Scarce stocks of the Love Plus+ Ita-DS iLL bundle have resulted in chaos at Akihabara, with police having to be called to disperse enraged otaku.
Online the situation is no better – instantly sold out stocks provoked further fury when it became apparent a large proportion of stocks had found their way into the hands of online auctioneers who proceeded to impose a markup of several hundred percent.
The situation in Akihabara began when staff at Sofmap told queuers to come on the first train rather than wait all night, as it was a nuisance.
However, Sofmap actually gave reservation vouchers to the all night queuers who came anyway, and then announced by Twitter that reservations had closed.
Those who had heeded their request to stay away were naturally upset to find that when they arrived in the morning they were turned away. However, despite being told no further orders would be taken, some kept on queuing.
Sofmap then began counting those who were queuing, enraging those who had stayed away or left on the understanding they could not order.
Finally, Sofmap told the people who came on the early train as asked, who had by this time been left waiting for 6 hours, that they could not order without a ticket. Unsurprisingly, bedlam ensued as otaku rage spilled over.
Otaku confronted Sofmap staff – fisticuffs appear only to narrowly have been averted:
Police had to be summoned to control the situation.
It should be clarified that otaku were not even queuing for the actual product, only the right to pre-order the packs, shown below in all their glory:
As if this tale were not sordid enough, online retailers selling the bundle sold out instantly, and at the same time the packs began appearing on online auction sites.
It appears legions of scalpers descended upon online stores to snap up the packs so they could sell them on to desperate otaku for 2-3 times the price – the lowest price Amazon sellers are now offering is a mere $650.
A denizen of 2ch provided this image to soothe the hearts of any despondent at their failure in life being compounded by failure at securing an imaginary life:
Wow that’s some ri-AWWWWWWWWW KITTEN IN A BOX
Just wait until the new the 3DS Love Plus 3D Bundle comes out XD
I think Sofmap is at fault here. I know I would be just as pissed off if I went through the same treatment.
On the bright side, not being a Love Plus otaku I find only a passing interest int what these otaku do or stop doing.
Boss police: SHOOOOTTTTTT the retardssssss, OPEN FIREEEE!!!!!!
Officer: noooooooo!!!! there are so muchhh fire fireee!!!
EMOTAKUS: AHHH AHHHHHH LOOOOVVEEEE PLUUUUSSSS AHHHH BRAINSSSS BRAINSS LOVE PLUSSSS NEEEENEEE AUUUHHHHH
OTAKU RAGE, XD, one of thesse days an otaku will kill a seller