Nintendo Store Opens in Osaka!

On November 11th, the second Nintendo Store in Japan finally opened in Osaka. It is located in the Daimaru Department Store in Umeda/Osaka, on the 13th floor. If you've been here before, then you'll know that this floor is also the home to the Pokemon Center - which was also one of its firsts in Japan at the time.

Along with the Pokemon Center, this floor is also the new home of a new Capcom Store & Cafe (its first one in Osaka was in PARCO Shinsaibashi). There is also a Tomica store and a Mugiwara store here, so you can properly nerd out here if you are in the Umeda area.

There is also a now smaller event space that changes every once in awhile to host exhibits and anime art, so you might find something of interest here too.

I'm personally quite happy that the store is here now. The Daimaru 13F has been quite empty since the Uniqlo up here closed shop long before COVID19. There's been various small exhibits that took up the space temporarily, like the Kirby Dream Factory I blogged about long ago. But usually the space is left closed off and unused... So I'm glad this space found another purpose.

But yes, if you were here for the Pokemon Center before, the Nintendo Store took out the floor space of what was Uniqlo a long time past. The Uniqlo wasn't small by any means, so you can expect the Nintendo Store to be of a decent size.

The above photo of the Nintendo Store is about 80% of the floor space of the shop.

Looking to Visit the Nintendo Store?

As of writing this blog in November 2022, the Nintendo Store in Osaka is through timed ticket entry only. Bad news is, it is extremely busy - even during the weekdays. I was told timed tickets were also being handed out on weekdays too.

When I took this picture, this was a Sunday (November 20th). I went to get a time ticket at around 1:45 PM, sort of as an experiment. I did want to try to go in, but I had some errands to run so I only had a set amount of time I was available to enter. The time ticket I received was for 18:50 PM on the same day. Unfortunately for me, that was out of my availability for the day. So I wasn't meant to visit that Sunday...

But as you can see, the wait is long. And if you're not going to hang around Umeda the whole day, this might not be a feasible trip for you.

Good news is, anyone can get a timed ticket. Assuming they are still available for the day. Daimaru closes at 8:00PM, so if they don't run out of time tickets until closing, you can get yourself a ticket to visit the shop.

And like all timed tickets here in Japan: no, they don't hand out ones for the next day.

And no, this is not a reservation system. It is strictly first come first serve. If you miss the time written on your timed ticket by 5 minutes, then gg - try again another time. (the staff there advised me to get there at least 10 minutes before the written time)

Here's where you get your timed ticket.

No, it's not on the Daimaru 13F as of writing this blog. If the location changes in the future, then I'm sorry... but as of now, don't head upstairs just yet.

If you are coming out of the JR Station, head to the 1F Central Gate and head south towards Daimaru. You want to be in the South Gate Plaza, where the "Water Clock" (or 水の時計) is. It is right in front of the Water Clock. There's no tables - just a blocked off area like the picture before with a few staff members. Approach one of them and get a timed ticket:

You will need one time ticket per person. So if you have six people in your party who wants to visit, each of your six people will need a ticket - so 6 tickets in total.

Hopefully, if you are reading this blog at a much later time - this timed ticket thing will have vanished and you can just enter freely. But as the hype for the store is still at its peak, I suspect this will continue on for another month or two.

I will update this blog if and when I get to enter it and let you know of the situation then!

As always, thanks for visiting my blog. I hope you guys will get to visit the Nintendo store when you're in Japan. Let me know in the comments below if you're been and your thoughts on the shop/the goods!!