If you’ve ever been to Tokyo, you will undoubtedly be familiar with the long underground passageways in many metro stations. And if you’ve ever felt frustrated trying to exit, you are not alone. The popular game and movie The Exit 8 plays on this shared anxiety, and here is a guide if you want to make a “pilgrimage” to relevant spots.
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What is The Exit 8?
The Exit 8 is a 2023 adventure game developed and published by Kotake Create that has the player walk through an endless Japanese metro station passageway, trying to spot anomalies in order to exit. A film adaptation, starring Arashi member Kazunari Ninomiya as the lead, premiered at the 2025 Cannes Film Festival in May before opening in Japanese theatres a few months later. Classified as a horror movie, there are a few jumpscares, but it is the persistent sense of unease that makes the film a winner.
Kiyosumi-Shirakawa Station
The Exit 8 was primarily shot around Kiyosumi-Shirakawa Station and at studio sets in Tokyo. The film’s central feature — an endlessly looping underground passage — was meticulously recreated on a set, while the station’s underground design was referenced to add realism.
The station, located on the Tokyo Metro Hanzomon Line and the Toei Oedo Line, is known for its cold lighting, sterile white-tile space, and watchful surveillance cameras. The atmosphere was recreated in detail for the film, with subtle changes to the set’s lights, stairs, and pillars to intensify the terror of being trapped in an endless loop.
For those making the pilgrimage, A3 is said to be the exit the original creator modeled the game on. The corner is question is almost exactly like the one that appears in the film.
The arrangement of the lights in that passageway, which leads to a bicycle parking lot, are eerie, like an “abnormality” in itself.
Walking through it, you can feel a déjà vu that is not unlike the film’s unsettling loop.
The stairs heading down to the platform on the Hanzomon line is also reminiscent of the one featured early in the film, when Ninomiya answers a phone call from his girlfriend.
Korakuen Station photo spot
For a limited time, you can see a replica of the Exit 8 sign and accompanying instructions on a wall near the elevators on the 5F of the Metro M building at Korakuen Station. It looks exactly as it appears in the movie, so you can get some nice snaps. Sadly, it is in a corner of a restaurant floor, so you will not be able to get that long passageway. For that, better to go to Kiyosumi-Shirakawa Station above, or just about any decently big metro station.
The Exit 8 Tokyo Metro Escape Game
From Aug. 29 to Nov. 3, 2025, Tokyo Metro is running an escape game based on The Exit 8. Let me preface this by saying that attempting the game is impossible unless you are extremely fluent in Japanese. Almost 100% of the puzzles rely on word play. Not to mention you need to understand the sometimes tricky wording of the instructions in the first place.
Cost
The game kit costs 3,300 yen and to my chagrin I discovered the 24 hour Tokyo Metro pass was not included. Meaning you will shell out an additional 700 yen for it on the day you play. For that reason, I feel the price was a bit steep for what was basically pieces of paper. Of course, I know you are paying for the planning etc. as well, but it would have been nice to have had a lasting souvenir in the bag.
How to play
You can purchase the kit online on the official website, or from authorised third-party booking sites like Asoview. You will need to pick up the kit from a specified location on the day. For purchases on Asoview, the pickup was at a special desk set up near Exit B7 of Nihombashi Station, between 10am to 5pm. Scan the QR code and enter the serial code in the kit to access the game page on your phone.
You can choose between three stations from which to start the game, and each will take you to a handful of other stations in the Tokyo Metro network. The game takes at least three to five hours to complete.
Once you have the kit, there is nothing stopping you from breaking it up or completing it another day. You will have to pay to travel between the stations, of course. To “escape” you need to clear eight puzzles that require you to travel to specific stations to solve. If you get stuck, you can get hints from the game page and even the answer itself.
Difficulty
Even as N1 fluent Japanese speaker, I found the puzzles difficult. I was able to solve some of them but gave up after three hours as it was tiring moving between stations and I was getting hungry. I think for native Japanese speakers, the word play would not be as challenging.
If you are a fan of pilgrimages, check out the archives for more ideas of where to go.