Valentine: Hey Toji, I thought you were gonna cosplay this year?
Toji: Nah. Something about a bunch of guys dressed up in weird costumes... sounds kinda gay
Valentine: Now that is a VERY immature attitude!
Toji: ...
I agreed to pick up valentine at 9:45 in the morning, just like last year. But to my suprise, he was just about ready to go. Fortunately, the venue for this year's anime convention wasn't too far away - more like 5 minutes down the road from his area. We get there, and we pretty much signed up fairly quickly, as they decided to have two different lines this year - one for those that were signing up for both days, and one for those that were only signing up for one day. While most of the suckers were lining up behind the two-days line, Valentine and I did the smart thing and line up behind the one-day line and got through much faster since nobody was there. Take that slow pokes!
So the first thing we did was hit the traders areas. Instantly we noticed that the rooms at Murdoch Uni were really tiny compared to UWA's, and therefore it was difficult to move around. I saw a couple of nice things, such as gundam and final fantasy models and such. Where the hell were the wallscrolls and music CDs? I was absolutely outraged, and started bashing some skulls in like a raging gorilla demanding his bananas. Well, not really, we decided to look around some more, before heading into the room that was screening anime. It started off with the first episode of Tsubasa Chronicles. I could understand some parts of it, but I failed to see why on earth the priest decided to go meet the "Dimensional witch". The main character had a reason, and that warrior had a reason, but the priest's reason wasn't really clear to me.
Anyway we decided to head off after that first episode, and planned to have a look at the traders once again. This time, we headed down to the Madman traders store. It was bigger than the first one we went to, but not by much. Volumes 11 and 12 of X had caught my eye, but I planned to purchase them a little later. I saw some Ghost in the Shell DVDs, but they didn't have the first volume. So after looking around again, we headed off to the games panel. Absolutely lost, we had to refer to the maps, and Valentine argued that the panel was in the room downstairs, while I said that it was on the floor we were on. So after proving him wrong, we managed to go to the right floor. However, we walked in to the Japanese Fashion panel. It only took us a couple of seconds to realise this, before we headed to the room that was further down. Unfortunately when we got there, one of the staff told us that the games panel was put off until the next day, and we wouldn't be turning up for the second day, but the guy was kind enough to give us some details of what else was happening at the time. So we left, and headed to the vendors again, this time I purchased volumes 11 and 12 of X/1999.
We decided to have a look at the AMV panel, and they showed a couple of AMVs that I thought were pretty good. However, my phone rang and I was forced to step outside to answer it. Turns out it was my friend Alex. He managed to make it to the campus, but wasn't sure where to go, but then said he'd follow the signs. So I went back into the AMV panel and let Valentine know that my friend was here. So we proceed to head out to the entrance to wait for them. We saw him, along with his two friends that were dressed up as Cloud (FFVII) and Lulu (FFX).
I'll probably just list the rest of this stuff down, as we were mostly wandering to and from the various rooms, and I can only remember the sequence of events to a certain degree. So here's a summary of where we went to (in no particular order):
Gaming Competitions
They were having a smash brothers melee competition that day. Alex was going to enter, but decided against it at the last minute, since there were already 27 or so people signed up. Alex went off elsewhere, while Valentine and I stayed around to watch. Unfortunately, we were kicked out before the actual competition started (we were waiting around during the period people were picking their characters) since it was overcrowded, and the organiser said for non-competitors to get out. What the hell's the point of a competition if there aren't people to watch? Yeah, the room was pretty tiny, and it started to smell... yes, the stench of otakus >.<. It was a nice addition (the competition... not the smell of otakus), but certainly there should be a bit more variety. How about some DDR? or even Guilty Gear Isuka? Or some n64 classics? Where the hell's my Perfect Dark?Vendors
There were plenty of models and manga and DVDs, but no Wallscrolls or CDs >.< As I said before, I went ahead and purchased volumes 11 and 12 of X/1999. I was hoping they'd have volume 13 too, but since that has only just come out here recently, I wasn't really expecting them to have it there.
There were plenty and plenty of models and other various toys too, including some from Final Fantasy VII Advent Children. I pointed it out to Valentine, and mentioned it to Alex also, but they both gave me the same reason as to why they didn't buy the models - There was no Sephiroth available - only Vincent and Tifa were available for purchase. I saw a couple of Evangelion toys, but once again, the choices were rather limited - Units 01 and 02 only, but I did see a Unit 01 Type F model. There was one vendor that was dealing specifically with Gundam models, and there were a hell of a lot of Gundam models there. I decided to take one of their little leaflets they had available and had a read through it during the day. Man, I've never seen so many Gundams 0.oScreening
Unfortunately, we didn't stay around for many of the screenings. Valentine and I only watched one episode of Tsubasa Chronicles and an episode of Full Moon wo Sagashite. I liked Full Moon, but like I said before, I couldn't follow Tsubusa Chronicles. They were also going to be showing episodes from Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex 2nd GIG later in the evening, but I wasn't able to make it for that, since I had work in the evening. They also had some good titles for sunday too, but alas we didn't go to sunday session.Cosplaying and Cosplay Competition
Since we had nothing better to do, we decided to watch the cosplay competition. I was actually pleased compared to last year's lot. There was actually an Auron cosplayer! and a pretty good one too - except if he had the right shades, it wouldn've been brilliant. There were plently of Bleach cosplayers too. Alex's friends entered at the last minute as well. Unfortunately, the experience was slightly let down by extremely annoying otakus that were two rows in front of us. Some of them were Naruto fanboys. They made me want to poke their eyes out... but I somehow managed to restrain myself. Interestingly enough there were a couple of nice cosplayers that didn't enter the competition that I saw around the place. There was one woman dressed up as Kamui... or Fuma (X/1999), I really couldn't tell since they both dress the same way; One that was dressed as Faye Valentine, and a decent one too; then there was one dressed up as Spike Spiegel, which was pretty good, though I think the guy had a bit too much hair for it. Oh yes, and there was a guy dressed up as Aeris/Aerith from FF7. I thought it was amusing, and suprisingly, he did enter the competition. He was saying the "Man-Faye" idea sort of inspired him to dress up as Aeris. But in all honestly, he doesn't even compare to "Man-Faye", which is a good thing really.Valentine and I said goodbye to Alex during the cosplay competition, since I had to get back home and get ready for work. I also asked him to let me know who won the cosplay competitions. He later told me that neither of his friends won any prizes, but the Vash cosplayer, Bleach group cosplayers and the Ash + Pikachu pair won prizes. It also sort of opened discussion between Valentine and I about whether we should cosplay next year, and if many people were familiar with Guilty Gear. Oh well, we'll figure it out later.
So the verdict this year? It was better than last year's convention in some ways, but it was also worse than last year's in other ways. I liked the idea of the video game competitions being introduced, but two games only? Another problem was once again, the lack of variety in merchandise - where the hell were the wallscrolls and CDs? I'm guessing this is due to a lack of Tamarket's presence that there weren't any of these types of items available. Another major sore point was the Size of the rooms. They're incredibly tiny compared to UWA's. Hell, even my uni's (Uni of Notre Dame) rooms are bigger in comparison. The final criticism:
Take a shower, you smelly otakus - or at least use some deodorant, especially the gaming competitors >.<