I should really do a "Conventioning 101" however that more or less gets covered in many FAQs for first timers at conventions. So here's my version which is for intermediattes, experts and more importantly the bored and energetic. It'll be stuff I do, stuff I don't do but want to, stuff I don't want to do anyway and stuff that is stupid enough to have you catapulted to The Convention halls of fame and/or stories we take away with us.
I should also note I'll do a seperate one on "How to Tokonatsu" and that'll have a downloadable disclaimer which exempts me from all responsibility and also entitles me for 80% of impending royalties if you get super fucking famous from it.
I'll assume that you too are a heavy drinking knobhead who has a decent tolerance/dependence on caffeine. Not everyone drinks beer (but bloody well should) so I'll factor that in.. reluctantly.
Amongst your standard crap you bring, YOU WILL NEED:
Hipflask
Moneyclip
Hat (I recommend bowler)
The glowsticks that aren't bendy
Wet wipes
Hair spray
Mouthwash
Contraceptives
Your hipflask is important, don't fill it with anything less than 15% alcohol unless you have an alcohol tolerance of a southerner or you'll be constantly refilling it. I prefer scotch or absinthe as the extra alcohol acts like a cleaning agent against bacteria and memories of *that* girl doing *that* dance.
Before you get to the con, prepare! Personally I'd suggest getting enough money to make a run to the local supermarket at the convention itself to avoid heavy luggage. Sometimes you can't do this when you're so arse-bleedingly far from the convention that you're rogered without a car (Kitacon, Tokonatsu). If you're in a town centre that's even better; root around the biggest supermarket for the best deals to bring back enough intoxicants to render you and your bezzies technically flammable by the evening. You'll need it. Be sure to get some powerade too, or any isotonic drink. Great for hangovers and sobering up fast for when you have to explain why you took a shit and set it on fire before flinging it at your -former- mates in the world's greatest pokemon impression. Of that monkey thing with the fire. You know the one.
Parties are awesome and rocking out in your cosplay is even better. Big kudos to that Belle in the ballgown (Beauty and the Beast) who was headbanging with the rest of us plebs. But you wanna go all night and be alert, we all know alcohol is a depressant so it'll slow you down. Check into a sports shop and get a sachet/bottle/vial of a pre-workout drink. This has a metric fuckton of caffeine and other stuff designed for sports people to ramp up their workouts like a coked out hummingbird. Big alertness and little to no "crash" because they're designed not to. Just be prepared to not sleep till the next day.
We love food, and we need food but somehow a staggering amount of you forget to get food and put it in your face. Personally I'm not quite sure how one of your basic survival requirements gets forgotten, but no worries. Just wake up and get down to breakfast (if there is one) to stuff yourself silly, take a bag too and see how much you can sneak off. I was so close to being able to carry round a mug of coffee with me last Kita.. so goddamn close.
Feel like you wanna stand out a bit more at parties? Don't feel glamoured up enough? Are Team Neko making you feel inferior because they somehow managed to wear so many glowsticks that if XtremeCaffeine dances hard enough you'll see rainbows on your vision for a week? Some things we can't help such as Team Neko's insane love of glowsticks, but what we can do is find a few T shirts that glow/uv react. If you're a fan of Cyberdog like me, you'll know they're the best source of rave gear (If anyone wants to prove otherwise, feel free to direct me where to throw my money for more rave gear).
Getting on Ebay will also get you to bulk buyings of glowsticks and it's always good if you wanna get loads with your mates or if you feel like handing them out like the creepy man giving away sweets at the playground, because everyone wants what you got.
At times you won't feel like you've got time, and drinking takes time, right? WRONG. Carry some straws in your pocket so you can shotgun entire bottles of beverage as if you're sipping it. Don't do more than 3 in one go unless you have a stomach of titanic proportions or you wanna show your mates what you meant by "Technicolour yawn". Though if you can/want to do more than 3, whether it is bitchpops or beer please take a video of it and send it to me. It'll make a change from all the hedge porn I'm getting, but hey who wouldn't sign up to "Fuckin' Shrubberies XXX"? I also suggest having an alcoholic beverage in the shower/bath, as this is always super fun, unless you're blind drunk then I accept no responsibility for you braining yourself on the taps. Please send pictures though.
