Random years after eighteen thoughts of anime conventions

[Dartz]

Random thoughts from 18 years of anime cons. Friday'll be the last one I go to.

---
-Attended first ever run of a con in 2005
-Pure desolation. But it existed
-Kept conbook for the last 18 years for no reason
-Completely useless memento
-
-Attended con in Feb 2007.
-Pedobear Cosplayer with kid on leash
-Things that'd get you kicked out today
-He was kicked out then too
-
-Yaoi. That's a paddlin
-
-Staffed con one year
-Got so drunk in the pub quiz I fell off stool and concussed myself for a week
-
-Cosplayer brings airsoft sniper rifle to con as prop
-Aim it from the top balcony at the con-directors head and rack the bolt.
-Squeeze trigger
-*Click*
-Hand it back to Cosplayer and politely tell him not to get fucking caught with a live rifle at an anime convention.
-(Not america lol)
-Would've missed anyway. I'm a bad shot.
-
-Con in a shitty hotel
-Fire alarm flooded due to heavy rain
-Everyone had to run outside in the rain five times on Saturday because lol fire-alarm randomly triggering
- Fire alarm disabled for entire hotel.
- That con died 8 years ago
-
-Otaku Con *existed*
-Claimed to have permission from Otakon
-According to someone involved in Otakan I may have inadvertently made aware of this - they didn't
-Name changed to Kaos Con
-Worst con ever. Didn't even have ballpit
-Owner threated to sue /CGL/ for deformation[sic] because of all the shitstirrers there
-Owner a known dickhead
-
-Spent an entire saturday drinking a bottle of whiskey from a flask
-Best saturday ever. Actually talked with people
-
-Someone paid full price to enter The Con at 15:00 on Sunday - an hour before the closing ceremony. Why?
-
-Attended last run of a con in 2016.
-A large number of the photographs in the 'goodbye' reel came from me.
-
-Due to drive everyone to Con Friday morning. 3 hour drive
-Spent Thursday evening drinking the guts of a bottle of whiskey
-Woke up Stocious. Rawest hangover ever
-Got a feed of fry in me and managed to keep it down
-Blew clear on the breathalyser
-Drove like death warmed up for three hours and passed out in the B&B
-Went at it again that night
-
-Con has pub quiz
-Prize is a voucher for free drink at the bar
-No value limit
-Win Pub Quiz by being Peak Weeb
-"Two of your most expensive whiskey please"
-Con director couldn't believe we did it. (But would've done the same himself)
-
-Take photo of cosplayer with film camera
-Cosplayer doesn't understand concept of film
-Demands to see it, snatches camera from my hand and opens the back
- Well, they're all ruined. Idiot
-
I've only ever spoken with two guests at a con
-Vic Mignonga (In 2008 I think, when I was staff at the con.)
-Todd Habercorn (In 2015, when the con had a VIP ticket option and a personal meet and greet with the guests was the only thing it got you)
I didn't want to be around either of them and I’m so fat they'd drop me on Nagasaki
-
-Got drunk in con-bar one year Todd Habercorn came
-Sang free-bird while he tried to sing with his band
-Someone called us a bunch of idiots in an online review.
-
Only record of a local con ever existing is that it's mentioned in the Evangelion 2.22 Blu-ray Director's commentary.
-
-The only time I ever managed to cosplay was as a TF2 engineer (Back when it was still popular)
-Made a prop-wrench out of scrap hardwood that was heavy enough to kill if swung with vigour.)
-Con took it on the first day.
-David Bowie lookalike won the competion
-I was just a fat guy in duct-tape goggles and dungarees, with computer parts hanging from my belt.
-Everyone enjoyed it.
-
-Worldcon 2019
-Have more intelligent discussins in the bar than I'd had in the last 10 years
-Artistic merit of using film in cameras
-How an RBMK reactor explodes
-'Bless your heart'
-Ginger Buchanan
-Different vibe
-
-Had intended 2020 to be my last con trip
-The Inconveniences ended that
-This year will have to do
-Just don't feel like part of it anymore
-Such is life

[robkelk]

YOu were in the con scene longer than I was, Dartz.

Yeah, eventually we all decide it's just not part of who we are any more.

[Dartz]

The Inconveniences delayed the inevitable. An overwhelming desire to try and spark a resurrection of a feeling I once I enjoyed may be the second. It's something worse than nostalgia. It's a hope that maybe This Time, I'll enjoy it the way I used to. But I never really did - and as more people moved on and things just got that bit shitter, it was time to end it.


On the other hand, I booked a First Class train ticket to go. Sounds fancier than it is. I couldn't be arsed driving so might aswell. It was a cheap upgrade - the only benefits of which are FIRST CLASS printed reassuringly on your ticket, and a slightly wider seat. It's still the same train.

[Shepherd]

I used to attend I-CON every year at Stony Brook University. It was great. They'd have a huge number of panels to choose from, I'd get a few autographs for free, and then spend hours sitting through anime marathons (It was how I saw most of the Ranma 1/2 TV series) in a building dedicated entirely to showing anime. I picked up my Tenchi Muyo VHS tapes one at a time in the dealer's room.

