So Anime North 2024 happened and I ended up going for two days, Friday and Sunday; I could have gone on Saturday too but opted to take it easy since it’s just AN after all right? Nothing much to see same old same old right? Well, I think I was wrong, this year’s Anime North in terms of scale and scope, was probably the best and largest Anime North in recent memory: perhaps ever maybe.
Wow, so how did this go down or rather, what things made this AN so much of an improvements over the past two years since resuming after the pandemic which have been extremely mediocre at best thus far. Attendance? Cosplay? Artists? Industry? Well let’s see. Unlike most years and events that I overview, I’m going to try to keep it minimal, because this is two days combined and roughly consist of just under 400 photos, that’s a lot of comments in which 70-80% are just photos of artist alley art so to ease my brain and typing fingers, I’ll try to keep comments sparse or couple of words.
For the first time ever in AN, the convention used the whole North building and they decided to move registration into that building too. What happened as a result of that is that there is a lot more foot traffic to and from this building and you get a better sense of the full scope of people attending the convention.
Inside they have nice partitions and hallways leading to new rooms and halls never seen before other than on tv at the federal conservative party convention that was held here a number of years ago pre-pandemic.
Wow, they actually have a line queue and guard rails leading up to registration to get your badge. Nice.
This process seems familiar indeed, except in a new building.
Badge obtained. Too bad they don’t have any tech or chips in this thing, like other conventions, here it’s just plastic.
This years guidebook and last minute change sheets. The layout and organization of these guidebooks is horrible, always has been. They really should organize by day, not by building or location.
Families and Ahri in the distance from league, still around. Nice glass from the building.
Standard walking to the place we all know. Interesting people in shot.
I knew they always had anime itasha cars but I didn’t know they came out so much on Friday and other days I guess.
Miku I think? Or not.
Mazda Miata purple with Jason mask in the seat wut?
Nice blue hololive Choco car, shit car though.
Kagura Mea vtuber car, she’s good friends with Aqua from hololive irl.
FGO Eresh car, I think this is a civic?
Symphogear car, noice. A pretty surprising choice but welcome.
Bait princess mononoke.
Nice pink Demon Slayers Nezuko car, not sure what car but I think it’s expensive.
Blue genshin car, noice.
Once we got inside I wanted to locate immediately the location of the Cohen ballroom; where they are having the Dokibird panel, this is apparently not even close.
After some mapping I figured out the location where we need to go. Gotta walk to the main building to find that room.
So this is the line to get into the garage sale of merch that they hold every Friday only, Nominoichi. Wow, I had no idea people lined up to this thing. It opens at like 7:30pm. I can’t make it unfortunately, gotta line up for my panel during that time.
For a Friday evening the area is surprisingly filled with people and pretty busy.
With some time to spare before they allow line-ups to the panel, decided to get some dinner. The same neopolitan style pizza that I had last year.
Proof of existence lining up for some wood fired pizza.
My order, the margarita pizza the “Luffy” for $19. Good shit, just like last year.
The hawaiian “Naruto” pizza still $19. “Luffy” is better.
People watching is nice. Is guy in red and blue something?
Mario and Luigi looking for pizza probably.
Some people were still wearing jackets and stuff, it’s pretty hot you know, even in the evening.
I checked back to the side area and the line up to Nominoichi has extended all the way to the front of the building. Wow.
Nice cosplay of some chinese style dress cosplay, not sure but probably Genshin or Honkai Starrail.
Two ballers and their anime game tunes. Mad lad requiem.
FF7 Reno and Vincent, the photo is horrible tho with the light and washed out all well.
People watching and maid bocchi are nice.
Gotta have that Miku you know, even with a full mask.
Pretty ace Goblin Slayer cosplay indeed. Must be hot inside.
Some interesting people in this photo. Bridget cosplay hoodie in there too, nice.
Lemonade tyme and some interesting characters.
Once the time came they allowed us inside to line up for the Dokibird panel. This guy lol.
There was a line waiting place to the main room for the panel. Place smelled like shit however, didn’t have good ventilation and was filled with BO smell.
There was a couple of side doors that allow you directly into the hall for Nominoichi. I took a sneak peek and saw how busy it was. Wow. Bonus entry jump.
