JB

Playing, collecting, & selling retro games. Also likes プロレス, F1, NFL/NBA/NCAA, drinking, and having fun here in Japan. Say hello!

[JB @JapanRetroGames]

Changed my profile name since the eBay store is not the priority it once was(thanks corona!); it was also restrictive in what I thought would be appropriate to post on a “gaming feed”. Hopefully you’ll see more of what I like on here, so deal with it 😜

[JB @JapanRetroGames]

@4amlaundry The car in question:

[JB @JapanRetroGames]

@4amlaundry I’d say it started to get like that when the bubble burst. My next door neighbor has an old car sitting in front of his house that hasn’t moved since he put it there as well

[JB @JapanRetroGames]

@mrjeffu Meanwhile office ladies when men have to turn the AC down to 18C because they’re still expected to wear suits:

[JB @JapanRetroGames]

@TheStingisBack Pretty sure I only watched the first one when I was a kid, but I had a glow in the dark action figure version and one with cap guns!

[JB @JapanRetroGames]

@retrogameboyz I knew about the map screens and more animation in the BG, but why the change in the rocks/ground is what I’m thinking about

[JB @JapanRetroGames]

@RGIII Dudes were on double secret probation and didn’t know it

[JB @JapanRetroGames]

@4amlaundry It was Japan only from the mid 90’s, and they made it look western on purpose- you can find the commercials on YouTube https://t.co/sFZ7lphhvh

[JB @JapanRetroGames]

@japan_nobunaga And in the US, the reason why people have the national flag out:

[JB @JapanRetroGames]

@mrjeffu So, similar to how they do baseball and basketball in Japan? Don’t other countries also do something similar?

[JB @JapanRetroGames]

If you’re not on team Kuniko, we can no longer be friends 🤪

[NyanChuu🔮🇯🇵🍭 @tanpukunokami]

In Japan, there are two chocolate snacks.

Same company.

Same shelf.

Same price.

One is shaped like a mushroom.

Called Kinoko no Yama.

Released 1975.

The other is shaped like a bamboo shoot.

Called Takenoko no Sato.

Released 1979.

Both delicious. Both made by Meiji.

And the country has been at civil war over which one is better for over 45 years.

This is not a joke.

The manufacturer holds NATIONAL ELECTIONS about it.

2018.2019.Official “Kinoko vs Takenoko General Elections.”

Over 26 million votes combined.

Campaign posters. Political-style debate ads. Celebrity party leaders. TV coverage of the results.

In 2018, Takenoko won by 169,447 votes.

In 2019, Kinoko got revenge and won for the first time ever.

The party leader cried on live TV.

Mushroom faction says:
→ better chocolate-to-cracker ratio
→ you can hold the stem, no chocolate fingers
→ more elegant design
Bamboo Shoot faction says:
→ superior cookie base
→ higher chocolate content
→ more satisfying bite
Entire Twitter accounts dedicated to one side.

The debate has its own Wikipedia page. In Japanese. It’s called “Kinoko-Takenoko War.”

And here’s the thing.

Japan does this with EVERYTHING.

Sugar on fried eggs?

Soy sauce on rice or next to it?

Left side or right side of the escalator?

These aren’t small talk.

These are positions.

World’s 5th largest economy.

Home to Toyota, Sony, Nintendo.

Leader in robotics and bullet trains.

Also spent 45+ years deciding whether mushroom chocolate or bamboo shoot chocolate is better.

I love this country.

[NyanChuu🔮🇯🇵🍭 @tanpukunokami]

March 11, 2011. 2:46 PM.
33 Shinkansen bullet trains were running through northern Japan.

Several were moving at 300 km/h.
Then the earthquake hit.
Magnitude 9.1. The 4th largest ever recorded.
Epicenter: off the Sanriku coast, 130 km ESE of the Oshika Peninsula.

Every single train stopped safely.
Zero passenger injuries.

Here's what happened.

12 to 22 seconds before the violent shaking reached the tracks,
a seismometer on Kinkazan — a small island off Japan's Pacific coast —
detected the quake and sent a signal inland.

The signal traveled faster than the earthquake itself.

Power to the tracks was cut.
Every train in the zone automatically braked.
By the time the ground started shaking violently,
the trains were already slowing down.

One empty test train derailed at Sendai Station.
Not a single train in service derailed.