A few years ago I made the mistake of attending MegaCon in Orlando. The panels were lousy and there were usually only one or two running at a time, anyone wanting autographs had to stand in huge lines and shell out $20+, and there was virtually nothing to watch. Attending a convention shouldn't leave you waiting around bored because there's nothing to do, then going home early because there's nothing to do.

[Bob Schroeck]

I-Con at Stony Brook? Peg and I did that a lot in the 90s, repping for Steve Jackson Games and running GURPS as MIBs. We probably crossed paths at least once.

The last con Peg and I attended was Philcon, circa 2018 or so. It used to be one of the biggest cons on the East Coast with hours and hours of quality programming. We attended every year like clockwork, even regularly planned on doing some of our Christmas shopping in its dealer room (back in the day when it was held in mid-November). But sometime in the early 2000s, after they hosted the 2000 Worldcon (as "The Millennium Philcon"), the concom decided they wanted to make it a smaller, more intimate, "literary-only" con instead of the sprawling multimedia delight it used to be. It's utter crap now, with almost nothing to offer.

So yeah, we know the same feeling.

[Dartz]

The con we're going to is going from strength to strength. The program looks interesting. I'm even on it lol. And I just realised I meant to update the presentation. Well. Can do it on the train lol.




The big coroperate-run 'Comic-Cons' seem like a special form of hell on earth to me. Too crowded.

[Inquisitive Raven]

I-Con at Stony Brook?  Peg and I did that a lot in the 90s, repping for Steve Jackson Games and running GURPS as MIBs.  We probably crossed paths at least once.

The last con Peg and I attended was Philcon, circa 2018 or so.  It used to be one of the biggest cons on the East Coast with hours and hours of quality programming.  We attended every year like clockwork, even regularly planned on doing some of our Christmas shopping in its dealer room (back in the day when it was held in mid-November).  But sometime in the early 2000s, after they hosted the 2000 Worldcon (as "The Millennium Philcon"), the concom decided they wanted to make it a smaller, more intimate, "literary-only" con instead of the sprawling multimedia delight it used to be.  It's utter crap now, with almost nothing to offer.

So yeah, we know the same feeling.

Just for the record, the Millennium Philcon was in 2001, the real start of the millennium. Also, it had a lot of its membership cannibalized by Dragoncon which was the same weekend.

I would add that I think that Philcon's decline started with the closure of the Adam's Mark hotel and the move to New Jersey (Cherry Hill? I think it ended up in Cherry Hill).

[Bob Schroeck]

I stand corrected. (It was 21 and a bit years ago, after all.)

And I miss the Adams Mark terribly.

EDIT: I just took a look at the area on Google Maps, and I am terribly saddened. Everything I remember in the area is gone, from the Denny's to the vaguely Polynesian-themed hotel that was across the street (or am I misremembering a different con location? Now that I think about it I'm uncertain). Is it me, though, or does the Courtyard by Marriot have roughly the same footprint as the Adams Mark did?

[Inquisitive Raven]

I stand corrected.  (It was 21 and a bit years ago, after all.)

And I miss the Adam's Mark terribly.

I was helping one of the vendors there (NOT the Button Lady although she was in the Dealer's Room). Also, completely unrelated to the Con but by a coincidence of timing, I needed to get a tetanus shot and a rabies shot that same weekend. I remember what year it was.

[Dartz]

That went as I expected. The con was fine, I guess. But the last 4 years were a sort of KT Boundary for people I knew - none of 'em crossed it, and what follows is different - irrevocably. I felt like the last Tyrannosaur. Oh well.

I'd gone to make the odd farewell and make it clear I wouldn't be back.

[Dartz]

In a strange postscript.

18 years ago, the university society I was a member of founded a con. It ran until 2016 and ended on a high note.

7 years hence, the Society has again founded a new con in a new, post-covid era. What came before is long forgotten, save for one or two greybeards still wandering around. As it should be. Better they find their own way, rather than being dragged down by the boat-anchor legacy of the past.

They ran into a little problem, however. 3 weeks before the con was due to run, the university decided to put a minimum cap attendees. Which they found out about on Friday. And which they needed to beat by Monday. By Friday - they were at the halfway point. They had three days to double their prereg count.

Amazingly, they made it. With more than a few old members sharing and resharing the post for good measure. A few of us even bought tickets and showed up on the Saturday. Got to show the flag.

The building had been mostly demolished - but enough of it remained that muscle memory still brought me from the bar to where the old toilets used to be - before getting bricked up. Fandom had changed so much, compared to the last time an anime con ran in that building. The panels had gotten worse - the same 'intro to Lolita' and 'Cosplay on a budget' stuff. Fan created stuff was everywhere - an artist's alley that took up one end of a corridor had spread through three levels of the building. What the fuck was a vTuber and why should I know what one is? People are eve more open about who they are. They nasty creepers seem to have fucked off.

A few friends showed up. We chatted. Ended up staying late in the bar enjoying the nostalgia.

For a con, it was quiet. Very much like the first con I went to, 18 years ago. That grew massive inside a decade. Maybe these guys will too

Maybe if a con invites just the right guest (I've a collection of signatures to finish) or if I came up with some good idea to run a panel on - I might go again. But as a Coda to congoing - I'm happy with this.

[classicdrogn]

It's always good to end on a high note