Gutsu Grill Shinjuku has been serving hearty, affordable steak in Nishi-Shinjuku since 1999, attracting crowds with generous portions and a menu built around value for money. The 44-seat restaurant regularly fills up at lunchtime, with customers praising its tender meat, large servings and reasonable prices.

Prime Minister Takaichi said the government will continue using subsidies to keep the nationwide average gasoline price at around 170 yen per liter, drawing on reserve funds set aside to respond to developments in the Middle East.

Four teenage boys have been arrested in Tokyo on suspicion of stealing ketchup and other goods from a supermarket before splashing the ketchup on the face and body of a woman in her 70s, with one suspect telling police he had targeted around 10 people in similar attacks.

The whistle of a steam locomotive still echoes through the mountains of Engaru in northeastern Hokkaido, where the historic Amemiya No. 21 continues to run through a region once sustained by forestry.

Japan's GX Promotion Organization has invested about 3 billion yen in two startups developing nuclear fusion and plastic recycling technologies, with combined public and private investment expected to reach around 20 billion yen as the government seeks to accelerate the commercialization of advanced decarbonization technologies.

Japan's traditional neighborhood public baths are struggling with rising fuel, labor and operating costs, but unlike most businesses they cannot freely raise prices because admission fees remain regulated under a postwar price-control law introduced in 1946.

Japanese companies and venture investors are stepping up efforts to commercialize technologies that could transform shipping and recruitment, with Mitsui O.S.K. Lines pursuing fully autonomous operation of giant cargo vessels while startup Calaris develops an interactive AI interviewer designed to uncover abilities that conventional job applications may miss.

Lawson plans to cut prices on its main line of onigiri rice balls by 10 yen from September 29 as falling rice prices begin to feed through to retail costs.

Tokyo stocks fell on August 24, with the Nikkei 225 closing at 65,528.09, down 488.27 points, or 0.74%, as global bond-yield pressure and caution ahead of Nvidia’s earnings triggered selling in artificial intelligence and semiconductor-related shares, even as the broader TOPIX edged higher.

SoftBank Group announced on August 24 that it will issue 1 trillion yen in unsecured corporate bonds for individual investors, in what is set to be its largest such offering.

Suzuki has unveiled a prototype of its first kei-class electric vehicle, the e SKY, which is scheduled to go on sale during the current fiscal year with a driving range of 310 kilometers, among the longest offered by a domestically produced kei EV.

A magnitude 5.9 earthquake centered in southern Ibaraki Prefecture shook a wide area of the Kanto region at around 2 a.m. on August 23, registering a maximum intensity of lower 5 on Japan's seven-level seismic scale in parts of Ibaraki, Saitama, Chiba and Tokyo.

A cognitive trait known as aphantasia, in which people are unable to voluntarily form images in their minds despite knowing what objects look like, may affect about 4% of people, highlighting significant differences in how individuals experience memory, imagination and everyday tasks.

China's exports of rare-earth magnets to Japan fell by more than half in July from a year earlier, while shipments of tungsten carbide remained at zero for a sixth consecutive month, according to trade data released by Chinese customs authorities.

Japan's Internal Affairs and Communications Ministry has begun considering reductions in postal services, including fewer mailboxes and less frequent deliveries, as the country's postal business continues to suffer losses following a prolonged decline in letters and New Year's cards.

Japanese online publishing platform note is using artificial intelligence to review its management meetings and analyze company-wide activity as it prepares for a future in which AI increasingly determines what information, products and services people discover online.

Japan's nationwide core consumer price index rose 1.8% in July from a year earlier, with the pace of inflation accelerating for a second consecutive month as higher food prices and a rebound in energy costs outweighed a sharp decline in rice prices.

Japan's government is moving toward abolishing the Cool Japan Fund, a public-private investment vehicle created to support the overseas expansion of Japanese anime, food culture and other industries, after its cumulative losses reached 54 billion yen.

Mitsubishi Electric said on August 20 that it will acquire U.S.-based PCI Energy Solutions, a developer of software used to manage electricity trading and other energy operations, in a deal worth about 220 billion yen, the largest acquisition in the Japanese company's history.

Russia has conducted missile exercises around the Northern Territories, including what appears to have been a launch from one of the disputed islands, prompting Japan's foreign minister to call Russia's growing military presence there unacceptable.

Japan welcomed a record 3.44 million foreign visitors in July, the highest figure ever recorded for the month, even as the number of travelers from China fell sharply from a year earlier.

Catalog House, the operator of shopping catalog magazine Tsuhan Seikatsu, has announced it will stop selling through Rakuten Market in protest over Rakuten Group's partnership with a German military drone company and its plans to support the introduction of the drones to Japan's Ground Self-Defense Force.

Handheld fans have become a summer essential in Japan, but a rise in accidents involving hair becoming caught in the devices is prompting warnings over injuries, potential legal liability and fires caused by lithium-ion batteries.

Small businesses across Japan—from Tokyo tech startups to traditional long-standing shinise enterprises— are increasingly becoming targets for sophisticated digital scams.

Japan strongly protested and condemned North Korea after it launched a ballistic missile at around 5:04 p.m. on August 20, with the projectile believed to have fallen outside Japan's exclusive economic zone, Defense Minister Shinjiro Koizumi said.