The Shinkansen has been running since 1964.
In 60 years, it has killed zero passengers —
not in a collision, not in a derailment.
Zero.

Most people stop reading here.
The real story starts now.

Japan built this safety system in two layers, for two different problems.

First: UrEDAS — the Urgent Earthquake Detection and Alarm System.
Invented in the early 1980s, deployed on the Tokaido Shinkansen in 1992.
The world's first operational P-wave warning system for trains.

Its seismometers sit along the coast, listening for earthquakes out at sea.
When one hits, the system reads the first 3 seconds of P-wave motion,
estimates the magnitude and location,
and sends a warning inland to the tracks.

Second: Compact UrEDAS.
Built after the 1995 Kobe earthquake,
which struck directly beneath a city with almost no warning.
When the earthquake happens directly under the train,
there's no time to calculate anything.
So Compact UrEDAS asks one question:
"Is this shaking dangerous?"
It answers in about 1 second.

Both systems end the same way.
They cut the power.

The Shinkansen is built so that the moment it loses power,
emergency brakes engage automatically.

The driver makes no decision.
There's no time to.

A 300 km/h Shinkansen takes about 90 seconds to stop.
No warning system in the world buys you 90 seconds.
The goal isn't to stop the train before the earthquake arrives.
The goal is for the train to be slowing down when it does.

This is the part foreign coverage misses.
The goal isn't to prevent the accident.
The goal is to make the accident survivable.

In-service Shinkansen have derailed twice in 60 years.

2004. Niigata Chuetsu earthquake.
A trackside Compact UrEDAS detected the P-wave.
Power was cut one second later. Emergency brakes engaged 1.5 seconds after that.
But the earthquake was directly beneath the train,
which was moving at 204 km/h.
8 of 10 cars derailed.
The train skidded 1.6 km before stopping.
154 passengers on board.
Zero injuries.

2022. M7.4 off Fukushima.
A Shinkansen traveling at 320 km/h detected the first tremor and began braking.
As the train decelerated toward a stop,
a second, stronger quake (M7.4) hit.
16 of the 17 cars derailed.
75 passengers. 3 crew.
Zero deaths. No serious injuries.

Two other derailments involved empty trains.
2011, Sendai Station, a test train.
2016, Kumamoto earthquake, a transit train.

In every case, the warning system had already cut the power
before the shaking reached its peak.

The system does not stop earthquakes.
It does not always stop derailments.
It just makes sure the earthquake arrives after the train is already slow.

Japan's earthquakes and Japan's trains grew up in the same country,
watching the same ground.

Somewhere in Japan right now,
a Shinkansen is moving at 300 kilometers per hour.

Far away, on a quiet coast,
a sensor is listening to the rock beneath it.

It has been listening since 1992.
Every time it was needed, it worked.

[JB @JapanRetroGames]

@Oyinkansol73072 That house has a lot of fish tanks

[JB @JapanRetroGames]

@mrjeffu Before the “crisis” I was getting 130/liter at Costco, it did go up to like 170 but today it was 143. By the way, a couple of months ago it was 150, so take that for what it’s worth

[Ambar @Ambar_SIFF_MRA]

Women think they are the best thing in their man's life

[JB @JapanRetroGames]

@CafeLearner I gave one Japanese company 3 weeks notice; one employee there threatened me-said I’m gonna have to talk to a lawyer…. The next week the boss asked me if I would stay on in a part-time role(which I declined). About a year or so later this company was out of business

[JB @JapanRetroGames]

@mrjeffu There’s one if these churches near my house. We’ll see if anything changes

[JB @JapanRetroGames]

@marugen17 Let’s goooooo! I’ll try to go as well-it’s only a 90 minute bullet train ride away from me🤘

[JB @JapanRetroGames]

@toshanshuinLA Go to your happy place!

[DJ YOHJI @DJ_Yohji]

多分みんな全く知らないと思うんだけど

ロングバケーションってキムタクと山口智子のドラマがあって

放送当時観てなくて、今日ロンバケかぁーそういややってたなーくらいの気持ちで見始めたけど、超おもしれーじゃん

みんな知らないと思うからオススメします

Netflixにあるよ

[JB @JapanRetroGames]

@loganofangirl22 If you’re not drunk at a Nascar race, you’re doing it wrong-this is from a guy who last went to a nascar race when he was 18 years old….