Comike 74: Getting hotter in more ways than one

17.08.2008 by Patrick W. Galbraith

1) After experiencing hours and hours of demos on doujin software in West Hall 1 and 2, it became clear that more and more talented people are getting better at making these games and also that their themes are rather erotic. After seeing the tons of software and the energy of the men and women after them, a mysterious overblown sign in the industry section above reading “I H8 You, Pornogame Players” was made even more esoteric. A whole new use of “H” straight from Japan.

2) Likewise, the sheer volume and diversity of Vocaloids – i.e., Hatsune Miku, Kagami Rin and Ren, Leon, Kaito, etc – in articulations from doujinshi to products to software and CDs cutting across concerns of genre, gender or even taste made one particular creative circle name sum up the day: Vocaloid Masturbation Smile. Something for everyone in vocal synthesizing software, apparently.

3) A sign reading "Girlish Comics for Boys and Girls." All right, I was aware things in the otaku world are getting a bit confused, but to make it explicit kind of just hurts deep down...

4) Hellish passages with temperatures approaching 40 degrees Celsius and hoards of people that stagnated frequently. The walkway between West and East halls was unventilated and already limited escalators were closed or slowed (the militant message was “Please leave one step on the escalator between you,” a response to the Wonderfest incident). Worse, the escalator to the fourth floor industry booths and cosplay area was down, meaning people had to go outside and climb the stairs. While this unleashed havoc on pedestrian traffic, the staff closed the cosplay balcony and suddenly moved it to the courtyard outside the path to East Hall, further confusing the flow of hot, irritable people now trying to get to the cosplay exit or push on to the East Hall. To add insult to injury, at this the hottest intersection in Big Sight, there was a UNCEF photo essay on global climate change.

5) The Global ‘Otaku’ Corner was opened in the industry section, the culmination of years of smaller efforts by the Comike Preparation Committee to make the event more international. It consisted of photographs of events held in and doujinshi bought in India, China, Taiwan, France, Russia, Thailand, Brazil, the United States, Korea and so on. The collection represents the private journey of a sponsoring company chairman who hoped his contribution to Comike will increase inter cultural communication. Seeing "Chobits" in Arabic was a nice wake up call.

Runner up: Police were out in force because of a bomb threat posted on 2channel. The man had been kind of enough to specify his full name and that he would attack Comike on August 16 (the girls’ day) at 13:00. He was apprehended on day one of the event, but day two still had the men and women in blue making sure there wasn’t a copycat.

Runner up: Pinafore’s maids were out performing idol songs in front of the Mainichi Shimbun booth, meaning the industry area was subject to spontaneous otagei attacks that kept the sweat flowing.