Anime Cons

[nyan]

What are your thoughts on anime/otaku conventions? I used to go to them every year when I was a teen, but that was also around the time anime was really starting to blow up here in NA, so the crowds eventually got too overwhelming for me. Haven't been to one in roughly 8 years. I always found that they were a good place to meet up with other members of online communities and such though; I sometimes really miss doing stuff like that. I still have a collection of pins, buttons, keychains, and lanyards gathered from attending events at these cons stored in a little memento drawer. Some fun memories include:

• First time meeting up with a longtime online friend. She decided to prank me by stealing my phone and running off into a crowd right after we met. She failed to realize that by taking my phone we no longer had a method to communicate and find each other again, thus we spent over an hour looking for each other afterwards.
• Unknowingly talking to a top player in a rhythm game about that same game and only realizing who I was talking to after the fact.
• Having two awkward guys try to promote their porn/hentai game site to me for ~15 minutes when I'm pretty sure I was very clearly underage at the time.
• Winning a tournament for a niche TCG I had never played before. (I don't remember its name)
• Spending all night watching screenings of random anime movies with some very drunk guys (there were some Girls und Panzer and Love Live movies iirc) and then staying at a coffee shop because I couldn't afford a hotel room.

What about you all? Any fun stuff to share?

[Parzival]

I've only ever been to one, and that was just last year. Before that I was both too young, too poor, and too far away in the middle of nowhere to go to any. Admittedly, as someone who doesn't really like leaving the safety and comfort of my home or being around people, those sentiments are really at the heart of what kept me away from them for so long.

I did enjoy the one I went to. It was a fun and interesting new experience, there was a lot of cool things to see and I got some really cool loot, but honestly the primary enjoyment came from the fact that it was an excuse for my online friends and I to meet up, most of us for the first time. According to my one friend though, who goes to cons constantly and to that particular one just about every year, it's really gone downhill, and so have cons on the whole, apparently. Obviously I can't speak to that but it seems I may have missed the heyday of anime cons and that kinda blows if true.

Other than that, I didn't really meet or talk to anyone new, I'm again obviously not a super social person, I mainly just looked around at all the things I'd never really seen before. I had a nice conversation with a vendor who was selling mainly horror movie themed wares who told me he obviously usually goes to horror conventions. Got a T-Virus vial from him. Other than that, and aside from my one friend and his gf getting kicked out of their hotel room because they booked it from a guy illegally and second-hand and one of the people he also booked the room for them to share with threatened to shoot up the venue, nothing of note happened. Just hung out with the boys.

Still seething over the mysterious stranger who, after I got the high score on the Gunbird 2 cabinet they had there and I left to go get the guys to show the board, proceeded to mog both me and everyone else who'd played before and filled out the whole leaderboard by himself. My begrudging respect, whoever the hell you are.

[Blond]

I used to go to every anime con when I was a kid. Hell, I wasn’t even a teenager. I went there with my whole family. My dad is an old school otaku, so he went to relive his good times and to buy merch of his favorite anime, like Dragon Ball, Hokuto no Ken, and Saint Seiya, or to look for ’80s–’90s stuff. My mom didn’t care about “Vietnamese cartoons” she was more of a gamer, so she went there to buy old NES and SNES games.

Besides the fact that they always seemed to arrange the con on the hottest day of the summer, it was a blast. I have a lot of good memories. I remember that at the second convention I went to, a group of cosplayers seemed surprised that a kid like me was there, so they asked me if I knew who the main villain of Metroid was. I think I answered Ridley and they made the soyjak face, way before it was even a thing. They gave me a Companion Cube plushie as a gift, which I still have to this day.
I also remember that at another convention it started raining and, I’m not joking, a good quarter of the people there were doing the Solaire pose while saying, “Praise the sun!”

Fast forward a few years to the time when I was able to go to cons alone. I planned to meet up with my best friend. She was, well, she isn’t very good at socializing and all that. But luckily, I was there to help her. I still remember the beating she gave me on DDR while we were doing the Hare Hare Yukai. Thankfully, I did the most logical thing and later beat her in a Touhou fighting game.
Then, when we were leaving, I think we were going down an escalator when I saw a guy going up with the new Vash look, since I think the reboot had dropped that season. I told him, “Love & Peace!” while doing the pose.

