NJPW World

[air_raid]

3 hours ago, mim731 said:

Worth remembering if you ask them to bring you back a t shirt or anything clothing related, Japanese sizing is quite different. If you usually wear an L T-shirt, you'd want a Japanese XL at least, for example. 

Or, if you're like me at WK'12, you'll buy the biggest size available just to play it safe and STILL own a t-shirt you'll never be able to wear.

[gmoney]

Eddie Kingston's been announced for Royal Quest. No opponent as yet. 

[DavidB6937]

Fucks sake. I was thinking I could miss it..

[WyattSheepMask]

We’re finally getting native apps for iOS, Android and Roku and offline playback.

With that though comes a small price hike. Existing customers will see an increase of 299yen (taking the price to Y1,298) whereas new customers are to be charged $9.99 (price wasn’t given in Yen in the announcement).

https://www.njpw1972.com/159104

As is often the case, if you sub through Roku rather than your usual Browser, you might be able to get it for a little cheaper.

Edited September 11, 2023 by WyattSheepMask

[DavidB6937]

Offline payback definitely got me the most interested. It's a shame I'm not really up to date with it at the moment.

[TildeGuy~!]

Doesn’t look like Okada will be at the Copperbox, unless he’s a surprise late announcement.

Edited September 21, 2023 by TildeGuy~!

[Michael_3165]

Njpw have really dropped the ball w RQIII. The promotion of it has been non existent and the card looks lacklustre at best. Ospreay v Sabre doesn't inspire for me and other than Ishii v Takagi (a great match on paper) the rest is a bit meh. 

Such a shame, I would have ripped their hand off for  NJPW show a few years ago, but I can now take or leave it. Which I never thought I'd say. 

It seems they have given up on the UK project or at least not investing as much as they need to into the cards when here. 

Does anyone know how many tickets have sold? I hope if it doesn't sell out that they don't take that as a lack of interest but rather them not bringing enough to warrant a trip a few months post All In (I think the timing is insane, should have waited at least 6 months)

[DavidB6937]

I do wonder if they think they can capitalise on their recent AEW appearances. But yeah it feels really cold. I'd much rather they put some effort in.

[westlondonmist]

From the seating map it looks like some sections were never put on sale and overall it looks like 3 or so thousand seats sold. I'm glad I didn't get a ticket, it looks pretty mediocre. Isn't really a match I'm interested in and it looks like a jumped up Rev Pro show more than anything else. I think it would actually probably be better with Takagi/Ospreay and Sabre/Ishii rather than what they've done. You've also got no Sanada, Naito or Okada. With the card they have I think they have done okay.

 

I do think that maybe the UK market is a bit saturated now. A stadium show last year, this year and next. Money in the bank this year in London and a WWE tour which stops in London 2 weeks later. All announced before Royal Quest, people are burnt out and only have so much money.

[cobystag]

26 minutes ago, westlondonmist said:

From the seating map it looks like some sections were never put on sale and overall it looks like 3 or so thousand seats sold. I'm glad I didn't get a ticket, it looks pretty mediocre. Isn't really a match I'm interested in and it looks like a jumped up Rev Pro show more than anything else. I think it would actually probably be better with Takagi/Ospreay and Sabre/Ishii rather than what they've done. You've also got no Sanada, Naito or Okada. With the card they have I think they have done okay.

 

I do think that maybe the UK market is a bit saturated now. A stadium show last year, this year and next. Money in the bank this year in London and a WWE tour which stops in London 2 weeks later. All announced before Royal Quest, people are burnt out and only have so much money.

SANADA & Naito are both on the show. Just haven't had their match(es) announced. 

 

Honestly, don't get your hopes up as BUSHI & Douki also have been announced but their matches haven't been set. Realistically it's SANADA/Douki vs Naito/BUSHI.

 

Gabe Kidd is on a RevPro show the weekend after so I expect him and Drilla Moloney on the card too.

 

Honestly, I have no complaints with the card. Zack/Will is the biggest match they can do after they've already done a big show on October 9th with all the other Title's bring defended. We're not going to get an IWGP World Heavyweight Title match 5 days after it was defended in Japan.

