The Toyota Group’s Toyota Marketing Japan in collaboration with Evangelion and the town of Hakone hosted an event in which the former Sengokuhara Middle School in Hakone was made to resemble the Tokyo-3 No. 1 Middle School attended by Evangelion lead character Shinji Ikari and his companions. Hakone was used as inspiration for a lot of the locations in Evangelion. The event commemorated the Toyota Prius PHV (Plug-in Hybrid) becoming certified as the official car of NERV in the animated film Evangelion 2.0.

“Recently with many people not expressing much interest in automobiles, we as a car company would like to promote this interest and are using this event as an opportunity to spark interest among Evangelion fans. Also many people are having difficulty understanding the concept behind the new Prius Plug-in Hybrid, so we planned this event with the use of anime to help people understand our products a little better.”

Scheduled for release in 2012, Toyota PHV can be directly charged from a home electrical outlet. It operates as an electric vehicle for short distances such as commuting to work or going shopping, but it can also run as a hybrid vehicle for long distances. Thus drivers can drive the Prius PHV without worrying about remaining battery charge or whether there is access to an electric charging station nearby. Toyota will be promoting the Prius PHV as the next-generation eco-car.

“We have created an original anime movie in collaboration with Evangelion in which one of the characters, Misato Katsuragi, provides an easy to understand explanation of the various features of the Prius PHV. This event promotes energy conservation, so based on this idea of conserving electricity, we have a demonstration to show that our new plug-in hybrids are capable of generating and providing electricity. A row of Estima hybrid vehicles has been set up to generate the electricity used for the exhibition area’s lighting and projector. So we are creating ways for people to understand that hybrid vehicles also have these types of features.”

The venue also has classroom displays made to look like scenes from Evangelion, as well as an augmented reality exhibit of a life-sized original Evangelion mecha. “We are giving away a driving map as a gift to people who watch the anime video. The driving map has various descriptions that pop up on the screen of an iPhone as augmented reality, so you can drive around Hakone while viewing this driving map. We hope that Evangelion fans will enjoy this experience and also become more interested in cars. We also hope that they will come away with a better understanding of the Prius Plug-in Hybrid.”

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