by: Charley (@ruperto2106)A couple Saturday's ago I attended SpringFestNY. Most of you are asking "WTF is SpringFestNY?" Well, SpringFestNY is the largest FREE Anime Convention in the NY/Tri-state area held at the Polytechnic Institute of NYU in Brooklyn. Unlike your typical comic conventions, this one primarily focuses on anime and Japanese culture, gamer life style, and the American otaku experience.
Personally, I haven't gone to many conventions but comparing it to the ones that I have, its really different. Yeah, there are the typical cosplayers, panels and vendors but SpringFestNY is a more of an independent event. All the panels were run by fan boys (literally, they were kids much younger than me) that are showing their love for the anime and their particular topic. There were topics that ranged from the ever popular "How to Survive The Zombie Apocalypse" to a detailed history of Gundam.
The first thing that caught my attention, was that they had set up four PS3 game stations with Street Fighter X Tekken and Ultimate Marvel vs. Capcom, for either tournament play or casual play. Gamers could use the controllers provided or bring their own controllers and battle to the death (not physically... even though it would of been kind of cool.)
A panel that caught my attention was "Lolita Fashion" because its something a little different that I didn't see offered at the other cons I have attended. In a nutshell, this panel was all about the lolita fashion trend, which is a fashion subculture that originated in Japan and is based on Victorian-era clothing. They broke down all the different styles as well as the does and do not's of lolita cosplay.
Another panel that I thought would of been interesting was a Hentai (sexually explicit anime). I thought it was going to be similar to the other panels that I attended, where the panelist spoke about the history of Hentai, but it turns out that it was just a screening of different types of Hentai. So yeah, it was just a little uncomfortable at first. but after a little while it turned into a joke fest about the content, making it more fun than just totally creepy.
After all the panels were over, they hosted a J-pop concert featuring Meiko Reactor, Uzuhi and Nullsleep, which I missed because I didn't feel like standing in line any longer.After spending a whole day full of anime, I must say it was fairly cool and is good for a first time con attendee. If you are an anime fan and don't want to deal with the typical run of the mill convention, SpringFestNY is for you. Oh yeah, I forgot to mention... IT'S FREE!!!For more information on SpringFestNY, Click Here!