Anna kata wa kirai desu. Ikanimo kimochi no yoi kata desu. Jitsu-ni rippa-na hito desu. Ano hito wa honto-ni yoi kata desu. I don't quite agree with you. I don't agree with you. I think you are quite right. I really don't think so. That's just what I think. That's my opinion, too. That is where you make a mistake. Shigoku sansei desu de gozai masu. Amari sansei de mo ari masen. So wa omoi masen ne. Mattaku sono tori desu. Watakushi wa, honto-wa, so kangae masen. Watashi ga omotte iru tori desu. Watashi mo so omoi masu. Watashi no iken mo onaji desu. Soko ga machigatte iras- sharu tokoro desu.
What about meeting him at the station? No, I don't mean that! No, not at all! To wo ake masho ka. Let me write it. Watashi ga kaki masho. Shall we go back together? Sugu o-dekake ni nattara yoka ari masen ka. Would you care to go to bed soon? Myo-asa de wa ike masen ka. Ano kata wo teisha-jo e mukai ni yukare tewa ikaga desu. Iya, chigai masu ; lie, so de wa ari masen.
Iya, zenzen chigai masu. I hope to call on Mr. I hope he won't be idle. I'll do so if you like. I agree to buy it on one condition. I am willing to accept your offer. I don't mind taking it away. So itashi tai mono desu. So shitaku nai mono desu. Myo-cho ano hito wo ho- mon shi tai mono desu.
Ano hito ni namake nai yd ni shite moral tai mono desu. Go-kibo nara so itashi ma- sho. Sore wo kau koto ni doi itashi masu ga, joken wo hi- totsu tsuke masu. O-moshiide no ken wa yo- rokonde shodaku itashi masu. Sore wo o-mochi-kaeri ni natte mo yoroshu gozai masu. I don't want that one. I want that one. Would you like that one? I shouldn't like that one. I should like that one. Would you care for it? I shouldn't care for it. Do you want to see the cinema? I'm not auxious to see the cinema.
Are or Sore wa iri masen. Are or Sore ga nyuyo de- su. Are or Sore ga o-iriyo de- su ka. Are or Sore ga hoshiin desu. Sore ga o-ki ni iri mashita ka. Sore wa ki ni iri masen. Eiga wo mi tai no desu ka. Eiga wo zehi mi tai to yu wake de wa ar'i masen. Laconic Expressions 27 C. I should like to go there. I am auxious to see the cinema. I don't want to go to Yo- kohama to-day. I want you to go to Osaka. Would you like me to go to Osaka?
Would you care for me to go to Osaka? I shouldn't like you to go to such a place. I should like you to go to Yokohama. I shouldn't care for you to go to the theatre. I wish it would be fine! I wish I hadn't told it I want to see the cinema. Eiga ga mi tai mono desu.
Would you like to see that picture? Ano e ga go-ran ni nari tai no desu ka. Would you like to see that one? Are wo go-ran ni natte wa ikaga desu ka. Watashi ni yubin-kyoku e yukase tai no desu ka. Zehi asuko-e yuki tai mono desu. Zehi eiga wo mi tai mono desu. Kyo Yokohama e yuka nai de ite morai tai no desu.
Osaka e itte morai tai no desu. Watashi ga Osaka e yuki masu ga, ikaga desu ka.
Mawaru Chikyuu Rondo (Japan)
Anata ni anna tokoro e itte morai taku wa ari masen. Zehi Yokohama e itte ita- daki tai mono desu ga. Anata ga shibai wo mini yukareru koto wa anmari sansei shi masen. Ito-san ga kureba yoi ga. Tenki ga yokereba yoi no ni. Ano hito ni sore wo hanase 28 Laconic Expressions him. I wish I were at home. Uchi ni itara yokatta ni. C21] Obligation, Necessity, etc. I mustn't do it. I have to go shopping'?
I am to go to Yokohama to see a friend of mine off to- morrow. C12] Ski Links, Akakura. He is bound to do it. Watashi wa sore wo ima shinakereba nari masen. Watashi wa sore wo shi tewa nari masen. Watashi wa mainichi kai- mono ni yuka nakereba nari masen. Myonichi tomodachi wo miokuri ni Yokohama e yuku koto ni natte i niasu. I'm not to do such a thing. W at akushi wa sonna koto wo suru hazu de wa nain desu. You shouldn't oughtn't go out in such a stormy day. Konna arashi no hi ni gai- shutsu shite wa ike masen.
I'm obliged to finish the task. Watashi wa zehi-tomo kono shigoto wo oe nakereba nari masen. Mo o-itoma shinakereba naranu toki desu, Ano kata wa sore wo zehi shi nakereba nari masen. Laconic Expressions 29 I'm supposed to go back now. I'm not supposed to go there. I was to see you last night. Mo kaera nakerefaa naranai no desu ga ; Mo kaera naku tewa ike nain desu ga. Watashi wa soko-e yuku koto ni natte iru no de wa ari masen. Sakuya anata ni o-me ni kakaru hazu deshita.
I'm bound to go to Osaka to-day. I know I shall finish it. There's no doubt about it. There's no question about it. Tasliika-ni sore wo oe masu. Myocho kitto o-ukagai itashi masu. Do-shite-mo kyo Osaka e yuka nakutewa nari masen. Do-shite-mo sore wo oeru kangae desu. Machigai wa gozai maen. Sore ni chigai gozai masen. Honto de gozai masu. Gimon no yochi wa gozai masen. I can't do it. It's ,out of the question. It can't be done. Wake wa ari masen. Totemo deki masu mai. Watashi ni wa deki masen. Mondai ni nari masen. Dekiru mon ja ari,. Perhaps he isn't at home.
It's possible he is out ; He's probably out. He may not come here. I dare say he will not come here. So, dochira deshd ne. Tabun uchi ni irasshara nai desho. Taitei so naru no desho. Domo ari so mo nai desu ne. O-rusu kamo shire masen. Tabun koko-ni o-ide ni naranu desho. O-koshi ni nara nai desho. Watashi wa so omoi ma- sen. I think he will go to church to-morrow. I don't believe so. I don't believe it. I can't believe it.
I don't expect so. I don't fancy so. I dare say it'll be all right. I doubt whether it. Ano kata ga asu kyokai e. Watashi wa so shinji'una- su. Watashi wa so wa shlnjl masen. Watashi wa shin-yo itashi masen. Shinzuru koto wa deki masen. Watashi ni wa so , omowa- re masu. Watashi ni wa so omowa- re masen. Sonna ki gaitashi masu. Tabun yoi to omoi. Masaka ; Shinjltsu to wa uketore masen. Good morning, gentlemen or ladies. I hope you will sleep well. Thank you; the same to you.
So-long ; So long. Mina-sama o-hayo gozai masu. How are you all at home? How are your folks at home? And how are you? And how is your health? Never better, thank you; Capital, thank you. How is your father? He is very well. You are enjoying good health, aren't you? I hope I see you quite well? Thank you, I am quite well. You look quite robust. I'm very well indeed, thanks. Mina-san o-kawari ari ma- sen ka. Arigato gozai masu , shigo- ku jobu desu. Anata wa ika- ga desu ka. Okage de aikawarazu gan- ken desu. O-tosan wa ikaga desu. Go-jobu de gozai masho. Arigato, jobu de gozai masu.
