Lori – the Eirtakon mascot and her most recent transformation
Eirtakon is now in its 6th year kicking off way back in 2005 on the campus of Dublin City University and building on the success of every year it has managed to not only become Ireland’s largest Anime convention but also one of the most popular conventions in Ireland and Europe with people travelling from all over to attend.
The original brainchild of John Doyle and Ross Duggan, the convention has only gone from strength to strength in the last few years and in 2010 the convention attracted over 1,200 visitors to their new location in the Helix and the numbers were just as impressive thus year with the convention rooms black with cosplayers, otaku, fan girls and geeks of all shapes, ages and size!
Kicking on Friday, the queues were out the door with attendees eager to get in and flood the Helix! Fridays are often seen as the relaxed day of a convention with little happening except for the general buzz but that was not the case with Eirtakon and the committee and staff put on one of our favourite events ever… Fairtakon!
The chance to play some anime themed fair games including a Naruto themed shuriken toss were dotted around the convention floors and on the Friday they were free to play and even with the number of attendees there, there was thankfully not much queuing time for any of the many games!
On Saturday there was a fee to play the games but now there was also a chance to win some pretty sweet prizes!
Picture by Manga and Anime Cahersiveen Society
While it would be biased to say the two games the arcade ran at the Con were a success we have to admit that it was an absolute blast for us to meet some amazing role-players and we have a big shout out for two in particular, the girl who played Orochimaru in our Manga Murder Mayhem you were devious, sneaky and underhanded and we salute your skill and the winner of our Silent Hill survival horror game, you turned into a sinister horror into one of the funniest experiences of our life…so fair play!
A special thank you to everyone who came to our Silent Hill game, you helped raised well over €100 for the DCU Rag Week charity as well as managing to revive the investigative reporter three times only for him to be killed off in an even more gruesome fashion each time!
As well as various panels, a huge trade hall and artist alley, a pub quiz and special guest signings and a chance to meet Liam O’ Brien (the voice of Gaara from Naruto) there were some amazing and unique events to keep attendees entertained and busy.
Eirta-fortunes, inspired by classic family game show Family Fortunes was a smashing success as two teams of attendees battled against each other to claim the title of the most knowledgeable geeks – the competition was fierce but finally one team won out! Continuing on from the family game show theme Eirtakon gave some lucky attendees the chance to find love with Cosplay Blind Date.
Hosted by Fiona O’Reilly, one half of the Cosplay Coordinator team at Eirtakon, one lucky attendee was chosen to find love with three eligible bachelors and bachelorettes by asking them anime inspired questions – responses were hilarious and finally two lucky couples were matched and whisked away to romantic dates in Dublin’s best sushi restaurant Yamamori Sushi.
On the topic of cosplay, a special mention has to be given to the hundreds of amazing cosplayers who attended this year’s Eirtakon. In particular we have to mention the Final Fantasy VIII group, the overall cosplay winner, Orla O’Grady or Absol from Pokémon will be representing Eirtakon and Ireland in the 2012 Euro Cosplay competition. The @rcade also got in on the cosplay action and we threw together our own cosplays from Kiba to Nightcrawler, Rita to Edward Elric (we’ve learned to never cosplay Ed again unless we feel the need to be glomped).
Picture taken from Ingy Ingamells
The games room was packed every day of the convention with so many competitions and tournaments running over the weekend – with everything from Mario Kart, Super Street Fighter IV, Blazblue, Halo Reach, Gears of War as well as Yu Gi Oh and Pokémon Card Game tournaments.
As always the convention wrapped up with the closing ceremony where we got to see some of the awesome folk behind the convention itself and while everyone on board was friendly and so bloody helpful we have to give a special mention to Fiona and Amy the cosplay coordinators, Jim Fitzgerald who help setup our panel and games and Mark Murphy the PR officer for the convention – thanks for all your help!
Picture by Manga and Anime Cahersiveen Society
Eirtakon, you’ve raised the bar once more not only for yourselves and next year’s convention but for all the conventions around the country! Job well done and we are already looking forward to seeing what’s in store for 2012! Bring it on!
