the same real-time format of the American series. TV Asahi negotiated with 20th Century Fox…
It is illegal to mod game save data and game consoles in Japan. Both are punishable by up to five years in prison and fines up to 5 million yen ($46,000). According to the official site for Japan’s Association of Copyright for Computer Software, modding game save data and game consoles violates the country’s Unfair…
If you like One Piece and are ever in Hong Kong, you might want to swing by this One Piece-themed eatery. Fittingly, it’s located in the city’s Whampoa area, a former dockyard. Not only is the decor One Piece themed, but so are the food and drink. While not the world’s only One Piece restaurant…
It’s late December. Let’s take a moment and look back at some of the Kotaku East stories from over the past year. Have a look below! Also, let me take this moment to tip my hat to our own Seung Park, who tirelessly chronicles K-pop with fascinating and in-depth daily music picks. Catch up with…
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