Arigato, nanno sawari rao- ari masen. Anata wa go-tassha rashiku mie masu. Arigato, mazu jobu de go- zai masu. Makoto-ni jobu de gozai masu. Thank you, I am well, and you? I hope you are so, too. I am not quite well. I am feeling very poorly. I am a little indisposed. What is the matter with you? What is your complaint? Don't you suffer from. You don't look well. I have the head-ache. Arigato, taiso tassha desu. Arigatd, jobu desu, shite anata wa.
Anata mo go-jobu de. D5mo jobu de gozai masen. Domo kibun ga yoku go- zai masen. Sukoshi kagen ga waru go- zai masu. Nan-to-naku daruku omoi masu. Yohodo daruku omoi masu. Ki ga hiki-tachi masen. Han-byonin de gozai masu. Do nasatta no de gozai ma- su. Doko ga o-warui no de gozai masu.
Anata wa ikaga nasare mashita ka Kiko no o-sawari de wa gozai masen ka. O-kao-tsuki ga yoku gozai masen. Zutsu ga itashi masu. Since the day I had the pleasure of seeing you at my uncle's. Do you take any- thing for it? Hisashu o-waru gozai ma- shita ka. Watashi no oji no tokoro de o-me ni kakatta hi kara desu.
Sore wa nagai aida desu, nani ka o-teate nasai mashita ka. Hai, kayu wo tabete i ma- su. Go-kyodai wa ima ikaga desu ka. I am glad of it. There is continual "B sick- ness in my family. I am very sorry to hear that. I hope you will soon be better. You must take good care of yourself. Thank you, I am taking the best care possible. I did not know she was unwell. I hope you will have a good night. Please present my compli- ment to your family. Give my regards to your parents. Thank you, I shall, with pleasure.
I shall, with pleasure. Arigato, kyo wa yoi ho desu. Sore wa kekko desu. Watakushi no uchi ni wa taezu byonin ga ari masu. Sore wa o-kinodoku desu. Hayaku go-kaifuku nasaru yd kibd itashi masu. O-ki wo tsuke nasaranto yoku ari masen. Go-zenkai no hi ni o-me ni kakari masho. Arigato, dekiru dake no yo- jin wa itashi masu. Watashi wa ano o-kata no go-fukai na koto wa zonji masen deshita. Sayo-nara, o-yasumi nasai mashi. O-taku e yoroshiku itte kudasai. Arigato, moshi kike masu. Sayd moshi kike masu. No, he is not at home ; No, he is not in ; No, he is out.
When will he be back? Ito-san no o-taku wa ko- chira de gozai masu ka. Brown-san ga taizai shite orare masu ka. Go-shujin wa go-zaitaku desu ka. Itsu o-kaeri ni nari masu ka. Can I see him? Whom do you wish to see? May I have your card? Tell him that Mr. Have I the pleasure of speaking to Mr. Itsu demo itsu goro gozai- taku desu ka. Mai ban shichi-ji sugi ni wa itsu-mo zaitaku desu. Go-menkai ga deki masu ka. Donata ni go-menkai desu ka. Chotto shihai-nin ni o-me ni kakari tai no desu.
O-namae wa nanto moshi masho ka. O-meishi wo chodai itashi masu. Kono meishi wo o-toritsugi kudasai. Watashi no meishi wo to- ritsuide go-menkai ga dekirij ka do ka kiite kudasai. Smith to yu mono ga o-me ni kakari tai to itte kudasai. Tada-ima o-me ni kakaru so desu. Anata wa Itd-san de gozai masu ka.
Sayo desu, watashi ga Ito desu. Please this way ; Please, come this way. What can I do for you? I hope I am not disturbing 3 you trespassing on your time? Please excuse me for a moment. Not at all ; Oh, that's all right ; Never mind. I am very glad to see you. You are very welcome, Sir. It's a long time since I saw you last ; I have not seen you for a long time. It is one year since I saw you last. I have not seen you this year. You are quite a stranger.
Do yu go-yd desu ka. O-jama de wa ari masen ka. Nagaku O-matase moshite sumi masen deshita. Yo koso o-ide kudasai ma- shita. O-hisashi buri desu ne. Go-busata wo itashite ori mashita. Kono mae o-me ni kakatte kara ichi-nen ni nari masu. Honnen wa mada o-me ni kakari masen deshita. Mattaku o-misore itashi mashita. Very well, thanks; and you? How are your family? Thanks, we are all very well. I did not hear of it. Yoku o-tazune kudasai raa- shita. O-kawari ari masen ka. Arigato, shigoku jobu desu, shite anata wa. O-kage-sama-de mina jobu desu.
Ddzo o-raku ni nasai. Kono aida o-tazune itashi mashita ga, go-fuzei deshita. Watashi wa sono koto wo kiki masen deshita. A Visit I am very sorry that I was out. I came to see you last Fri- day, but you were not. I am sorry I was out when you called on me last Friday. I wish to call on you, as I have something to tell you. To-morrow I shall be out so please come the day after to-morrow. Thank you very much, but I'm sorry I can't do myselt that pleasure.
I am very much obliged to you. I can not stay. I must go home. Fuzai wo itashi mashite makoto-ni zannen deshita. Kono mae no kin-yo-bi ni ukagai mashita ga, go-fuzai deshita. Kono mae no kin-yobi ni wa fuzai de shitsurei itashi mashita. Su-do o-ukagai itashi mashi- ta ga, maido go-fuzai bakari deshita. Myonichi wa ie ni ori ma- sen kara myogo-nichi irashite kudasai masen ka. Myonichi maitte mo o-sa- shitsukae ari masen ka, chotto o-tazune kudasai. Ban-shoku wo tabete itte kudasai masen ka. ArigatS gozai masu ga, sayo shite orare masen. Taihen o-sewa ni nari ma- shita. Watashi wa todomaru koto ga deki masen.
Taku e kaera nakereba nari masen. O, must you go? It is quite early yet. You are in great haste. I am already engaged. Pray excuse me to-day. Surely you can stay a little longer. I'll stay longer another time. I thank you for your kind visit. I hope I shall see you soon again.
Brown called to present his compliments. Mo okaeri desu ka, mada hayai desu yo. Taiso o-isogi desu ne. Naze sonnani o-isogi desu ka. Shinakereba naranu koto ga gozai mashite. Sore-dewa o-hikitome suru koto wa deki masen. Kyo wa go-men wo komuri masu, Mo sukoshi no aida irashi te mo yo gozai masho. Iroiro o-hanashi shi tai koto mo gozai masu.
Tajitsu yukkuri mairi ma- sho. O-tazune kudasai mashite arigato zonji masu. Chikai uchi ni mata o-me ni kakari to zonji masu. Go-shujin e o-kotozuke wd negaware masu mai ka. Ito-san e Brown to mosu mono ga tazunete mairi ma- shite yoroshiku moshita to osshatte kudasai. I think it's time to go to bed. Well, I'm going to bed ; I'm sleepy. Give me the key? The bed seems very hard. Bring me another blanket. I hope you'll sleep well.