People sitting down for the wait, it was like about an hour wait before the panel. Nice bag and pins charms there.
Not sure but these two sitting ahead of us were in cosplay of something and I think were a contributing to the BO smell badly. But then again, it could be anyone in the area since everyone is so close.
Nice print of hololive Bijou. I got the same one when I went to animeNYC last year. Looks like the same artists is here as well. Noice.
So bait.
Wow, they actually gave out wrist tags coming into this waiting place to ensure that there was enough seats available. Apparently the room can only house 600 or so people.
When the time came they made an announcement and told everyone to go in and not leave any empty seats. Nice rando cosplays astolfo.
Here we go.
I’m pretty sure it’s not but the cosplay on the left looks like former Hololive member Rurshia, but I don’t think it was. Probably something else.
Packed house indeed.
It begins. The entire panel was an hour and started off strong with good questions and people asking them but eventually got a bit stale with people asking shit questions and or boring ass dumb shit like what battlefield 2047 do you like and if you think it’s going to be good in the future, what kind of future events do you want to plan or run, last anime you watched, is cereal a salad etc.
The panel itself was conducted by Doki and one of the past Anime North Idols, the girl who won 2016 and “all stars” recently I think. She didn’t’ do much since it was a QA panel and it was like 95% Doki just answering questions. All the questions are screened first which is fine.
They probably should have had a set of pre prepared questions for the first 15-20 minutes by the MC AN idol person to level set the audience and tell everyone who she was and etc but they went straight into audience QA, which is a bit odd. Overall it was a pretty good panel but a bit more planning and moderation would have been better. It’s great that Dokibird was a guest to begin with at AN however so I can’t really complain.
After the panel, this hall and area is pretty nice. After all these years I had never gone into this area of the South building before and it’s pretty good. What the hell, AN should have made use of this space better after all these years if they rent it all the time.
After Dokibird it was already like 9:30pm, the main vendors and artists alley close at 10pm so there was no point going there, Nominoichi however closes at 11pm so we spent the remainder of Friday here looking at people selling their stuff.
Truly, some booths felt like garage sales offloading their unwanted stuff while some others basically felt like full blown stores just selling shit as if they were in dealers.
Oh shit, it’s Isekai Ojisan in all his glory. Nice game cartridge too.
After I took his photo he told me to wait a bit, he dived deep into his pocket and gave me this ring. lol. If you watch the show, you know what this is. Jokes. What a baller. lol.
Our boy Mark’s friend’s table helping out. Very large table and one of the table(s) that can pass as a dealers store selling figures and other merch. Pretty good.
After browsing for a good amount of time it was almost time for Nominoichi to close and leave. Wow, it’s dark outside.
Right here especially with the cheese curds food booth this looks like the CNE at night.
After all these years they finally decided to install screens at the TCC and they have a Anime North banner outside, looks good.
The night rave outdoors party where apparently vtuber Mint Maid, another former Nijisanji member made a surprise guest appearance. Wow.
I didn’t go on Saturday but spent the evening watching Dokibird’s Wrestletuber 2024 event with Mint Maid which appeared as a guest commentator. Reuniting the two ex-Nijisanji vtubers after some time, doing the same thing as they did last year when it was Niji based event. Nice.
Up and early and we begin on Sunday now with more cars, I remember seeing this one a while back, the show itself is pretty old too, guess he didn’t bother updating to newer shit.
Old tyme miku car.
Nice sticker and decals of zero two.
Today we had to line up in some gated area to go into the main hall which is kind of weird but I guess it worked out.
Once inside we see the open space and I decided to check out the artists, from here on out I will try to keep comments minimal because there is quite a lot to get through.
Hello old friend, nice to see you again.
On point topic subject matter.
Too lazy to get up early for opening huh.
The emptiness won’t last long over time.
Papriocots table and a surprised bro.
Nice frogs.
Hello cute again.
Nice hats.
Beginning to get populated.
Seen before, nice to see again.
Varied quality.
Very tall height display, isn’t this not allowed anymore?
Crowding begins.
Cat and pet scarfs for sale, my sister brought one.
Very nice key chains of ace popular things going on at the moment. Ended buying 3 key-chain charms from them. Gud shit.
Same table but showing their print offerings.
