Ive been into anime and japanese culture my entire life and ive only recently been interested in cons and making cosplays. Looking more into them, ive found out that its been heavily bastardized and a shell of its former self… or so ive been told. That begs the question, are they even worth going to?
>>10974396It depends on what con. I heard animexpo is really trash these days, while otakuthon is better aparently? If you want to go i reccomend you go with a friend, just keep on mind most people just go to buy stuff and watch panels and maybe cosplay and leave. They are weirdly asocial these days
>>10974396they are but it depends on what con
It depends on what you want out of the con experience. If you're a buyfag, right now is a very good time to go to anime cons because there's been a trend of finance bros flipping retired boomers' anime store stock with reduced prices at conventions, so you can get good deals on potentially rare stuff. If you're there for community and/or cosplay, you're stuck with attending con meetups because people will usually not talk to you otherwise. But if you're looking for the type of autism anime cons used to have ~15 years ago, anime cons and the anime scene as a whole are too compromised now and you'll have to go to video game or vtuber conventions to get your 'tism fix.
I already spoke on this elsewhere, recently, so just gonna gonna do post that again with a couple adjustments>Phrases like "worth it", "heavily bastardized", "shell of its former self" are loaded premises, piled on one after the other, and most are none the wiser. Maybe you know the entire history of your local convention for 25 years, front to back. You can speak about your experiences as objectively as possible, it still doesn't mean that's gonna register in the same way for someone else. There are people who think you're a ""normie"" if your MAL profile has under 5000 ratings, but a ""normie"" to someone else could be "Oh he hasn't even seen JJK." Folks also seriously underestimate the importance of geography, and what you're even looking for. Speaking for myself anyway, a truly great one has to be in a single central location and have a high percentage of people who will start a conversation about whatever random nonsense is on their mind, probably because we're both hiding flasks. To a turbopurist, a party atmosphere is already a "heavy bastardization". To some, "a shell of its former self" means introducing ANY outside media. Take things as they come, play by ear, be open to new situations...but also don't bother with western cons those are just ass, yesThanks for coming to my TED Talk
>>10974396>>10974409I find this to be true. I love modern cons- old ones had a charm of only concentrating autists and NEETs, which has its upsides, but honestly current cons are way more fun for me. WAY more shit out there now as a buyfag (I love figure hunting), cosplay has become huge and accessible (it used to be whatever you could cobble together from your parents closet, now there are a thousand DIY tutorials, panels, tools, resources). They aren't overpriced and undervalued (yet)/ I think we are actually in a golden age of con-going, its just that nostalgia makes NEETs feel like normies invaded their space, which I guess is sorta true, but the more recent cons have been some of the most fun. Artist Alleys are rapidly expanding over the "I buy shit wholesale and sell the same shit as the person 3 rows down". I'm finding even the most niche shit has some sort of merch. I'm dreading when something like private equity swoops in and kills cons in general.Don't listen to the "wah things were better 15 years ago" people. I was there, it definitely had its charm, but it's 100% worth going now, before corpos fuck it up completely.Trust me, 15 years from now people will wish cons were the same as they are now.
These past couple years I started attending conventions. I can't compare it to the past ones. However, I do enjoy them when it feels like the people in charge care about the cons and it isn't corperatized. I think >>10974417 is right that now is probably a great time to attend them. Depending on what you are going for of course. I think it'd be worth at least attending one con to see if you like it or not. I'd recommend going to one with guests you are interested in and that isn't too far away (at least doesn't require flying).I also agree with >>10974409 because I've found some great deals on anime merch. The artist alley is definetly worth taking your time because sometimes you'll come across some great fan made art prints, tshirts, and whatnot. For example, I found the Record of Lodoss War DVD set for $15 at one (not a great savings but it made me happy). I also found this nice fan art prints of The Girl from the Other Side and Yotsuba. I also saw a used PS4 for $250, but I was too scared to take the risk at the time.Seeing the Japanese industry panels and the cosplays were also a lot of fun.
>>10974417>WAY more shit out there now as a buyfagDespite me being positive about this in my initial reply, I don't actually think of this as a good thing for cons as a whole because the more cons turn into flea markets for nerdslop, the more the average congoer will be some speculator that doesn't actually care about anime. The end game of cons having their dealer rooms be the main draw (there are already a few cons in my area that are literally just dealer rooms with VA's doing autographs in the back, and nothing else except maybe an arcade area) is you end up with a con floor full of the types of people getting in fights at Target over Pokemon packs. But like I said, if you're primarily a buyfag then right now you're eating good at cons.>cosplay has become huge and accessibleThis has been something of a double edged sword in the community. On the one hand, increased accessibility is good since more people who want to try cosplay can get into it, but on the other hand it diluted cosplay from being a form of fanart to being a method for peacocking. When cosplay was harder to make, it took real dedication to make a cosplay, let alone a good one, so you had to really be into whatever you're cosplaying to see it as worth it, and because of that people could use your cosplay as a conversation starter. Now people will just do FOTM cosplay without even knowing the character. At my old job I remember talking to this girl one time that was taking suggestions for what to cosplay at some upcoming convention, picking something out depending on if the character looked good without even knowing what show they were from. I'm told this is now a common practice in this community among zoomer girls who are then horrified they unknowingly cosplayed something from "diddy media".(cont.)
>>10974417>>10974572(cont.)>They aren't overpriced and undervalued (yet)I've seen some recent saturday-only passes have early bird prices that are as much as how much three day passes were 10 years ago, and that's adjusted for inflation (i.e. the price of the 10 year old pass multiplied x2). And with some convention staples from 10 years ago now being gone, I wouldn't call what we have now a good value. Still fun to attend, but not a good value.>before corpos fuck it up completelyThis is one of the few aspects of modern cons that are undeniably better than 10 years ago. Anime streaming services (at least in my state) have stopped having a presence at every con and now either fully endorse one specific con in the area or have completely disappeared. While you do feel the effect of cons having less money invested into them by anime streaming services these days, it is nice to not be bombarded with HiDive advertisements at every step. So we're a bit further away now from corpos fucking up cons than we were a decade ago.
>>10974401I've found Otakuthon to be mediocre, but I live around there locally and has been there for ages and have not really has been to most other cons. Big stuff I liked to do there doesn't happen anymore and has been replaced with nothingBoth Comic-Con and Otakuthon, it's always the same vendors, it's always the same artists
>>10974573>I've seen some recent saturday-only passes have early bird prices that are as much as how much three day passes were 10 years ago, and that's adjusted for inflationDid you check to see if those are specifically for-profit cons pic VERY related?
