Past Dying

Like something from Raymond Chandler, with that Deco font, or a cruise liner where puff-sleeved women skywrite with ivory cigarette holders as long as their silk gloves.

That’s the appeal of how Japan imports Western finds. Drop the context, the baggage, and have it for what it is. So the title card of a Golden-Age Bogart vehicle can instead be the portal to smoky Mahjong simulators and imaginary robot fights.

It’s sad, then, that Sega are mysteriously murdering their heritage with these orange-red lightboxes. The sign used to match the doors with retro-retro letters on scarlet. Doesn’t take a super-sleuth to detect a lack of care – a femme-fatale swoon to the drifting scent of moolah.