A 27-year-old unemployed man from Aichi Prefecture, Japan, has been arrested after sending a series of chilling threats to Nintendo’s headquarters in Kyoto, claiming he had planted multiple bombs on the premises and that his plan “cannot be thwarted.”
The man, whose name has not been publicly released, was taken into custody on May 12, 2026, by the Kyoto Prefectural Police Minami Station on charges of forcible obstruction of business (威力業務妨害). The arrest followed a police investigation that began in March after a threatening envelope was delivered directly to Nintendo’s corporate offices.
A Timeline of Threats: What Happened
According to reports from Japanese news outlets including Kansai TV and the Kyoto Shimbun, the alarming sequence of events unfolded over the spring.
- Early to Mid-March, 2026: The suspect mailed an envelope from Aichi Prefecture to Nintendo’s headquarters in the Minami Ward of Kyoto City. Inside, a letter contained explicit threats, including statements such as “I’m going to blow you all up” and the unsettling claim that his “plans cannot be thwarted.” More alarmingly, he asserted he had “already planted multiple bombs” within the company’s facilities.
- March 16, 2026: The threatening envelope was received at Nintendo’s Kyoto headquarters. Following established protocol in the wake of past threats against the company, Nintendo immediately reported the letter to the Kyoto Prefectural Police.
- Mid-March, 2026: Acting on the report, police conducted a thorough search of the Nintendo headquarters building and the surrounding area. After a complete sweep, no suspicious items or explosive devices were found.
- May 12, 2026: After a two-month investigation that involved tracking the origin of the mailed threat, police arrested the 27-year-old suspect in Hekinan City, Aichi Prefecture. The suspect has reportedly admitted to all charges against him. The police are now focusing their investigation on his motive and any potential connection to other threats.
The man, who is unemployed and living in Ishibashi-cho, Hekinan City, reportedly sent an envelope containing documents with the written threats. His direct claims of having already planted explosives inside the building are what elevated this case from a general threat to a very specific and terrifying one.
A Disturbing History of Threats Against Nintendo
This is not the first time Nintendo has been the target of serious and disturbing threats. In fact, it is the latest entry in a series of incidents that have increasingly put the company and its events on high alert.
Previous Threats at a Glance
- Late 2022: A female office worker in Tokyo sent a threatening letter and a death certificate for a Nintendo executive to the company’s headquarters. She was arrested in 2023 and claimed to have “no direct grudge” against the company.
- August – November 2023: Gensin Kazama, a then-government official in Ibaraki Prefecture, sent 39 threatening messages to Nintendo via its official website. The threats, which included death threats and bomb warnings, specifically targeted participants of the Splatoon Koshien 2023 tournament. In one message, he wrote, “I will make you regret releasing such a game into the world.” He was later sentenced to one year in prison, suspended for four years. During his trial, he stated he sent the threats to “relieve stress” from losing in online games.
- Present Day (May 2026): The current incident involves a direct physical mail threat that forced a police sweep of Nintendo’s headquarters.
This persistent targeting has had real-world consequences. The 2023 threat from Kazama forced Nintendo to postpone the Splatoon Koshien 2023 national finals and cancel the entire Nintendo Live 2024 Tokyo event out of an abundance of caution for the safety of its employees, players, and spectators.
The Growing Global Problem of Gaming-Related Threats
Nintendo is not alone in facing this grim reality. The gaming industry, with its passionate and highly engaged global fanbase, has seen a disturbing rise in similar threats.
In South Korea, a bomb threat at HoYoverse’s Genshin Impact Summer Festival in 2023 led to an evacuation. Other major Korean game companies like Com2uS, NCSoft, and Nimble Neuron have also been targeted, prompting the South Korean government to strengthen laws against public threats.
As GamesHub’s Paul McNally noted, “Nintendo, like most major publishers, is a company more than capable of inspiring deeply strange levels of loyalty, anger, and obsession. Most of the time, that just means people arguing online… Sometimes, unfortunately, it means police being called to check a company headquarters for explosives”.
FAQ: Key Questions About the Incident
Q: Was anyone hurt?
A: No. The threat was entirely in writing, and a police search of the headquarters found no actual bombs or dangerous materials.
Q: Has the suspect admitted to the crime?
A: Yes. According to police, the suspect has admitted to the charges of forcible obstruction of business. An investigation into his motive is ongoing.
Q: Is this connected to the past threats against Nintendo?
A: There is currently no indication that this incident is connected to the previous threats from 2022 or 2023. The police are investigating the suspect’s motive and background.
Q: Why was he arrested two months after sending the letter?
A: The police needed time to investigate the origin of the mailed threat and build a case before making an arrest. The two-month gap between the threat being received in March and the arrest in May is a standard timeline for such a non-emergency, investigation-driven case.
Q: Why are people doing this to Nintendo?
A: The motives vary. In the 2023 incident, the perpetrator admitted to sending threats to relieve stress from losing a game. In other cases, the motives have been unclear or seemingly random, part of a broader trend of corporate and celebrity harassment in Japan and worldwide.
The Bottom Line
A man sent a letter claiming he was going to blow up Nintendo’s headquarters with bombs he had already planted. It was a hoax, but it was the kind of hoax that forces a company to treat it as real. Nintendo called the police. The police conducted a search. And two months later, a 27-year-old unemployed man was placed under arrest.
The incident is over, but the pattern is not. The threats against Nintendo keep coming—from angry gamers, from stressed-out office workers, from people who seem to have no connection to the company at all. Nintendo Live 2024 was canceled because of one of these threats. The Splatoon Koshien finals were postponed because of another. Each time, Nintendo is forced to choose between ignoring the danger and disrupting its own business, and each time it chooses safety.
This time, no bombs were found. No events were canceled. But the price of that outcome was a police investigation, a corporate headquarters on lockdown, and an entire company forced to wonder, once again, if the next letter will be the one that is not a hoax.
What are your thoughts on the increasing number of threats against game companies? Let us know in the comments.
About the Author
