A sweet deal for some sweet Nijuseiki.

Plushies and figures are by far the most common prizes you’ll find for crane games/UFO catchers in Japan. But at one of Tokyo’s newest crane games, the prize that players are trying to grab isn’t an uncannily lifelike rendering of One Piece’s Luffy or a cuddly stuffed Pikachu, but pears.

This unusual amusement machine isn’t located inside an Akihabara arcade. Instead, you’ll find it inside the Tottori Okayama Shimbashikan, in downtown Tokyo’s Shimbashi neighborhood.

The Tottori Okayama Shimbashikan is what Japan calls a “satellite shop,” a store that showcases and sells regional products from a different part of Japan. In this case Tottori and Okayama, two north/south neighboring prefecture in west Japan, share a satellite shop. Tottori just so happens to be Japan’s largest producer of pears, and right about now is when the Nijuseiki variety, loved for its juiciness and extra sweet flavor, comes into season.

▼ Nijuseki pears


Japan is a country that’s almost always willing to spend a little extra for high-quality fruit, and the Nijuseiki pears sell for 700 yen (US$4.80) at the Tottori Okayama Shimbashikan. As of last Tuesday, though, the store has a crane game where you can win the prized pears, and with each try costing just 100 yen, if you’re lucky/skilled enough, you could walk home with a Nijuseiki for less than 15 percent of its regular purchase price.

Of course, as Sega once reminded us in Morse code, crane games are not vending machines. So while you could win one of the Tottori pears with just 100 yen, there’s no limit to how much money you’ll sink into the machine if you keep losing, right? Nope! If you should happen to lose three times in a row, the store staff will take pity on you and award you with a pear anyway. So worst-case scenario, you’re getting a 700-yen pear for 300 yen.

▼ Tottori governor Shinji Hirai stopped by to check the machine out personally.

The pear crane game is stocked with 30 pears a day, and each player is limited to winning one. Still, this is a pretty sweet deal for a beautiful, sweet piece of fruit, and if you’re looking to try your luck, the machine will be in operation until September 15.

Location information
Tottori Okayama Shimbashikan / とっとり・おかやま新橋館
Address: Tokyo-to, Minato-ku, Shimbashi 1-11-7
東京都港区新橋一丁目11番7号
Open 10 a.m.-9 p.m.
Website

Source: PR Times via IT Media
Top image: PR Times
Insert images: PR Times
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