Otakon 2011 Day 1: Okay, Sorta Wotakon

Brought to you by a nice, classic Saolilith DJ set. The middle segment was a page out of Nico kumikyoku circa 2008. Listen and Love.exe are a couple good touches.

I mean, let’s be honest: DJ con guests are rarely given the respect they are worth, but that may be because they are often not seen nor heard in the first place. I thought 2010 was a good year because we got all those denpa DJs touring cons like Acen and AX. This year, not so much; just your local variety beat thumpers giving something for teens and college kids to prance to in the dark. It’s tempting to say that the authentic slice of Akiba-otaku (technically she’s not from Tokyo so whatever they do in kansai I suppose) beat Saolilith gave us tonight is wasted on the American youths, but it’s also a brave attempt at cross-cultural education through hard beats and heartful wig-banging. How does she DJ with those long strands in the way?

There’s not much else to wota to at Otakon this year. I think Yura’s brought over a vocalist, but she’s the classic sort. Not that stops everyone. I just couldn’t make it to their panel.

Shinkai is as affable and friendly as he seems in his live footages if you’ve been watching those DVD/BD omake. He’s a little shy on stage tho, very geek-like. His English is also passable (that puts him in the top 5 percentile of Otakon Japanese guests). Looking forward to picking his brains!

The rest is pretty much SOP for my 13th Otakon. Day 0 was especially chill since I got all my reg and things over with fast. Prereg this year is record-breaking on Thursday, so they say. What 20000+ con can do pre-con prereg with a 10-minute line? There is no such a thing (short of mailing badges).

Ok, actually press is a little in disarray this year. It’s like only my 2nd year as press at the con but this is pretty bad. I hope they can get themselves together.

The industry news is interesting; I wasn’t at any of those panel but who needs that when you have Twitter? (Still, that hopefully will be rectified tomorrow). I caught the Q&A part of the Madoka screening and learned a few things: basically everything good visually from Madoka is thanks to Inu Curry. That and some Shinbo’s professionalism over the DVD/BD release that resulted in the brush-ups we have been seeing. And it does look like the Tohoku disaster has nothing to do with the content of the last two episodes; and not much else besides the delay that the ensuing disruption the disaster has caused. Thanks IwakamiP!

Oh, there was one more wota note: The “behind the scene of Mikunopolis” panel was quite the informative summary of all of the Vocaloid events that took place at AX. It included even the Fox news aftermath–all of it. Along with coverage on the panels, and my favorite PV from Mirai no Niero this year (at least of the ones I can see).


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