@Chopemon You can check the location of gun shooting arcade cabinets on this Wiki. Here is the page for Lost World specifically.
Here is the page where you can check all Kantō area arcade centers.
The info is not always up to date but it seems, at least until February 2024, 1-chome Playland in Odaiba had one active unit.
Here is the address:
1 Chome-6-1 Daiba, Minato City, Tokyo 135-0091
@chazumaru wow, this is amazing, thanks. I’ll see if I can fit a trip to Odaiba in.
Thanks for the links and info, really appreciate it.
@Chopemon The notes at the bottom of the page mention « sights are unstable, misaligned on both sides, and only slightly better on the 2P side » but I assume you won’t be too picky.
suddenly realized ill be in japan for golden week. should i be scared
We’re thinking of going to Japan in late September. Never been. Good idea??
I went in late September last year, and I must tell you that it will still be quite hot and very humid! Pack accordingly!
Good to know! We could potentially push to October.
So finally have flights booked for my first ever trip to Japan. Feeling equally excited and nervous about the whole thing. I think we’ll be staying in Tokyo and Osaka with day trips to different places sprinkled in.
For Tokyo and Osaka are there neighborhoods, or even specific hotels, you’d recommend? Since it’s our first time here we value ease of getting around and access to transit. And as a little nicety we’d like to stay in a place where good coffee shops/cafes are so we have nice stuff to do in the mornings before we head out for our days. Thank you!!
Edit: so far we’ve found hotels that look nice in Ginza and Asakusa. Though unsure if those areas meet our criteria.
Double edit: Also I’m pretty desperate to do either the Ghibli museum or amusement park. Has anyone been to either/both? A little torn on which would be better though it seems like both will be equally hard to score tickets for.
in tokyo i particularly like yanesen or nakameguro. asakusa is nice too–i think you’d probably find a better price if you looked a bit further south near the tawaramachi station. kind of a dark horse pick but i like the bakurocho neighborhood as well.
for osaka i recommend the tenma neighborhood. this hotel was really nice.
i haven’t been to the ghibli musuem, but we did go here which is pretty favored by miyazaki himself–he designed the mascot for it and there’s a little art he did in the udon shop. highly recommended.
I can definitely answer your first question!
Those two places are great for transit access and cafes, respectively. Ginza is right next to Tokyo Station, so it’s well connected, but its also big on business and luxury stores, so cafes will lean Starbucks and fancy brunches instead of kissaten (in my experience). Asakusa is the opposite, where it’s slightly farther from a bunch of the places you’ll want to be, but the shopping streets in the area are like 30% coffee shops.
fwiw, i don’t think there’s a single neighborhood in tokyo that has “bad” access to transportation–but then again i am american so even a regularly scheduled bus is a luxury.
Yeah same here. When I was a teen working at McDonalds I used to have to take a bus that showed up once every hour lol it was so wack.
But thank you for the suggestions y’all!! It does sound like Ginza is worth a visit but probably not the place we want to stay. Asakusa looks amazing but def worried about how long it’ll take to get places from there. Any opinions on staying in Ueno?
ueno is cool! it’s pretty close to that yanesen neighborhood i mentioned. in general i would not worry about it too much–you’ll have plenty of time to explore lots of neighborhoods which will help you get a better feel for where you’ll want to stay next time ;)
if you are doing day trips from tokyo, i recommend nikko.
I know staying in Shinjuku probably isn’t at the top of most peoples’ lists, but I’ve stayed at the Hotel Sunroute Shinjuku for almost every trip I’ve taken to Japan. It’s been a few years now, so I can’t vouch for its price still being reasonable, but it was always a really good combo of affordability, ease of access, and lack of fussiness. It’s literally right next door to Shinjuku station.
I wish I could recommend my old reliable place in Kyoto (it was a midrise with several tiny apartments that was laughably cheap) but they appear to not exist anymore?
For ease of travel and access, I highly recommend staying in a hotel close to the south exit of Shinjuku station. Makes everything so much easier. It is good for the limousine bus to and from the airport as well.
I’ve stayed in Sunroute and Century Southern. Century Southern is nicer but it was a bit of a treat to stay there.
There are plenty of coffee shops but I’ve always found that in the morning I’m on the move so haven’t got any recommendations for them.
However, on my trip this year, I found a good breakfast place https://maps.app.goo.gl/6bAZTSxKKQSf92Tq7
Very foreigner friendly (so long as you eat fish) with touchscreen ordering. Always wanted a breakfast like that and this one is good, cheap and easy to order from.
I’ve stayed in Takadanobaba (great for access to western parts of the city like Kichijoji, Nakano, & Ghibli Museum), Asakusabashi (one stop away from Akihabara and on a direct line to Asakusa and Skytree) and Ueno. Ueno is close to a lot, the park obviously which is home to many museums, ameyoko shopping district, not too long walk to kappabashi-dōri, shinkansen and yamanote line access…
I would easily recommend each of the neighbourhoods I stayed in. They’ve each got a bounty of great restaurants and shops around. Though it seems to be hard to go wrong anywhere so I guess I would recommend trying to plan out daily itineraries and see which area makes those itineraries the most convenient.
secured my Ghibli Museum tickets and my relief is immeasurable
I’m going to Japan end of September for the first time. It might be too late for me to secure the Ghibli Museum. Securing tickets to USJ was rather tricky!
I’m also going end of September(Ghibli tix are for the 29th) and they went on sale on August 10th for the month and sold out almost immediately, as they always seem to do. I think you could still go to a Lawson ticket machine and check to see if there are any available, or buy them through a tour agency.
Any recommendations for places to stay in Tokyo?
Last time I stayed at a hostel in the Motoyoyogi district in Shibuya and I thought it was wonderful.
Loved the hostel, loved the neighborhood, loved being so close to Yoyogi Park.
BUT, next time I’ll probably have my girlfriend with me so I think it’s hotel time.
Looking for something that won’t break the bank.