Japan Gaming Guide

This card reader from Taito is just the thing for Mario fans who can’t bear to be without their hero long enough to copy their photos onto a PC. The reader is a little on the bulky side but who cares – you can send Mario down the pipe and listen to the authentic sound effect as many times as you like.

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Capcom have opened up a fantastic looking restaurant/bar in Shinjuku which features themed dishes based on some of their games. Our favorite has to be this Biohazard Zombie Brain Cake.

Other delights include Tyrant Spare Ribs, as well as dishes based on Monster Hunter, Sengoku Basara and Gyakuten.

Want to know what toys Japanese kinds are going to be playing with this year? Then the World Hobby Fair is your place to go. Put on by toy and game businesses, the show gives kids the chance to play with all the newest stuff and gives the companies lots of feedback about what’s hot or not.

This year was dominated by Pokemon, Gundam, and Inazuma Eleven, with all three licenses being spread over a wide variety of merchandise and crossovers. Nintendo and Sony both had a substantial presence, setting up large booths and lots of demos and tournaments. Battling toys were getting a lot of attention, it seems kids want anything that lets them pit one toy against another in a brawl. Professional Yo-yo…ers?..ists? were drawing crowds teaching tricks and hosting shows. Girl-focused games like Pretty Rhythm, Tamagotchi, and Cooking Mama were bringing in lots of players too.

Our picks for the best of the show? The Taiko no Tatsujin game being demoed inside a giant snow globe, the very unusual pairing of feudal Japanese warlord Oda Nobunaga with Pokemon, and the Sony shrine featuring Playstation characters and selling good-luck charms.

Here are the pictures, scroll over for a description.

Wonderland found some great World of Warcraft themed masks. With the recession still going strong, how about getting your halloween stuff in the off-season?

[Read, via Wonderland]

It’s a mini space-invaders bank. You can actually play it too, it takes Y100 coins. What a great way to encourage saving! It has little controls, and even the bands on the screen to make it look like it’s in colour. This costs a mere $60, wonder how much a full size one would be?

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Uniqlo have fulfilled our wildest geek dreams by launching a range of game based T-Shirts. T’s based on Pac-Man, Bomberman, Dig Dug, Arkanoid, Ape Escape, Mappy and Resident Evil are already out. More will be added over the next few months, including Ridge Racer, Street Fighter and Sonic the Hedgehog based designs. The range is pretty large, there’s something for everyone in there.

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Have a look at this wonderful Katamari Bento. It’s enough to make us hungry.

[Read, via 4 color rebellion]

If there’s one thing Jenga has always lacked, it’s an angry gorilla and a small Italian plummer. No longer. Donkey Kong Jenga is here. Our Christmas list just got a bit longer.

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USB keyboards are near must-have accessories for gamers these days. With everything from the Wii browser to Xbox live messenger integration asking for regular text input, using a joypad to slowly select key after key can eat loads of your time. If you want something game themed you could go for this – a space invaders keyboard. Speed and convenience without making your game area look too PC like.

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Games Radar just posted a great article on videogame systems of the ’70s. All the old favourites are in there, Atari, Intellivision, Magnavox and there’s a load of stuff we’d never seen before. Pictured above is the Telstar Arcade which shipped with a neat gun – fun for all the family!

[Read, via GameSpark]