My first ever anime con was last year here at Sakura Con. It was cool to see people dress up as anime characters and walk around and take pictures-- I took a picture of an oompa loompa on one of the days I was there

I loved the game room with all the dance games like itg, piu, and ddr. I also participated  in two of the dance game tournaments held during Sakura Con-- I made it in 3rd for the Itg tournament and 2nd for the DDR Extreme tournament. I had a lot of fun and I got to meet some new people. I'm hoping everything that was there last year be here this year.

I'm going to try and cos-play this year as Terumi from BlazBlue

At SakuraCon last year Pyramid Head graced us with his presence and played Pop'n Music and Pump It Up.

I hope he returns this year to do the same.

Here is the cell phone pic I took at the time:

http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?pid=11878654&l=d62c05f804&id=691160175

A couple SakuraCons ago, we hung out with Chris Foy by the ITG 3 cab, and one of the performing groups was Smile.dk :]

This last year, DM Ashura was there, I believe.
On top of ITG3 and DDR Extreme, we've had the PIU Pro2 cap there (where it premiered locally) and a Supernova, Pop'N, and Guitar Freaks arcades on freeplay. There's also StreetFighterIV and possibly BlazBlue among the non-rhythm arcades available. Next door, there would be a retro-gaming room, tabletop RP & cardgame room.. still a fraction of the gaming opportunities you'd see at PAX, which also takes place in the Seattle Convention Center.

Every year it's a little different, but Tuan and I will hopefully cosplay too this time around. About ¼ of the attendants tend to cosplay, from what I can tell.

Sup from your friendly Sakuracon Arcade Coordinator.  This year, we're looking at:

ITG 3
DDR Extreme
Bill's Pop'n 13
Drummania V3
Street Fighter IV from ACME
A couple of Initial D cabs

There will be an ITG tournament, a DDR tournament, and some kind of crazy challenge tournament, all organized by Yours Truly because that's the way we roll.

BTW: We still have staff positions open.  Your job would be to hang out in the arcade and make sure people don't break things/inform me or Tony if we need to repair pads/sensors/adjust volume/etc.  You have to work for 16 hours; I make the schedules and can probably accommodate preferences. Payment is a free badge.

Edit: Also, Tuan... I was thinking of doing Litchi and trying to talk Tony into doing Bang.  Maybe we could get an epic BlazBlue group together!

Yesss!! I'm going to have to bring a spare change of my sports attire with me so I could formally compete. Course that's optional seeing as there was someone in a Fatal Fury costume that participated in the extreme tournament last year:

Fatal furry! DDR match

Good times... I forgot who it was under the FF cos-play.


This would be so awesome to see you and Tony be as Litchi and Bang-- those two are so comical in game and I'm sure you guys could pull off the look

i will be attending

@Tuan: Fatal Furry was Scrambles The Cat/Eric/Eric-c-c on these forums.  He's fucking awesome.

*dying laughing at the FF video*.  I've seen worse things entering ddr tourneys.  Hell, Otakon '08 I entered DDR in fuzzy cat slippers, a large fur robe, and had 2 female friends on leashes....and won.  Now I want to look that pic back up hahah.

Pantsuuu!  The same pantsuuu from the sakuracon boards?  I'm def on board with running a IIDX tourney.

*edit - Also, the game room sounds sexy Laura.  Aside from taking pictures and con misadventures, you've just described my weekend.

SIGN ME UP LAURA!!!!

Hahahaha, maybe you will get along with me and Tony after all.

RF 09 Dance Competetion 5 of 6

For those interested, here are more of Eric's fursuit antics.

Did somebody say IIDX tourney? MAKE IT HAPPEN

It ended up more like this.  Somewhere along the way I decided Nike Frees > Cat Slippers for perfect attack.


As for IIDX, if me and Pantsu can run it on our Daos, it'll happen.

omg, NEKO! Big pimpin'

One of the best pics I've ever seen haha

Bring sexy back this year Neko

Laura, we still have a Blazeblue arcade cabinet available.

Yes thats me.  i will bring my fp7 but i dont really want to bring my playstation lol.  also gorrum will win :C

Tony and I could potentially supply a JPS2, as we have two.  This is what happens when nerds get married.

my wife and i have been going ever since i moved up here in late 2006...

hahaha awesome pic neko

i have no legitimate copies of any iidx game anymore so somebody should at least bring empress and premium best so we have some new and old songs to play.

Sakuracon isn't so hot on burned games (for both not-getting-sued and not-losing-sponsors reasons), so legit copies are completely necessary.

What'd you do with the 8th style I gave you son

as long as nobody hits the eject button on the PS2, noone will know, right?

Even if the console and TV are set up and run as part of the arcade, rather than a console room, they will still want to keep close tabs on every piece of equipment that gets brought in.  Additionally, that would mean only having a single style for the entire weekend.

Ideally, the IIDX equipment will be managed by console room staff, since the arcade games are set up on either side of a major walkway (the arcade, rock band stage, and console rooms flank the 25-foot wide path from registration and the dealers' room and the rest of the convention center).  With an average of two people on staff at any time, we'd have to dedicate half of our staff to watching the easily pocketed PS2 + accessories (seriously, a vigilante staff member did pocket a Gamecube and take it to the Ops. office just to prove a point about security one year - with the current layout, I would not allow anything that takes fewer than 2 or 3 people to quickly move to be left sitting out unattended in the arcade).  We keep spare parts and tools behind the main gaming desk, because it's too easy for things to disappear - it's not that Sakuracon is full of thieves, and there are badge checks on both sides of the gaming area, so it's attendees only (in theory), but the headcount last year was 18,000+ (I'd estimate 19-20k this year) and things can disappear with that many people around.

i am kinda scared to let the staff keep my stuff anymore.  i have yet to have a pleasant time getting my shit back from them.  i always have to get jon to lay down some justice.

If i am guaranteed access to take my stuff when i want then i will be more than happy to keep it with the console gaming staff.

so who is bringing the iidx games lol.  i havent played distorted for awhile so it would be nice to play that lol