Sakura Con 2013

[kndy]

So far Japanese guest panels are well-attended.

A shot right out near the escalators....



But we have a staff member covering it right now...but hopefully some of you are at Sakura-con today or the weekend?

[davemerrill]

I like the "no stopping in this area" signs. Might have to steal the concept for some other shows.

[Heero]

I really hope to get to Sakura-con one day. I've been curious about it for a long time.

[Armblessed]

I was pretty disappointed in my experience with Sakura Con 2012 so I skipped it this year and went to Emerald City Comic Con instead. Still, I'm interested to hear how Sakura Con is this year.

[kndy]

Kawamoto Toshihiro's press conference at Sakura-Con was packed. But I am so happy to get an autograph from Kawamoto-san and also from Atsuko Ishizuka, a director of Madhouse. While he's known for co-founding Studio BONES and for the character designs of "Cowboy Bebop", for me, it was his involvement in "Mobile Suit Gundam 0083: Stardust Memory", "Mobile Suit Gundam: The 08th MS Team", "Orguss 02" and "The Cockpit" that I enjoyed so much! Thank you so much Goromi-chan!

[usamimi]

I used to go to Sakura-con every year when I lived in WA...I started going in '98, back when it was called "Baka!-Con". I actually found this while looking through some boxes of my old stuff at my mom's house last month:



When I went in 98 I just had a day pass, which I either lost or threw away after, I can't remember...this was my first weekend pass ever, and the first year I cosplayed (as Miaka from "Fushigi Yuugi"). Ah, memories!

It was kinda weird seeing the con go from this tiny thing at the SeaTac Double Tree Inn (which doesn't even exist anymore, it got demolished to expand the mall. RIP Double Tree XD) to it's various other places, to where it is now. I remember when we couldn't get any Japanese guests for a while because they didn't like the idea of going to an "Idiot Convention", lol. (Hence the name change eventually to Sakura-con.)

Sakura-con's kinda hit or miss now. Even though they've been around for a while now, they still have yet to work the kinks out of everything, and they're terrible at keeping up to date with information...or even giving out full, basic information. I remember one year, they announced Kouta Hirano as one of the guests, and I was really excited (they don't seem to get a lot of manga artists, most of the guests are anime industry people)...nowhere in the press release, website, or anything else mentioned that he was only going to be there ONE DAY--and not only that, but instead of standing in line and waiting for an autograph like you usually did, you had to stand in line to PAY for a raffle ticket for the CHANCE to get to stand in line to get his autograph. o__O So, yeah, that didn't fly with me...I was really annoyed, because they'd never done anything like that, and I'd wished they'd mentioned that somewhere in the guest information so I wouldn't have gotten my hopes up about it. :/

I mostly kept going to it specifically to hang out with people I only seemed to see at the con, and to hit up the dealer's room. (Even though that was kinda hit or miss, too--there were some years I came home with barely any purchases.) There are definitely better cons out there, but it's definitely not the worst.

(Haha, I sort of rambled a bit there, sorry. XD)

[kndy]

I used to go to Sakura-con every year when I lived in WA...I started going in '98, back when it was called "Baka!-Con". I actually found this while looking through some boxes of my old stuff at my mom's house last month:



When I went in 98 I just had a day pass, which I either lost or threw away after, I can't remember...this was my first weekend pass ever, and the first year I cosplayed (as Miaka from "Fushigi Yuugi"). Ah, memories!

It was kinda weird seeing the con go from this tiny thing at the SeaTac Double Tree Inn (which doesn't even exist anymore, it got demolished to expand the mall. RIP Double Tree XD) to it's various other places, to where it is now. I remember when we couldn't get any Japanese guests for a while because they didn't like the idea of going to an "Idiot Convention", lol. (Hence the name change eventually to Sakura-con.)

Sakura-con's kinda hit or miss now. Even though they've been around for a while now, they still have yet to work the kinks out of everything, and they're terrible at keeping up to date with information...or even giving out full, basic information. I remember one year, they announced Kouta Hirano as one of the guests, and I was really excited (they don't seem to get a lot of manga artists, most of the guests are anime industry people)...nowhere in the press release, website, or anything else mentioned that he was only going to be there ONE DAY--and not only that, but instead of standing in line and waiting for an autograph like you usually did, you had to stand in line to PAY for a raffle ticket for the CHANCE to get to stand in line to get his autograph. o__O So, yeah, that didn't fly with me...I was really annoyed, because they'd never done anything like that, and I'd wished they'd mentioned that somewhere in the guest information so I wouldn't have gotten my hopes up about it. :/

I mostly kept going to it specifically to hang out with people I only seemed to see at the con, and to hit up the dealer's room. (Even though that was kinda hit or miss, too--there were some years I came home with barely any purchases.) There are definitely better cons out there, but it's definitely not the worst.

(Haha, I sort of rambled a bit there, sorry. XD)

Thank you for sharing your memories. Things have changed with the convention as I have friends who were president for one year, but a lot of things have changed with this con. Now it's huge, but when cons get huge, there is a positive but also a negative to this... but thank you for sharing your experience in the past! I enjoy reading these things as I look at conventions back then, as the ones I miss the most.

[usamimi]

Aww, well I don't want people to think I HATE Sakura-con or anything! XD For the longest time, I thought it was practically perfect, and the flaws it had were normal things that couldn't be helped...until I went to a few other cons and discovered that wasn't true. XD Before I moved in 2010, I went to Sakura-con every year, and still feel sad that I've missed it. 10+ years I went to that con!

(I was especially sad that I missed Kotono Mitsuishi recently, but a friend of mine was kind enough to not only get her autograph for me on my Sailor Moon R box set, but she stood in line to get that autograph for me and she DIDN'T EVEN LIKE Sailor Moon. That is a true friend right there. <3)

[Animusubi]

My younger sister created this year's mascot, so she had an artist alley table there. I heard she did really well. Was kind of disappointed though that this was the year they decided not to have the mascot displayed everywhere (such as banners on the streets and such) like previous years. That was one of the fun parts of having your mascot design win. So people actually came up to her table and didn't even know she was the mascot. Or that she was the artist.

I was going to attend to see some friends, but since I'm moving soon, I had too much packing to do and didn't have time to go.

[usamimi]

My younger sister created this year's mascot, so she had an artist alley table there. I heard she did really well. Was kind of disappointed though that this was the year they decided not to have the mascot displayed everywhere (such as banners on the streets and such) like previous years. That was one of the fun parts of having your mascot design win. So people actually came up to her table and didn't even know she was the mascot. Or that she was the artist.

Wow, really?! What's the point of even entering the mascot contest if they don't use it? :/ That's super disappointing.