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| Grahf 405th Post
 
Gold Customer
   
    
|  "Two Days of Tokyo" , posted Tue 16 Aug 06:22
Hey everyone. A week from tomorrow I will be on my way to live in Hong Kong for the next four months. On my way there, I will be spending three nights in Tokyo. I was hoping some people here might be able to help me plan my two fulls days in the city.
There are a couple of attractions that I know I want to see (Tokyo Tower, Korakuen Amusement Park), but other than that I still need to decide what all I should see and do. Where are the best places to shop? Best arcades? Views? Shrines? Basically what do I absolutely have to do while I'm there? I know I don't have much time, so I want to be sure to do the best of the best.
Also, any recommendations on restaurants? I can't go overboard on my budget, but I want some good food and variety (i.e. not JUST sushi).
And, as I mentioned earlier, I'm going to be living in Hong Kong for a while, so any suggestions for activities there are welcome too. It's just not quite as urgent since I should have plenty of time while I'm there. Oh, and is anyone here from Hong Kong? Let me know!
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| Pollyanna 1315th Post
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| "Re(2):Two Days of Tokyo" , posted Tue 16 Aug 06:59
I would recommend the Meiji Shrine/Yoyogi Park, especially on Sunday. I had the fortune of seeing a wedding there along with dancing greasers, Gothic Lolita types and a lot of cute street musicians.
Depending on what KIND of shopping you want depends on where you should go. If you want otaku-type stuff, just go to Akihabara. You could spend a week there alone buying junk. I don't even need to recommend a PLACE there, you'll find thigns. You can't NOT find things.
There are also more giant arcades than you can shake a stick at. I don't think you'll have a problem finding arcades ANYWHERE, though (well, in Asakusa, I guess). Personally, although I went to Akihabara to shop, it sort of made me miserable. Lots of ugly nerds, lots and LOTS of pornography, nothing interesting to look at, just tons of manga/anime/electronics etc.
I like fashion and seeing cool people, but I don't expect you to share that sentiment, so my advice on "good places to shop" might not apply.
Also, with so much stuff to do, I don't know that Tokyo Tower is that awesome, either.
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| Sano 1948th Post
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| "Re(3):Two Days of Tokyo" , posted Tue 16 Aug 08:50:
quote:
Depending on what KIND of shopping you want depends on where you should go. If you want otaku-type stuff, just go to Akihabara. You could spend a week there alone buying junk. I don't even need to recommend a PLACE there, you'll find thigns. You can't NOT find things.
Yeah, Akihabara, Akihabara, Akihabara. Take the train and don't miss the Gundam store in the train station. If you want to take a one day Tokyo Tour those are nice, they'll take you to Tokyo Tower, you'll participate in the Tea Ceremony, you'll eat at a nice restaurant and stuff, it's kind of cheap for a tour and you'll have the rest of the night for everything else. Roppongi has some nice dance clubs, Shinjuku is great for any type of shopping you can think of under the sun, but some of the malls are freaking huge and it will exhaust you. On second thought, just stay in Akihabara since you're only doing 2 days.
Ryu and Chun-Li forever!
[this message was edited by Sano on Tue 16 Aug 08:52] |
| makatiel
169th Post
Regular Customer
| "Re(4):Two Days of Tokyo" , posted Tue 16 Aug 11:46:
id skip both tokyo tower and korakuen amusement park.
tokyo tower is small and nothing special. it's in the middle of the city, but at the same time, surrounded by nothing within walking distance, so after seeing it you have to hop on a train to get back to where everything else is.
korakuen is okay i guess, but honestly, if youve ever been to any amusement parks in the states, then korakuen is tiny. it's really not much and is a bit of a ways out. it has one kind of cool, very short roller coaster that goes in and out of a building, but personally i dont think that one ride is worth the trek out to korakuen (unless of course youre going to catch a baseball game also).
as for places to go, ive listed some of the larger train stations and what you might want to do at those locations:
shibuya day and night (for young fashion and clubbing)
shinjuku day and night (for drinking and partying)
roppongi night as a red light-ish district that caters to foreigners (lots of hostess clubs and bars)
akihabara day
harajuku day (alternative youth culture)
ueno day (for the park and ameyoko - kind of like a street market)
asakura day (for some traditional culture)
omotesando / daikanyama day (high fashion)
[this message was edited by makatiel on Tue 16 Aug 11:47] |
| Maou 699th Post
Red Carpet Regular Member
| "Kanda + Alpha" , posted Thu 18 Aug 23:47
Sounds fun, Grahf, and makatiel's hit it on the head with his outline. Harajuku and Shibuya are really where you should be for fun, and if you want to buy electronic stuff Akihabara is obviously the place, just don't waste time in the big new goods stores and spend all your time in used stores that are just holes in the wall, you'll find much better stuff.