Making friends may seem tricky and some people resort to signs. Now if this were a good idea then signposts and lamposts up and down the country would best mates. In fact some have more than me, but let's gloss over that because I don't want to spend too long wishing I had friends as I've got to make some fake profiles on facebook and kid myself for a bit longer. A good way to make friends is to compliment them on their cosplay and be down to Earth and somewhat more corporeal than many present themselves as. (However due to that many people won't be ready for someone actually down to Earth at Expo, and may react adversely such as hyperventilation, broken bad Japanese, guttural throat sounds, severe defecation and sweaty hugging). I wouldn't even try throwing catnip or balls of yarn at the catgirls or furries, it's a waste of time and they just steal your fucking yarn for use as a free prop.
However you didn't come here to do things by halves, so here's what you do; find the party animals. I'm not talking about that girl who blazes herself like a moist teatowel across the forums in an effort to show how cool she is, there's like 7-8 different ways this would pan out as bad but I'm already waist deep in Angry Lesbian ranty mode here and if I go anymore I may as well cut off my junk, buy a chequered shirt and quiff my hair. You must find the Party Animals, these beasts of conventions are actually tough to find and a rare species. Some may even get wasted before the parties start and get carried off by their mates, I can't even dream of being that awesome. Not in public anyway because you can get in trouble when it's apparent you've got a raging boner. Finding them depends on experience and you'll have to be prepared to stay up all night, but I know you little fuzzybums are hardcore and you can do it! Best place to look is to the committee/organisers, they'll know who to tell you to find. It'll be a crazy night but well worth it, take along at least one full bottle of vodka and leave your mobile phone in your room.
Yatak's Con Essentials is a golden set of rules for any weeb at a con, however rule 7 is quite important;
Bring Condoms. People actually do the horizontal shuffle at conventions, and the last thing you want is to be caught short and use one of those white ones with TESCO written on the side. I'm joking, don't use a tesco bag as contraceptive. You've got more class than that, use a Sainsburys one.
Hanging out at the bar with your mates is a staple of the convention. That feeling of knowing you spent a crapton of money to be there only to do what you can do in any bar back home for free. Use this time to get nicely wasted with that bottle of JD in your bag so it looks like you're getting drunk on cola. Also check out what special drinks they're doing for you special con-goers. These are always full of win, such as the infamous Amecon Back Door Smasher. Anything alcoholic that is named after reaping great vengeance upon one's coccyx has got to be good. Get 3-5 of them to make sure it really tickles your taint, you'll like it after the 4th, honest.
You're waking up in bed as if the Hulk had teabagged you into it, half awake with a mouth full of funk and a head full of hurt. What do? Well don't stay there, you're wasting time! Drag your sorry ass to the bathroom and get a powerade down, or water. Drink it all in one go if you can, you need to process that fluid before your morning Guinness. If there's a sachet of coffee, eat that and get in the shower, right now I don't care what you do because no amount of cleaning will remove those memories but you do need to get yourself straight. Put the Rocky theme on, Eye of the Tiger and pump yourself up! (Personally I do this, but with the intro theme to Fist of the North Star, the not Gackt version). I tend to bundle my clothes into sets, so I pull out a set of clothes in a neat bundle. Clean yourself, chew toothpaste in the shower and get something to drink. When you get to breakfast start on the eggs and meat, high amino acid profiles/protein will assist in breaking down the alcohol in your system. Lots of coffee and/or a Guinness to top up your iron levels should seal the deal. And yes, I did say eat the coffee granules, don't be a pussy.
When you come to the sunday of the Con, try and pack your shit up the best you can and find something to put all your alcohol into, like a fishbowl or some shit. I guess you could save it and take it home, but you gotta carry it and waahhwahhhwaahhh. Don't mix beer and liqour unless you're ridiculously awesome to the max. You've got one more day of the convention to shuffle through so smash back a pair of paracetamols and have at it like the worlds most fabulous swashbuckler. If you're lucky they'll play the Pokémon theme at the party so you can do all the actions to it, if you're lucky you may win some new friends. .. That's a lie, it never works, no matter how heartfelt my actions to the song are.. OHH YOU'RE MY BEST FRIEND! IN A WORLD WE MUST DEFEND!! .. My best friend... friend...
By the time it comes to Monday morning then you are on your own. Hopefully you'll feel like a bag of smashed arseholes with equal amounts regret and joy. But that is called living and for more information leave a comment or email or something, yeah.
~Warai Otoko
Showing posts with label cosplay. Show all posts
Showing posts with label cosplay. Show all posts
Saturday, 9 February 2013
Tuesday, 1 January 2013
New Year New Events New Douchery
I'm not going to stand here and pump you all up like a special guest preacher at the Evangelist family redneck special fun day about how great 2013 is going to be, because today is Tuesday and yesterday was Monday and that's how it is for me. Be honest now my little mufflewumps, nothing really changes as if by witchcraft and court orders against that really creepy girl we all "sorta know". (She'll get you eventually mate, and you said being a douchebag to her was just mean. Mate, I saved my own damn hide. Learn how to say no if you wanna avoid 3 years of being the one getting dicked down.)
