My trip with friends to a Vtuber Convention.

I knew I was going to have fun, I just didn’t realize I was going to have this much fun. In contrast with my experience at CRX 2022 (Crunchyroll Expo), I felt like this experience was more personal and tailored to my interests. Let me qualify that statement more, Crunchyroll Expo was a blast. However I would also like to add that anime expo’s feel more like they are about a merchandise haul more than anything else. Of course there were the concerts, but unless you bring earplugs of some kind it’s not enjoyable to get your eardrums blasted. Panels can be good, but a majority of the time it’s someone random from the anime industry you have never met, and will probably never meet again. Sometimes they can be entertaining, most of the time they are just a miss. The best part of a panel is usually having a seat or a nap, then going back to the merch hall.

In contrast Offkai Expo Gen 2 offered a different feeling. Located at the Hyatt Regency in Burlingame, California (South of San Francisco) the hotel offered a smaller venue which was perfect for the event size. It was not overly crowded and comfortable. You didn’t have to walk miles during the day to get to one location to the next. Panels were easy to find and get to. They had a nice booklet that contained a schedule of events. You could literally pick and choose who you wanted to visit based on your personal interest. Certainly enough for everyone. I really enjoyed the variety of content, from watching your favorite vtubers on the big screen, to learning about the tech, to concerts (that didn’t blow out your eardrums), there were plenty of fun things. Everything felt personal, that you already knew the people you were going to be seeing. No random industry experts, but the industry itself.

Meet and Greets, Dubious Characters

As I mentioned previously since the location was a smaller venue, many vtubers and content creators large and small by scale were there in person. I passed many vtubers and vtubers adjacent with and without knowing it. I was shocked by how much of the community that I knew only from online interaction was there in person. They are in fact real.

One of the best features of Offkai was the chance to meet your favorite vtubers in person. I consider these more or less once in a lifetime opportunities. There is no guarantee you would ever meet them face to camera ever again. Meet and Greets consisted of 60 second sessions (in theory), though normally time would run over in most cases while meeting people. While 60 seconds is decidedly short when meeting someone, it was more than enough to convey a thought or two to someone you enjoyed watching. I exchanged friendly words, thanked, and was even called out by some of the vtubers I met. While most vtubers remained hidden behind their avatar, I have it on good authority some were actually in person in the room. Wild.

Most people at the convention were there for a good time, and most communities in the vtubing space seem like good people. But as with any event, there is always bound to be a little mischief. I had the misfortune of running into people who impersonated online personalities (anonymity kicking us in the ass) and there was no way to find out they were fakes until much later. The impersonator who made the biggest stir pretended to be a clipper named Cooksie, only later to be exposed that this person was not in fact that same clipper. As a joke, most people referred to the imposter as Crooksie.

Overall it was a well made event, lots of fun, even with the staffing and technical issues. I am very interested in attending in the future.

My Trip to Crunchyroll Expo 2022

Crunchyroll’s Webtoon Adaptations – Tower of God and God of High School