Call me at five o'clock. Watashi wa hijo-ni nemuku nari mashita. Mo yasunde ii koro desho. Kanari osoi, jikan wo go- ran nasai yo. Watashi no heya no kagi wo kudasai. Nedoko ga yohodo katai yo desu. Kono makura wo torikaete okure kudasai. Kono makura-bukuro wo kaete okure kudasai. Katai Yawarakai makura wo moral tai no desu. Mofu wo mo ichi-mai mot- te oide kite kudasai. Nan-ji ni okiru o-tsumori desu ka.
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Go-ji ni okoshite kudasai. Roku-ji ga nattara okoshite kudasai. I'll get up at seven o'clock. It is five o'clock, Sir. It is time to get up. I feel too lazy to get up this morning. I've been up for the last two hours. All right ; I'm just going to get up. I've only just woke up. I shan't be long now. I'll be down in a moment. Bring me some coffee and hot. Okosu koto wo wasure na san na. Shichi-ji ni oki masho.
O-oki nasaru told desu. Koncho wa taiso darukute o-kiru no ga iya desu. Okite kara mo ni-ji-kan ni nari masu. Ei, ima okiru tokoro desu. Ima me ga s;. Sugu shita e yuki masu. Kohl to yu wo motte kite okure kudasai. How did you sleep? Very well, I thank, you. You are up early. I generally rise at six o'clock. Watashi no uwagi to zubon ni burashi wo kakete okure. O-isogi de yu wo motte kite okure.
O-hayo gozai masu, ikaga desu, o-nemuri nasai mashita ka. O-kage de taiso yoku ne- muri mashita. Watashi wa tsune-ni roku-ji ni oki masu. Help yourself, please ; Help yourself, Sir. Help yourself to cake. May I offer you some toast? There Is some soda water also. Nani wo sashi-age masho ka. Dozo go-zui ni meshi agat- te kudasai. Dozo o-kashi wo meshi a- gatte kudasai.
Yaki-pan wo sashi-age ma- sho ka. Ota-san, nani wo nomi masu ka. Blru ni itashi masu ka, bu- doshu ni itashi masu ka. Soda-sui mo gozai masu. Thank you, anything will Arigato, nan demo yoi desu. No, thank you ; No more, thank you. Can I have any breakfast now? May I have another cup of coffee? I am dying with hunger. Anata ga soda-sui wo o- nomi ni naru nara, watashi mo sukoshi morai masho. Won't you help yourself to something more? Motto nani ka meshi-agari masen ka. Won't you take another cup of tea?
Cha wo mo ippai meshi- agari masen ka. Arigato, mo sukoshi itada- ki masu. Mo kekko desu ; Mo taku- san desu. Mo choshoku ga deki ma- shita ka. Itsu choshoku ga deki aga- ri masu ka. Kyuji-san, bata wo motte kite o-kure kudasai. Kohl wo mo ippai itadake masen ka. Watashi wa hara ga hette shini so da. Watashi wa hijo-ni hara ga hetta. I haven't got any appe- tite. You are a poor eater.
I fear or am afraid you have made a poor meal. No, thank you, I've made an excellent meal. Oh, no, I did full justice to the dinner ; I have enjoyed my dinner very much. Thank you very much for your, kind hospitality. I have enjoyed a very nice evening. I wish you good night. Watashi wa hijo-ni nodo ga kawaita kara nani ka nomu mono wo kudasai. Watashi wa sukoshi mo tabe taku ari masen. O-sara ga kara ja ari masen ka, maton wo hitotsu sashi- age masho. Sukoshi mo meshi-agari masen no ne.
Ikko meshi-agatte kudasara nai ja ari masen ka. Ie, do itashi mashite, jubun itadaki mashita. Ie, jiibun itadaki mashita. Iroiro-to go-chiso ni nari mashite arigatd gozai mashita. O-kage-sama de komban wa taisd yukai deshita, sayo- nara o-yasumi nasai. Hara-kun no kenko wo shukusuru tame-ni go-kampai wo negai masu.
Ano hito no shinshitsu ni shirasete o-kure. Meals 51 I will, Sir, immediately. What shall I offer you? What will you take? Which do you prefer, tea or coffee? Which do you like better? Here are hot rolls'? The things are excellent. I'll take some toast. Hai, kashikomari mashita, tadaima sugu.
Asa-han ga dekita to mi- nasan ni moshite o-kure. Nani wo meshi-agari masu ka. Cha to kohl to dochira ga yoroshu gozai masu ka. Dochira ga yox-oshu gozai- masu ka. Atatakai maki-pan to yaki- pan to ga gozai masu. Watashi wa maki-pan to kohl ni itashi masho, Kore wa kekko desu. Watashi wa yaki-pan wo itadaki masho. I hope this coffee is to your taste. If it is not sweet enough, pray take more sugar. I will take some tea. Make some for me quick- ly. Do you like mustard? I like it very much. How do you find it? Won't you take any more? Give me some more. No more, thank you.
Give me two boiled eggs. Dozo ima sukoshi gyunyu wo kudasai. Moshi amo gozai masen deshitara, motto sato wo o-ire kudasai. Cha wo morai masho Chokoreito wo sukoshi. Dobin wo motte kite o-kure. Yoku futto shite iru yu de nakereba dame desu. Karashi wa o-suki desu ka. Go-jiyu ni nasai mashi. Umitate-no tamago ga go- zai masu ga, ikaga desu. Kaki no supu wa o-suki de wa ari masen ka. Ima sukoshi meshi-agari masen ka. Arigato, mo takusan de gozai masu. Yude-tamago wo futatsu kudasai.
Atarashii bata ga ari masu ka. Bata wo tsuketa pan wo. Meals 53 This butter is rancid. Show me the wine list. I will make the tea myself. Put some more water in the tea-pot. Another cup of tea. Please give me half a cup of tea. Thank you, I have. Will you smoke a cigar? Sake-rui no mokuroku wo misete o-kure. Kono budoshu no sho-bin wo morai masho.
Watashi wa jibun de cha wo ire masho. Dozo chawan ni hambun cha wo kudasai. Mo o-shimai desu ka. Hamaki-tabako wo o-sui nasal. At the same time, drawing on a field research we will also briefly examine a movement of resistance that has emerged in a residential area of Kyoto, where since a group of citizens has been opposing to the construction of a new pachinko hall. In the third part of the chapter we will examine the exterior design of pachinko halls.
We will illustrate the influence of the architectonic concept of postmodernism and of themed architecture on the aesthetic of pachinko halls. Before beginning our analysis, we should remark the mediating role that urban environment plays in our perception of reality, by making a short reference to the movie They Live , dir. The obscene ideological message becomes explicit. He puts on the glasses and then he looks again. Short after, the protagonist looks at a second billboard. Glasses off, he sees a typical summer resort advertisement: Glasses on, the picture and the text on the billboard fade away.