I highly doubt I'll be going to many Expos by MCM unless I get dragged there to extract the urine, it's a headache in a monkey's vagina that I can very well do without. I may have to take this back if I have a ridiculously good cosplay I want everyone to see so that I can have one day in the year where I don't cry myself to sleep. I haven't seen much change in 2012 as I have done over the last few years. A lot of cosplayers are younger now than we've had before and we're seeing some crazy effort put in; but I'm not too sure if we're seeing that because there's just more people now and by lieu there's a fuckton of half-assed Ls and Naruto's at a Bahmitzva than I've noticed.
New conventions and small events! For me that's where it'll be this year. Gemucon, Tokonatsu, Fushicon and on the other end of the scale I'll try and get to Ayacon (No promises). Being new to an event brings back some of the magic and last Toko was my first. I had high hopes for entering the masquarade for next Toko however my girlfriend is an insanely awesome cosplayer that makes me look like I made my shit out of Animeleague flyers, banana pulp and kleenex; she's been made a Judge for the masq as she keeps winning it and now I'm either gonna have to learn how to weld or sit this one out due to potential calls of favouritism. Now, where's that arc-welder..
I've met more really interesting people by going to conventions than I ever did through expos, and I guess that's where it's at now. Expo used to be a place where you met people, now it's swelled so big it's become a microcosm of the English Society; keep to yourselves, don't talk to strangers and move along there's nothing to see here.
What I really love is the creativity of conventioning. Humans are pretty stupid meatsacks but sometimes this stupidity is an amazing source of entertainment through ingenuity. Last Amecon a friend of mine realised he paid almost £200 for a room he barely used, there's tons of places to sleep and if you can borrow a mate's shower/floorspace for luggage you're all set. I've even heard of the room rota, you get 6 people to a room, they have 1/3 of the 24hour day to sleep in the room. It's so stupid yet my OCD loves the efficiency . I don't know wether to smile or frown and it makes my face ache so hard I want to tear out my eyeballs and fill my sockets with Patron Gold. The same friend who decided to "HoboCon" wants to see if he can pitch a tent. Again my common sense wants to tell him to stop using JD Honey as the water component in his coffee, yet Tokonatsu springs to mind and I'm still drinking my HoneyJack Coffee.
Shameless plug times;
Gemucon 5th April - 7th April - Nottingham
Places are already at the 250 mark, and it's filling up. FREE CUPCAKE FOR EVERYONE GUARANTEED.
Gemu Pre-Con Party 4th April @Brass Monkey - Nottingham
If you can make it to the PreCon, we've got Happy Hour prices until 3am and single mixers/bottled beer at £3. Brass Monkey is my personal favourite bar and a classy-ass place to be but you don't need to dress up. Cosplay and stupid/in game meme T shirts encouraged.
Looking forward to news of future conventions and as always keep the news/comments/confessions of love/suggestions/ransom notes flooding in. You can get me on my email, twitter and for anyone in Yorkshire I'm three hills north past the pointy rock as the afternoon crow flies.
~Warai Otoko
I highly doubt I'll be going to many Expos by MCM unless I get dragged there to extract the urine, it's a headache in a monkey's vagina that I can very well do without. I may have to take this back if I have a ridiculously good cosplay I want everyone to see so that I can have one day in the year where I don't cry myself to sleep. I haven't seen much change in 2012 as I have done over the last few years. A lot of cosplayers are younger now than we've had before and we're seeing some crazy effort put in; but I'm not too sure if we're seeing that because there's just more people now and by lieu there's a fuckton of half-assed Ls and Naruto's at a Bahmitzva than I've noticed.
New conventions and small events! For me that's where it'll be this year. Gemucon, Tokonatsu, Fushicon and on the other end of the scale I'll try and get to Ayacon (No promises). Being new to an event brings back some of the magic and last Toko was my first. I had high hopes for entering the masquarade for next Toko however my girlfriend is an insanely awesome cosplayer that makes me look like I made my shit out of Animeleague flyers, banana pulp and kleenex; she's been made a Judge for the masq as she keeps winning it and now I'm either gonna have to learn how to weld or sit this one out due to potential calls of favouritism. Now, where's that arc-welder..
