Nipponica

The museum in Uji, Kyoto Prefecture, is located inside a renovated old factory built in 1969, where the gaming giant began life making Western-style and Japanese playing cards and later repaired consoles.

The company on Tuesday also released a video of Shigeru Miyamoto, the renowned creator of Super Mario Bros and other famous games, giving a sneak preview of what's inside.

"The Nintendo Museum is a place where visitors can learn about Nintendo's commitment to manufacturing that places importance on play and originality," Miyamoto said in the clip.

Booking flight now.

The photos, found among previously unarranged materials, capture scenes such as the bustling black market in front of Hiroshima Station, streetcars in the process of being restored and houses that began to appear among the ruins of the Aug. 6, 1945, atomic bombing. These images document the period when people were beginning to take steps toward the city's reconstruction and recovery after its complete destruction.

The pictures include three shots taken in September 1945 and seven taken in February 1946. With cooperation from the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum and experts, the locations of all but two of the September 1945 shots were identified. There were no records of the names of the reporters who took the pictures.

The National Diet Library Law requires publishers and others to deposit publications to the library when they are released. When the law was revised in 2000, commercially available video games were included in the deposit system.

The library in June 2022 started a program to allow visitors to play some of the games, about 3,300 title, in its collection on a trial basis. However, due partly to a lack of advertisement, there have been only 16 instances of a video game being played in the about two years until Jul7 27. The program limits the use of video games to research and study, and the library checks how the user plans to publicize the results of the play session.

After reading the headline, I reflexively started to buy a ticket to Tokyo to take up the Diet Library's offer of an afternoon of GTA: Vice City. However, my hopes were dashed when the use for the archive was research. Shame.

Maho Yamamoto, 27, who visited on the final day of the ride, told the Mainichi Shimbun, "Since it (the closure) was announced, I've been counting down to this day. The ride's charm is its ability to simulate space." Her mother, Kumiko, 62, said with a smile, "I'm overwhelmed with emotion. I've been bringing my daughter to Disneyland since she was little, and we used to ride it twice or three times a day. It's a bit sad, but I'm also looking forward to the new Space Mountain."

The curry bread of Japan's 7-Eleven convenience store chain has been certified by Guinness World Records as the most sold freshly made curry bread in volume in 2023, the chain's operator, Seven-Eleven Japan, said Thursday.

The bread, fried in store, logged 76,987,667 pieces sold.

And someone, somewhere today in Ireland is cashing a very big check.

Tokyo Disneyland on Wednesday closed its highly popular Space Mountain ride for renovations until 2027, its operator said, after the roller coaster traveled a total of 22.6 million kilometers since its maiden voyage in 1983, equivalent to 29 round trips between the Earth and Moon.

While its general design will not change significantly, new sound and lighting effects promise to dazzle guests even further, said Oriental Land Co., which will invest around 56 billion yen ($372 million) in the makeover.

Pour one out for one of the classics. I do trust that Oriental Land Company will actually improve the ride as their work over the past decade has usually been exceptional compared to the drastic decline of the Disney parks on the other side of the Pacific.

Gov. Hideaki Omura appeared before 16 cosplayers from eight countries who were dressed as Naruto Uzumaki from the manga "Naruto," Ponyo from the animated film "Ponyo," Oscar from the manga "The Rose of Versailles," and other characters, with his hands spread out like airplane wings. The governor was dressed as Arale Norimaki from "Dr. Slump," which was created by famous manga artist Akira Toriyama, who passed away this spring.

Adding this to my 'images of midlife crises' folder.

“The chief reasons behind the record-low inventory is a decline in production last year due to high temperatures combined with water shortages, and the relative cheapness of rice prices compared to prices of other crops such as wheat,” farm ministry official Hiroshi Itakura told Agence France-Presse.

“The increase in demand by foreign tourists has also contributed,” Itakura said, and added that “we are not in a situation of facing shortages of rice”.

This is the headline that would stoke the most outrage in the country. Never mess with the rice.

The pavilion's exterior adopts a minimalist design inspired by the Japanese traditional aesthetic of "wabi-sabi," featuring two triangular buildings with wooden facades juxtaposed by an illuminated, suspended cube.

Under the cube, visitors will find an open-air courtyard with a performance stage, allowing them to explore music, dance and other entertainment, as well as cuisine. Images to be shown at the pavilion are expected to include U.S. landmarks such as the Golden Gate Bridge and the Grand Canyon.

Quite lack the design and the understatedness that is absent from many American monuments. Should be a good fit for an expo. Looking forward to seeing more pavilion designs to see if there is going to be a cohesive theme or architectural chaos.

When you pick up a Japanese text written before 1945, the language used in it will likely look different to what you’re used to, and that’s the Japanese you’ll need to tackle in order to read Akutagawa, who is considered by many to be the greatest writer in Japanese history. He even has a literary prize named after him — the 171st 芥川龍之介賞 (Akutagawa Ryūnosuke-shō) was jointly awarded Wednesday to Sanzo K. Matsunaga and Aki Asahina for their works "Bari Sanko" and "Sanshouo no Shijuku-nichi," respectively.

To be able to read this work, it will first be necessary to understand the differences between prewar and postwar literature. One major difference is the aforementioned use of 旧漢字 — however, modern editions of books will always replace these old characters with their modern equivalents. For example, in an old edition of “Kappa,” the “並” in 人並 (hitonami, ordinary) may have been its 旧漢字 equivalent, “竝.” Fortunately, there is no need to have to read these old characters.

Interesting story about the evolution of written Japanese and one of the nation's most treasured authors.