Review of EXP CON IV

I’ve debated whether EXP or AWA would make my favorite con of the year. Not so much in terms of what a con has to offer, but personal enjoyment alone. Having grown tiresome of AWA, my expectations were pretty high. Sure EXP does not have as much to offer in comparison to AWA or Metro, but it seems to fall in the category of a dubbed “hang out con.” So how does it compare to last year?

Well for starters the venue hadn’t changed at all. It is still that small L shaped hallway with the huge panel rooms at the end of it. Artist Alley is still lined up across the lobby hallway with the doors to the main events room in between the tables. Parking is never a problem and there are some fun places just right outside the con to take pictures. In fact I was actually a little disappointed at one point, because I was scheduled to have a pool shoot and the hotel pool lights up in different colors at night. Nothing was expanded and the only semi-notable addition was at night the lobby has neat blue lights on the roof, but unfortunately these lights weren’t strong enough to show up in pictures.

While there was a noticeable growth in attendance (around 4,000), the con fortunately never felt too crowded except when I was in line for something held in the main events area. Lines always stretched out from the door to the end of the hall, sometimes taking up half the convention. It didn’t help either that it felt like some of the events started a little later than advertised.

The main events I was able to attend were pretty cool. The Masquerade Ball on Friday was 10 times better than last year and even had a nice light set up for pictures, however some of the music choices such as Daft Punk were a little questionable. The extra food/snacks was a lot better and at the time made paying the extra $10 worth it. The Saturday night rave was also mounds of improvement in its presentation. However, the room sort of had a foul stench to it by the time I got there. The costume contest was pretty much more of the same. There wasn’t anything too extravagant, but I was happy a Touhou cosplayer placed Best of Show.

When it came to the cosplays present, overall there wasn’t anything too ridiculous or luxurious.  I did have a revelation at some point where I realized Homestuck Cosplay has now dethroned Hetalia and Vocaloid as the top trend.
As far as other main events go, I got a little sidetracked and couldn’t attend much. I did however sat through some of Chris Sabat Dub Over-Drive and it was pretty entertaining. I’ve never been to a fandub panel before and I was pretty surprised it was run by a real voice actor. It was comprised of some Dragon Ball Z footage and with some hilariously inappropriate new dialogue. Chris also came off as a great guy and host. I can tell he really loved being around the fans.

Speaking of being around the fans, I constantly saw the Mega64 crew throughout the con. Like last year, I always found it welcoming and rare to see a prestigious convention guest simply walking around the con halls talking to fans. They also took several videos during the con which can be found on their respective youtube channels ( http://www.youtube.com/roccob64 ). I remember Rocco of Mega64 saying he had recorded a candid video of me and it was going up on youtube, but as of writing this I have still yet to see it.

Charles Martinet who voices Mario was also a guest I occasionally saw through the crowds. He was constantly signing autographs and getting pictures with attendees. The same went with Vic Mignogna who also returned from last year. The  atmosphere was pretty lax the whole weekend.

Now when it came to the rest of the con, well I don’t really have much to say. As far as the panels go… overall these were kind of so-so with some repeats of last year. Video game room.. eh just a repeat of last year. There was a neat Japanese style looking tea room I got to have a brief glance of, but then I had to attend to something else so I wasn’t able to check it out. I wish I did since I had never seen anything like that at a convention.

So if you notice a theme here there was nothing that stood out, but the con wasn’t awful either. The only running criticism I have heard about the con stems back to the venue itself. Apparently the hotel went under new management and weren’t too pleased about the event they were hosting; even from what I heard tried to intervene in things. On top of that, some attendees staying at the hotel were accidently charged extra by mistake of the hotel staff.

Did the con meet my expectations and did I have a good time… well yeah. Did it exceed them… eh no not really. EXP Con is essentially the “hang out” con of Florida and if you approach it as such you’ll have a good time. However if you’re not one to meet new people or have friends around you might get bored easily.

Pros: Lax atmosphere, decent cosplays, decent video game room, nice location with great parking, friendly convention staff

Cons: Could use more emphasis on what makes it unique, some occasional organization problems, so-so panels, obvious venue problems