Zenkaikon 2008 – Pictures Uploaded

Well, every con has to have a starting point.

Only in their second year, Zenkaikon managed to put up a decent show despite their very limited venue space.  You’d be disappointed if you expected a huge concert hall for the main events like the masquerade or the ‘Whose Line is it Anime?” comedy show, or even a room that’s much bigger than your kitchen.

So here are the highlights:

The Game Room: Nothing particularly fantastic, but there was plenty of space there, great TVs, a projector set-up for tournaments, and they even had arcade sticks for the 360. They had what most people would want: Smash Brothers Brawl, Rock Band, DDR, the Naruto and Bleach Fighters for Wii, Soul Calibur, and Guilty Gear to name a few — very nice selection. Tournaments were ran nice and fast, even if they were all single-elimination tournaments ran one single station. The staff though, were really cool. They let me handle their Marvel vs. Capcom 2 tournament so they can have time setting up the bigger Halo 3 tournament. The MVC2 tournament ended up being a 3 hour, double-elim, best 2 out 3 rounds slugfest — because that’s what everyone wanted. For a con tournament, the competition was surprisingly decent. I ended up taking third place, losing to the much better Mad Magnus.

And they actually had prizes for all these tournaments.  Ten to twenty dollar gift cards and Gamestop.  I swept a 60 man Soul Calibur 4 tournament with Byron at Anime USA and all we got was a handshake and an massive boost to our ego.  So prizes = good.
Uncle Yo/Whose Line is it Anime?: Love him or hate him, he brings a lot of energy to whatever con signs him up.  This eccentric stand-up comedian and avid otaku was given an hour at the main events hall for his comedy routine, provided color for the Brawl tournament, and was given another hour for ‘Whose Line is it Anime?’  The guy’s presence alone made these events worth attending.

Anime Dating Game (18+): Sorry kids, but you missed out on bachelors ‘in the refridgerator’ as their favorite sex position, Solid Snake trying to convince the audience he’s not gay, and Ness

describing how he’s alergic to pussy (cats) unless they’re hairless.  Unfortunately, my camera

ran out of battery before I could take any vidoe, but it was a riot.

Rose and her Otaku Belly Dance: I really didn’t know what to expect from this before going.  Thankfully, it was very entertaining thanks to the belly dancing goddess, who had on-stage presence and personality as enchanting as her hip movement.  A nice surprise this was.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EvnaAxzVHHQ

Ultraball:  I’ll be honest.  I was quite speechless when I attended this small little concert.  I mean, one of those guys is Ash Ketchum, and the other one is in a full-sized PIkachu suit.  I do have to admit, as bizarre as this seemed at first with their, uh, pokemon-based musical performances (see video), the Ultraball duo were really cool guys to talk to.  Their personality definitely carried them through their show.

But seriously, he’s in a Pikachu suit!

Stuff that kinda sucked:

Small main events room.  Like, really small: Not the staff’s fault; they did their best with what they had to work with.  Still, having your rave in a room no bigger than the average panel room with very little air circulation can cause a man in a pikachu suit to pass out in 5 minutes.  And oh god, the smell.

Security: Sorry guys, but I have to say it.  I paid for a Friday only pass, but just walked right into Saturday no problem.  How did this happen?  Their friday, saturday, and all weekend passes were all the same.  So I essentially paid $15 for the whole weekend.  Even if I wanted to be honest, registration was closed by the time I reached the con.  So word of advice to the staff:  Put some extra work on those badges and tighten security.  Or better yet, put some more events into Friday, rather than making it an afterthought (Zenkaikon was originally supppose to be a 1-day con).

In conclusion:  Zenkaikon will (thankfully) change their location for next year.  If they managed to get a bigger venue with more to work with, the Philly convention scene will definitely be something to pay attention to.  The staff are great, events were ran smoothly for what they had to work with, and the weekend was relatively cheap.  Once they move beyond that terrible Raddison hotel, they can only get bigger and bigger.

Here’s hoping.