I've met more really interesting people by going to conventions than I ever did through expos, and I guess that's where it's at now. Expo used to be a place where you met people, now it's swelled so big it's become a microcosm of the English Society; keep to yourselves, don't talk to strangers and move along there's nothing to see here.
What I really love is the creativity of conventioning. Humans are pretty stupid meatsacks but sometimes this stupidity is an amazing source of entertainment through ingenuity. Last Amecon a friend of mine realised he paid almost £200 for a room he barely used, there's tons of places to sleep and if you can borrow a mate's shower/floorspace for luggage you're all set. I've even heard of the room rota, you get 6 people to a room, they have 1/3 of the 24hour day to sleep in the room. It's so stupid yet my OCD loves the efficiency . I don't know wether to smile or frown and it makes my face ache so hard I want to tear out my eyeballs and fill my sockets with Patron Gold. The same friend who decided to "HoboCon" wants to see if he can pitch a tent. Again my common sense wants to tell him to stop using JD Honey as the water component in his coffee, yet Tokonatsu springs to mind and I'm still drinking my HoneyJack Coffee.
Shameless plug times;
Gemucon 5th April - 7th April - Nottingham
Places are already at the 250 mark, and it's filling up. FREE CUPCAKE FOR EVERYONE GUARANTEED.
Gemu Pre-Con Party 4th April @Brass Monkey - Nottingham
If you can make it to the PreCon, we've got Happy Hour prices until 3am and single mixers/bottled beer at £3. Brass Monkey is my personal favourite bar and a classy-ass place to be but you don't need to dress up. Cosplay and stupid/in game meme T shirts encouraged.
Looking forward to news of future conventions and as always keep the news/comments/confessions of love/suggestions/ransom notes flooding in. You can get me on my email, twitter and for anyone in Yorkshire I'm three hills north past the pointy rock as the afternoon crow flies.
~Warai Otoko
Monday, 3 September 2012
Convention Review: Amecon 2012 [3 Mile Walks and Backdoor Smashers]
About this time about two-three weeks ago I was at Keele University campus for Amecon 2012, my first Campus based convention. Two main things that stand out from a campus based convention is that there are less general public around and you'll have to do a fuckton of walking. That aside, it was quite enjoyable. It would have been more enjoyable if I hadn't broke my goddamn 2 litre stein when I checked in, but I guess it was karma for me not to walk around with more beer than is humanly logical.. Fuck you Karma. Fuck you.
The only major downside I found was the cost and the difference in facilities. You see, to pay a bit extra gets you a lot more however that cost to start with is already fucking painful to start with and you do run the risk of feeling like you didn't get your monies worth if you don't throw yourself into the deep end.
So lets get started!
Accommodation
Standard student halls. Okay so it's the most expensive part and you get a choice of ensuite or non. Personally I went ensuite because I like the option of hosing myself down after a technicolour yawn in case it's not as tidy as I had hoped. Having been through a variety of student accommodations in my heyday as a dirty student I can say it's pretty decent, albeit the motion sensitive "Jedi" showers were a fucking pain in the arse to operate/adjust. The rooms were tidy nonetheless and functional. They even gave a little kettle and tea/coffee thingies in the room which I thought were nice considering it was a university not a hotel.
Food
Breakfast was pretty fucking awesome. Seriously! Though the coffee was liquid shame the rest of it was on par with some of the large hotel conventions; Hilton standard at least. From there it gets sketchy, food is available from a studenty type restaurant but till like 4, then you've got takeouts from what I believe or the mini-mart on campus where you can stuff for later. Handy as there are microwaves in the kitchens at the student halls. And for the really hardcore twats out there, ovens! Yeah, check that shit out.
You can do what I did and get a chinese take-out on the Friday (furama palace I think) spend about £5 and get enough food to last you 2 days. I'm not joking, massive portions and value for money. Unless of course I had stumbled upon magic egg fried rice that never ends, stranger things have happened.
Conventioning
Holy feckerama, there's so much going on and I even managed to wangle myself into the Masquarade! The committee, or rather Ilpala was really sound about me getting in last minute; no groans or hiccups and for that I'm really thankful. I've even gotta hand it to GrannyGertrude for his announcement for me"Alan Gabriel from Big O- BIG-O BIG-O BIG-O!" A thing Big O fans get from the ridiculous intro sequence. That pretty much made it for me, and my first masquerade was a lot of fun. Big shout out to Tino and Rob for being legends with the facepaint emergency, muchos gracias.
