Heaven's Gate — Restaurant in Tokyo

OK. You should know some things first. This is an all ages cafe. There was definitely a family with a 7 year old having a blast there. This is an innocent type place. If you were seeking something more... adult oriented- This ain't it. This is a very high-energy environment. We arrived after 10 hours exploring the city and were drained / not very invested in the experience. 2/3 of our party thought we were going to be like pampered and spoiled during our visit. NOT the case. There were seriously about... 9-14 maids working. For maybe 7-10 groups. And I can't put into words how little I felt we were interacted with by them. I'd often look up and see a group of 6 swarmed around a party of 2. We felt ignored and neglected. Due to our low energy, I can only assume that was why we WERE neglected. There was a HUGE language barrier. I often didn't understand what they were trying to say or get me to participate in. Like, we read the rules but the maids would often come up and try and make us say words or chants over food items that weren't easy to repeat or have a pronunciation in English to help me try and participate. You must say "Meow Meow" to your maid. We only ordered ice cream and 2 cocktails. We also bought a bazooka. We paid and stayed for the full hour, but I'll say we felt highly stressed out as we realized that THEY were trying to keep us there longer than an hour, which would force us to pay for a 2nd hour. But the amount of time it took for the ice cream and cocktail to arrive... unacceptable. Over 30mins. The buddy received his bazooka - which they ONLY let you have for a stage performance took almost an hour to be delivered to our table. Which we were told we could not take out with us, and since we didn't want to stay for that 2nd hour charge, increased our anxiety. No pics or videos allowed of the maids. Like, "What?" I PAID to enter, but I have to pay an extra fee to be able to record or take pics??? Imagine paying to go Disney, and then Mickey Mouse wants you to fork over an extra $20 for a pic.

So here's the takeaway: Be prepared to pay for at least an hour. Slow food and service. If you're not fluent in japanese - this could easily be a disappointment. If you're tired or have low energy - just skip this until you have the energy/endurance to stay a full hour and keep a smile on your face. The food is cute, I just feel like you can find the "cute" food almost anywhere else where you're not forced to pay by the hour and won't have an extreme wait. Like, I truthfully feel like I saw all other tables, including those who arrived after us, get served before us.

To me, this is a skippable experience. I love DDR music, but after an hour, I could go the rest of my life without that high energy, high-pitched singing. Add in the fact that i just felt like a very neglected guest for well, not memorable food... at best, this is a 3-star experience, at worst a 1. If you ARE looking for a bizarre, high-energy experience. Look no further. But beware the customer service and...

Can't miss out on the opportunity to go to this maid cafe while you're in Akihabara! They have live performances and you can request one of the maids to dance to a song (that they at least know of). They also change into different costumes around night time, possibly to signal that it's drinking hour. Speaking of live performances, I just want everyone to be aware that if you are sensitive to noise, you may want to have noise-cancelling or deafening earphones to have with you because this place doesn't stop being really loud. It's lively for some but can be annoying for others that are highly sensitive to noise.

The food is amazing! Everything was so good, except for maybe some of the drinks like the demon beer that they have. However, again, the food was worth it! It was my wife and my younger brother's first time at a maid cafe. Although they didn't like the atmosphere and the theme of the cafe, they at least enjoyed the food, especially the Pasta Carbonara that they had. They would not stop mentioning the fact that they would come back to the cafe for it specifically.

Although I enjoyed my time there, our second hour in the cafe was disappointing. When I asked to extend our time there, our QR code to order wasn't functioning well. Although two of the maids were trying to accommodate us by taking in our orders, the orders wouldn't go through. It took a lot of calling them back to our table to make sure that the order was put in. My younger brother didn't receive his pasta until the very end. He was too drunk to enjoy it since they had too many drinks by the time it came by. They also forgot my parfait but realized that I had ordered it at least and got it to me, even though our time was about to end.

The highlight of my time there though was the song request. I love how even though they're dancing to the song for everyone, they make it a point to dedicate the song to you as well by making eye contact and gesturing at you. It makes the experience worthwhile and feel a little personal.

I believe we spent a little too much in the cafe, granted we ordered combinations for...

Visited twice, once with a larger group and the second time just two people. I can honestly say the experience is exactly what you'd expect from a maid cafe. Very cute and energetic girls dashing about the place always providing service with a smile. Food and drink ordered online via QR code presented when walking in. Both times I went there was already a streak of live shows on the stage which was great to watch and listen to when hanging out. Drinks were brought out relatively fast the food you do what to wait a while for the food to come out but the food does taste great and alot of detail and effort is put into some dishes like the desserts and the omelette. Did have some small conversations with some maids due to the language barrier of me speaking English and very little Japanese they tried the best to amme the experience equal for myself as they would any of their native and more regular customers. Would like to give a big shout-out to 3 maids specifically being "Madoka" who was my maid of choice for a picture on the first visit and the second visit my maid of choice for a picture was a very cute lady named "Vanilla" and finally we had the maid "kaguya" on the door when I was leaving who spoke the most lovely English and wished for our return soon though we did explain we was leaving the country.

But all in all a very fun and solid experience will 100% be coming back for any future trips to Japan...