AnimeNYC '25: The Travels of Ragiroth
Rich L.
Another year of Anime NYC has passed. Each time, I feel this convention gets better and my overall experience improves. Generally, I’ve missed out on the panels and main events, and my focus has been on speaking with artists, wandering the marketplace, or meeting with entertainment guests. This year, I prioritized events and panels over all else. I couldn’t attend the entire weekend, but I was there for the two biggest days: Friday and Saturday.
As for the general convention, the setup at the Jacob Javitz Center is as beautiful as always. Dan Da Dan and JuJutsu Kaisen are two of the hottest anime right now, so of course there were a lot of displays for those shows. It was easy to get around, and it only got intensely crowded for a bit on Saturday. I cosplayed as the Thousand-Year Blood War version of Sōsuke Aizen from Bleach on Friday, and as Shūhei Hisagi from Bleach on Saturday. Excuse my lack of purple hair and scars for the Shūhei outfit, it was all last minute. Now, let’s talk about the events and panels I attended on Friday.
Friday
On Friday, I attended a panel called Cosplay Armor 101. There have been cosplays I’d love to do that would require a lot of armored parts, which I never really understood how to make. Of course, buying cosplays like that would cost an arm and a leg, so this panel seemed like it would be right up my alley. It was hosted by Kevin “Hatake” and Keith “Sahara” from HS Cosplay, along with JJ from Bulletdancer Cosplay.
SideNote: They have won multiple cosplay awards from previous conventions, such as Best Advanced Craftsmanship from AAC 2023 and 1st Place Masters from AB 2019.
It was a presentation, and the hosts also passed around parts of their previous costumes to give attendees an idea of what certain materials feel like. They started off by talking about different kinds of materials and what the pros and cons of each are. Types included Pepakura, Leather, Thermoplastic, Vacuum Form, 3D Print, and a few others. Some pros and cons mentioned were: Pepakura being cheap but tedious and blocky, leather being versatile but expensive, thermoplastic being moldable but less flexible, and vacuum forming being lightweight and hard to get right.
3D printing received a lot of focus mainly because it’s newer, less labor-intensive, and still provides good results. Of course, 3D printing isn’t without caveats either; it’s time-consuming, durability is material-dependent, and it requires handling hazardous materials.
Lastly, they broke down step-by-step instructions on how to assemble armor, such as what safety equipment to use and when. They also mentioned various tips and tricks, like how important it is to make sure armor is flexible in certain areas for your own comfort (such as being able to sit), since video games and anime don’t really account for real-life human movement. After all, while you may want your cosplay to look great and accurate, you also want to be comfortable (speaking from experience here).
Despite it being an educational panel, the three of them still kept it light and entertaining. Many of their cosplays featured in the presentation were from Monster Hunter (as well as admitting to being huge fans of the series), with some from Halo. They also have a podcast called The Cosplay Collective, which they do every Sunday, where they talk about video games, anime, cosplay, and more.
Thankfully, they also included a link to the presentation with all their information.
Did I feel immediately ready to make cosplay armor after the panel? Not quite, but it’s great to have more of that knowledge in my back pocket.
The link to their information is here along with their Linktree, which also includes their podcast link.
There were two other activities I attended on Friday that weren’t quite panels but were still on the schedule: the Content Creators Mixer and the Educators Mixer.
The Content Creator Mixer was where I felt like I could network and promote myself. I met a lot of people from different content creator backgrounds, VTubers, TikTokers, and even someone who has their own mahjong game. It was also great to promote and advertise my YouTube channel here as well. Special shoutout to some acquaintances I made at the mixer:
Shannon from InAsianSpaces.com
Hataka & Sahara Cosplay
Szkkrrj YT - The Embodiment of Cringe
Lauren Melissa Ellzey - autienelle
Harrison Done - Majong Pros.
SideNote: It’s always awkward doing it outside of events like this because you don’t want to be overbearing with your brand.
Later, I attended the Educators Mixer with my friend and fellow writer, Josh since both of us work in the education field. Like the Content Creator Mixer, there wasn’t just one type of educator there. I met high school teachers, college professors, and even school librarians.
SideNote: At both events, I had trouble talking to people at first, but it was like Pringles, once you pop, the fun doesn’t stop and I started to feel comfortable networking and promoting myself at this mixer as well.
Something I want to stress is that every fan convention needs to have events like these. Fan conventions are one of the few places you can go where people share the same interests as you. Yet it’s difficult to meet people in the chaos of conventions, with so many crowds and so much happening at once. Be it for friendship, dating, networking, etc., it helps that both mixers were in a small room with some relaxing music playing and a few places to sit down. Massive props to Anime NYC for putting on those kinds of events.
Saturday
For Saturday, there was another type of mixer in a different area. It was called Weeb Mingle, and it happened in the late morning behind the autographing and Artist Alley. This was a more general mixer than the other two. You put on a name tag and added a colored sticker: one color meant looking for friends, one meant looking for love, and one meant being down for anything. This idea is always smart for events like these, so people have a better idea of what the person they’re talking to is there for. It was hosted by ITSF Collective and Toasty Marshmellow.
The last panel I attended was called How to Design a Fighting Game, hosted by M. Paul Weeks from M. Paul Games. While I’ve abandoned the path of becoming a game designer, I’ve always loved fighting games, so I figured it’d be interesting to learn some behind-the-scenes details of how they’re made.
M. Paul is a fighting game developer who worked on games like Tough Love Arena and Scramble Heart City. He also showed that he had interviewed guests at EVO (the biggest fighting game event of the year). Since his games are 2D fighters, he primarily discussed developing 2D fighting games, with some mentions of 3D fighters like Tekken and Soul Calibur.
Some of the information discussed I was vaguely familiar with; like how the characters in fighting games are made up of hitboxes and hurtboxes (areas around their sprites/models where they can give and receive damage to the opposing character). However, I didn’t realize that different types of fighting games have different types of hitboxes. 2D sprite games have rectangular boxes, 2D games with 3D graphics like Marvel vs. Capcom 3 have circular hitboxes, while fully 3D games like Tekken have cylindrical hitboxes. I also learned that fighting game characters use a “finite state machine,” meaning the character is only ever doing one thing at a time.
He stressed the importance of movement and how it’s a huge part of player expression. Additionally, he discussed how fighting games like Marvel vs. Capcom are all about combos, with pros and cons to that, while games like Street Fighter are more footsie-based (essentially movement-focused). He also discussed fighting game archetypes: grappler (specializes in close-quarters combat and grabs), zoner (the opposite of a grappler), vortex, and rushdown (speedy). I was generally familiar with most of these but had never known the proper definition of a vortex character.
He also spoke about online play, stressing how important it is to use rollback netcode in your fighting game if you want it to sell, though he also mentioned it’s not a 100% failsafe. Overall, it was an educational experience that also refreshed me on some fighting game terms. If I had any criticisms, I’d say I wished he spoke more about the general aspects of a game like modes, art direction, etc., but I understand that most of what M. Paul spoke about is what fighting game fans care most about. If you’d like to check out their presentation, it is right here.
Final Thoughts
This was the meat and potatoes of my time at Anime NYC this year. Of course, I looked at the merchant hall as always, and they had a lot of great merchandise, but this time it was all about the panels. I’m excited to see what the future holds for Anime NYC, and I hope other conventions adopt its approach of hosting diverse events that bring like-minded individuals together.