Same artists buy QR code and socials in case I forgot who they are.
Didn’t have to print your payment preferences with a color space background bros. Save the ink.
Nice custom ink stamps, cool.
Same.
Pomu Rainpuff, former Nijisanji vtuber that is now Mint Maid. Nice plush, she is in a better place now being independent.
So much keychains and colors, does anyone just sell prints anymore? I don’t think so.
Crowding continues.
Effort but still mid.
Keychains and mid.
Poor display but hay at least key chains are viewable right?
Fabric meta is growing and bag game grows.
China themed shit I have no idea.
This guy sold metal pins that were backgrounds of famous movies, video games and other fantasy locations, really good concept and illustration idea. Good shit, brought some cause brain idea.
Nice art but are these just printouts of the selections? They don’t put the actual print sample anymore?
Maybe it’s just me but the actual print and poster game this year is weak and the price of prints have increased while the paper size has shrunk. Paper-flation?
Mad lad insanity spongebob keychains that are interactive with stuff inside of them that shakes and some that can spin. I saw this kind of thing last year in the US in previous cons and I guess the trend has finally hit here, or at least they now allow at AN.
Despite covid being basically over, some people and vendors/artists still prefer to be wear masks, also probably to just over their faces too in case they become vtubers or get famous.
Fabric game with Frieren and other material goods are on point. The days of prints and posters is basically over, plastic and fabric goods are the shit now.
Same artists as before but print offerings. Is it just me or are they smaller? Minus the very large scrolls at the top however.
Dark nrg.
Kinda plain.
Nice custom plushies and mayo. Nice dino nuggets plush too. Creative. My sister brought a mayo plush, noice.
Noice, guilty gear and fighting game keychains. I am pretty sure I brought some of these before, this artist was also at Anime Toronto last year, one of a handful, you can’t forget them that easily you know. Good shit.
More guilty gear and random keychains but not as good as the previous. Good to see that people are making guilty gear stuff still.
Hello korone and ina art and nice keychains again. New meta.
Meta keychains of vtubers, hololive and even Dokibird, gotta meta you know. Noice.
Nice prints but nah.
Not entirely sure but I think one of the booths supporting on of the lesser known vtuber companies at AN?
Nah man.
Nice art and posters. I have the vtuber bijou art print and I was going to buy their two fuwomoco ones to match but looks like it sold out, ahwell. I just realize the artist had all of hololive advent but their shiori and neressa don’t stand out that much.
Fancy displays for the new meta products.
Crystals and candles by Jann.
Fabric bag game is a thing this year it seems.
Crowding continues.
Very nice pillows and fabric arts for dakimuras, nice boob squish girl on the right pillow to. I think saw at Anime Toronto last year.
No comment.
Stickers and black and white prints? I dunno about that man.
Shiny metal pins and meta keychains.
3d printer making some worm dragon things.
Nah.
Eh. Very small prints? It isn’t just me right that thinks the print sizes are really small this year?
Hello again familiar artist. Nice bargain bin of acrylic standees in bottom eleft. I am pretty sure this artists was selling them for like $30 or even $40 in previous years, I guess with the overly high price and with everyone having plastic now, gotta lower prices and discount them. I brought a couple.
Even artists with bad plain art are getting on the shaker game.
Cute wood things and display. Wood coasters huh? New thing? I dunno man.
Retro neon booth with nice art of consoles and shit. Might as well make art for PS4 and PS5, to ensure longevity for the future retro.
Can you just like not show up for once? At least the booth is smaller this time.
Snazzy.
Interesting.
The crowding continues, but now with more cosplay.
Pretty good shit.
Nice art, artist or booth guy is like, why tho?
May or may not have seen before but it looks crazy colors around here.
Mid.
Nice bees.
Some mid and eh.
Decent…hair and cosplay from green girl. Decent hair, from dat boi.
You can’t resist the round pokemon thing. Nice mask and gloves from the artists I guess?
Do you even have prints to display at all? All in a key-chains and other goods i guess?
Nice artists selling vtuber art mainly hololive Suisei and Aqua/Towa stuff. They were at Anime Toronto, brought some stuff there so not today. Gud shit.
Gems and bags? Ok.
Nice prints, too small tho.
Good art, too small prints.
