User blog:LuciaHunter/CharaExpo 2015

Introduction to CharaExpo 2015
So what is CharaExpo? It's a new project by Bushiroad to host a new event during the first half of the year that so far has been lacking in Singapore. Rather than thinking of it as an opponent to Anime Festival Asia, it's more of a way to fill in the gap for all the hardcore otakus that need their events but do not have any. All existing events before this are small-scale and non-official- that is to say, they are unable to get things like companies, studios, voice actors and actresses to come down and participate. CharaExpo was designed to specifically take advantage of this lacking, and eventually evolve into something hopefully just as massive as AFA.

As this is its first year, many things depend on its performance. It is still unknown what the turnout will be like, and whether this is viable to be done again in future years. Still, it has had quite a promising start from what I saw today, and so I'm hopeful for it to happen again.

I started my trip together with Lunaries, but he left sometime after noon. A lot of time was spent camping in queues or just resting though.

There were a ton of Love Live! cosplayers too, but I really don't like taking photos of people so I didn't take any. But there were cosplay standards of all levels, I was surprised to see the really good ones.

Bushiroad Booth
More than a booth, they had an entire area to themselves. You can check out their catalogue here, but they ended up bringing some things in last minute that weren't even in and I missed out on them because I didn't know they were there. Curses. Anyway, it's obvious they were the biggest because well, it's their event, so.

The stuff they had were really unexpected. The jerseys, LLSIF Thanksgiving Festival T-shirt & Towel, Letter Set and Postcard Kuji they had are all goods that made their debut just two weeks prior at the LLSIF Thanksgiving Festival. Half of the Anniversary files here haven't even been released in Japan. This is really the first time we've seen an instance of overseas events getting official event goods directly and this quickly, and it's really something to be hopeful about.

The most important part about the Bushiroad booth was, however, the scam they had ongoing: This was the biggest factor in making me want to buy stuff. But the odds were astronomical. There are literally only 5 boards, one for each seiyuu and one for all four of them, and the Kuji has over a thousand balls.

This was taken just before I went home at 5pm, an hour before closing time. Clearly some executive either failed his math, or grossly overestimated his sales. The Kuji still had at least half its balls left. Kind of makes me wonder what they are going to do with those two remaining boards though.

I was sad about not winning anything in my 4 tries at first, but then got over it when I realised the sheer odds I was up against. Also, felt a lot better when I saw someone win the one with "ALL". That's the best board, right? It's gotta be sheer awesome, worthy of the one guy who paid tons of money, and beat odds harder than a UR draw, right?



Apparently, no. Bushiroad can't even afford to print seiyuu photos or character illustrations. Here's a plain shikishi with 4 signatures on it.

When the guy who won it let me take a photo, I actually almost felt indignant on his behalf, and also on behalf of all the fans here. Bushiroad, you really can do better than this.

Xarts Japan Inc Booth
This is just a tiny booth, but it carries pretty interesting goods: they're from the Kanda Matsuri x Love Live! Collaboration that took place this year. I suspect they overestimated necessary stock for the actual festival in Tokyo back in May, and decided to clear it in overseas events. Which is really a win-win situation for us, because it's kinda hard to make a pilgrimage to Kanda Shrine (If you're a LLiver, this is something you have to do at least once though). Catalogue here.

Bushimo Booth
Also known as the Love Live! School idol festival area.

There was a pair of guys in front of us (in the 3rd picture) with Kingblades, and because the guy in front of them was playing Nawatobi, they turned their KBs to green and started waving them. It was kinda funny. And then the two of them decided to compete in scores, and they played Beat in Angel while their KBs were set to red and yellow. Cute.

Lunaries and I took a leaf from their book and competed in Anemone Heart. I won by 11k points. :D

Sometime after that I checked Twitter and some guy I've been talking to for the past couple of days mentioned how he was using his KB to wave to the guy playing Nawatobi in front of him- All the coincidences in life wahahaha.

Other Booths
The small Chibi Kyun-Charas from Banpresto.

Banpresto's booth also held a ton of Ichiban Kujis, including the Love Live! Kyun-Kyun Sensation! set. Since Luna and I already had everything we wanted from that set (actually more like he does while I only have a Nico figurine, but I know to quit when I'm ahead), we passed up on it.

Good Smile Company had a display of their Love Live! Nendoroids and Eli figma. The figma was actually smaller than I had expected. Still, cute. Those tables in their display area were actually a sort of activity where people could design their own Nendoroid face plates.

ODEX had a booth too. It's the company handling the LL Movie for most of South-East Asia.

Many of the local hobby shops had booths too. The notable thing about this one was Luna asking me where the art of those three files hanging under the shop's sign came from, and I was literally quoting him magazine volume numbers and which months they were released. Even the people passing by also turned to give me weird looks.

Yeeeah, I think working on the Love Live! History page has damaged my brain permanently.

What does Japan pro wrestling and Vanguard Cardfight and Love Live! have in common? They're all owned by the same overlords.

Yes. There literally was a wrestling ring in CharaExpo and exhibition matches. I caught a few, they're actually pretty intense. Since I had nothing better to do while waiting, might as well.