The obscene injunction appears: The Real is the world of pure signifiers. It is fundamentally a void constituted of pure materiality, which therefore can never be accessed by a subject. The Symbolic is the hidden chain of superego injunctions which structure our perception of reality. Urban spaces have always been shaped by a net of institutions and by a set of laws. Every road, every building, every written message is expression of a network of rules and forces. Every element of the urban space includes a hidden injunction, which we do not recognise, but which controls our vision of reality and our behavior.
We can already notice a first ideological injunction: It is hidden because it mostly works at the symbolical level and not at a conscious one. And it is ideological, since private property is not something which exists per se. Private property has a meaning and exists only in specific ideological contexts.
As already mentioned a non ideological reality can not be accessed. It is not a matter of taking off the lenses which are filtering our glance. Rather, we need to do the opposite. We need a new filter, a critical one -by the way, such a critical filter is as ideological as the previous one. As the city has been built up by citizens, the city itself is now building its own citizens. Urban spaces are not neutral entities. We live in environments which continuously stimulate and manipulate our thinking. Architectures, locations, lights, sounds etc. Subjectivity is constantly mediated by material -not just semiotic- relations within the city.
Citizens are determined by a metropolitan network of invisible powers. These forces guide us and make us act in certain ways. We only need to realise it. When they woke up, they were already in front of a gambling machine. Some of these stories I have heard were told by people who, at that time of such experience, had already been diagnosed with gambling disorder. Despite being perfectly aware of their problematical behavior toward gambling, many extreme pachinko players can not bear the need to play as they bump into a pachinko hall. They are aware they should not get inside and play.
They are in economic troubles and they might have been explicitly warned by their families not to play. Nonetheless, coming across a pachinko hall, they happen to get inside as if they could not refrain. An indebted player whose apartment is situated right in front of a pachinko hall wrote on a web forum: But then the next day I end up walking toward the hall to spend all my salary. But whenever I have some money in my wallet I end up in a pachinko hall anyway. Ironically, such a pressure is supposed to encourage players to stop. Apparently there is some other kind of force or pressure at work.
Something else 47 My translation. Something which goes beyond the idea of society as a collectivity of solely humans: Getting off the train and walking out of one of the many train stations in a Japanese city, players are suddenly surrounded by a massive set of injunctions. Among these injunctions one is especially effective: Of course such is a simplification, since relations of powers and forces can not be reduced to univocal injunctions or to linguistic acts. Players subjectivity is mediated by heterogeneous actors.
It is about our mind, our bodies and our organs as it is about the environment in which they move. Urban design has undeniably an active role, stimulating players and driving them toward the gambling machines. Thus, even outside the pachinko hall players are constantly assailed by sensorial stimuli. Broadly speaking, we constantly interact with the city and the city interacts with us. Spaces, objects and architectures are projected to make people do something, to guide them. Programs of action are inscribed wherever we look.
Kore ga Watashi no Ikiru Michi
Private companies -but also public institutions- deploy specific designs to control specific segments of the population. Different goals might guide this process of delegation. One of the most crucial aim -at least among private companies- is to increase the profit. A brand message which most of the television viewers in Japan knows, since it is incessantly repeated by a song in many adverts of the company. And this aspect participate to what we use to call marketing. A frame from T Figure 2. Outside Takadanobaba Station, in Shinjuku, the signboard of Espace pachinko hall stands higher than anything else at the center of the image.
The first one starts in the late s and ends in the late s. At that time pachinko machines had not yet known any kind of computerization. It is an era of intense economic development in Japan, and among the many expanding businesses there is pachinko. In there were 4, halls. Just a year later, in , halls were 8, Sugiyama By they had exceed 40, An incredible expansion which, besides the economic growth of the country, was mainly due to several technological advancements that had been introduced into pachinko machines.
The introduction of an automatic handle to fire balls in repetition see chapter 4 strongly increased the sense of thrill produced by the game, making pachinko more and more popular. In pachinko business reached its peak. There were 45, halls in Japan. Pachinko was literally everywhere. However, that same year new legal regulations were introduced due to the growing concern over the addictive effects of the game. Specifically the automatic handle was prohibited and this ban caused a huge contraction of pachinko hall market: According to Han the second era of modern pachinko starts in and ends in the early s.
During this period there is no noticeable increase or decrease in the number of Japanese pachinko-halls. Nevertheless, it was not a period of steadiness for pachinko: In these years the average number of pachinko machines per hall has more than doubled Han The third period starts in the early s: New pachinko machines were developed and pachi-slot machines were introduced to Japanese market. In few year pachinko and pachi-slot get extremely popular. By the overall number of pachinko halls in Japan had exceeded 17,, an impressive figure, which would then slowly decline. A massive drop in customers in fact occurred in the early s.
Since many small pachinko halls -especially in the countryside- went bankrupt and had to close. However, this decline is not only the consequence of a contraction of gambling market. Another vector has been shaping pachinko industry over the last two decades: Currently a small number of very developed companies is holding a large share of pachinko hall market.
Big gambling corporations have emerged in the recent years. These corporations have been growing quickly, and they now hold and manage tens of halls. There are less halls, but bigger, more technologically developed, and in the hands of fewer people. Rationalization and expansion of large chain store corporations at the expense of small-medium size businesses, is certainly not a trend unique to Japanese electronic gambling. Rather, this is a pattern which has emerged also in many other sectors, and which has occurred in most of the developed countries.
Chain stores have been growing for different reasons: Thirdly, big corporations can achieve stronger political connections. As a consequence of these advantages, smaller competitors get outdistanced. On the one hand big corporations keep on growing, and on the other, smaller companies do not survive. In regard to this specific issue, there is no radical difference between pachinko and many other businesses. Maruhan and Dynam, the two leading companies in pachinko hall business, hold more than pachinko halls.
Along with the systematization and the decreased diffusion of pachinko halls, another fundamental change has occurred in the last 20 years: The physical dimension of buildings have widely increased. An undisputable growth, which is further evident in the newest halls. This phenomenon has influenced also the exterior appearance of pachinko halls, which have become bigger and more visible than ever figure 2.
Currently, Japan is by far the country with the highest rate of EGMs per capita. In few other regions electronic gambling has become so widespread. To give a second example, while in the United States there are 1, casino, in Japan there are more than 11, pachinko halls. In Japan few other economic sectors have such a widespread net of stores all over the country.
There are more pachinko halls than family restaurants or home centers. For instance, statistically we are supposed to find a pachinko hall approximately every 5. There is no region and no province in Japan without pachinko halls. They are basically everywhere. Except a tiny minority of people living on small islands, most of Japanese citizens can easily reach a pachinko hall by car, by train, by bicycle or even just walking. There is in average one pachinko hall every 10, Japanese citizens.
The diffusion of pachinko halls largely varies across Japan. However, this figure gets 50 In Italy electronic gambling facilities are actually more widespread than Japan. The geography of electronic gambling in these two countries is rather different: Kagoshima is the region with the highest rate of pachinko halls per citizens, with A very high rate if we consider the extremely high population density of the city. From the perspective of gambling corporations, the development of a widespread net of gambling facilities is a significant step toward the expansion of gambling market.
