Between the worldwide player base of Grand Order and the upcoming strange fake anime series from A-1 Pictures, Type Moon's Fate franchise has come a long way since its humble beginnings just over 2 decades ago. Last January, a long-awaited official remaster of Fate/stay night released on all platforms, growing the fanbase even further.
The original game's legacy as a groundbreaking visual novel is indisputably thanks to its story and characters, but what ties it together is its understated yet memorable setting.
Rather than staging the story of heroic high schoolers locked in inter-dimensional mortal combat in Tokyo or another existing city, Type-moon’s Nasu Kinoko and Takashi Takeuchi opted to create the town of Fuyuki for Fate's setting. A quiet, mysterious fictional port city with a significant place in Japanese cultural history and an early adopter of international exchange, it served as the perfect backdrop for the war between overpowered characters found in various folklore from different cultures around the world.
Fuyuki feels just big enough to offer enough of the familiar anime set pieces, like the characters visiting a busy but not overcrowded cafe downtown. On the other hand, it's still small enough that when a battle between medieval knights and magic-wielding teenagers breaks out in a public park with nobody around to see, it doesn’t seem that big of a contrivance.
Unlike the story of Fate, however, Fuyuki isn’t entirely a work of fiction. It may not be found on any map of Japan, but it’s a place you can visit. Kind of.
Just west of central Japan, between the mountains of Hyogo prefecture and the stunning blue of the Seto inland sea, you'll find the unassuming city of Kobe. You'll also find more than a few overlaps with Fate's city of Fuyuki.
Port city? Check.
Busy, but nowhere nearly as packed as nearby Osaka or Kyoto? Definitely.
Long history of international exchange? Of course!
How do you think Kobe beef got to be such a big deal everywhere else?
Kobe is also where you can find many of the real locations that Type-moon used as references for the backgrounds of many iconic scenes in Fate/stay night.
While Type-Moon was founded in Tokyo (Nasu and Takeuchi are both from Chiba), and a few areas around the Japanese capital were used for references for Fuyuki as well, some of the more well-known settings are taken from this small city in the Kansai region.
The use of Kobe for Fate locations is likely thanks to Sakai Nobukazu, game creator and former CEO of the since-dissolved adult visual novel company minori. His name, or simply "minori", is the only credit that appears attributed to Fate's background art. He was also based in Osaka, a brief express train ride away from Kobe, at the time of Fate/stay night's production.
The “sacred” or “holy sights” for Fate/stay night in Kobe, as Japanese otaku have long dubbed any irl locations used as references for anime, movies & games, are still regularly visited as a "pilgrimage" for dedicated fans from all over the country and abroad.
Here’s a look at scrmbl’s own “pilgrimage” to Fate's "holy sights" around Kobe, and other places where the strange fiction of Fuyuki feels summoned into reality.
Fate/stay night begins with the young but experienced mage Rin Tohsaka casually reflecting on expositional details of the neighborhood in Fuyuki where she’s lived for most of her life:
“Fuyuki is a strange city.
One side of the intersection dividing the residential areas is filled with old samurai estates, while the side I’m on has an abundance of mansions built in European style.
Apparently, a whole bunch of foreign families immigrated here long ago, but I’ve never seen a single foreigner around.”
Rin’s quick summary of Fuyuki’s international community basically matches Kobe’s history, although in reality there are plenty of foreign residents to be seen in much of the city.
There were indeed “a whole bunch of foreign families” who moved to Kobe when the port opened for international business in 1868. The Former Thomas House, the reference for the exterior and interior of Tohsaka’s home, is a prime example of one of the homes where some of these new foreign residents lived.
Designed by a German architect for a German merchant in the manner of popular German design at the time, it seems a fitting inspiration for the home of a (sometimes) German-speaking mage like Rin.
Built in 1904, the house already had some pop culture clout long before Fate. The home loosely inspired the setting for a popular late ‘70s NHK morning drama series set in Kobe. Though the story had no relation to real events, it still drew attention to the city for fans all over the country.
Similar to Rin's description of her Fuyuki neighborhood, the Thomas mansion is close to other western-style houses that were the homes of foreign merchants, diplomats and others who immigrated to Kobe. These were dubbed 'Ijinkan' in Japanese, a specific term for buildings with western designs housing those from abroad. In Kobe, most of these are found in the Kitano cho neighborhood, along with a couple of side streets also used as backgrounds in Fate.