Love_and_Peace.png (411.32 KiB) Viewed 160 times

The guy laughed and did the same thing! What a goddamn legend. Same goes for the cosplayer.

I was planning to go to the Madrid anime con to see Ryukishi in person with her. Unfortunately, due to some problems, we weren’t able to go. Better luck next time, I guess.

If I had to note something, it’s that I could see with my own eyes how much cons started to shift more toward the mainstream side. I haven’t been able to go to cons for years because of my studies, but people I know told me that the convention held literally a week ago had a group of DQNs' mocking other cosplayers while wearing CSM cosplays. Imagine going to the only place where you can meet other people like you and it’s still filled with normies…

[Parzival]

If I had to note something, it’s that I could see with my own eyes how much cons started to shift more toward the mainstream side. I haven’t been able to go to cons for years because of my studies, but people I know told me that the convention held literally a week ago had a group of DQNs' mocking other cosplayers while wearing CSM cosplays. Imagine going to the only place where you can meet other people like you and it’s still filled with normies…

Yeah, that's something I noticed at the con I went to, no one I saw was that rude but a lot of the attendance was very normie-seeming. Lots of only the latest, most mainstream stuff. I think I always feared that growing up and that's also why I never went before last year. I'm old and have been terminally online long enough to be able to remember the tail end of the web 1.0 and the anime community of that time, but that's it, only really the tail end. For most of my life now, anime is something that slowly, and then suddenly, became more mainstream and accepted. Unfortunately, us more old school style fans haven't become as accepted. If anything, we get hated on more now somehow.

I wish I came from a nerdy family like yours, though, I was born to the normiest normies to ever norm. Going to an anime convention, or any kind really, was never in the cards for me as a kid.

[Blond]

I wish I came from a nerdy family like yours, though, I was born to the normiest normies to ever norm.

I wouldn't really call my family nerdy. From where I'm from, is very typical that dad's really love their anime. And besides DK and Mario, my mom wasn't really into modern games. I remember she used to snacth my DS to play the New Super Mario Bros. Good times.

[nyan]

I wish I came from a nerdy family like yours, though, I was born to the normiest normies to ever norm. Going to an anime convention, or any kind really, was never in the cards for me as a kid.

I feel this. I had to lie about going to cons otherwise I would have been lambasted. I would tell my dad something along the lines of "Oh, I'm just going to the big city with some friends for the weekend - you can just drop me off at the train station :)" as a 14 year old rural kid taking the train alone to a city I'd never been to.

[capstasher]

From where I'm from, is very typical that dad's really love their anime.

Blond comes from the future after we win.

[Blond]

Blond comes from the future after we win.

The benefits of living in Spain.

[Parzival]

I feel this. I had to lie about going to cons otherwise I would have been lambasted. I would tell my dad something along the lines of "Oh, I'm just going to the big city with some friends for the weekend - you can just drop me off at the train station :)" as a 14 year old rural kid taking the train alone to a city I'd never been to.

I've never really had irl friends and my mom's always been a bit of a helicopter parent so I couldn't have even gotten away with this if I tried Cool that you got to though, sounds like you had a lot of a fun and made a lot of good memories

I wouldn't really call my family nerdy. From where I'm from, is very typical that dad's really love their anime. And besides DK and Mario, my mom wasn't really into modern games. I remember she used to snacth my DS to play the New Super Mario Bros. Good times.

I'd call that pretty nerdy! My mom isn't into video games at all. At absolute most she would play Pac-Man at some hangout that had an arcade cabinet back when she was a kid in the 80s. None of my family besides me and a cousin who's really into the Fallout games are into video games. The only anime my family have ever been into is Saint Seiya, which I don't think they're aware even is anime, it was just aired as if a regular cartoon and was THE show back in the day. My mom tells me when a new episode would air the town would basically become a ghost town because everyone would go inside to watch it.

[Blond]

My mom tells me when a new episode would air the town would basically become a ghost town because everyone would go inside to watch it.

Never forget.