I just realized I haven’t made a con post since last year’s Dreamhack in Leipzig. Woups! I went to quite a lot of conventions last year, all of them awesome! I figured I’d try to summarize the highlights and lowlights of the events I went to last year after Dreamhack.

Hydracon 2017

That’s a small convention in the centre of the Danish mainland. Usually, I go with the Warcrafters and our Darkmoon Faire, but this year we went as regular visitors. I performed in the show with my Cammy cosplay together with two other Street Fighter cosplayers. The show was so small, they decided to remove most of the prizes and have just a single one. We didn’t win, which was fine, but it was kind of sad to have such a short show. There was also a showcase which I participated in with my Ysera formal version dragon, which won best innovation. I mostly just participated to get a chance to use my Ysera cosplay again after doing a lot of repairs, but it was fun.

RPC 2017

RPC – Roleplay Convention – is a big convention in Cologne, Germany. I visited it for the first time last year, and was instantly impressed. First of all, they treat cosplayers and artists very good. We went as cosplay guests, and the requirement from us in return for free entrance was to be there early, when the rest of the guests arrived, and pose for photos etc in our cosplays. And then just walk around in cosplays and set the mood. I really liked that!

We stayed with some friends in a private home and half of my group went to the convention centre with the tram, the rest took a car, so we had a place to store spare clothes etc. Getting to the convention centre with public transportation is nice and easy – the S- and U-bahn trains of Cologne are very convenient.

The convention itself was held in two big halls plus a large outdoor area. It was around 30 degrees, and I wore my Valeera cosplay, which is mostly fake leather and too much wig. It was so warm, I felt I might melt, so we stayed mostly inside the air conditioned halls. There was a big dealer area with a big variety of offerings – from the usual anime/China things to gaming merch, LARP eqiupment, tabletop games, cosplay materials and much more. There was also a lot of artists selling original art and crafts, and a row of cosplayer booths where you could see exhibited cosplays and get your cosplay repaired.

Quite a few photographers had set up mini studios and took professional grade photographs of cosplayers for free, among them EosAndy, Fotograf-13 and other talented photographers.

The outside area, which I visited mostly on the 2nd day, had a medieval faire. I love those kinds of things, so for me this was perfect. They offered clothing, jewellry, swords, armors and much more.

The biggest downside of the convention was the prices on drinks. I’m from Denmark, and things like soda, bottled water etc. is generally more expensive here (hence why we drive to Germany to shop for such things). But at RPC, prices were expensive even by my standards! The first day, we didn’t know it was allowed to bring your own food and drinks. We found out more than half-way through the day, and made a trip to a nearby supermarket to stock up (after we’d changed out of our too hot cosplays).

The food at the convention area was also a bit expensive, but not unaffordably so. And it was really delicious, too, although hard to eat in cosplay. Especially the meat on stick they were selling in the medieval area was good!

We didn’t get to see the cosplay contest or any other stage events, since there was just so much to see and we could only stay a few hours the 2nd day, because we had a long drive back to Denmark. But all in all, it was awesome, and we’ve already planned our trip for this year’s RPC!

Dreamhack Summer 2017

This post is getting kinda long – but I wanna add just 1 more event to it! Dreamhack Summer 2017. I went again with some of the Warcrafters and we worked at Steelseries’ both this time. They had a contest going on where people had to post selfies or pictures with us. That was pretty fun!

We all participated in Komplett’s cosplay contest, and I won 2nd place with my Lagertha and Lisa won 1st with her D.Va. Pretty cool!

We also took lots of pictures that turned out really good. Han med kameran was particularly nice and took some really good photos in an outdoor green area.

We stayed at a hotel in town and in the evening went to a big party at a local sports bar. It’s really fun to hang out like that and see each other outside convention settings.

The second day I had the worst problems with my eyes, some kind of allergies. I had planned to wear lenses, but I couldn’t even wear proper make-up. I had a fun day, anyways, so no big deal. We walked around and saw the rest of the halls and watched some matches of Heroes of the Storm tournament.

We got pizza in the evening and ate it at the hotel, since we were just that exhausted. Due to some language barrier, I ended up with one that had meat, salad AND fries… Very interesting combo.

The last day, I went to the pharmacy before heading to the con area. After much discussion and googling, I found some anti-allergy pills that helped my runny eyes, and after a few hours, managed to do my make-up. For fun, Lisa and I joined the Dreamhack cosplay show. I was wearing my Murloc, so I did it more as a moral support and comic relief. Lisa wore her D.Va and won 2nd place. The contest was nice – there was snacks and drinks for cosplayers and a place to change and do make-up. The stage was outside, which I wasn’t a big fan of. But otherwise, it was good!

All in all, a nice experience. Food wasn’t gourmet, but decent enough and fairly priced.

Coming soon: Cons of 2017 part two!