John Zeitler

I think I can safely say that Kurokiiro Festival is a good convention.

Let me back up a second. First off, this is the first time that the event’s been called Kurokiiro, as opposed to its previous designation of “Tekko 1/2″. Basically, they’re treating this as the first run of a brand-new convention, and it kind of had that atmosphere. For two days, the eighth floor of the Parkway Center Inn was a haven of gaming and anime… more heavily on the gaming, but we’ll get to that. By and large the most significant difference here was that it was a two-day event as opposed to a single day.

They were expecting about 300 people or so. I didn’t ask anyone for an official number on my way out, but the last I heard was that it hit somewhere around 600 or 700 all told. Yeah. Despite this, it never felt overcrowded or too confining; it was laid out very well.

The game room was small, but you could still see and hear pretty much everything that you needed to. Smash Bros. was the order of the day, with Rock Band 2/Beatles coming in a very close second; three sets had the varying versions of the game, while a Rock Band setup was pretty much persistently in use. People swapped in and out of that pretty freely, though, and I got to do everything but drum (which is good, because I can’t drum well). I did get to do lead vocals on “Dear Prudence”. Which was great. Sadly, there was a poor BlazBlue station that saw comparatively little use. Was it because it was on the PS3, or just jammed into a corner? We may never know.

People go to cons for different reasons, but “watch anime” is usually a pretty big one. In this regard I think Kurokiiro could do a little better next year by having two video rooms instead of just one. Also, scheduling them a bit better might work out well; I did want to see the four .hack//LIMINALITY shorts, but I wasn’t about to stay up until 11p on Saturday to see them. Fortunately, there were enough other things to do that it was a minimal problem– just please lose the “blocks” idea. I would have stuck around for Cardcaptor Sakura if I didn’t have to sit through Angelic Layer first, but since you didn’t tell me when CCS started, that didn’t happen.

Which really leaves the main events and the panel space. The only “panel” I attended was the usual “DS get-together”, which as usual was way too short (I’m going to get off my dead ass and try to get it to be a constant thing at Tekko 2010). Main had the AMV contest, which I really liked, but it also had a couple of concerts. I’ll admit that I didn’t quite know what to make of Battlecake, but I will similarly admit that I was blown away by The Soft Reset. One might not make the connection “video game music = jazz” at first, but once they start in on “Fountain of Dreams” (from pretty much every Kirby game) it just clicks. They even managed to make Big Blue relaxing. Yes, you read that right.

I came away from this convention with a lot of useful information. First off, I need to get a room. I can’t be at the mercy of knowing I have to drive back home every night; if I was assured that a safe warm bed was just floors away instead of miles I’d be able to take those late-night viewings in stride. Secondly: Suncoast did not close up shop entirely. The one in Erie died back in 1999, but Greensburg (only 20 miles from my house) is still kicking and has literally the best anime selection I’ve seen in a regular store since 2004 (when Media Play in Erie kicked the bucket). You have no idea how much my heart leapt when I got there.

Finally, and this is the most important thing. The Pittsburgh/southwest PA anime culture is one of not just tolerance, not just acceptance, but genuine and sincere love. Love of the craft, to be sure, but in truth it’s a love of each other. Every otaku is treated the same here. If gaming is your thing, there’s an ODST controller with your name on it. If you dig EGL, the tea party’s that way (mind your manners). All are welcome and all are loved. It’s a miracle that happens at every con, really. But in this world, it seems like I always wind up re-learning that lesson just in time. And never have I been more thankful to learn it once again.

Have a good night, folks.