The masquarade itself was a little unorthodox for me as I'm used to seeing one single stage, this one was all the way through the Student Union with several stop points and I'll be honest I was so paranoid about being as good as I could be that I probably ran through the entire thing like a coked out butterfly. The Masquerade briefing could have been a little better rather than a glorified role call -IT'S PRONOUNCED "VALLON"- but hey we got the gist.
Party-wise it was pretty hit and miss, catering to a lot of genres but again that's what the convention scene is about; varied tastes that generally hit within the mainstream of our collective tastes. I got my DJ Snap conventioncore set, which had me rave out like a Disco-Fu after an eyeball injectionful of DMAA. Something was pretty awesome about the Student Union Layout; if you didn't like the nightclub part you could go next door to the very warm and welcoming bar, play some pool, get a cheap ass drink, have your backdoor smashed in or be entertained by the hilarious bar staff. Saying the "drinks were cheap" is an understatement along the same depth as "Neil Armstrong was a cool guy" or "Mike Towers is a bit of a shady character", because how much better can you get other than Student Bar prices? I barely spent £20 the entire weekend, maybe £10 of drinks bought for me because I'm a classy mother hubbard like that, I probably consumed about half a bottle of Kraken Rum too and found myself nicely inebriated through the entire gig. I didn't get drunk off my face because due to the walks I'd have found myself waking up in a hedge or in a tree with a crown.. I'm looking at you Cid. I had quite a few shots called BackDoorSmashers which was essentially everything in a shot and tasted like a party in my mouth, you know the kind of party that ends with the police getting called round several times and someone getting knifed with a broken Pink Floyd CD.
As a conclusion, anyone who is into the convention scene needs to attend Amecon at least once and get in the deep end. Although not as glamorous as Kitacon it does the basics incredibly well and the sheer scale of the Con is not something to be missed. Though anyone used to a Hotel Convention will find the area difficult to cope with at first, once you nail the timings you'll be fine.
Pack a camera and take along a little more maturity than you would normally, this is one convention where you can get a hell of lot out of it. A lot of friendly faces and appreciators of the more obscure cosplays.
~Warai Otoko
The only major downside I found was the cost and the difference in facilities. You see, to pay a bit extra gets you a lot more however that cost to start with is already fucking painful to start with and you do run the risk of feeling like you didn't get your monies worth if you don't throw yourself into the deep end.
So lets get started!
Accommodation
Standard student halls. Okay so it's the most expensive part and you get a choice of ensuite or non. Personally I went ensuite because I like the option of hosing myself down after a technicolour yawn in case it's not as tidy as I had hoped. Having been through a variety of student accommodations in my heyday as a dirty student I can say it's pretty decent, albeit the motion sensitive "Jedi" showers were a fucking pain in the arse to operate/adjust. The rooms were tidy nonetheless and functional. They even gave a little kettle and tea/coffee thingies in the room which I thought were nice considering it was a university not a hotel.
Food
Breakfast was pretty fucking awesome. Seriously! Though the coffee was liquid shame the rest of it was on par with some of the large hotel conventions; Hilton standard at least. From there it gets sketchy, food is available from a studenty type restaurant but till like 4, then you've got takeouts from what I believe or the mini-mart on campus where you can stuff for later. Handy as there are microwaves in the kitchens at the student halls. And for the really hardcore twats out there, ovens! Yeah, check that shit out.
You can do what I did and get a chinese take-out on the Friday (furama palace I think) spend about £5 and get enough food to last you 2 days. I'm not joking, massive portions and value for money. Unless of course I had stumbled upon magic egg fried rice that never ends, stranger things have happened.
Conventioning
Holy feckerama, there's so much going on and I even managed to wangle myself into the Masquarade! The committee, or rather Ilpala was really sound about me getting in last minute; no groans or hiccups and for that I'm really thankful. I've even gotta hand it to GrannyGertrude for his announcement for me"Alan Gabriel from Big O- BIG-O BIG-O BIG-O!" A thing Big O fans get from the ridiculous intro sequence. That pretty much made it for me, and my first masquerade was a lot of fun. Big shout out to Tino and Rob for being legends with the facepaint emergency, muchos gracias.
The masquarade itself was a little unorthodox for me as I'm used to seeing one single stage, this one was all the way through the Student Union with several stop points and I'll be honest I was so paranoid about being as good as I could be that I probably ran through the entire thing like a coked out butterfly. The Masquerade briefing could have been a little better rather than a glorified role call -IT'S PRONOUNCED "VALLON"- but hey we got the gist.
