[1] Due to Kobashi's high-profile status in the history of Japanese professional wrestling, the event gained mainstream attention in the country.

[2] On December 3, 2012, the Tokyo Sports newspaper reported that Pro Wrestling Noah had decided to terminate the contract of veteran wrestler Kenta Kobashi due to financial issues.

[2] None of the wrestlers designed to replace Kobashi at the top of Noah had his charisma or drawing power and eventually the promotion lost its network television contract.

[2] Noah's decision to cut Kobashi led to an immediate backlash from wrestlers loyal to him with Atsushi Aoki, Go Shiozaki, Jun Akiyama, Kotaro Suzuki and Yoshinobu Kanemaru announcing their resignation from the promotion.

[7] On December 9, 2012, Kobashi appeared at Noah's Ryōgoku Kokugikan event, announcing his retirement from professional wrestling, having deemed it impossible to fully recover from the accumulation of his injuries.

[8][9][10] Originally Kobashi planned to have his retirement match on February 26, 2013, which would have been the 25th anniversary of his debut, but quickly realized he needed more time to get into ring shape, which led to the date being pushed back to May 11, 2013.

Despite Noah's recent difficulties, it was considered a "given" that the promotion could sell out Nippon Budokan for the show, while Tokyo Dome was deemed "too big of a risk".

[1] After the third match, Kobashi came out to the ring for his retirement ceremony, which was also attended by wrestlers Akira Taue, Hiroshi Hase, Masahiro Chono, Masanobu Fuchi, Mitsuo Momota, Takeshi Rikio and Toshiaki Kawada as well as Asuka Kuramochi from AKB48 and Yoshihiko Noda among others.

The ceremony also included a written statement from John Laurinaitis, Kobashi's on-and-off tag team partner in the 90s, and a pre-taped promo from Stan Hansen.

[2] The sixth match featured the reunion of No Fear as Takao Omori and Yoshihiro Takayama, who had teamed together in both AJPW and Noah, took on Minoru Suzuki and Naomichi Marufuji.

The match featured Kobashi doing several of his signature moves, including the Cobra Twist, half nelson suplex, rolling cradle and 187 chops.

Akiyama, Mutoh and Sasaki then all signaled for Kobashi, who hit a body slam on Kanemaru and then climbed the ropes for the final moonsault of his career, which won the match for his team.

After a ten-bell salute to signal the end of Kobashi's career, his greatest accomplishments were read out loud after which the event concluded with his theme song "Grand Sword" being played in Nippon Budokan.

[31] Kensuke Sasaki, one of the veteran wrestlers who had teamed with Kobashi in the main event of the show, announced his retirement on February 13, 2014.