However, from the point of view of problem gamblers we get a very different picture. And this integration is a necessary condition to the emergence of gambling addiction. As we have noticed, from the perspective of gambling industry the most profitable customer is the addicted customer. Different marketing techniques are adopted to forge addicted subjects. But the first necessary step is to create an environment which let people be physically -or even virtually- entangled with gambling on a daily basis. This is a condition of possibility of the addiction.
These three examples concern three different urban environments in which I have personally lived. During my work on electronic gambling I have spent about two years and half in Japan, obtaining the status of resident in three different cities -Izumi, Tokyo and Kyoto. I will report my personal point of view, as well as the point of view of several other residents who have lived in these three areas. I lived in Izumi for few months from March to September My 53 Such a low pachinko diffusion rate is also consequent to the distinctive legal context that Okinawa had endured during the post-war.
The region has in fact been under the administration of the United States until On foot, it would have taken approximately 15 minutes to get there. However, it would have taken much less to get to the closest pachinko hall: The hall was so close to my place that I could actually see the building from my own veranda. An enormous statue of a gorilla riding a spaceship was standing on the roof figure 2. It was a very bizarre installation which could be recognised from various areas of the city figure 2.
On the roof an angry gorilla is riding a spaceship.
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View of Izumi from a park nearby the Izumi Central Station. Pachinko halls are often strategically located nearby crossroads and access roads.
As a matter of fact, to get to the station I necessarily had to walk in front of it. Moreover, the hall was also located between my apartment and the university I attended. This is not a coincidence. From the point of view of pachinko industry, being close to a station and other strategic infrastructures is crucial to attract a wide range of customers and to penetrate into the everyday life of residents. However, from the point of view of problem gamblers, this means being forced to come across a pachinko hall on a daily basis.
Whether they wish it or not, most residents living in that area can not avoid to get in touch with a pachinko hall once or twice a day. In such a context it might be very hard for a problem pachinko gambler to restrain from getting inside a hall and playing. This is an issue of relevance: The first characteristic is the presence of a big parking lot. Outside the major metropolitan centers, car is a widely diffused means of transportation. Parking lots make halls easily accessible by car. The idea of building a facility with a big parking lot in an area reachable by car is surely not peculiar of pachinko halls.
Many retail facilities adopt a similar strategy when it comes to building up a store. In this analysis we are not interested only in the peculiarities of pachinko halls, but also in the marketing aspects that pachinko corporations share with other industries. We consider these aspects and we discuss their agency in the context of pachinko and addiction.
Parking areas let car drivers stop by a hall anytime they feel the urge to play. Thanks to parking lots even who lives in a relatively remote area or on the outskirts can easily reach a hall. The presence of a parking area in the hall encourages players to stop by before or after shopping. It is relatively big if we consider that the hall distances only 10 minutes on foot from the main train station in the area.
The parking is free and there are no time restrictions of sort. Players can stop their cars, their motorbikes or their bicycles, give their shopping bags or any kind of items in custody to the counter and play without having to worry about time or parking fees. Even if their cars are running out of gasoline or the battery is dead, players do not have to worry. They can get in the hall, relax and play, since in the worst case scenario the staff of the hall is going to take care of the problem for them.
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Convenience stores have an active role in the achievement of such aim. Japanese convenience stores offer a wide range of services that might eventually sustain long sessions of play. Players can buy snacks, cigarettes, get a cheap meal, pay gas bills, get simple medications, and much more. They can be accessed at any time. If there is a convenience store nearby, players can relax and play as much as they want. There is no need to worry about shopping hours. Convenience stores are necessary infrastructures in order to keep customers playing as long as possible. During a game session, players might forget about everything.
They might skip meals in order to play, they might lose all their money and get out of the hall at 10 pm. But as long as there is a convenience store they will be able -or at least they will be encouraged- to get some food and pay the bills. Among the many services offered by convenience stores, there is one which is especially significant: ATMs provide players with cash whenever they run out of money.
Cash limit therefore is not an obstacle anymore. As long as they own a credit card, they will be able to withdraw cash money and go back to play. Indeed, the proliferation of ATMs is said to have fundamentally contributed to the spread of pachinko addiction in Japan Tanabe Furthermore, most Japanese convenience stores currently provide also loan services.
As we will see in chapter 5, the tendency to borrow money and get loans is so widely diffused among extreme players, that it is regularly accepted as a criteria to define gambling disorder. Extreme players get indebted to repay their gambling losses. They get a loan to continue their play. Getting a loan in Japan is easy and fast. A player who has lost a huge amount of money may not be able to restrain from getting one.
But the crucial point here is that at a certain level it is not even a matter of restrain anymore. An environment that lets players get a loan so easily is an environment which support the development of a gambling addiction. It is one of the most central and one of the busiest areas of the city.
Its main train station, which is Shinjuku Station, is currently considered the most trafficked transportation hub in the world. A lot of people means a lot of possible customers: I lived in Shinjuku district for a year from September to October However, my apartment was situated in a quiet residential area far away from the chaotic Shinjuku Station. I lived in a small building next to a park.
Such decentered position made my residence relatively far from any facility. Main roads, shopping areas, convenience stores, train stations and any other kind of infrastructures distanced at least five minutes walking. The closest pachinko hall was called Miyoshi and was about 12 minutes on foot from my residence. It was a rather small hall figure 2. A trace of an earlier generation of pachinko halls which is slowly fading away in the shadow of new market trends. Miyoshi pachinko hall in Takadanobaba, Shinjuku.
The hall was neither on my way to the station, nor on my way to school. Therefore, I rarely walked in front of it in the morning. Despite not being part of my morning route, Miyoshi was frequently appearing in my afternoons. Miyoshi was in fact located on a crossroad very close to the main campus of the Waseda University -the university I was attending at that time-, and this crossroad was located on the main street connecting the university to the train station. It was in the middle of a pathway crossed everyday by thousands of students coming from or directed to the station.
Actually, on the same route there are other two pachinko halls: The area around Miyoshi is very abundant of shopping facilities. In front of the hall is located a Don Quijote discount store, one of the cheapest supermarkets in Shinjuku. Attracted by the low prices of the discount store, I happened to walk across Miyoshi almost everyday. The proximity of discount stores and other facilities is a significant element in the analysis of electronic gambling.
In the specific context that we have been examining, the discount store had an agency: Here we need to explain an important aspect of our present research: We have been contemplating Miyoshi as a specific case of this network. Miyoshi is a specific actor-network.
It exists as an actor of what we have referred to as pachinko industry, it exists as an actor inside the urban environment of a specific area of Shinjuku, and it existed as an actor in the context of my personal daily life. In other words, as an actor, Miyoshi has been engaged in multiple connections at the same time. However, if we intend to examine Miyoshi in its peculiarity, we need to look at it as a specific network.
In order to contemplate an actor, we need to break it into pieces and rebuild it in the form of a network. Therefore, if we shift our perspective and we approach Miyoshi -as well as any other pachinko hall- as a network, we might recognize that we are looking at something that is much more than just a building filled with gambling machines. When we consider it as a network, Miyoshi becomes an aggregate of materials, legal definitions, urban spaces, players, lights, electronic components, revenues and many other actors.