Crazy shit with shit and earrings huh. Wow. No prints, not even anime even, wow.
Great Frieren cutout and art, good way to attract attention.
No prints here, just charms, magnets and shakers, noice. That drink must taste good too.
Soon all of AN will feel like charm and stationary booths filled with shit like this.
Some black wood key chains, pretty rare but I don’t know about th material tho.
So apparently it seems like this company VGen was a big sponsor at AN, they are a company/website where you can connect with artists and have them do commissions for you, basically like Patreon except more artists focused I guess. Cool ball.
Crowding continues further to almost max power.
Wow, nice background artist.
VGen had a very large presence at the artists alley, I think they probably paid for and pushed for the artists alley to be much larger than previous years. It certainly feels like it that’s for sure.
Shitty.
But baller art. Mad lad.
Not my thing rly.
It’s cool and all but it’s just backgrounds. Something for everyone I guess. Might be mistaken for AI art.
I think this is VGen’s mascot? Nice stand.
Walls to display associated artists with VGen to show samples of commissions.
More.
Even copyright Idolmaster art too huh?
Nice.
Cool stuff, I hope they succeed. Alot of artists had stickers on their booths to show that they signed up to the site and are on there platform, cool.
I thought that this booth was associated with Phase Connnect a smaller vtuber company since they have a pretty big display but it’s not really.
Nice cutouts of some of their vtubers.
I mean it was for Phase Connect vtubers but there wasn’t any merch or things to buy. They were just giving out sample card packs because they had a collab with Japanime games for some trading card game.
An example of the card packs that they were giving out. They each had a single card in them, kind of a waste of a big display but sure whatever, they paid for it.
Oh shit, a small area where they display the puppets used in the Thunderbolt Fantasy series of action puppet shows from Taiwan-Japan that I watched. Apparently some of the creators and people in charge were guests here at AN.
Nice, smaller than I thought but nice and detailed.
They had “Ragna”, Red guy, Blue girl and some other new ones I haven’t seen before. They had “Merlin” not on display today, apparently he was on display earlier in prior days.
It’s a puppet show but it’s pretty good lol full of action and jokes.
Season 4 looks like is coming soon in 2024, wow, good shit. Never would have expected this kind of stuff to be here, any industry is welcome, even if they are puppet shows.
Nice mayplat, mad lad.
These displays with no print materials or posters are getting more and more prevalent.
One thing sold out.
Not bad but kind of everywhere.
Nah but nahh.
I have no idea but nice gems.
This booth has gone ALL in on the keychain shaker game, allowing people to fully customize what they want in their vessel, from ramen toppings, sushi and or other food items or anime game characters. Kind of insane really.
Some good not great art, all very small print size, why.
Another angle of vGen booth.
Fabric game on point. But why tho?
Nah, good looking display tho and mask, on point with meta goods.
Looks like if you only have paper goods for sale, your doomed, basically every table has non-print goods and for some it’s the majority of their table these days.
Will this be the new thing? key chains with hinges on them to open a door?
Noice meta.
Sure why not.
Prints look to small, not big enough non-print goods.
Ok I guess.
Pretty good, but not enough keychains I think. No wonder they look sad and confused, need more non-print goods.
Behind the scenes.
Kinda everywhere but nice to see some Muslims selling stuff.
Nice display but prints not big enough. Not for me.
Nice hair on mr red flannel. Prints are nice but nah.
Really good selection of art prints but it feels too small, very varied style, probably at least 2 different artists friends.
Cups and charms?
Hello again, see you before, glad that you didn’t kill yourself and quit when magni betrayed holostars and left.
Another pure non-print booth selling the meta.
Mid prints and art but the non-print goods make up for it I guess.
Prints guess it getting smaller and smaller in favor of keychains.
Pretty creative box thing with artifact inside it. Noice.
Similar concept but with games, cool.
Keyboard keycaps custom cool shit and lollypop figures? Wow pretty interesting.
Nice but nothing for me. Most artists have leaned into Frieren and other popular shows of the past year but yea, I don’t think there is anything super popular that really stands out.
Ace goods.
Kinda mid.
Nice Yugioh cards keychains. My sister brought the blue eyes one.
Forever.
It’s really crowded now.
Free water is nice.
