Animazement 2010 Is Very Relaxing, Again
I think every time I do this I vow to keep it short. Maybe I will this time, because this sure isn’t the first nor last anime con I’ll have to write about this year.
Animazement is, as I always say, the most laid back and relaxing anime con in the US. This is qualified by the fact that they have mad pimp guest pwn-age from Japan. Because while you can strut around at a local no-name con for a relaxing romp in the dealer’s room, odds are those types of cons don’t offer the kind of fantasy fulfillment Animazement does.
Which is just another way of saying, really, that even with so many anime cons popping out in the US, not all cons are alike. More importantly, I’ve just spent two paragraphs to stress how different Animazement is. So trust me on this. It’s still an anime con where it can be tiring, where you might have to get in a line at times, as cons are sometimes known to be, but unlike most cons, it’s tiring just to the right degree that makes recovery smooth and short. And while you’re at the con, it doesn’t feel rushed or like you have to go at 100% to get everything done.
Ranma was Kappei Yamaguchi’s first major anime role. He worked with Noriko Hidaka, the female lead to Kappei’s male lead, throughout the several years that the 8-season TV show has run. Richard Ian Cox was the voice of Ranma (male) for much of the English-language release of Ranma 1/2. They were all at the con. The story continues somewhat when Yamaguchi and Cox both frontmenned Inuyasha, which was the next big Rumiko Takahashi adaptation. Hidaka also got a fairly major role in that…
While Akane from Ranma 1/2 holds a special spot in my heart, Animazement and Hidaka was all about the Erica Ohayo dance.
This con was relocated last year from the suburbs of Raleigh-Durham to downtown Raleigh proper. I think there’s some kind of inner city revitalization effort going on, so there were some construction and things that made the general vicinity where the Raleigh Convention Center was pleasant. Definitely more than I expected anyways.
This new con center is like, a maze in some ways.
That said, while it was clean, there just weren’t that many people out and about. It’s a little unsettling for someone who is used to walking around in Manhattan, but maybe that is for the best.
The con itself is only sparse on Thursday…
The crew this time around included:
- The Moy – fresh meat and HK smooth
- Southern kingpin Momotato. We’re treading on his soil. With his pimp toy (I want one too~)
- Alex D – combat veteran
Like last time I was at Animazement (2008…2009 had the Swine Flu cancellation thing if you recalled), I bought a boat load of little Aria figures. This year I walked home with the DVD omake set. In fact, I probably bought too much–prices were pretty good, although selection could have been a lot better. Unless you were looking for dakimakura covers, anyway, which there were plenty of. There was this Ryou pillow which was totally hug-a-licious. But not as tempting as the Luka nendoroid.
I made some kind of comment over the weekend about vocaloid hitting a critical mass at US cons. There were a lot of cosplayers doing it. The vocaloid panel I attended was scripted in Ren’py by this intense dude named Patrick. You guys know how much work that was? Anyways, the vocaloid wave should be fun to watch when AX and Otakon roll along. Wonder if it’ll outnumber the Naruto and Bleach cosplays.
Saturday night we decided to kill time watching some idol videos. It’s Moy’s latest poison and I wasn’t expecting much. Walked away with a showing of Berryz Koubou’s Dschinghis Khan. It was a weird remix video that I couldn’t google up, and weird is a pretty good description for it.
Not much else happened. Laid-back con is laid-back. There were autographs, and luls. I have some video and things taken with my phone, which has proven itself worthy of every cent on the convention floor. There were a few other minor notes. This year I made the trip down a day earlier and drove to Alex’s Wednesday night, which made Thursday much more bearable for me. The new Raleigh Convention Center is like an Escher-esqe nightmare. It’s not terrible for human flow, because it seems like there were a lot of redundant pathways. But there are some paths where you think it should go somewhere, except it doesn’t. It is a pretty place though, and fairly spacious. In fact, it’s really spacious for a crowd of just over 7000 attendees.
Their karaoke room was way too small. Actually, the awesome pre-con meet-the-guest stuff this year was out, and instead we get some random things for Thursday night, like a FFA karaoke session in a larger room. Someone sang one song, so I hear. I can’t really brave the normal-hour Karaoke room though.
Cosplay-wise, there were nothing really outstanding. There were a handful of K-ON cosplays. I saw a pretty alright Yin. There’s a handful of non-anime cosplays, as you’d expect. I did not see a single Touhou cosplay however, and that is really odd. And as mentioned, a bunch of vocaloids.
