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Easily reached from Kokura station, Aru Aru City is Kitakyushu's center of otaku culture, hosting frequent events per year, eight stories of anime-, manga-, and game-themed shops, game arcades, a manga kissa, and the Kitakyushu Manga Museum. While obviously not as huge as Tokyo's Akihabara or Osaka's Den Den Town, it is far more specialised than those two and has the obvious convenience of having all shops under the same roof.
小倉城 Kokura-jō
Built by Hosokawa Tadaoki in 1602, it was the property of the Ogasawara clan which came from Harima (near Himeji) from 1632 to 1860. The castle was burnt down in 1865 in the war between the Kokura and Choshu clans. The keep was reconstructed in 1959, and the castle was fully restored in 1990. The Matsumoto Seicho museum and castle garden were opened in 1998. The keep contains a modern folkloric museum. Inside the castle you can see a video show about what Kokura was like during the Edo period, a display of Kokura Castle and its surroundings during the Edo period which is made of many lifelike tiny paper dolls, and you can also ride inside a palanquin like the castle lord would have when traveling. The box rocks back and forth to recreate the motion. It's amusing and free, so enjoy being the daimyo for a minute. You can also see two beautiful paintings of tigers with gold leaf on display. There is a café at the top floor (no ATM, bring your cash!). There is a wheelchair lift sort of device. See also Japanese castles.