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Akihabara still shows off Japan’s love for physical media
Things are changing.
Its sheer scale elevates it above any similar electronics district in the world, with everything from big-box retailers in multistory towers to tiny independent component sellers huddling under train tracks. The early 2000s appearance of maid cafes was shortly followed by the arrival of formerly dominant J-pop idol group AKB48, a handful of members of which would perform daily at a theatre on Akihabara’s main strip starting in 2005. “Not only online like everywhere else in the world but also just by walking into one of the many, manysecondhandstores that we have in this country.” It might not be as romantic as finding a long-out-of-print Sega Saturn game, but hey — you can still save a few thousand yen on a copy of Final Fantasy XVI.
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