Geeks, freaks, and nerds rejoice – I finally made it to the abandoned Game Boy Mailbox!
The abandoned Game Box Mailbox can be traced back to four years ago, when a Japanese angler was looking for a fishing spot in the mountains and instead found a supersized original Game Boy, once used as an advertising display in Japanese stores, converted into a mailbox. Unlike most non-urbexers (and some bad apples within the community) the guy actually cared and didn’t blurt out the location to the world – and so even some well-connected and respected Japanese explorers haven’t been to this little hidden gem. It took me a few years, too, but when I finally made it there on a beautiful autumn day I took pictures from pretty much every angle… because there was not much else to see or do nearby. Somebody put a regular mailbox into the strictly decorative plastic case (none of the buttons are or ever were functional – also the proportions were more than just slightly off!) and used it as such. Since the thing hasn’t been cleaned in quite a while and the nearby house also is in questionable condition it’s pretty safe to say that the Game Boy Mailbox really is abandoned – though there were indications that the house is still used occasionally, maybe as a weekend home.
For most people the Game Boy Mailbox is probably just a grey plastic case, but as a huge Nintendo fan I had the time of my life and took pictures of that thing from pretty much all possible angles. Sunshine, warm autumn day, bamboo grove in the background, autumn leaves surrounding, a remote mountain road – and a now rare piece of video game history. Everything came together perfectly! And if you like (arcade) games as much as I do, you might wanna check out my article about the abandoned *Arcade Machine Hotel*!
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Abandoned Kansai 
Wow you are really going deep into the fantasy forest here. Cheers Florian!
We also hit two road blocks due to landslides, so yes, that journey was really deep… 🙂
oh wow, thats not something i would expect to see like this, really cool :D.
no wonder the location of this is such a secret, someone would deffo get this out of there, one way or another lol…seen one of these, but still in functional shape on yahoo auctions some time ago, price was well over 100k yen and someone bought it anyway lol
Japan is full of surprises!
I guess the main problem here is the key. Nintendo keys are usually super rare and you wouldn’t be able to do anything without damaging the Game Boy.
if i remember correctly the ones i seen for sale did came with the key aswell. who knows how it is with this one tho, given to the added hinges haha
Yeah, it’s not exactly in mint condition anymore. Probably would be cheaper to recreate one than having one in bad condition with added hinges and a replacement lock.
Love this! I’ve been doing custom DMG Gameboys for a while now. Its lots of fun. https://i.imgur.com/P7nPIWC.jpg
Cool! There really wasn’t a clear / skeleton original Game Boy? Oh, you even replaced the buttons… really cool!
More than the buttons, and yes this is an aftermarket shell (there was a factory clear one in the “Play it Loud” series) The best part is the modern IPS screen. Remember they originally had a fuzzy, non back lit kind of dull green screen? These modern screens make them much better. Here are some more I did. https://i.imgur.com/A864IWG.jpg
Love this! I’ve been doing classic DMG custom Gameboys for a while now. Tried to add a photo link but it wouldn’t post.
I think it worked!
By the time it posted I found I couldn’t delete the original post.
Does it have to be abandoned to be interesting though? Good find.
Oh, it doesn’t have to be abandoned, but it helps! 🙂