Party-wise it was pretty hit and miss, catering to a lot of genres but again that's what the convention scene is about; varied tastes that generally hit within the mainstream of our collective tastes. I got my DJ Snap conventioncore set, which had me rave out like a Disco-Fu after an eyeball injectionful of DMAA. Something was pretty awesome about the Student Union Layout; if you didn't like the nightclub part you could go next door to the very warm and welcoming bar, play some pool, get a cheap ass drink, have your backdoor smashed in or be entertained by the hilarious bar staff. Saying the "drinks were cheap" is an understatement along the same depth as "Neil Armstrong was a cool guy" or "Mike Towers is a bit of a shady character", because how much better can you get other than Student Bar prices? I barely spent £20 the entire weekend, maybe £10 of drinks bought for me because I'm a classy mother hubbard like that, I probably consumed about half a bottle of Kraken Rum too and found myself nicely inebriated through the entire gig. I didn't get drunk off my face because due to the walks I'd have found myself waking up in a hedge or in a tree with a crown.. I'm looking at you Cid. I had quite a few shots called BackDoorSmashers which was essentially everything in a shot and tasted like a party in my mouth, you know the kind of party that ends with the police getting called round several times and someone getting knifed with a broken Pink Floyd CD.
As a conclusion, anyone who is into the convention scene needs to attend Amecon at least once and get in the deep end. Although not as glamorous as Kitacon it does the basics incredibly well and the sheer scale of the Con is not something to be missed. Though anyone used to a Hotel Convention will find the area difficult to cope with at first, once you nail the timings you'll be fine.
Pack a camera and take along a little more maturity than you would normally, this is one convention where you can get a hell of lot out of it. A lot of friendly faces and appreciators of the more obscure cosplays.
~Warai Otoko
Thursday, 31 May 2012
As a Cosplayer
At one point in my life I used to try and cater what I say to everyone, that had me crash and burn out because there's just no pleasing everyone. So I thought I'd just cater to the intelligent folk.
[Quick note before I launch into this; for you pricks who thought I was complaining in my last post, go suck a dick. That was a review, an observation, written in the way I write. If I ever complain I do so to the relevant persons so I don't waste my efforts. All of this is a form of journalism and blogging, you morons.]
This post is about hostility between cosplayers. It is not about what constitutes good/bad cosplay, nor is it a rant telling people what they should and shouldn't do. The fact I have to spell this out makes me not want to live on this planet anymore because some cretin will come along, get butthurt and completely miss the point.
Staying "middle of the road" does nothing to convey one's message, it's simply directionless waffle. I chose to play the Devil's Advocate or to be more concise; be vocal about being the Devil's Advocate. Many of you have thought about the things I say already, I know this because it's started more internet arguements than Religion, Drugs, Animeleague, and Goku vs Superman.* This proves that many people have thought about what I say.
*For the record Batman would fuckin' kick everyone's ass. He's the Goddamn Batman. He'd absorb Goku's energy attacks with his relay gauntlets, use the energy to pull a meteor out of orbit with a network of WayneTech Sattellites and plough that 72megaton space nugget into Goku's nutsack after having him chase ghosts and shadows on the dark side of the motherfuckin' moon. Don't even get me started on how he'd bend Superboy over and Leeroy Jenkins his internal organs with the Batfists.
I'll try to explain as much as I can because I've never actually seen anyone articulate enough to take the time and spell it out for everyone to understand. You see I'm a cosplayer, holy crapola no shit son. I don't claim to be the best, I have my strengths and weaknesses much like anyone else and I have my own reasons. I'm the kind who works to his strengths and has fun with what he does. However I see many who make it sound like they're not really having fun at all, and this confuses me. Why would you go do something to bitch and whine about it afterwards? Oh yeah, internets! Oh you!
In my last post I mentioned something about random fucknuts in certain accessories who claim they're cosplayers, many seen at Expo. There are no rules on cosplaying, but a couple of themes and I'll explain;
- Have fun in what you do. It's about having fun, because the only other reasons you should be doing it is because it's a favour to a friend, or you're getting paid to do it. If you're doing it for attention, you're pretty much an attention whore, superficial, shallow, uninteresting and knowing you is more of a chore than a friendship.
- Love the character, love the costume, or both. I'll not claim you should know the character, some of us properly fall in love with the outfit before we know anything about the character. Hell, the Japanese make a pasttime about getting into hobbies and knowing nothing about it (case in point is Gunpla, you get hobbyists who've never watched one episode of Gundam, yet love the mechs, models and putting the kits together. They don't even intend to watch an episode.) Again, reasons why you wouldn't do it for these two reasons fall into a favour, or getting paid. If you're doing it for the sake of having people take pictures and swoon over you, then you fall into the catagory I like to call the "Jeremy Kyle Guestlist".