My Trip
So now I'll just fill in the blanks about my day. Just so you know, buying merchandise is Serious Business. This can never be stressed enough. Whether it's Japan or Singapore, if you want goods, you have to be prepared to suffer for them because the best things will always sell out within literally minutes of the convention doors opening.

And that was why I got up at 5am, took a train down and was there by 7am.

Surprise surprise, hardly the only one with the same idea. I was about the 50th to 60th person, but luckily not everyone was aiming for the Bushiroad Booth. Quite a few of them were headed for the KEY VisualArts booth, which had a lot of event-exclusive items.

The event opened around 9.30am, complete with ribbon-cutting ceremony and all because it was the first. Didn't get to see anything though.

Luna and I rushed in straight for the Bushiroad booth, and I grabbed my Maki jersey. It was one of the last two. I've no idea how that happened, but it was a good thing Luna reminded me to grab it first instead of looking at the other stuff. =X

Anyway when we were doing the Bushiroad Kuji after that, the guy in front of me had like a bazillion draws and it was really weird. It was only a while later that I found out the answer on Twitter, when I saw a picture of a receipt circulating around. Seriously dude, why? That's a lot of poor people behind us deprived of jerseys. I just hope he's buying for his friends (18 other LLiver friends???) and not reselling because if it's the latter, these kind of people need a good punch in the face.

Oh yeah, all his 60 Bushiroad Kuji draws? He didn't get a single signed board. There was some hideous irony here that I didn't know whether to sympathise with him or laugh at him.

This photo was taken by my senpai an hour after the convention started when he finally checked the goods listing and realised Bushiroad was bringing in a lot of really recent stuff from the SIF Thanksgiving Festival. But I know the jerseys were sold out as early as twenty minutes in thanks to well, as mentioned earlier.

I spent a lot of time just wandering around and saying hi to people. Because CharaExpo had approached my club to hire part-timers, there were a lot of people I knew working as staff- unfortunately, no one had any staff discounts or benefits =X

Luna and I pooled our stuff together after lunch for a photo hehe. He bought the two shirts and they still cost less than my jersey. ._. The next row of items are the 6 "X Million Users Anniversary" files, along with a concert lanyard. The Maki sheet key-holder is mine, as well as the Maki sticker. The towel at the bottom left is his and the rest are freebies.

It's probably worth noting that the price of the towel and lanyard in this picture are half of what I bought them for at last year's AFA heh. But well, last year it was more important to clock the spending than the actual buying (autograph tickets!), so.

I stayed late into the afternoon for an autograph session by Kishida Mel, the illustrator for the Atelier: Adventurer of Arland game series, Hanasaku Iroha anime, and Kamisama no Memochou light novels. His session was due to start at 4.40pm. I had to start camping at 3pm, and I'm lucky I picked the right spot to wait for the queue to start because it was a mess. There was no purchase requirements, and it was limited to the first 70 people in line, so everyone was desperate to get it. Securing this ticket was a bloody battle. But I ended up 3rd in the queue whoo.

I really need to work on my speeches to seiyuus and illustrators. All I ended up saying was that I played all the Atelier games and I really loved the cute art. ._. Well he had another 67 people behind me to sign for anyway so I guess it's just as well I didn't bore him.

Went home after that, taking one last loop around the place to see what the scene was like and saying goodbye to friends. Place was pretty much winding down at 5pm already since certain places such as the movie screening area and pro-wrestling area had finished their events for the day. Activity was left only in the stage, card-game and goods areas.

Loot
Loot accounting, my favourite yet most dreaded part of coming home from an event. Here we have the jersey, and on top of it is a bunch of LLSIF stickers given free for playing at the LLSIF booth. The fans next to it are also from the same booth for free, and these are actually the same fans handed out at the SIF Thanksgiving Festival I mentioned earlier. Maki sheet key-holder, Premium MAKIE Maki sticker, and UmiEri pens for someone else.

All the freebies, this playmat was something I won from the Bushiroad Kuji. Not quite sure what to do with it. Also a bunch of postcards. ._.

My new Maki jersey yaaaaaaaay I have joined the elite ranks of those who own the official jersey. I tried it on and it's actually made of a slightly rougher material so I'm not used to it, plus it's new so a bit scratchy. Also the collar is stifling and it'll probably take a while for it to get used to being folded down.

Despite all these complaints though, it's actually a lot nicer in colour than I had feared previously. My photo doesn't quite do it justice, but it's something I think I could pull off rather fashionably without fear.

And this is where all my stickers went whoo. The bottom row was from last year's AFA, and now the new stickers have been stuck on top. It actually took me quite a while to figure out the new order! I was bugging everyone for their opinions on it, but this was what I finally came up with that settled quite a few criteria: It's OCD-friendly in colour-placement, it has Maki in the center, and it's also arranged by shippings. It's amazing this was even possible! xD

And that's it for everything to do with CharaExpo 2015! Time to go back to eating plain rice and drinking water for the next six months until this year's AFA where Bushiroad will undoubtedly figure out a new way to take our money from us.