The promise is too good to be true -- all you can drink and "excellent service" provided by "companions" for 6,000 yen in Tokyo's adult entertainment central.

Yet, thousands of visitors to the Kabukicho district of Shinjuku Ward get duped by barkers and end up paying tens of thousands of yen instead.

The art of "bottakuri," or the rip-off, is a notorious phenomenon here, and it's growing. As of the end of June, police had already received nearly as many complaints by people who have been duped as they got all of last year.