Which somehow I didn’t take a good pic of. Got a couple vids though…
She was really into her character. Loves her too I bet… LOL.
I’ve seen Top Gear more than just a couple times, but it didn’t occur to me that the Stig was an actual “character.” Oh well.
Speaking of Top Gear–
It’s a mod I’ve seen already before, but it’s always worth a photo op.
That’s how it looked like on Sunday afternoon IIRC.
Despite having nothing special that happened, I suppose I do have to write up the Ohayo dance, so let me do just that before I wrap this up:
So Noriko Hidaka, to me, was a big part of Sakura Wars 3. Sakura Wars 3 was also my favorite part of the game’s franchise. Yeah, I like Team Paris over Hanagumi [/don't hurt me]. And having seen Hidaka in the Kayo shows, it’s uh, very very natural to want her to do the Ohayo dance.
Momotato and I joked about this online, and he brought this up first. Naturally. However he should get the props for bring the props–going out of his way to pick up a pair of maracas. The rest was a bit of luck and guts. I linked it in the update post already, but here it is again.
Last but not least, check out Misuzu’s con report. Is very cool, TK.
PS. There was also this pretty amazing foodie joint. It cost a lot, but it’s probably worth it if you can get your mind around the concept of paying $9 for a bowl of macaroni and cheese. Simply put, it’s a gourmet spin on American comfort food. Oh, it’s across the street from the con center.
That’s some fancy-pants appetizer that isn’t worth $12. Has marinated avocado on crab.
The main dish is just chicken on mash, really.
Also the most expensive chicken on mash I’ve ever had. And most tasty.
Fried chicken thighs on mash is safe southern cuisine I suppose. And mac and cheese is just all-American.
But they call it something else… Not sure what it was. It’s their trademark item. And we probably wouldn’t have ordered it if I didn’t look it up lol.
This is just a solid pound cake with rhubarb sauce. Rhubarb and something else, not sure. It’s hearty, at times almost a bit bread-like.
This was the other dessert, which is just a very well-executed cheese cake with rich ingredients. It screams single serving. It hits you the way rich Asian sweets do, not the overloaded-with-sugar sort of way.
They have a full bar, and a lot of choices. But it really is more a wine-and-dine kind of joint. Even with the anime con junkie stigma aside, we’re probably under-classed for this place.
This is their “normal” dinner entrée that I think they serve year-round, which is something like a burger with just one slice of bread. So it’s more like a ground-beef-steak thing. I don’t know, is there some historical root that this “royale” can be traced back to? Or the “seared in duck fat” part?
PPS. Loot were to be had, here’s a peek:
Oh my gosh, that cheesecake is gorgeous. I really like the extended crust! And the presentation of the chicken and mashed potatoes is superb.
Glad you had fun at the con. :) Quite jealous of that cosplayer who owns the official Midori hand doll.
Well I’ll be, I thought I was the only nutter on this planet to have liked Team Paris over Hanagumi. Indeed, Sakura War 3 is still probably the most enjoyable of series to me as well. IIRC I aimed for Erica route initially, so yeah she was probably my fav char in SW3. Nuns with guns, yo.
But I must say, Sakura Wars 5 is really good, too.
@2DT actually I remember seeing a few guys w/ the Midori hand doll walking around throughout the con. Really odd since I don’t think I’ve ever seen the doll prior to this.
Omo, the poundcake sauce also had peaches in it too FYI ;) But yea, we should definitely go back there again next year… and order that mountain of fries we saw everyone else was getting! LOL
Based on the Sunday morning panel comments and the YouTube videos I’ve seen next year we have to go hang in the Marriot’s hotel bar.
@2DT: the crust is mostly for presentation, yeah, it looks good. If you don’t eat it.
I didn’t know you can poorly present mash with chicken. I guess you can!
@cowboybibimbop: o> I don’t think Erica is my fav, which is too bad. She actually asked me who is the fav from ST3 during the autograph session and I said “everyone” ;_;
Should’ve went with Kayama.
@moyism: yeah, the big mistake we made was not interact with our waitress and ask what the hell we’re ordering. It would have made all the difference. No guarantees that fries will be on the menu if we go back next year though.
@Basroil: shhh ;)
Yay ST3
(also, there is totally a place in Manhattan that charges $55 for mac and cheese and another that charges $16)
(Yeah, but that’s Manhattan. This is freaking boondocks Raleigh!)
[...] Omonomono, who I finally got to meet this Animazement, now has their report up too. It’s a good read! [...]