PSA for foreigners that are looking to visit the One Piece Base Shop in Shinjuku
Hi One Piece fans,
For those who plan to visit the base shop and are not Japanese, just be aware that even if you have a reservation, you’ll still be denied entry unless you can prove you live in Japan.
My wife and I got the first come first serve lottery via the Japanese version of the base shop app for May 20th and we’re excited to check it out. Once we got our wristbands and were in the store, they scanned our reservation QR codes and asked where in Japan we live. We said we are staying at a hotel in Ginza and showed our US passports for proof of identification. They then told us that because they can’t match us to a Japanese address, we have to leave the store.
For reference, US passports don’t even have addresses on them so there is literally no way to for foreigners to show proof of Japanese residence.
Meanwhile, the Japanese people in front of us were looking at resale prices for the one piece TCG products so there’s that.
Hopefully, this post helps set some expectations for those coming to Tokyo with a reservation to the Base shop and more importantly, save you some
time.
TDLR: Even if you are lucky enough to get a reservation to the base shop as a foreigner, you’ll still be denied entry if you can’t prove you have a Japanese address.