I'm so hardcore...

I'm so hardcore that Akihabara seemed commonplace and boring to me second time around. Sure I went, but only for teh games (more on this later). No, I've grown so bored of random junk filled stores that I needed to feel completely surrounded and drowning in junk and toys.

Thats when a little birdie told me about Nakano Broadway. This is THE nerd paradise. Fuck all those who tell you that Akihabara is the place to go, Akihabara is a porn shop and game store. Nakano Broadway is where baby gets his fix.

Be forewarned that some of the pics are going to be NSFW, so they're only going to exist as links here.

So, I read about this mythical place on some blogs and saw that there's this massively huge mall of like 90% of the stores being related to anime, junk from the 80's, and manga. Nakano Broadway is on the other side of Tokyo, far, far removed from all the shiny shiny of Akihabara and buried under the guise of a discount shopping mall for soccer moms.

After doing my usual amount of homework (googling the shit out of locations, google maps, google this, google that) I found out how to get to Nakano Broadway in Tokyo. It involved rolling through the Shinjuku station in Tokyo and going another two stops west from there. Getting off at the Nakano main station, I was a little lost on where to go until I saw the signs.


Entrance to the mall from the train station

Basically, leave the train station's north exit and head outside. You can't miss it. Those arches on the lower left are the concourse entrance to the mall.

In front of the mall you'll go through the most nerd-pessimistic mall you've ever gone through. Shoe shops, pachinko, cell phones, girls clothes, hair and nail salons... Surely there's nothing for us nerds and otaku here! This is some sort of TRAP!


You stole my line, you fucker!

But if you keep going, you'll see that you've arrived.


Sweaty nerd feet, don't fail me now!!!

Once you get inside, you need to make your way to the second and third floor. There's nothing for you on the first floor. Again, it's there to throw people off the trail. Nerds don't want to be found.


Once you see this as you enter, you slowly realize where you're going...


This is the first floor, you're going up. Find some stairs, quick, before you convince yourself you need a manicure and a perm.

You walk up those stairs, you hang a left and then it hits you, you see it all before your eyes.
Yada, yada, yada... Should've sent a poet, I know...


LADIES AND GENTLEMEN... I PRESENT TO YOU...

Nakano Broadway...














Yes, I saw a $15 MAXX figurine. And I touched it too. HAH!








What the fuck does this mean? WTF?!?!


This shop sells NOTHING BUT UNIFORMS and costumes.

















NSFW Bewbs are heavy!

Whoever has this much free money to buy nekkid anime girls, they need to buy me one as well.

Chun Li! Think of your FANS! That's NSFW!

So, that's some pictures there. The highlight stores in this mall are Mandarake and Robot Robot.

Mandarake owns 10 separate stores in this mall, each store specializing in ONE type of item. One store for comic books, one for hentai manga, one for yaoi manga (that's for girls only, btw...), one for resin figurines, one for super hero shit, another JUST for box sets of anime shows. And I mean box sets. Like crates full of every Dragonball Z episode for $800.
Pricey shit, but it's complete and legal.

Robot Robot sells capsule toys that have already been opened. When you buy something there, it takes away the guess work of what toy you might get from a capsule toy. Maybe it sucks for the element of surprise, but you know that you're gonna get that one Mario toy you were wanting.

After Nakano Broadway, I stopped off at a restaurant called "Katsuya" which specialized in my favorite Japanese dish, Tonkatsu (ie fried pork cutlets)

Here is their menu for reference's sake.
I had the 830 Yen plate on the lower right. That's a pork cutlet, a bowl of miso, a plate of shredded cabbage, and a bowl of rice all for $8. Great deal. Trust me on that.

Afterwards, I moved onto Akihabara. But that's for next time. NEXT TIME DTOID! NEXXXXXXTTTT TIMEEEEEE!!!!