This dude used to spray paint outside some panels in real-time, glad he got a spot indoors where all the action is.
Going outside for some lunch. Nice terry and green Genshin girl. There is a decent amount of cosplay today but for some reason alot of people always seemed to be on the move so didn’t get a chance to stop and ask for photos.
Delicious in Dungeon main guys trying out the nice Goku and Naruto pizza.
Bob’s Burgers truck, no relation with the show I don’t’ think. But they try.
Poutine shack pretty busy.
This cheese curds and curly fries cne like place was busy with a line.
For the Muslims I suppose with halal shawarma.
I decided to get some poutine from a stall right beside the shawarma truck, for $12 flat it’s not bad man. Put some extra seasoning and ketchup just in case it’s shit, didn’t’ need it but you never know. Still gud.
Sister and bro got chicken shawarma, it was decent they said.
We split with bro who headed out elsewhere to do other things and I went into dealers to scope out the area.
Nice Genos.
Opening area is about the same although the vendors are a bit different.
Sparetime was a light sponsor last year, sellling shit and other stuff like this.
What was formerly a very big empty wall now has the standard books and artbooks back. The table arrangement was very wide and had like 4 tables worth of depth, you couldn’t’ actually reach for some of the books on display because they were out of reach, not sure if intentional or not.
Material fabric goods in the meta.
The space of former Harry T’s is now occupied with random stores forever.
As per usual, some artists couldn’t get the main artists alley and decided to put their money down in a place in dealers. I am never sure if this actually works out or not.
Somewhere between artists and a full blown store.
Nice crispy boi but I have too many already, big boi from Japan is just chilling in my chair at home, with nowhere else to put him.
Proto Lord.
Cute city.
This dealer had some illustration poster boards from Japan, from ichiban kuji and also hololive. I didn’t mention it but I actually brought some on Friday from a seller at Nomonochi, I asked my sister to buy one from here yesterday too. I like things and paper. Not enough paper.
Tons of prize figures for sure.
In general vendors had alot more wider walking space them previous years which is good.
Oh boi our staple Shilin pro artist is here again. I think no shit she might have been here for like 10-15 years maybe. Staple.
Prizes and figures per usual at this space.
Checking out some nice disney twisted wonderland merch.
Wall of Mikus.
Nice onigiri cat, too flat tho.
Small ebi-berry is nice.
Navito world, doing their thing with a pretty large display as previous years, good to see they are back.
Gallery pins doing their thing, another staple of all conventions. I find that they always get attention from first time convention goers.
Wow, what is this? Artists alley? More pins and charms huh even in dealers.
Lots of stuff here.
Lots of clothing booths appearing, lots themed with cars and stuff too. Initial d-like kinda.
Some indie vtuber talks with someone on the floor of the convention at this booth. Wow. nice.
The booth itself has a nice collection of waifu merch such as pillows, boob mousepads and other less standard goods. I think they were first here last year when Shylily vtuber came as a guest but with now upgraded display.
They know what’s up, very big stands of Dokibird and Mint Maid, gotta support those ex-Niji guys you know as independents.
A sample of their goods. They are very, I think maybe fully all in on vtubers based on these pillowcases. Nice art.
It’s kind of a gamble to go all in on vtubers, especially if they are not official merch or anything but I wish them the best.
Some stores had some official ichiban kuji lottery stuff, nice hololive goods.
Nice, some of the newest prize figures of last year. The Bocchi figure was newly in crane games in Japan when I went last year and the one that people camped and cleaned out out of all the machines within hours.
Crazy ghost socks.
Prize figures without the boxes.
Some bullshit white people role play buy mystery box.
Seen these guys over the past few years, they are always empty, hope they doing alright with the shirts.
Merch fully stocked.
Noice, they have hololive relax time prize figures. These were also in Japan in crane games and seem to have stock of last year and more recently. Good shit.
Sure this isn’t artists alley?
Booth that had some very big expensive figures on display. The large Date a Live Kurumi is 1/2.5 scale recently came out too. Of course they overcharge for this cause they are a business but yea, cool that they brought this here.
More displays of their stock, interesting they had no glass. They were here former years too I think.
Going into the Beguling, one of the last bastion that sells manga and books, having a very large area sectioned off for them that requires masks.