The city bought the Thomas House and opened it to the public as a museum in 1978. It's a well-known attraction for history buffs, and even features special displays and goods for Fate fans who come to visit Rin’s “real” home.
Unfortunately, the interior has been closed to visitors since late 2023 for earthquake-proofing renovations. It’s a shame to skip the recognizable rooms of Tohsaka's house for the pilgrimage, but the reason for the closure is an important one.
This January marked the 30th anniversary of the Great Hanshin-Awaji earthquake, which devastated much of Kobe’s infrastructure and claimed thousands of lives.
Aside from the museum closure, other stark reminders of the tragic events on January 17, 1995 can be found elsewhere in Kobe, such as the stopped Marina clock in front of city hall or the preserved section of the damaged port at the Earthquake Memorial Park. The city also commemorates the victims with the Luminarie illumination display every year.
Thankfully, fans can look forward to the Thomas House reopening this March. But the preventative renovations are a sobering indication that while the city has since recovered from the disaster, it has certainly not forgotten.
A couple locations on this pilgrimage require a trip just outside the Kobe city limits to neighboring Akashi city to the west. A car certainly saves time, but you can still get there easily by train or bus. Just be sure to safely pack your bow & arrow if you’re using public transit to get to the next spot.
You can find the inspiration for the Fuyuki High School archery club exterior at the Hyogo Prefectural Archery Range. The real building is quite impressive, so much so that Nasu felt he needed Rin to provide some context later in the prologue:
“One of our school’s trademarks is its well-equipped archery range.
The chair of the school board has a passion for kyudo, Japanese archery, so they built a magnificent range on campus.
It’s kind of a waste for a high school club, to be honest.”
Boasting multiple baseball fields, tennis courts, playgrounds, a track, and winding walking paths lined with trees, it’s pretty “magnificent” as far as public parks go. And unlike the high schoolers in the original visual novel, you can treat yourself to a cold drink from the vending machine by the entrance.
Like many public parks in Japan, Akashi park is on the grounds of the centuries-old castle of the same name. Built by Tokugawa loyalists in the early Edo period, Akashi castle stands along one of the only roads allowing passage between a still politically-divided eastern and western Japan; a last line of defense for the shogunate if Himeji fell. When the castle was completed, the town that sprung up afterward was populated with samurai families and their impressive estates.
For example, you can find one former samurai home across from the Akashi castle grounds that may be recognizable for Fate fans.
This historical front gate is the unmistakable reference for the Emiya household. Just after the prologue, protagonist Shirou Emiya introduces his traditional yet anachronistic family home:
“This Emiya residence is a Japanese samurai-style house, located on the outskirts of town.
My old man wasn’t from a notable family, yet for some reason he owned this giant house.
That in itself was a mystery, and it also seems he didn’t have any relatives here in Japan.”
In reality, you’d have to at least know somebody related to a samurai to live here. This historic estate was home to multiple generations of the Oda family through much of the Edo period. On a busy road tucked between parking garages and high-rises, the centuries-old front gate certainly feels as if it's been summoned from an iconic era in Japanese history.
The gate is all you’ll be able to see however, as the interior of the home has long been in disrepair and is closed to visitors.
Back to Kobe proper for the last major background reference location and easily the most recognizable for any Fate fan.
The bright red bridge connecting the city to Port Island made its debut for Fate players back in 2004, but it’s been making cameos in several other entries in the franchise ever since.
Once the largest artificial island in the world, Kobe’s Port Island was built in response to the accelerating growth of global container cargo and the need for a major eastern hub. But the island has since developed residential areas, primary schools and university campuses.
It’s also where you can find the Kobe Convention Center and the UCC Coffee Museum.
Other spots in Kobe may not directly appear in Fate’s background art, but they still have curious connections between fantasy and history that are more felt than seen.
Rin’s info dump about her western-style home in Fate’s prologue, for example, also mentions another part of Fuyuki that becomes an important stage for the events of the Holy Grail War:
“There’s even a cemetery for foreigners in Shinto, the new part of the city, across the river, but it was built for the generation that immigrated here.
Maybe Japan just didn’t suit them.”