The point of this digression is rather intuitive: As we have already mentioned an actor is everything that affects, perturbs or influence other actors. This is why it is so crucial to consider the discount store in front of the pachinko hall as constitutive element of the specific gambling network that we have been investigating. That discount store is what connected me to Miyoshi Such program of action was presumably not inscribed into the discount store by the executives that decided to build the store in that precise location.
It is, in other words, a case of delegation from nonhuman to human actors. It is common to see discount stores in the proximity of pachinko halls. Many people are made walk nearby a pachinko by such actors. In recent years pachinko industry must have recognized the potential mediating role of shopping facilities. Many recent big size pachinko halls, in fact, have been built not just in the proximity of shopping facilities, but in the same building of shopping facilities. Maruhan for example has recently opened a big size pachinko hall in Osaka, which directly integrate a Don Quijote discount store -the same store that was situated in front of Myoshi Alliances between shopping and gambling facilities are not a new phenomenon and indeed this is proved by the presence of pachinko halls in many shopping districts.
However, -as we will see in the next section- these alliances have been strengthening in the recent years. Shinjuku is a peculiar place. In addition to Miyoshi there were approximately other eight pachinko halls reachable in less than 20 minutes just by walking from my apartment. In order to get to all the biggest shopping and transportation facilities I had to encounter a pachinko hall.
There were two halls between my residence and Takadanobaba station figure 2. There was one in the direction of Shinokubo station. There was a hall even in front of the tram station outside the campus of the university I attended. Electronic gambling in Shinjuku is ubiquitous and there is no way to avoid it. It is a relatively decentered area of the town. The density of pachinko halls in the area is quite low in comparison with Shinjuku in Tokyo, but still very high figure 2. The closest pachinko hall was situated on the main crossroad in the area and distanced less than 50 meters from the school campus.
Therefore, I happened to come across it everyday. In the proximity of my residence there were at least other two halls, which I often happened to bump into during my shopping tours. It is about a pachinko hall that existed only as a project, and that was planned to be built. Takano is mainly a residential neighbor, but it also accommodates the biggest shopping mall in the area.
In a construction company publicly announced the development of a new wing of the shopping mall. According to the construction project the new wing of the building was expected to be a big-size pachinko hall. Considering the scarcity of pachinko halls in the area and the wide range of customers attracted by the shopping mall, this might have been a very profitable project. We have already seen the connections between pachinko halls and shopping facilities in the case of Shinjuku.
In the case we have already taken in consideration, the gambling hall and the discount centre were located in the same area, but appeared as two separated material structures. In the case of Takano we go a step further: The customers of the shopping mall would be forced to get in a building where there is also a gambling hall. The location would in fact facilitate the first contact with a gambling activity. A penetration that would force them to bump into and get in touch with electronic gambling on a daily basis.
If the player will not go to the hall, the hall will go to the player. Such an alliance between a shopping facility and a pachinko hall could not have occurred until two decades ago, because of the negative image that afflicted pachinko halls. We should in fact recall that up until most pachinko halls were connected with criminal organizations. However, thanks to the support of Japanese police see chapter 1 the image of pachinko halls has positively changed in the recent years Brooks Pachinko business has been normalized. Nowadays retail corporations do not fear anymore the possible backlash generated by strategic alliances with the electronic gambling industry.
Through these new alliances gambling corporations can implement new effective marketing strategies. They put gambling where people go and where people live. The case of Takano is exemplary. The residents described me the possible penetration in their living spaces of a new pachinko hall as a form of colonization. Gambling corporations wish to break in and colonize Takano. Takano is a residential area, not a commercial district. From the point of view of the residents I met, their area has been chosen in order to attract new kinds of customers, i.
Pachinko industry is trying to expand its customer-base: The one currently occurring in Takano might be considered as a colonization, but colonizations rarely occur without the emergence of movements of resistance. This is also the case of Takano, where a large group of residents has organized a movement to fight the construction of the new hall. It is a very peaceful fight indeed. The group is not officially affiliated with any political party and is open to everyone interested in manifesting his or her opposition. In the proximity of the area where the pachinko hall was planned there is a park, a library, a nursery, an elementary and a middle school.
In an interview two representants of the movement told me that until now no other movement has ever been able to ultimately stop the construction of a pachinko hall. In order to achieve such result just rising the voice would not be enough: Apparently the legitimacy of some aspects of the plan is dubious. My informants hoped that a legal victory would produce a precedent. The corporation supporting the plan has never shown up.
Is it true that how you yield a profit is everything and you may create anything for the profit?! How many times should we repeat such an act of folly? In their study they compare the different local regulations implemented in the cities of the Hanshin area. Different local regulations have produce great disparities among the cities in the region. They especially highlight the case of Ashiya, which is a rare example of a city without pachinko halls. There is a clear connection between the absence of pachinko halls and the local regulation in the city.
Map of the Kyoto city. The green circle points the construction site for the new pachinko hall in Takano. The blue markers signal pachinko halls that already exist. The city has been entirely colonized by pachinko halls. Specifically, we have considered three different urban environments and we have shown to what extent pachinko halls have been physically invading the daily life spaces of their residents.
We have highlighted where and how frequently we get in touch with pachinko. Furthermore, we have seen how pachinko halls, through interactions with surrounding infrastructures -especially shopping facilities- actively support the development of an addiction. In the following sections, we will focus on the external design of pachinko halls. We will examine what we look at when we look at a pachinko hall. Specifically, we will consider the architecture of pachinko halls in a broader architectonic and urbanistic context. The majority of contemporary pachinko halls shares a common stylistic influence: Las Vegas had a prominent role in the theorization of postmodernism.
The Las Vegas described by Venturi would lay the foundations for the philosophical conceptualization of postmodernity. As any other private company on the market, the aim of pachinko halls is to make profit. The external architecture of pachinko halls is explicitly shaped by this aim.
The influence of the market on the external design of buildings has not always been an obvious phenomenon. In most modern countries urban spaces are supposed to be public, and thus open to everyone. The sole on which a building lies may be propriety of a private company, but the building itself can not be understood as an autonomous 60 For a critical introduction to postmodernism in architecture see Waldrep We may even go further and say that postmodernist architecture has been one of the conditions of possibility which has given life to postmodernist theory.
In other words, theorization of postmodernism has moved from a specific context which emerged prior to such a theorization. Of course the same could be said for contemporary ontological theories such as ANT. Something which leads us to the conclusion that ultimately even theory has to be understood in its contingency. Aesthetic principles that did not necessarily conform to market dynamics have often conditioned the appearance of buildings. The necessity of integrating a building with the surrounding environment is still prominent in most contemporary societies.
Urban environments are often strictly regulated by urban plans that determine what you can build and where you can. The majority of such regulations focuses on the area and on the height of buildings in a specific urban context. As a matter of fact, legal and political regulations are very influential in the definition of pachinko architectures. Why we do not find gigantic apes on the roof of pachinko halls in Kyoto?
Simply because it would not be allowed -while it is allowed in Izumi, which is not a tourist destination and thus is far more permissive. It would be inaccurate to state that our urban environments have been totally shaped by the market. We need to consider also the agency of all those entities that have emerged outside the market.
