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That dream came true in October, and my two-week vacation included no shortage of time spent playing and checking out video games. As this was a vacation, however, I also made room for a lot of other fun diversions: temple and castle visits, prestigious tea-tastings, gorgeous museums, and om-nom-nomming on unbelievable food. (I've already chronicled one food-related discovery I made in Osaka.)

I point that other stuff out only to clarify: this article about arcades, video game merch stores, and board game cafes is by no means a comprehensive, capital-letters State of Japanese Gaming. Instead, this is a look at what you might expect as a surface-level tourist—and it just might dispel a few notions you might have if you've never traveled there.

Sam Machkovech







































































































































Sam Machkovech





















Most of this article's meat can be found in the captions I've written for the above and below galleries. The gallery at the very top focuses on the variety of arcades I visited during my trip, and the second gallery is more about shops.

The top gallery's absolute highlight is Natsuge Museum, a tiny, cramped arcade that memorializes the earliest glory days of Capcom, Namco, Sega, and Konami as arcade-game producers. Most other arcades are not individually named, as even your run-of-the-mill Taito Game Center or Club Sega (which can be found all over Tokyo and throughout Japan) trafficks in weird and retro games, in addition to modern titles. Thus, games you find at one arcade, you can expect to find at many others.

And the bottom gallery spends a lot of time at Yodobashi Camera, an electronics store in the bustling Akihabara district whose entire top floor is dedicated to video games. It's not a bad start to getting your finger on the pulse of what Japanese game companies are pushing onto console fans; if we're talking about floor space alone, Nintendo wins this year's round. That gallery also includes some retro and rare offerings from delightfully weird shops like Super Potato and Mandarake. And it concludes with a weird version of "public gaming" that you might have seen on a recent Conan O'Brien special.

(If you can't get enough Akihabara, by the way, my colleague Kyle Orland chronicled his own trip there in 2013.)

In terms of a brief takeaway, I point to a strange mix of intimidating and welcoming content at game shops. Trying to dip a card and launch any given Japanese arcade game can be a terrifying experience, especially with a language barrier, but between copious on-screen instructions and friendly fellow gamers, I was able to relish a few more experiences than my no-Japanese self ever expected.

This is the second part of Sam's three-part Japan-vacation series. Part three, an interview with American-born, Japan-residing developer Lucas Pope (Papers Please, Return of the Obra Dinn), will go live this month to celebrate his inclusion in Ars Technica's Games of 2018 feature.

Listing image by Sam Machkovech