Sure enough, in the mountains north of hilly Kitano Cho and its western-style Ijinkan, you’ll find the Kobe Foreigner’s Cemetery. Just under 3,000 of Kobe’s foreign residents from the time of the international port’s opening are buried here on a tree-covered hillside overlooking the city.
While the cemetery itself is not directly accessible to visitors without an arranged appointment or joining a scheduled tour, there’s an observation deck that lets you get a look at the cemetery and surrounding landscape.
Fuyuki’s fictitious foreigner’s cemetery may not have made direct visual use of Kobe’s, but a hilltop cemetery of foreign residents, complete with a modest Christian chapel not unlike the “sanctuary” from the Holy Grail War, seems like something more than a coincidence.
Recommended to travel to by car, the forest paths and serene Shiogahara pond on the way to the cemetery make the trip all the more worthwhile.
Afterwards, for a look at more of the city's international essence, there’s Kobe’s historic Chinatown: Nanking Machi. “Historic” may be a tricky descriptor, as this pocket of the city has gone through several changes since the community of Chinese immigrants grew along with the port’s opening. Unfortunately, it was also one of the areas severely damaged by the earthquake, meaning many original structures were replaced.
However, Kobe's is the 2nd oldest Chinatown in Japan after Yokohama.
Today’s Nanking Machi is another colorful reminder of the roots of Kobe’s global community, complete with a small stage area for cultural events and performances like the week-long Chinese New Year celebration.
Locals are honest about the touristy theme-park feel of the neighborhood today, and as far as Fate goes, it's more of an atmospheric connection than a thematic one. It’s the kind of photogenic, diversionary spot any of the Fate characters may stroll through on any given day off from school or fighting for their lives against centuries-old demigods.
When you consider there's a whole Fate spinoff manga/anime about Shirou and the squad just cooking stuff together, it's not that big a reach. Besides, fresh steamed pork buns and soup dumplings for a couple hundred yen around every corner may keep you from overthinking it too much.
You can also find great Chinese food and other cuisine in Kobe's Shinmachi neighborhood, the name of which curiously shares a similar etymology with Fuyuki's Shinto when read in Japanese.
Kobe has historically held the position of being right at the crossroads of history-making happenings and the larger-than-life figures behind them.
When the city opened to the rest of the world, those from abroad moving for their careers or their studies found themselves as strangers in a strange land. They lived in houses that catered to their home country’s aesthetics, but undeniably kept them separated from local communities.
As new settlements were built and the city expanded, it became clear that Kobe's newly found role as a vital international port altered its place in Japan's culture and history forever.
Before that, an entire town was built around a castle that stood between the past and future of the nation's power structure. And much more recently, the city faced the grim challenge of reconciling and rebuilding after a devastating natural disaster.
The characters of Fate/stay night have similar experiences. Masters and Servants alike, from different times, backgrounds, cultures, and faiths all find themselves caught between forces much bigger than themselves.
Whether by being summoned from another time or just dumb familial circumstance, they’ve all ended up in a war for a powerful object that's loosely based on a loosely described item from a loosely retold moment from history. Yet despite the esoteric nature of Fate's Holy Grail, it's nevertheless coveted by homicidal "heroes" and maniacal monsters alike, making it all too real for those who stand in their way.
They also bring to the challenge their own doubts, regrets and guilt echoing from painful events from the past.
What the main characters must decide is how to deal with it all, and the player must do the same.
Run or fight? Lie or tell the truth? Shut out the pain of the past, or face it and recover? Ignore what you want and accept what seems decided, or take a risk because you believe it to be right? Decide for everyone else, or decide for yourself?
No matter what choice is made, everyone must face what comes next.
These kinds of decisions, and their consequences, have been faced time and again by the various cross-cultural inhabitants of Kobe. In making the Fate pilgrimage, you not only find places featured in the series, but windows looking in on those very real moments in history and the people who were a part of them.
And just as many of Fate’s Servants are the exaggerated versions of very mortal human beings from the past, the gulf between tidy fiction and complicated reality draws ceaseless curiosity wherever your pilgrimage takes you.
Kobe isn’t just Fate's passive backdrop, but a less-than incidental inspiration for a moving story that started a globally beloved multimedia narrative universe. No matter how brief your pilgrimage may be, you’ll have more than enough questions to investigate.
And if you come across any especially good Chinese restaurants, please let us know.