It is always a matter of diplomacy and mediation. In the case of urban planning, marketing strategies have various degrees of incidence. However, in the end they will have to negotiate with local urban regulations and with political interests. Nevertheless, we need to recognize that since the s, along with the rise of consumer culture, marketing strategies have increasingly shaped our cities. Frequently the external architecture of buildings has been shaped in specific forms with the intent of attracting customers and increasing the profit.
The building has been designed just following the imaginary lines provided by the legal restrictions regulating the building area. To effectively maximize the space the designers made the legal restriction plans design the building for them. The paradoxical result is an extraordinarily deformed building which -as the name suggests- resembles a mineral. Pachinko architecture is peculiar and definitely stands out in a Japanese urban context.
Indeed, references to the architecture of theme parks and casino resorts are evident in pachinko halls. Theming in architecture -as a specific postmodernist trend- has produced a radical rupture with the elitism and the anonymous functionalism of modernist tradition. To rationalism and minimalism, themed architectures reply with the excess. An excess of significations that is produced through a myriad of references.
Flowers, animation characters, billboards, flags, gigantic LCD screens, neons, colours Halls are modeled by unconventional shapes. We might see arches, columns, curves, spheres and pyramids all in the same building. A heterogeneity of architectonic symbols, borrowed from different histories and times and mixed up together in one structure. Or neither of these two? Pachinko Jumbo in Shinjuku. Fremont Casino in Las Vegas. Pachinko corporations have been reproducing this kind of design process to such an extent that the architecture of pachinko halls has gradually become self-referential.
Pachinko has created its own aesthetic. Architectures have become more complex and recognizable. Pachinko architecture has not always been like this. As a matter of fact the design of pachinko halls had been rather anonymous for a long time. Nowadays such kind of signboards have become redundant. The architecture speaks for itself and there is no need to textually remark it.
In the recent years, pachinko chain stores have come to adopt peculiar aesthetics in order to specifically advertise their companies. Architectures have become part of their brand image. The recognition of a pachinko hall as such is the premise. Maruhan, Dynam, Espace, Gaia, etc. All these companies have developed their own themes, their own aesthetics. Specifically, we will investigate the active role played by architecture in attracting and creating new players on the one hand, and in creating and supporting addicted players on the other.
We will focus on all those architectonic stimuli which make pachinko players feel the urge to get inside a hall and play. Our aim is to recognize how these elements participate to an addiction. We have already examined the architectonic style -namely, postmodernism- shared by most pachinko halls. Postmodernist architecture is clearly a point of jointure between Japanese electronic gambling and global casino-resort gambling.
But what is the purpose of giving themes to architectures? As we have already mentioned the primary motivation is economic. Postmodernism and themed architecture reflect a consumerist oriented vision of architecture. The goal is to increase the profitability of a space by leading consumers inside, in order to make them spend time and money.
If we leave out cost-cutting measures, the strategies adopted by electronic gambling industry to increase profits can be broken down in two main categories. The first category concerns all those strategies whose aim is to increase the customer base.
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Theming is implemented as a possible answer to one of the most crucial questions in the world of marketing: This question becomes especially troublesome when it comes to gambling. Gambling has often been regarded as an immoral activity. We have already mentioned that due to a negative perception of gambling most modern states have managed to marginalize gambling activities, by imposing a wide range of space-time regulations. Both Japanese pachinko and American casino-resorts are legal exceptions to these regulations. As a matter of fact, despite its huge popularity, pachinko in Japan is still seen very negatively by a large portion of the population Kaji Architectures of pachinko are scripted in order not to evoke the negative image that commonly marks gambling activities.
Flashy lights, vivid colours and ostentatious shapes are some of the elements deployed to convey an image of amusement and fun. They need to intrigue nonplayers, avoiding any direct reference to gambling, which might recall the ambiguous moral and legal legitimacy of such activity. This same linguistic shift is visually reproduced through architecture. The design of the most recent pachinko halls tries to materialize such shift adopting translucent materials and luminous lights to convey an idea of transparency figure 2.
Everything is clean in the aesthetic of recent pachinko halls. Pachinko industry is clearly making efforts to be recognized as a positive form of amusement and pachinko is trying to present itself as a healthy escape from the boring routine of everyday. Omega pachinko hall in Shiga. Metrohills pachinko hall in Wakayama. This structural difference has affected the architecture of the two industries in different forms. In cities such as Las Vegas and Macau the process of theming has embraced entire urban areas, if not whole cities.
Las Vegas and Macau are considered gambling heavens not only because gambling is legal, but also because through different media they have been themed as such. Pachinko has clearly evolved in a very different architectonic environment. In Japan there is no Las Vegas or Macau: Their architectonic richness strongly contrasts with the anonymity of the surrounding buildings. Pachinko halls produce an aesthetic cut in the urban landscape.
In order to achieve such aim pachinko corporations often go against the popular taste. It breaks the architectonic monotony of the city, reinforcing the idea of an extra-ordinary space. Images of popular anime, movies or music stars are commonly exhibited outside pachinko halls. Their characters are depicted on walls or displayed on temporary billboards and big LCD screens located on the facades of buildings. There are different reasons why Japanese gambling halls adopt these characters instead of just showing images of the game.
As we have said, the industry carefully avoids to recall the idea of gambling. These images distance pachinko from 63 Theming has affected Japanese cities well beyond pachinko architecture. Despite the absence of gambling districts, other kinds of thematic areas have emerged. Balinese hotels, flashy neon lights, curved shapes, columns, flowers, French names etc. However, there are also examples of themed architecture which do not share such a symbolic excess.
For instance, commercial streets nearby historical touristic spots such as the Kiyomizudera in Kyoto, have developed their own aesthetic through a postmodernist reinterpretation of what is perceived as Japanese traditional architecture. These images arouse curiosity in the nonplayers who recognize them.
This curiosity might even induce someone to get inside and have a try. Entrance of Espace pachinko hall in Shibuya. The appearance of buildings contribute to this aim. Appearance is designed to guide players into the hall. This same architecture stimulates ordinary players in a slightly different way. Ordinary players do not get inside a pachinko hall moved by curiosity toward the unknown. It is rather the opposite. They are perfectly aware of what there is inside the hall. Some of them get into a hall pursuing a sense of excitement that they had in the past.
Before actually stepping inside the hall with their bodies, they are already inside with their minds. Most of them know where to sit and which machine they are going to play. On the roof of the building is placed the statue of a giant gorilla, the symbol of Minano company. The gorilla is an extremely eye-catching mark, which makes the hall recognizable from distance. The gorilla stands out even from other areas of the city.
It is hard to avoid such a prominent figure. From a market perspective, such an iconic architecture is highly beneficial, since it makes the hall easily noticeable. However, extreme players are especially receptive to the various stimuli concerning pachinko. The industry adopts disruptive designs to forces players to be aware of pachinko and to think about it. Walking nearby a pachinko hall, extreme players are catched by the flashy lights, the LCD panels, the images, the sound of machines leaking from the building, the BGMs of popular anime etc..
This phenomenon does not regard only appearance of pachinko halls. Most of contemporary EGMs in Japan are structured on various transmedia franchises, which expand the gaming experience, combining the gameplay with contents and narrations. In the parking lot, the feeling gets even stronger. The characters pictured outside pachinko halls are the same characters which appear on gambling machines.