Those two pretty much cover it, and it's not limited to Anime/Manga. Some people I know do it for movies, Sci Fi, TV, Internet etc etc. It's a massive spread of media.
But understand this; there are many who put more effort into these costumes than you could imagine. They may not be the grand elite, they just love what they do. Imagine how they feel when they see obvious n00bs at an event who've half-assed a cosplay. Sure these faggots are new to the game, but we're not talking novice mistakes, we're talking "I'm pretty sure Captain Hitsugaya has white hair, not a brown ponytail.." or "Hey, I know I don't read Kuroshitsuji, but did that kid with the eyepatch wear converse?". Seeing individuals who half-ass it, throw on a random wig, dress up in faux-lolita dresses and end up looking like teenie whores who've magnetised themselves and rolled around in Claire's Accessories, all of that is a bit insulting to many cosplayers. All this hard work we put in gets trampled on.
I know many cosplayers who go as far as changing their body type to be able to cosplay certain characters. I'm not saying everyone should do it, I'm saying be aware of the level of dedication some people put in. We can tell how much effort someone has put in, trust us, you don't wanna know how hardcore some of us get in this hobby.
Those who are blatantly out for attention/social acceptance I perceive in the same light as free huggers/douchebags who hold up signs to explain their cosplays/that school bully who couldn't read/assbagels who only stick to their own little cliques/hardcore AL'ers/alcoholics or people who like to be known as an alcoholic*. Basically, it's stupid, unintelligent, unoriginal, immature and just sad.
*Real Alcoholism is horrific, and I wouldn't wish this upon anyone. It's an addiction and destroys families and people in the same way that using bad Japanese in your sentences destroys any shred of respect I have for you as a person, human, lifeform, mass of protoplasm, worm fuel. To brag that you are an alcoholic is stating you simply enjoy alcohol, you douchebag poser.
Excuses don't wash either. Such as "I'm Naruto when he's at his Bah Mitzvah" or "I'm cosplaying Guy Shishio if he was at the sexual health clinic" or "This is my Master Asia when he's at the beach".. Shit like that makes me wanna tear a weeb apart with a clawhammer, it's just excuses. Especially when it's so out of character. Maybe.. MAYBE you'll get away with something like "This is Ichigo cosplaying Zangetsu"; in fact I saw two truly inspired ones last Kitacon: Garrus Vakarian and Thane Krios from Mass Effect as Jules and Vincent from Pulp Fiction. Both characters are badass, and it's just makes sense, hats off to Manticore and Manjou. They nailed that harder than Thor with itchy hammer arm.
We've seen adaptations, some good, some bad. Some we can't help such as the gender transitions, and gijinkas. However I'm pretty sure than a pikachu gijinka wouldn't show underboob. Pikachu just isn't a "sexy" pokémon, unless that's just my personal tastes.
If you do find pikachu a sexy little bastard, then follow me on Twitter and read my brain farts since you're already a sick bastard it's not gonna do any more damage.
~Warai Otoko
[Quick note before I launch into this; for you pricks who thought I was complaining in my last post, go suck a dick. That was a review, an observation, written in the way I write. If I ever complain I do so to the relevant persons so I don't waste my efforts. All of this is a form of journalism and blogging, you morons.]
This post is about hostility between cosplayers. It is not about what constitutes good/bad cosplay, nor is it a rant telling people what they should and shouldn't do. The fact I have to spell this out makes me not want to live on this planet anymore because some cretin will come along, get butthurt and completely miss the point.
Staying "middle of the road" does nothing to convey one's message, it's simply directionless waffle. I chose to play the Devil's Advocate or to be more concise; be vocal about being the Devil's Advocate. Many of you have thought about the things I say already, I know this because it's started more internet arguements than Religion, Drugs, Animeleague, and Goku vs Superman.* This proves that many people have thought about what I say.
*For the record Batman would fuckin' kick everyone's ass. He's the Goddamn Batman. He'd absorb Goku's energy attacks with his relay gauntlets, use the energy to pull a meteor out of orbit with a network of WayneTech Sattellites and plough that 72megaton space nugget into Goku's nutsack after having him chase ghosts and shadows on the dark side of the motherfuckin' moon. Don't even get me started on how he'd bend Superboy over and Leeroy Jenkins his internal organs with the Batfists.