Lots of boxes and stock.
Their R18+ selection and related goods have increased over the years which is good, not just a FAKKU books depot now.
Larger selection of lewd goods, not pictures, on the table full of FAKKU books.
Some people trying to capitalize on that nice blue flower from Frieren. Ok I guess.
Pro artist I think.
Budget Tom Holland cosplaying as some red women with a bat. I have no idea.
Trash goods.
OG legend booth selling the standard doujishi stuff, probably here for 10+ years now I think.
Unlike the past two years, the very rare empty spare table.
Leather bag goods huh no anime?
Something that I would make fr fr.
These custom art bags are meta I guess now.
2B and handler take a break in another empty spare booth.
AN is where people buy clothes now apparently.
Assorted goods.
At Noms booth to buy some extra purse bag thing that my sister wants. Noms is good, part of the anime convention circle corruption.
Nice that all kinds of people enjoy Noms stuff, food is universal.
Inflated Gengar doing his rounds.
Nice penguin eggs plushies. OC, plz do not steal.
This shop in the corner selling prize figures is always here. Forever I guess.
Hollowknight princess girl who is supposed to be main character in Holllowknight 2 but game where apparently, duke nukem legacy maybe?
One of the stores/minor sponsor brought some of their goods and display cubes to show off stuff, noice.
Prize figure quality has improved considerably over the past few years which is cool. This purple date of live girl is apparently considered one of the best quality prize figures in recent memory and I can see why. 10-15 years ago something like this as a decent scale would be over $100 for sure but I think this is only like 30-40 dollars? Wow.
A man stands with only cranes on his mind. He’s going to kill me.
Plamod store brought one of their smaller gundams like last year I think, nice.
Some bullshit stationary.
This is not artists alley by the way, but some other space that is like kinda a 1.5 artist alley for overflow it seems. It’s the space where registration used to be.
Nice fists.
Katamari goods are rare you know. Gotta take em.
As mentioned the area I am now is not the dealers but some limbo space that is supposed to be for other convention booths or related spaces but apparently other artists here because why not?
Not artists alley, just saying.
Definitely not artists alley that’s for sure.
Some not lego bullshit that has been around for a few years.
Nice crown Gura.
Yep, not artist alley.
Cute pumpkin cats plushies. OC, plz do not steal.
Somehow fitting to be put in not-artist alley 1.5 area.
Definitely not artist alley.
Nice assortment of plushies from vtuber mascots and even Dokibirds OG form, the tomato.
Gud shit, Mint maid and Dokibird art along with hololive and other relevent trends. Gud.
Nice Dokibird tomato bagg.
This is actually pretty cool and good, arctlic stands of guilty gear characters and other anime franchises like chainsaw man in the same style of skullgirls. For all I know, this artist might very well/is/was a sprite artist for skullgirls. Thought about it, but nah, not my style, cool tho.
Wow, definitely crazy not an artist here.
Even this bonus artist alley area .5 space is pretty busy. Nowhere near as busy as the main one but still respectable.
However, I would still be pissed if I had table at artist alley and they put me into this limbo area, the traffic is not that great still.
Probably a bro that chills out at midland and finch with his suped up itasha car. Noice.
Ok USA.
A much larger gundam statue was also in the area, not sure who brought it but it deserves more attention compared to that small bitch one.
Limbo area apparently has screens now, nice.
Heading over to north building to check out the new gaming area and AN idol finals. 9S kinda weak even with the sword.
Cars remain maybe more even.
For the first time they opened up this space for panels and events. Wow, looks cool in the true form of the North building.
They could do something.
Very nice fancy bathrooms in this space, makes the main south washrooms like shit.
The gaming area is very large now, and it’s good.
What was once in the limbo area now gets the full space of this hall which is cool.
Tons of of people playing card games and magic yugioh shit, gud stuff.
Even classic games like this get attention.
No idea what game this is.
This is either yugioh or magic I think for this group.
Ample seating room for resting or gaming.
Couple of booths to sell merch and fill up on packs I guess. No Dolly’s this year tho.
Rock band/guitar hero gaming and seats.
Area around.
They had a large area of laptops for pc gaming too.
Wow even full towers, who the hell brought all this shit here?
