With the festivities winding down today, so ends another chapter of A-Kon. There were cosplayers, internet celebrities, furries, 4channers, and regular fans all gathered together for the sake of anime. Sure the smell was… unique, but it was certainly fun. There was a group Caramell Dansen in the dealer room earlier but alas, I didn’t bring my camera for the final day.

Picked up one final item, the Kotobukiya Shana swimsuit version for a cool $30 plus tax. I couldn’t resist Shana’s siren song after all. I also saw the cute Max Factory Kotori Shirakawa, but then I realized that while I like Da Capo, I don’t like it that much. Some of the dakimakura covers were tempting too, but I wouldn’t be caught dead with one of those.

Anime Fest is spaced far enough from A-Kon to give my wallet time to recover, and for better or worse, it’s a much smaller convention.

I don’t think I’ll go to A-Kon next year, but I’ll be shooting for either Anime Expo or Otakon in 2009, because it’s time to see and experience something new. I’ve really wanted to go to both of those conventions for a long time. I should start looking for a group to meet up with since I don’t know anyone out there, and it’s doubtful I can persuade any of my friends around here to travel that far.

This year’s A-Kon journey has come to an end. Well it’s not officially over yet, but Sunday is more of a wrap up day to haggle for dealer leftovers. The Rebel XTi went on its first convention tour-of-duty and there are plenty of pictures, but what I have doesn’t even begin to encompass the massive amount of con-goers and cosplayers that were there. I meant to take more but fatigue (and laziness) set in.

This was my first real outing with the camera. I know the photos aren’t great, so I have to keep practicing to get better. You can find all the pics at the Photobucket link below. My favorite pics and goodies are after the jump.

A-Kon Photos

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The shadow of A-Kon 19 is looming overhead. I just spent the last 3 and a half hours standing in the vicious pre-registration line. It’s discouraging that my morale is so low before the convention has even started. Over the next few days, I’ll brave the dangerous crowds to hopefully attain some much coveted goodies, all the while taking pictures of otaku in their natural habitat.

Survival gear, camera, checklist, hazmat suit, autographed picture of Donna Summer… All systems green. I’ll be back in a couple days.

Continuing from 20-11, here are the Top 10 on the list. It was easy enough to pick the girls. The hard part was actually putting them in order. Without further delay, check out the results after the jump.

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I know most lists are usually of the Top 10 variety, but sometimes ten spots just aren’t enough. Even having twenty still forced me to cut some of my favorites from the list. A Top 30 would have been a bit much, so this is a good compromise. I’ve decided to separate the list into two entries to make it more manageable. So who made the cut? Find out after the jump.

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Let’s face the facts here. If you’re a male anime fan, you like girl’s school uniforms (seifuku) in some way, shape, or form. There are so many school life anime that it’s nigh impossible to avoid exposure to them. I was originally indifferent to seifuku, but they’ve really grown on me over the years for some reason. They just have this cute charm. I’ve classified the uniforms into three different types after the jump.

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So you think you can make an eroge? Well now it’s possible… If you can write multiple scenarios, compose music, record voices, create sound effects, draw the characters, and script the entire thing. Still interested? If so, then check out two visual novel freeware Blade Engine and Renpy. Think of these programs as the RPG Maker equivalent for visual novels.

Making a visual novel is one thing. Making a good visual novel is something else entirely. Don’t forget to include the ero scenes!

Moe is many things. Maybe it’s a childhood friend’s alien robot maid that is physically weak, paraplegic, blind, schizophrenic, has Alzheimer’s, and happens to be a ghost too. Now that’s what I call moe~.

It’s a real shame that the Welcome to the NHK anime had to tone down this skit from the original manga. Here’s the original version from the manga.

Words are lost to me.

Arcana Heart provides half of your daily recommended intake of moe with less calories than the typical moe anime competitor. Examu’s all-girl fighting game brawled its way to North American shores in mid-April courtesy of Atlus USA. Eleven girls, each representing a different facet of moe otaku culture, duke it out in a fighting system highly reminiscent of the Guilty Gear series.

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