A little more background: Four of us will start the trip together and stay for 3 weeks, 2-4 will join during the second week (may spend their first week in Tokyo while we are traveling around) and at least one more will join during the third week. Everyone has spent some time abroad. After several group meetings, the focus is on taking in the culture more than creating a hard and fast itinerary. We had long discussed traveling somewhere together and when one of the later-arriving members announced he had to go to Japan for a wedding, we thought it would be a great trip.

We live in Texas and I am the only one not in the computer industry. We spend most of our time together in bars or playing computer games. At least one out of the group is smitten by Japanese women.

Some of the items on all of our agenda's are to go to the fish market at least once, visit Roppongi (I apologize in advance for any misspellings) several evenings, check out the electronics in the Akihabara, visit the bridge where the Cosplayers meet (I'll have to hunt the name down); visit some of the gardens, take in the cherry blossom, visit Mt. Fuji (not sure if I can get the others to hike around with me); see a variety of shrines, and eat lots of sushi

I hope this gives a better description of what we are interested in. We are definitely interested in minimizing costs (i.e. keep costs to around $100/day).

Based on this information, would you recommend seeing shrines in every city or one particular city? Are there particular areas of Kyoto and Osaka that we should visit for night life or taking in a bit of culture (traditional attire/something uniquely Japanese)? Where are the best places to find inexpensive sushi (not necessarily a certain restaurant but maybe a type of restaurant to watch for)?

Thanks again for all of the information.