If you like books, also seriously consider going through the Kanda bookstore area, not terribly far from Asakusa, there's blocks of great bookstores, big and small...I forget if you speak Japanese or not, but even if you don't, I think there's some English language bookshops, too, but I can't remember. It's a LOT of fun, either way.
人間はいつも私を驚かせてくれる。不思議なものだな、人間という存在は．．．
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| Oroch 858th Post
Red Carpet Regular Member++
| "Re(1):Kanda + Alpha" , posted Fri 19 Aug 03:42
quote:
Sounds fun, Grahf, and makatiel's hit it on the head with his outline. Harajuku and Shibuya are really where you should be for fun, and if you want to buy electronic stuff Akihabara is obviously the place, just don't waste time in the big new goods stores and spend all your time in used stores that are just holes in the wall, you'll find much better stuff.
If you like books, also seriously consider going through the Kanda bookstore area, not terribly far from Asakusa, there's blocks of great bookstores, big and small...I forget if you speak Japanese or not, but even if you don't, I think there's some English language bookshops, too, but I can't remember. It's a LOT of fun, either way.
head out of kowloon man, get into the outer islands and new territories on the weekends
unless of course you like rubbing elbows, then stay in kowloon :)
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| Grahf 407th Post
Gold Customer
| "Re(2):Kanda + Alpha" , posted Sun 21 Aug 07:15
Hey, thanks again everyone. I think I have my plans for my trip now. On the first day I'll probably visit some places around Ueno, Asakusa, Kanda, and Akihabara. On the second I'll go by the Imperial Palace area, Roppongi, Shibuya, and Shinjuku.
quote:
head out of kowloon man, get into the outer islands and new territories on the weekends
Yeah, I have my classes set up so I have Monday's off, so hopefully I'll have lots of time for excursions during my three-day weekends.
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| Grahf 408th Post
Gold Customer
| "TOKYOOOO" , posted Sat 27 Aug 19:48
I just finished my trip to Tokyo; I arrived in Hong Kong a few hours ago. It rained all day my first day, but the second was nice but hot. Anyhow, on to reporting the gaming related stuff from my trip.
NGBC was in every arcade I went in, and it was getting a good amount of use. Most of the players weren't all that good, but there was one guy who was doing pretty well with Shiki. I didn't see anyone using Kyo or Iori, but they weren't using any of the new characters either. Maybe the fact that they weren't all that good has something to with them not picking Kyo and Iori though. Tekken 5 was getting played a good bit too, and I saw one Melty Blood machine. Pretty much everyone in the arcades smoked, and every machine had an ash-tray stitting by the controls, which I thought was pretty funny.
Akibahara was pretty cool. I saw pretty much every game I've heard about here that we don't have in America and every game that still isn't out here. Dance Dance Mario was all over the place. Jump Superstars was advertised a lot, but most places I checked they were sold out. Overall it was a very cool departure from what I'm used to in America which is only the most recent and mainstream games sold en masse. Instead there were all kinds of obscure titles and plenty of games for old systems as well.
I only saw two people actually playing a DS while I was in the city, and no one using a PSP. The two DS's were both pink and being played by very little girls. They looked like they were having fun though. On the trains almost everyone was busy text messaging on their phones or reading.
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| KTallguy 728th Post
Red Carpet Regular Member+
| "T0KY0~had0uken" , posted Mon 29 Aug 14:31
The thing about the common Japanese fighting game players, is that their sense of spacing, timing, and reading the opponent are very good. They don't even really need to know the combos, if they can just read you and do a decent combo every time you wiff or they block a big move.
Learn to play footsie... really good timing is also important, know exactly the range of the opponant and your own moves and keep in a distance where you can hit them and they can't hit you. I've played some really hardcore turtlers (machi), where they will really capitilize on a player that is too predictable. Of course this doesn't apply in GGXX, because turtling is very bad in that game.
Also, TRF2 isn't really that popular man. It's not a bad game by any means, but people just aren't digging it. Unfortunately Nejibako isn't huge either, although I see people play it. It seems like we need another SF3 Third, because people play that game like there's no tomorrow. And GGXX. And T5. VF is almost completely dead now... =( But VF5 is coming!1!!
Proud Supporter of Next Generation GAMEPLAY
"テメエがヤクブソクなんだよ!"
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