Real Talk By: J.Valdez

Another year, another Ohayocon come and gone, and with it, the sad reminder that real life is not as fun as Con life. Unfortunately this wasn’t the best Ohayocon. Don’t get me wrong though, I enjoyed myself like always, and so did Kat, but there were some things that didn’t work too well in favor of the convention.

One thing being all the construction going on in the convention center. This is in no way fault of the organizers, but unfortunately did have an effect on the convention itself. The Construction caused cramped spaces which made it hard to stop people for pictures or even interviews, certain rooms were blocked off causing some events and areas to be moved from their usual spots. One big plus however, was not really having to share the convention center with any other big events.

For those that have never attended a convention, or even know what goes on at these events, I’d like to suggest you do so. There are so many things you can do, from people watching, to dances and panels, there is always a dealer room full of really cool stuff for your inner or outer geek, as well as artist alleys full of talented people showcasing and selling their work. You can meet a lot of wonderful people who share similar interest with you, because believe me, every fandom is found at a convention.

I normally don’t attend panels, mostly because I can’t stay still in one place for too long at conventions, but when I see something that interest me I make every effort to go. I saw a few panels that did interest me, but unfortunately I would forget before their times, or they happened while I was at one of the dances, and those take priority for me. Hopefully I do get better at attending them in the future, because I’ve been told I need to go to Hentai Olympics (18+ Panel), and Who’s line is it Anime sounds fun as well. I did walk into one panel where they were showing Outlaw Star, an anime that I had heard of but never took the time to actually watch, after seeing that one episode, I did add it to my list.

I spent a majority of the con wandering, looking for cool or fun looking cosplay to take photos of, which there were many. It’s actually my favorite thing to do at a con, because I really like seeing other people’s creativity come together, people can spend anywhere from a day to weeks or months perfectly creating their costumes. Our newest member of the Playlegit family (Who I actually met at Ohayocon 2015) worked on her Tira (SoulCalibur) cosplay for over a month.

Hopefully by next year, most of the construction is done at the convention center. Since this was my first con, I do kind of hold it dear. Luckily I didn’t have problems with anyone or any staff. As usual, I leave you with a gallery of the pictures I took over the course of the weekend. This is just a portion of the pictures, you can view the full gallery here.

 More awesome picture galleries in the links below!