J-World Tokyo!
J-World Tokyo…
The stuff of dreams for any anime buff that might happen to stumble by it.
It is located in Sunshine City, Ikebukuro, a shopping mall that houses an exhibition hall, an aquarium, a planetarium, an observation/virtual reality deck, Namco town, J-World and plenty of shops.
J-World sits at the far end of the third floor covered in pictures of popular anime characters, that I’m sure is enough to make anyone want to go inside.
Bobbi and I ended up heading in just after 3pm after a morning spent in the Sunshine Aquarium (more about that in another post). The entry fee is 800yen, with each ride additional or 2,600yen for an unlimited attractions pass. Of course we went for unlimited, and I was glad we did as each ride cost from 200yen to 800yen.
As I was paying the guy at the counter asked if I had a passport, because I could get a discount. Of course I whipped that document out so fast and almost laughed when my discount came to a total of 50yen off (the equivalent of about 60cents). But hey, discount!
After that he gave us a stamp card. Pretty much you got a stamp for each ‘big’ attraction you did. Three One Piece attractions, one Naruto and three Dragonball Z. Once you completed all the rides you took your stamp card to the information desk and you got a medal (it was a lucky dip out of Dbz, Naruto and One Piece which resulted in a 50cent coin sized medal). If you completed all the rides a second time you got to draw a medal again, but this time you could choose from one of the three animes.
…which is exactly what we did.
The attractions where actually pretty fun.. Good for both adults and children as long as you’re interested in anime.
The space it’s self is split into different zones.
First is the Naruto zone when you first walk in, which has a few interactive elements lining the walls, including a Chidori simulator, which didn’t really make sense.
A Summoning jutsu on the floor which is just for pictures and another summoning jutsu that is in front of a projector that allows you to summon your own summoning animals.
(The animals you make a contract with that help you defeat the evil ninjas!)
I got the demonic statue of the outer path, which… isn’t really a good thing.
They have a game where you can try and steal Kakashi’s bells by hitting the glowing buttons, but even with two people we were struggling.
The big attraction in this section is, A fierce fight! “Ninkai Taisen Emaki!” It’s a walk through attraction where you follow the instructions through a transceiver and help the Shinobi defeat the Akatsuki (the evil ninjas. i.e. the cool ones) who are attacking them. Good thing about this attraction is that they also have English transceivers, which is always a plus.
After we completed this attraction for a second time there was a Naruto Uzumaki cosplayer standing in the room where you hand your equipment back. I would have asked for a picture but he scared the shit out of me, because I didn’t know he was there. On the way out was a Sasuke Uchiha cosplayer, but he was surrounded by people.
After leaving the Naruto area you walk through a centre room which has a red touch screen in the centre surrounded by a wall of projections. You can touch a characters face on the screen and they will be brought up as a large projection and do or say something.
Next you walk into the One Piece area, the biggest area in the park by far. I’m not really a big one piece fan, having only ever watched a handful of episodes out of the 830 AND COUNTING episodes so far. But I do know some of the characters, and it was exciting no matter what.
So in this section they have three major attractions, a handful of small games as well as a One Piece themed café, which looked awesome.
The first ride is the “Shiro Mokuba” Carousel, probably the most kiddish ride in the park which has you on a carousel with horses which have the characteristics of One Piece characters. It turns around to the music played by “Soul King” Brook, a skeleton pirate that comes out of a window off to the side playing his guitar.
Next is “Solider Dock” Adventure, a spin ride which has you sitting in carts as you make your way through the different rooms playing memories from the One Piece anime. They also give you torches which you can point at the memory dials on the walls to make different things happen.
The last and easily the best attraction in the One Piece section is Chopper Quest. A kind of adventure quest that has you walking around the One Piece area with a Chopper backpack as you play different games to earn ingredients to a medicine that will save Luffy because the idiot ate some sort of bird that caused him to expand.
You only get one go at each game, so if you lose, you lose. And there is a time limit of 15 minutes, so you gotta hurry. I failed both times we did it, bobbi won once, but that’s not important. After you finish all the games you go into a small room with a scene where you place your Chopper backpack and learn Luffy’s fate. Spoiler. It doesn’t matter. After which you get to take a wanted photo with the gang and take a picture of it off a screen once you hand Chopper back.