Retro gaming and old consoles, cool.
DDR plastic sheets for dance games, much better than back in the day.
Wow, what the hell is this, they have Mahjong tables? I mean it’s cool and all but who comes all the way to a convention to play Mahjong? I guess when your bored and out of things to do, might aswell Pon and Ron some bitches I guess.
They have some big screens and stages from sponsors, I think MSI/AMD.
Oh shit real, some black dudes going at it with street fighter 6. Wow.
Nice gaming case.
Yea, MSI was a big sponsor that brought all the pcs and shit. In many ways, this really is like last year’s CNE, which at the time I was calling Anime North, funny how they actually ended up coming to actual Anime North to sponsor and do shit. Good shit.
Inside stage for AN idol, the last two performers.
The winner ultimately.
Girl who went last and has been doing this since she was 14, I think she’s been doing this for 8 years now.
Proof of existence, purple light sitting edition.
After the show we head back out to the main area and see samurai red head legend, guarding the door. Thank you.
On our way to the hotel and seeing cosplay peeps if possible.
Kamen rider and Makima from chainsaw man, noice.
Nice backpack of hololive stuff and person themselves is kinda Fauna hololive wig I guess.
Hololive Korone with shades.
Ultraman buddist monks, maybe canon. I have no idea.
Nice Rem with morning star/flail thing.
Old Terry Bogard is just done. Had enough of your shit.
Gundam Seed Strike freedom and several Lacus Clyne cosplayers, gud shit.
Nice clones we got here.
Nice clones we got here too.
Parking area dance people forever I guess.
Oh shit, pretty nice cosplay of Utena/Magia Baiser from “Gushing over Magical Girls”, the best joke magical girl show in recent memory. Very brave cosplay to do too. Noice.
Nice cosplay but not sure from where, guess Genshin/Starrail as per usual, china shit probably. Maybe wrong tho.
Baller king of all cosmos sipping his drink. You know.
Fat armor.
A bit less Tokyo Revengers this year but yea.
Very nice FGO Koyanskaya cosplay in her second outfit, the bunny one where she technically never wears in the story but sure, why not. Good shit.
OH SHIT. CCP Tank. I am not well versed in CCP propaganda or recent political hardships of late but I think I saw two asian bros walking by with their crew and one stopped and pointed and said to the other “hey”, pounded his chest and pointed and said “Taiwan is a country” then they bro hugged and went on their way. lol.
Nice, the full cast of Frieren doing a great job of cosplay and two Ferns because sure.
Wow, even the local swiss chalet has acknowledge this time as an opportunity to make money of AN, more of this please.
On our way, smiley.
Some furry and blonde guitar guy.
Making the rounds inside the hotel looking at people.
Nice Vega and Juri. noice.
Not this year, not this year.
Showing some AMV or some old anime I think.
Not a kid, just a squid.
Yakuza Majima tries his hand at genderswap or something.
Is this open? Ginko.
Walking back the way.
Lemonade, since 2010 maybe I think?
Nice guts in the distance.
Cells at work is still around sometimes.
Another nice Frieren and Himmel cosplay. Might have taken a picture of them in the past but who knows.
Himmel gave me one of his favorite blue flowers after I took their photo. Lol. I think this is a thing I guess now?
Some winx fairies or something as my sister says.
Couple of Guras doing some last minute shopping in dealers beguling. What’s with the purple bag tho? Plushies or clothes? A bit too pale tho, what’s with that.
Red ranger and black ranger just walking, no body cares about them anymore. They had their time. On our way out leaving AN now and to dinner.
We had originally wanted to go to Osaka sushi at woodside square mall because I have never tried their all you can eat but once we got there we discovered they were gone…some Pho place replaced it now. Shiettt. In times of need, you gotta go with what you know, just like last year, to Sushi Legend then. Mann.
Always good always solid Sushi Legend.
We all ordered for ourselves on our phones, we did a pretty good job of ordering only the stuff you are going to eat.
Nice assortment of torched sushi nigiri.
Roses, salmon and eel. Not all mine. Mine is only the eel I think and one spicy salmon.
Gotta get that shark fin soup you know and korean kalbi. After a nice sushi dinner that ended our day and I dropped people back home.
