TOKYO – At Luida's Bar, Tokyo's biggest Dragon Quest fans gather to share food and drinks themed around the popular role-playing game series, mingling with friendly costumed hostesses.
Just another day in Akihabara, the city's nerd-culture capital? No, actually: Luida's Bar is located a few train stops away in the wild nightspot of Roppongi. It's inside a narrow little shop connected to Pasela, an upscale karaoke establishment known for its gourmet food, which customers eat while belting out intoxicated covers of the latest pop songs. It's what's known in the country as a "standing bar" – the space is so small there's no room for seats.
Dragon Quest has long been Japan's most popular videogame franchise. Last year's release of Dragon Quest IX for Nintendo DS, which included a gameplay mode that let players trade rare treasure maps with random strangers, sparked something of a renaissance for the cartoonish RPG series.
Luida's Bar, named after the virtual pub in the game where players swap items, is a natural progression of the series' popularity – a real-life Mecca for fans, a miniature Disneyland where the world on the screen turns real.
Like the hostesses, the whole shop is done up in faux-medieval Dragon Quest style. Replica swords hang on the brick-patterned walls, figurines adorn the bar and a monitor shows video of upcoming games. Game music blares constantly from the speakers.
You can't just walk in to Luida's Bar and order. It's not the sort of place you drop by to grab a quick midday snack. The business hours are divided up into 90-minute increments, and customers are escorted in and out. There's a little bit of wiggle room – I showed up right after a session began, and they put me at an empty table.
A red velour menu lays out all of the food and drinks, each themed after the game in some way.
There's the Slime nikuman, identical in every way to the pork-filled steamed buns served at dim sum restaurants, except that it is shaped like Dragon Quest's most adorable enemy character.
You can get cookies in the shape of the main character's coat of arms, a turkey leg branded with that same emblem or "dragon jerky."
The drinks are mostly named after the game's magic spells, like the Sexy Beam, a red drink made with sparkling wine and cranberry juice. You can get an "elf potion" energy drink in a jug with a stopper.
Is this stuff any good? It's edible, but it's not exactly gourmet. Then again, Luida's Bar is about the experience, not the food. As I was ordering Slime buns and Sexy Beams, the hostess picked up a microphone and welcomed everyone, explaining that the latest game, Dragon Quest Monsters Joker 2, was due out later in the month, to polite applause.
She also told us that the bar was going to "level up" in a week, adding new food items. Bigger applause. We all got complimentary mini-pizzas, one of the new items.
At this point, the hostess started traveling to each of the tables and bar seats, making small talk with the patrons, a little more than half of whom were female. Later, Luida herself returned (from hunting Slimes, no doubt) and she, too, visited each table, talking about Dragon Quest with everyone. So it's actually kind of like Disneyland crossed with a maid cafe.
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