The Sacred Building

I play PlayStation more now, but Nintendo has a permanent place. The SNES games shaped my entire childhood—Chrono Trigger, Secret of Mana, Super Mario World. I think about it seriously sometimes: I want to take a console to the grave so I can keep playing pixel adventures forever.

When I was in Kyoto with Sari, there was only one thing I actually wanted to do. See the Nintendo headquarters. Touch it. Lick it, honestly. We got to the wall but the gates were locked. Security. Probably tired of fans trying to find Shigeru Miyamoto every single day.

Kit Ellis and Krysta Yang from the official Nintendo channel got inside. They filmed the lobby, some hallways, a few empty rooms. Not much, but more than I managed. Even the official channel barely got anywhere—just sterile corridors and blank walls. The place is locked down. You can tell they’re keeping cameras away from where the real work happens.

So you watch them walk through those empty hallways and it feels like some kind of forbidden temple tour, except it’s just a company keeping everyone out. Can’t really blame them. But I’d still lick that wall.