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GiGO (Formerly Sega) Akihabara Arcade #4 to Close on September 25
posted on by Alex Mateo
GENDA GiGO Entertainment announced on Friday that GiGO (formerly Sega) Akihabara Arcade #4 will close on September 25 at 8:00 p.m. JST, as the facility's lease contract is expiring.
Sega Akihabara Arcade #4 opened in September 2010. There were five GiGO Akihabara Arcades, though only three will remain following the closure of the fourth one.
The occupancy rate of many arcades had been declining due to closures from the effect of COVID-19. The Sega Akihabara Building 2 arcade in Tokyo closed in August 2020. Sega then permanently closed its Sega Ikebukuro GiGO arcade in Tokyo in September 2021 after 28 years. The large-scale arcade center opened in July 1993 under the name Ikebukuro GiGO, and was renamed Sega Ikebukuro GiGO in July 2013.
Sega then opened a new arcade center across the street in October 2021 named Sega Ikebukuro. GENDA GiGO Entertainment president Nao Kataoka stated in October that the opening was "volume 1" of an "Ikebukuro Project." The new arcade was renamed to GiGO Ikebukuro.
GENDA (Global Entertainment Network for Dreams and Aspirations) purchased 85.1% of the shares of Sega Entertainment in December 2020, and renamed the company GENDA Sega Entertainment. Sega Entertainment's percentage of voting rights became 14.9% following the share transfer.
In January, GENDA acquired the other 14.9% of shares of arcade and amusement center company GENDA Sega Entertainment, and renamed the company GENDA GiGO Entertainment. GENDA is renaming all 196 Sega arcade centers across Japan as GiGO (which stands for "Get into the Gaming Oasis"), starting with arcades in Ikebukuro, Akihabara, and Shinjuku.
Sega Sammy then withdrew from the domestic arcade management business by the end 2020 as a result of GENDA's acquisition. However, existing Sega arcades still retained the Sega name.
Sources: Press release, GiGO's Twitter account via Hachima Kikо̄