 

Shingo/Ishii will be great. As well Tsuji/Jacobs. I don't mind the 6 man as Kingston/Henare is happening in America two weeks after. The crowd would potentially dump on Oku if he defended the RevPro Title against a NJPW wrestler. And Tanahashi is best used in multi-man matches these days.

 

Not keen on Trent vs Desperado but Trent has been great in RevPro since returning and has name value, so to speak, from NXT UK. Desperado has never won a singles match in England so Trent is big enough to take the loss.

[Maikeru]

Anyone else going tomorrow? Must say I kind of like these shows with less hype. Going in with moderate expectations, without too many titles on the line, you can just relax and enjoy some matches. Haven’t been to an NJPW show since Royal Quest 1. 

[pitseleh]

Yeah, that was alright. I've always kicked myself for missing the first two Royal Quests, so I'm glad I got to witness one, even if the hype has fizzled down due to all the big UK shows we've been spoilt with since the pandemic came to a close.

The crowd was hot throughout the show and the show looked to have a satisfactory attendance. The upper bowl only had fans in the seats facing the hard camera. It didn't seem to affect the atmosphere, but it did leave me wondering if they could had filled up more seats if they got some bigger names like Moxley, Jericho or Okada on the card.

The first 8 matches felt like all of the big established NJPW names were stuck on house show mode. The RevPro guys were hungry and you can tell that they were giving it all to gain some new fans and to impress some of the NJPW brass in the back. Robbie X, Leon Slater, Cameron Khai and Luke Jacobs all impressed me tonight. I've seen them countless times at RevPro shows, but you could tell that they pulled their finger out tonight.

Watching Tanahashi was tragic tonight. The guy's body has failed him and it looks painful for him to move around. He botched his cross body from the second rope and thankfully the crowd was decent enough to not make a big deal out of it. He really needs to retire soon.

I think Naito got the biggest reaction of the night. He felt like an absolute star and outshined the actual current IWGP Champion. The Sanada experiment can probably be put to bed soon. Eddie Kingston was the second most over wrestler on the card, in my opinion.

Ishii Vs Shingo and Ospreay Vs Sabre delivered and stopped the show from feeling forgettable. I think I'm over the Ishii bombfests, but he always sucks me in whenever I see him pull one out in person. Some of those strikes sounded devastating. Ospreay and Sabre wrestled the match you would expect them to see. We got some incredible counters here. I was rooting for a Sabre victory, but I know deep down that Ospreay needed this victory more to further cement him as the face of British Wrestling.

With the exception of the last two matches, this felt like an NJPW house show with a BritWres flavour. Not that's a bad thing, but they need to make next year's show feel like a big deal if they want to pull in a bigger attendance.

[2Xtreme_lives]

We felt in the car home that the show only felt important for the 3 final matches but were surprised by the attendance considering last year was 2 nights in what seemed a bigger crowd but this year being one night and no upper bowl. The venue is lovely though much better than crystal Palace 

I'm glad it was online quickly as I'd like to see a few things back again 

 

[Snitsky's back acne]

16 hours ago, pitseleh said:

He botched his cross body from the second rope and thankfully the crowd was decent enough to not make a big deal out of it. He really needs to retire soon.

 

I bow to those who know more about New Japan than I do but am I right in thinking Tanahashi is one of the few New Japan talents that never did an excursion anywhere?
I know he worked Mexico for a couple of months with Nakamura but that wasn't counted as an excursion was it? Is there a reason why? I thought it was/is essentially a ritual to have an excursion for New Japan wrestlers?

[westlondonmist]

1 hour ago, Snitsky's back acne said:

I bow to those who know more about New Japan than I do but am I right in thinking Tanahashi is one of the few New Japan talents that never did an excursion anywhere?
I know he worked Mexico for a couple of months with Nakamura but that wasn't counted as an excursion was it? Is there a reason why? I thought it was/is essentially a ritual to have an excursion for New Japan wrestlers?

Not everyone does it and some do it when they are already recognised. Possibly though because he came in in 99 after a couple of years there was t anywhere to send him and Mexico can only accommodate so many. By 2001 WCW was done and weren't working with NJPW by that point, RoH wasn't available like it would be to people like White or EVIL.