Description

This is a very unusual Japanese travel game published by the Osaka Mainichi newspaper in 1926 (Taisho 15), quite unlike the typical Mawari-Sugoroku board, which has a path of pictures spiralling toward the center.

This game is a huge map of the world surrounded by flags. It measures about 43" tall and 30" wide. It is oriented (no pun intended) toward the East at the top, with North to the left, South to the right and West downwards. Japan is centered in the upper half, with the Pacific and Americas above it, Australia to the right, Asia/India in the middle and Europe/Africa at the bottom.

The map shows a wide variety of destinations linked by numbered routes. Each player starts from Japan and travels in the direction indicated by a die roll (with a 6 going nowhere). The objective is to reach London by travelling either east or west, with North America at the top connecting to European/African destinations at the bottom.

The period illustrations are wonderful, including a bust of Lenin in Leningrad (with a train heading back to Germany), Charlie Chaplin being filmed as the little tramp in Hollywood, a cannibal eating a white man in Indonesia, a hookah-smoking Turk, a kilted Scot, an arrogant European waiter, a Dutch girl in clogs and a Spaniard fighting a bull. There also are drawings of all the famous sights, from Niagara Falls, the Taj Mahal and the Pyramids to the Kremlin, Statue of Liberty, Westminster, and a biplane flying over the Eiffel Tower.