Retro Game Hunting in Japan 🇯🇵

So much fun.

It’s a wild idea to think you can pop into town in Tokyo and come back with a Sega Saturn, a bunch of games, and some cool accessories and only be down around £60. Here in the UK that sort of thing is basically impossible, and I assume that’s likely the case in lots of other places.

I recently got back from a 3 week trip to Japan, and while I didn’t buy a Sega Saturn (wouldn’t fit in my suitcase), I did go retro game hunting. I wanted to grab a couple things while I was there; firstly some more games for the SNES I picked up on my last trip in 2019, a tamogotchi for a friend, and my true ‘grail’ was a WonderSwan, which is a handheld Game Boy competitor that I always wanted as a kid. I’m not sure they even came out in the UK now I think about it.

Enter Akihabara, Tokyo’s ‘Electric Town’. It’s the de facto home of all things gaming, anime, electronics, collectables and it certainly lives up to the name. This area is packed to the brim with stores selling this type of thing and the shops themselves are just as mad. Seriously, it’s information overload for your eyes, everything is so tightly filled it’s easy to miss entire sections!

Much to my happiness, and after checking out every retro store Google Maps could find, I managed to get everything I was looking for. I picked up Kirby’s Dream Course and Super Bomberman for my SNES, an old famicom game because it looked cool, and TWO working WonderSwans for a crazy low price in a junk bin! I also found a few original tamagotchis from 1997 but they were way too expensive, still glad I found some though.

I had so much fun wondering around and just enjoying the atmosphere. I saw things that made my inner child so happy. If you are planning a trip to Japan and you’re a gaming fan then you have to go to Akihabara. I recommend the following stores if you do: Bleep, Home Appliance Ken-chan, any Book/Hard Off, and Super Potato although the latter is possibly a little touristy and overpriced now despite being well worth the visit.

If there are times where I wish I could vlog (I’m too awkward for that) then this was one of them, but here’s a photo I took at ‘Home appliance Ken-chan’ which gives you an idea of what the stores are like!

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Creator Spotlight

💽 Obsolete Sony - A beautifully curated instagram page full of Sony’s weird and wonderful products that are no longer with us. They recently had a kickstarter for a book too, which is worth checking out.

📹 Becca Farsace - A lot of you might already know Becca from The Verge but she’s recently gone solo with her own YouTube channel reviewing ‘tech outside’. I’ve always enjoyed her videos, so it’s nice to know we’re getting more of them now.

🗣️Fully Ramblomatic - Brutally honest game reviews spoken very fast. Yahtzee has been going for years now but has recently moved from The Escapist to Second Wind and the show is all the better for it.

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I’d love to say sorry for a lack of newsletters again but at this point I think we all know they’re kinda rare. Regardless, I am thankful to you all for being patient with me. In 2025 there’s a few changes I’d like to make with everything I’m doing and this newsletter is part of that. Anyway I’ll sign off before making any promises I can’t keep!

- Tom