Anime location
Hashima Island (Gunkanjima)
The abandoned island where the live-action Attack on Titan films were shot. Landing depends on the sea, and you walk a fixed path.
Hashima is a 480-metre lump of concrete 18km off Nagasaki. It was a coal mine, and at its 1960 peak around 5,300 people lived on it — reportedly the highest population density recorded anywhere on earth. The mine closed in January 1974 and the last residents left that April. Nobody has lived there since. The seawall gives it the silhouette of a warship, which is where the nickname comes from. It was inscribed as a UNESCO World Heritage site in 2015 as part of the Meiji industrial revolution sites.
Why it is worth it
The live-action Attack on Titan films used this island for the ruined world outside the walls. It is not a set and not a reconstruction. It is the actual place, and it looks the way it looks because it was left.
When to go
Summer is busiest. The real variable is not the crowd but the weather — landings are cancelled often enough that you should not build your only Nagasaki day around it.
Good to know
Book the tour in advance and treat the sea as the deciding factor. Several licensed operators run from Nagasaki Port; landing requires calm water, and when the captain judges it unsafe you cruise the island instead of stepping onto it. Check each operator's policy on what happens then, because it differs. On the island you are confined to a fixed concrete walkway with three viewing points, and you cannot enter any building — the ruins are genuinely unstable. There is no shade, no shelter and no toilet on the island. One correction worth making: the James Bond film Skyfall did not shoot here. Its island was a set built in England, inspired by photographs of Hashima. The Attack on Titan films did shoot here.
Attack on Titan
The live-action films (2015) were shot here. This is the ruined world outside the walls.
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