The following is a quick summary of the things that I got at AN this year, which admittedly even I didn’t think I would end up buying so much shit worth.
I normally don’t get prize figures because they are too cheap and low in quality for me but I ended up getting these two because there isn’t too many figures for Hololive’s Haachama and FGO’s Abagail Williams, a noodle stopper figure. Why not, the selection of merch and goods this year at AN was above average honesty, considering I brought these.
I brought alot of charms and key-chains from artists this year, a shit ton. Pictured above is I think roughly $150ish worth of plastic and charms. From the top, FGO Abagail, Chino from order is a rabbit, Squidward dance spinner keychain, Dokibird and Mint Maid charms, Suica game shaker keychain, Hololive baerys charm, hipster location pins, bottom row: Shigure Ui (OG non-loli form), Hololive Fuwamoco, Guilty gear Elphet and Dizzy.
Free paper and those free single pack cards of Phase Connect vtuber card game.
Hololive Ichiban Kuji illustration boards, first two from the left is Chlole, Subara which I got from Nomonochi for $20 each, the last blue one is Lamy for $40 in dealers. They are cool, not sure what I am going to do with them or display them but they are cool. Official goods are good even paper/card.
Opened up that Haachama figure, looks not bad, for a prize figure. I am happy with it’s quality and price point. Even if a bit overpriced.
Abagail noodle stopper is pretty nice too a bit small but it works.
She can chill right besides my Kenshiro noodle stopper that I brought in Japan as well lol.
These two figures are supposed to be of the same style/line, the relaxtime prize figures line but why does Haachama seem so much bigger? lol It’s like Subaru is 1/8 scale while Haachama is 1/7? I have no idea but it’s fine. They both supposed to be highschool girls, but why the big difference, even considering Haachamas bigger boobs? Ahwell lol.
Well then, with that said for the first time in a long time I didn’t but any prints from artists alley, I think the first time in a long time where this has happened, wow. It just seems like key chains and other acrylic goods have taken over, even clothing and other merch instead of prints which is somewhat understandable. I have the feeling that with the advent of AI generated art, alot of artists have been discouraged from making high quality prints and illustrations and have instead focused on simpler chibli arts and making keychains and non-print goods because AI, which is just a guess on my part but after AN this year, I think I may be right. The size of prints have also shrank too, maybe it’s just me but that’s just how I feel seeing it on Sunday. Outside of the general meta shift in goods in artists alley, the size and scope of artists alley has increased considerably over last years, I would roughly guess it is around 30-40% bigger than last year, they basically took the entire artist alley area and have significant other areas even in dealers and in the “Limbo” space that was formerly for registration that now house artists. This may be due part to considerably sponsorship from VGen which I am sure have influenced the size of artists alley this year, which is a good thing. In general while there is still a lack of real anime industry, I see signs of progress with sponsor presence in the gaming are with MSI providing computer and gear and other smaller scale sponsors like Claw Me Baby (money laundering but whatever) and other shops. The fact that AN is now using the entire North building this year is a huge upgrade over the entire history of AN thus far, they should have always used that building and I am glad that they are spending money to do so this year. The move of registration into the North building was a very good move and the wait/line up was nonexistent. The overall conduct and organization of this year’s AN has vastly improved over the past couple of years and dare I say it, I think this years AN was the best overall AN in it’s history. There is enough vendors, artists and things to see/do this year where you can actually justify spending 3 full days there unlike previously where Sunday was good enough for me and I was done. The move towards getting more vtuber guests like Dokibird and other smaller vtubing companies is great stuff and they actually had some voice actors from Astroboy and some older shit show up which is very nice, it’s not exactly Nao Tōyama or Tomokazu Sugita but it’s better than just pure English VAs which no one cares about. While they still lack real industry presence, if they go heavy into the direction that AN is the best fan convention for artists and supporting them, then I am ok with having no industry; suck up more to VGen and get Wacom or Paint Studio Pro in here and you have successfully made AN a good convention for artists and buys of artist produced merch. They still need better security and other things but overall this year was probably the best AN ever, if not at least in recent memroy. I had no expectations of AN as per usual but this year I was pleasently surprized, considering I brought so much shit that I didn’t think I would find at AN. Good stuff, keep it up AN, maybe you don’t have to die after all.