I'll try to explain as much as I can because I've never actually seen anyone articulate enough to take the time and spell it out for everyone to understand. You see I'm a cosplayer, holy crapola no shit son. I don't claim to be the best, I have my strengths and weaknesses much like anyone else and I have my own reasons. I'm the kind who works to his strengths and has fun with what he does. However I see many who make it sound like they're not really having fun at all, and this confuses me. Why would you go do something to bitch and whine about it afterwards? Oh yeah, internets! Oh you!
In my last post I mentioned something about random fucknuts in certain accessories who claim they're cosplayers, many seen at Expo. There are no rules on cosplaying, but a couple of themes and I'll explain;
- Have fun in what you do. It's about having fun, because the only other reasons you should be doing it is because it's a favour to a friend, or you're getting paid to do it. If you're doing it for attention, you're pretty much an attention whore, superficial, shallow, uninteresting and knowing you is more of a chore than a friendship.
- Love the character, love the costume, or both. I'll not claim you should know the character, some of us properly fall in love with the outfit before we know anything about the character. Hell, the Japanese make a pasttime about getting into hobbies and knowing nothing about it (case in point is Gunpla, you get hobbyists who've never watched one episode of Gundam, yet love the mechs, models and putting the kits together. They don't even intend to watch an episode.) Again, reasons why you wouldn't do it for these two reasons fall into a favour, or getting paid. If you're doing it for the sake of having people take pictures and swoon over you, then you fall into the catagory I like to call the "Jeremy Kyle Guestlist".
Those two pretty much cover it, and it's not limited to Anime/Manga. Some people I know do it for movies, Sci Fi, TV, Internet etc etc. It's a massive spread of media.
But understand this; there are many who put more effort into these costumes than you could imagine. They may not be the grand elite, they just love what they do. Imagine how they feel when they see obvious n00bs at an event who've half-assed a cosplay. Sure these faggots are new to the game, but we're not talking novice mistakes, we're talking "I'm pretty sure Captain Hitsugaya has white hair, not a brown ponytail.." or "Hey, I know I don't read Kuroshitsuji, but did that kid with the eyepatch wear converse?". Seeing individuals who half-ass it, throw on a random wig, dress up in faux-lolita dresses and end up looking like teenie whores who've magnetised themselves and rolled around in Claire's Accessories, all of that is a bit insulting to many cosplayers. All this hard work we put in gets trampled on.
I know many cosplayers who go as far as changing their body type to be able to cosplay certain characters. I'm not saying everyone should do it, I'm saying be aware of the level of dedication some people put in. We can tell how much effort someone has put in, trust us, you don't wanna know how hardcore some of us get in this hobby.
Those who are blatantly out for attention/social acceptance I perceive in the same light as free huggers/douchebags who hold up signs to explain their cosplays/that school bully who couldn't read/assbagels who only stick to their own little cliques/hardcore AL'ers/alcoholics or people who like to be known as an alcoholic*. Basically, it's stupid, unintelligent, unoriginal, immature and just sad.
*Real Alcoholism is horrific, and I wouldn't wish this upon anyone. It's an addiction and destroys families and people in the same way that using bad Japanese in your sentences destroys any shred of respect I have for you as a person, human, lifeform, mass of protoplasm, worm fuel. To brag that you are an alcoholic is stating you simply enjoy alcohol, you douchebag poser.
Excuses don't wash either. Such as "I'm Naruto when he's at his Bah Mitzvah" or "I'm cosplaying Guy Shishio if he was at the sexual health clinic" or "This is my Master Asia when he's at the beach".. Shit like that makes me wanna tear a weeb apart with a clawhammer, it's just excuses. Especially when it's so out of character. Maybe.. MAYBE you'll get away with something like "This is Ichigo cosplaying Zangetsu"; in fact I saw two truly inspired ones last Kitacon: Garrus Vakarian and Thane Krios from Mass Effect as Jules and Vincent from Pulp Fiction. Both characters are badass, and it's just makes sense, hats off to Manticore and Manjou. They nailed that harder than Thor with itchy hammer arm.
We've seen adaptations, some good, some bad. Some we can't help such as the gender transitions, and gijinkas. However I'm pretty sure than a pikachu gijinka wouldn't show underboob. Pikachu just isn't a "sexy" pokémon, unless that's just my personal tastes.
If you do find pikachu a sexy little bastard, then follow me on Twitter and read my brain farts since you're already a sick bastard it's not gonna do any more damage.
~Warai Otoko
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