‘Ghost of Tsushima’ Fans Raise $260K to Help Restore Torii Gate Destroyed by Typhoon

Fans of the popular PlayStation 4 game started a crowdfunding campaign in November 2020 to help repair the destroyed torii gate at Watatsumi Shrine, according to Siliconera.

Torii gates symbolize the border between the secular and sacred worlds in Shinto religion. The Watatsumi Shrine is dedicated to Toyotama-hime, a Shinto sea goddess, according to SoraNews24.

Yuichi Hirayama, one of the shrine’s priests who created the Camp-Fire campaign, initially set its goal to 5 million Japanese yen (more than $48,000), but fans managed to raise 27,103,882 yen ($260,435) before the campaign ended this month.

 

Gate repairs will begin this April and will likely end sometime in August. Everyone who donated at least 10,000 yen ($96) will have their names written on a stone monument near the gate.

“Ghost of Tsushima” is a 2020 action-adventure video game set in the 13th century. It follows the story of Jin Sakai, a samurai whose main quest is to defend the island of Tsushima from a Mongolian invasion. Since its release, the game has sold more than 5 million copies and received several nominations at The Game Awards 2020, from Best Narrative to Best Game Direction. The game won Famitsu’s Game of the Year Award last year, making it the first American game to receive this award.

Feature Image via PlayStation (Left), Camp-Fire (Right)