School Days Train Stations

It’s my sixth day in Tokyo. I spent the whole of last night standing in the rain at near-zero temperature for about 9 hours. Comiket is insanity. But I’ll talk about that in its own post. Yesterday, I took a trip down to the centre of Tokyo Prefecture, in Kokubunji, a boring place that no sane tourist would visit.

School Days Train Station

I went there in search of two of the train stations featured in the popular bishoujo game and anime series, School Days. It’s 2D meets 3D!

School Days Train StationSchool Days Train Station
Kotonoha taking the train at “Haramihama”

The fictional Haramihama Station was actually designed based on the JR Nishi-Kokubunji Station (JR西国分寺駅) on the Chuuou Line (中央線). You can take the line from Shinjuku Station. It’s the same train as the one you would take to go to Nakano. Just make sure you take Rapid and not Local.

School Days Train StationSchool Days Train Station
Makoto the stalker

School Days Train StationSchool Days Train Station
This shot required me to step over the yellow line

School Days Train StationSchool Days Train Station
I hate Kotonoha

School Days Train StationSchool Days Train Station
Actually, all trains have such advertisements

School Days Train StationSchool Days Train Station
Why is 0verflow’s version so long?

School Days Train StationSchool Days Train Station
Kitafuchuu Station

The train station near their school is actually Kita-Fuchuu Station (北府中駅), just one stop away from Nishi-Kokubunji Station on the Musashino Line (武蔵野線). If you do not exit the gate at Nishi-Kokubunji and instead transfer from the Chuuou Line to the Musashino Line, the price of the ticket (from Shinjuku) is the same.

School Days Train StationSchool Days Train Station
View from inside the station

School Days Train StationSchool Days Train Station
View from outside the station

School Days Train StationSchool Days Train Station
The perspective is a little messed up

School Days Train StationSchool Days Train Station
The sign is different, but note the building behind

School Days Train StationSchool Days Train Station
Note the house at the left

School Days Train StationSchool Days Train Station
No snow

School Days Train StationSchool Days Train Station
Maybe they changed the clock…

It takes 30 minutes to get to Nishi-Kokubunji from Shinjuku. I also tried looking for high schools around Kita-Fuchuu Station to see if any of them match the in-game one, but I couldn’t find any. Oh well. And I wonder if 西国分寺 is the inspiration for Sekai’s family name 西園寺…

Thanks to lolipuni for identifying the stations. You can also take a look at additional photos I took around the two stations in my gallery.

And yeah, today was the first day of Comiket 73. It was chaos beyond imagination. For those of you who know how huge Tokyo Big Sight is, imagine every single square metre of it packed with people. Now I know why they don’t allow photographers to take pictures of cosplayers outside of the cosplay zone: there just isn’t space for it.

I’ll make an overall post on Comiket after all three days are over. Looking forward to visiting Shingo’s booth on Monday.

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31 Responses to School Days Train Stations

  1. lorddesis says:

    Woah, you remember all the locations or did you have reference materials?

  2. Kira says:

    Wow, nice job. Which fansub did you use for those SS? I like those fonts.

  3. rollchan says:

    that’s cool. nice boat! cheers for 2008! thanks for this post!

  4. Edge says:

    Glad you made it to Kokubunji :3
    Hope you enjoy Comiket, and sorry that I couldn’t end up making it to Tokyo. Catch you on IRC in a couple of days, probably.

  5. DS says:

    So does this mean the NICE BOAT is real too?

  6. nutcase23 says:

    wow…talk about true to life….

  7. Phenie says:

    Your ability to find those places is inhuman.
    Very nice though :D, it’s always interesting to see the 3D vs. the 2D.

  8. Hinano says:

    Wow that’s pretty awesome great job :D

  9. Nekonron says:

    I also want to know whether you had reference or you really did remember all the locations and angles o.O

  10. Asch says:

    I always like to see where anime artists get their inspiration and they always to seem to be out of the way boring places.

  11. 0rion says:

    Even though I watched the entire show, I had no idea it all went down right there, just a couple stations from where I used to live (Tachikawa)! Trippy! I’ve walked through those stations many times, yet I didn’t notice the connection. :O

    Great job lining up the shots to match the animated scenes, by the way. That must have taken a bit of work. :P

  12. Kip says:

    Once again, you’ve not failed to amuse me.

  13. someone says:

    Woah! How did you do that??! Do you have a photographic memory or something?? Or Did you lug your laptop with school days in it while taking this pics?

    Anyway, Nice comparisons! Enjoy your stay there!

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  15. DarkMirage says:

    For all of you wondering, I synced the screenshots to my iPod touch before setting out. :P

  16. lorddesis says:

    rofl. careful trip planning eh?

  17. animeking says:

    Oh master dark mirage,teach me your inhuman skill of discovering locations so similar to the anime you have watched for no apparent reason that benefits you in anyway! D:(not serious,nor he has slept all day…(Seriously XD))

  18. Ryuko_Hikaru says:

    “I hate Kotonoha”

    Take it back or I will tie you to the railway tracks with Haruhi’s ribbon and Yuki’s jacket! xD

  19. bluemist says:

    Actually I kinda travel around those areas while I was there, but I would never really notice the scene from School Days because those stations all almost look the same! To think that I do weekly trips bypassing Nishi-Kokubunji…

  20. CactusAvenue says:

    Wow, I can’t believe that the School Days version of the train station is almost similar to the real station. xD

  21. aSKer says:

    Wow! Thank you! I always wanted to write in one of my sites something like that.

  22. Anthony says:

    Are the pictures from the game or the anime? Is the game fansubbed/patched? I don’t remember those particular scenes in the anime and I didn’t think there was a patch out for the game…

  23. Zaga says:

    Fantastic shots! but don’t hate Kotonoha, she’s nice :3
    I would love to visit those places some other time.

  24. Wew… that’s very great.. I never expect it’s in Chuo Main Line since the train was so different….

    Thanks for the tetsu-ota stuff :D

  25. kiranray says:

    Wow… Amazing… very nice work…

  26. makoto says:

    ㅇㅂ
    ilbe

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  30. I was wondering if you ever considered changing the structure of your blog?
    Its very well written; I love what youve got to
    say. But maybe you could a little more in the way of content so people could connect with
    it better. Youve got an awful lot of text for only having one or two images.

    Maybe you could space it out better?

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