When Nintendo opens a new store, you sit up and pay attention – largely because it's an extremely rare occurrence, especially outside of Japan. Some cities in the US have gotten lucky with stores, but here in the UK there's never been a sniff of one, until now.
This is your first opportunity to pick up a whole heap of exclusive Nintendo merch, across a bunch of its different franchises, without needing an expensive plane ticket to enable you, although my guess is that the store will be mobbed for at least the first few weekends that it's open. Except, brutally, it's only actually open at all for a few weekends: between 22 October and 16 November.
That's not long at all, and might mean that a weekday visit is the safest bet, but I should probably stop speculating and get back to what I actually saw. The pop-up shop is impressively dense, given that it actually doesn't offer a huge footprint to move around.
At the front of the store, there's a display with t-shirts from the Osaka and Tokyo stores if you want them (with no love for Kyoto), while the rest of the store is basically divided into small islands per franchise. Mario and his various pals have the biggest slice of this, but there are also sections for The Legend of Zelda, Donkey Kong, Kirby, Animal Crossing, Splatoon and Pikmin, each with a compact range of merch and some plushies on offer.
Most of these items are charming enough, especially for younger gamers who want a soft toy to add to their arsenal, although I can't pretend they're not a little pricey. If you go in with £10 to spend, you'll leave with very little, but that's probably no surprise to most people.
Frankly, as someone who already experienced the adrenaline rush of Nintendo consumer fever in Kyoto (and indeed bought some stuff that has since gone the way of the charity shop), I think probably the choicest item overall is actually the one that looks most specific to the store – a nice red tote bag with the store's logo on it.
The store itself is also a little more barebones than the Japanese equivalents, which is no surprise, since it's a pop-up first and foremost. That means the displays aren't too intricate and there aren't any large models or anything (although I was treated to some people in Mario and Luigi suits).
As far as I could gather from cross-referencing with my older photos, most of the other stuff I saw wasn't unique to the pop-up, so there's not actually a deeply limited quality to what's on offer. To be clear, that's a good thing, as it hopefully will stop scalpers and resellers going buck wild when the doors open.
With a ticketed registration system already in place (and seemingly sold out) for the opening week, though, Nintendo's clearly braced for huge amounts of interest. I can only hope this is the first foray into a wider retail plan in Europe, though. While it's a thrill, for sure, to check out the Japanese stores when visiting, there's no good reason why a company as big as Nintendo can't have a more permanent presence in a huge city like London.
Until then, though, this is literally your best chance ever to get some Nintendo merch in the UK and have fun browsing through franchise areas, both niche and ultrapopular, all in one place. If you're in the area, it's a no-brainer to at least swing by and see if you can get in, not least because it'll be gone in a few weeks.
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