LCD monitors, flags and posters placed outside pachinko halls advertise specific devices. This is how pachinko halls arouse curiosity in habitual players. Outside the hall are publicized the new arrivals, the new machines which have been recently introduced. Ordinary players are not curious about pachinko or pachi-slot machines in general.
They are curious to try specific devices. They might be induced to get in a hall just by looking at the posters advertising new machines. The systematic introduction of new machines is a fundamental aspect of contemporary pachinko. Every machine produces a different gaming experience. Changing the gambling machines, discarding older devices and installing new ones, introduces a temporality in pachinko. Pachinko halls are never the same. Every week new devices are introduced. Every week something new is going on.
The emphasis on such occurrences, contributes to the creation of an extra-ordinary image of pachinko halls. This kind of temporality clearly reinforces the contrast between the eventfulness of pachinko halls and the monotonous routine which shapes our lives. Contemporary pachinko halls attempt to deliver a sense of constant novelty. Most players will likely be very attracted by an event related to their favourite gambling machines.
The message of all these posters is rather obvious: Gambling corporations need players to get inside the hall as often as possible. But what happen when you live in an environment which repeats this same message every day? What happen when players start believing that every day is worth to be seized? The strategies adopted by gambling industry to 66 These terms are often adopted by other industries as well, in order to highlight the presence of time-limited services. Creating temporalities, timelines and commercial narrations has become a very widespread marketing strategy which goes well beyond electronic gambling.
The idea of constant novelty -which may sounds like a contradiction- has become a core vector in convenience store market. We have investigated the marketing strategies adopted by pachinko industry to create, affect and govern players in urban environments, and we have focused on the relationship between addiction and these marketing strategies.
Firstly, we have recognized in the large diffusion of pachinko halls a condition of possibility of addiction. All the elements that enable the ordinary interaction between players and EGMs are material infrastructures that also enable the development of an addiction. Without these material infrastructures, subjects addicted to pachinko would not possibly exist, or would exist in a very different form. Rathern than being situated in marginalized areas, as would be in the case of casinos, pachinko halls are located in busy spots nearby essential facilities such as supermarkets and stations, therefore forcing people to get in touch with and become aware of them on a daily basis.
Fourthly, we have described the influence of postmodernist architecture and themes on the appearance of pachinko halls. Contemporary pachinko halls are designed to dissociate the games of pachinko and pachi-slot from the negative image of gambling, while at the same time delivering a sensation of amusement and arousing curiosity. Pachinko halls adopt disruptive visual elements in order to force players to look and focus on them.
Sixthly, we have examined the advertisement posters, lcd monitors and flags displayed outside pachinko halls. Moreover, through references to popular entertainment products, these advertisements might also attract nonplayers. Every element we mentioned in the present chapter plays only a small part in a much more complex and variegated network.
Every hall participates to a specific material environment and every company has specific strategies. Pachinko industry is not a homogeneous body that moves harmoniously. Rather, it is a chaotic and heterogeneous network, which encompasses contrasting instances and actors. Moreover, every player and every nonplayer has its own unique history as well.
Everyone belong to a specific daily life network, in which pachinko halls might play very different roles. The internal components and the architecture of stores play a fundamental role in any kind of retail market. Private companies manipulate visual designs, sounds, smells and every other element that constitutes a space of consumption. The aim is equal to any corporation: Marketing is indeed an instrument of control Deleuze Players have to play as often and as long as possible.
Pachinko industry makes various efforts in order to make players acquire what is ultimately a compulsive behavior in their relation with gambling machines. Gambling technologies are constantly advancing in order to achieve this goal. Deleuze describes a shift from a system of discipline that operated in the environment of factories -in the production-, to more subtle system of control structured on punishments and rewards that perpetually produces -and control- our desires.
In the case of pachinko, a very addictive virtual space is surely a necessary condition, but it is not 68 sufficient to make people spend an entire day in front of a gambling machine. To give a rather obvious example, a virtual space could be smartly designed, but if there is no toilet in a hall, players will inevitably have to move away from the machine and step outside the hall whenever their bodies need to. To create curiosity and attract customers into the hall is important, but even more important is to keep them inside the hall and to keep them playing.
In order to do so, electronic gambling corporations provide their customers with various complementary services, which go well beyond the activity of gambling, and which are meant to mediate the behaviour of players, keeping them inside the hall. In the second part we will investigate the architectonic and atmospheric management of pachinko halls.
Specifically, we will describe four categories of stimuli: In our investigation, we will often make comparison between pachinko halls and Las Vegas casinos, trying to highlight the common strategies adopted by these distant, but constantly interconnected, gambling industries. This trend can be noticed in countries such as Italy, where both online gambling and physical electronic gambling have been legalized in the s. Despite its potential ubiquity, online gambling turnout in was less than a third of physical electronic gambling turnout in Italy. Online gambling generated 13 bilion euros, while VLTs and new slots turnout exceeded 49 billion euros Esposito In Japan online gambling is currently illegal and accurate data concerning the topic are very limited.
Computer technologies do not only create virtual spaces and govern gambling mechanisms, but are also constantly deployed to control players and collect data, which sequently will produce new marketing strategies. As already pointed in the previous chapter, while the number of pachinko halls in Japan has been slowly decreasing since the late s, the material size of individual halls has been considerably growing. Moreover, if we look at older data, we can easily understand how much halls have changed over the last 50 years.
In , averagely there were less than EGMs per hall. However, size is only one aspect of this transformation. Architectures, designs and decors have changed as well. The pachinko halls popular in the sixties and throughout the seventies were radically different from the contemporary ones. The next passage of a nostalgic player shows a significative example of this transformation: Now that pachinko balls are mechanically moved by complicated computers it may seem unbelievable, but back in the days when I started playing, in pachinko halls there were no chairs.
Everyone played while standing, leaning a shoulder against the glass of the 70 machine to sustain the body. Chairs were not a common furniture in pachinko halls and players had to stand all the time. The introduction of chairs, which have become more and more comfortable in the 70 My translation.
It has allowed players to spend more time in front of the machine and has made them focus more on the game. It is believed that the idea of making players sit down was firstly adopted by a pachinko hall in Son Until that year, pachinko was a played in standing position figure 3. A pachinko hall in the 50s. Everything was done manually. Balls had to be inserted one by one into the machine see chapter 4 , and counting operations too were manually done by staff members at the counter. At that time there were no machines doing the counting, and the staff used a special kind of thin plate made by wood to count pachinko balls.
Back until the s the mechanism of collection and supply of balls had not been automatized as well. On the back of the machines there was a narrow corridor -which in contemporary pachinko halls does not exist anymore-, where staff members were standing to manually collect balls and refill machines.
Most of the services and the machines that we will describe in the next sections did not exist at that time. Pachi-slots and low-stake machines too did exist as well. Until the s pachinko halls had to provide only two essential services: They focused on gambling, but not on any other elements of the experience. This aspect negatively affected also the popular perception of pachinko. However during the s, and especially since s, new models of pachinko halls have emerged.
A sort of McDonaldization Ritzer has changed pachinko halls.