The third section is Dragonball Z, the best section of them all (not that I’m biases or anything..) This area has three major attractions, first the Shoot! “Kamehameha!” This one was actually really cool. It is a virtual reality simulator that allows you to shoot Kamehameha with Goku, first at Krillin and then at Frieza who just happens to conveniently show up when you’re practicing.
For this attraction you are in your own room and before you go in you practice your Kamehameha stance with Goku in front of a screen. Must admit I was a bit freaked out at first when both Krillin and Goku jumped off the screen and stood right in front of me.
…Virtual reality, it’s wild.
Next is Fly Off! Virtual Roller Coaster Flying Nimbus. This one was awesome! I for one love roller coasters as much as they terrify me and a virtual reality roller coaster is no different.
Before you go in you stand in front of a screen (if you speak English the staff member gives you an iPhone with the translation as Goku speaks). Pretty much it’s just Goku asking Korin (an 800year old cat who lives atop Korin Tower) if he can take us for a ride on the flying Nimbus (A cloud that Goku uses to fly around without using any of his energy). Of course you have to have a pure heart to fly on the Nimbus, but that wasn’t a problem for any of us…
After the introduction you have to call the Nimbus and then you are taken into another room where you are given a set of virtual reality glasses and are instructed to stand on top of a nimbus looking stand and grab the pole in the middle. After which Goku will show up in front of you and lead you on an adventure. At two points in the ride you have to have a decision on where you want to go, i.e. leaving back or forward to choose up or down. They have wind and everything to make it seem more realistic (the first time I was wearing a hat that didn’t sit well on my head because of the glasses and I had to keep hanging onto it so it didn’t fly off, the second time I took it off). The second time we went through we chose a path that took us over water and where very surprised when we had mist constantly sprayed in our faces.
I’m always amazed at how virtual reality rollercoasters are able to mimic the feelings you get in a normal rollercoaster, all while you are standing, it’s very different to when you’re sitting. My stomach was constantly dropping and I was sure I was going to fall off.
The last attraction in this section was Seek! Dragon Ball! Another walking adventure where you are given a dragonball locator (and for us an English guide) and have to infiltrate the Red Ribbon base and collect the dragonballs. The first time we failed and I got lost in a mirror maze which had too many of me in it and Bobbi ran into a wall.
So the second time we went through we both collected the dragonballs. No matter if you win or lose you are instructed down the stairs to the bottom floor. If you failed in collecting the dragonballs you are taken to your own little room and told to put the locater on the podium. You are still able to summon Shenron (The dragon that grates wishes) but you do it with the help of Goku and the others. If you are successful in collecting the dragonballs you are taken to a bigger room where the seven dragonballs are put in front of you and a much larger Shenron appears in front of you. And yay! You’ve saved the earth!
After you save the earth there is a photo op where you can become just like Yamcha, i.e. dead in a pit killed by a messily Saibamen. Which was fun. He’ll never live that moment down. (He’s alive now…)
There’s another section where you can sit in a Saiyan pod, which of course I did, I didn’t want to leave it! You can look through a very large scouter and see Vegeta and Goku’s power levels and you can take a picture in Raditz (Goku’s dead brother’s) armour.
Each section also had a photo booth, which we took advantage of in the Dragonball Z area and the Naruto area.
There is also a J-Carnival area which has small games from smaller popular animes where you can win limited J-World gifts, but these cost an additional 200yen each.
They had signs up for a new cosplay room which looked like it would be awesome, but once you added everything up, costume, time and photos it came up to about 8,000yen (about $90) so we gave that one a miss.
We had dinner in the food court, indulging in Naruto ramen, because that’s always been a dream. The price wasn’t bad at all, and we didn’t even finish them! We also got a Goku drink, which was really tasty, but the mint cream whip on top kind of tasted like toothpaste. And we got Vegeta garlic fried chicken, which was a little bit much.
They also had a patisserie in the same section, but at the time we were there they were almost all gone. But they did have one tiny cake which was Goku riding the flying nimbus which I was tempted to buy despite the $7 price tag. (I didn’t buy it)
We left the park at about 9:30pm, figuring six and a half hours inside was enough and we got our money’s worth.
I would definitely recommend this place to any anime lovers out there, even if you’re not a fan of the major three animes.
I had fun.
