Katsucon

Feature 1

Katsucon, the Valentines/President Day weekend Con, occurred on February 18-20 2022, one week after the Superbowl. It is located in National Harbor at the Gaylord National Resort & Convention Center in Maryland. Before the convention in January, the convention announce the Covid Policy to be Fully Vaccinated to attend the convention due to the Omicron variant development in the DMV area and was willing to give refunds for people that no longer wish to attend. Even with all this, it had an impressive attendance and cosplay to showcase. The cosplay consist of dresses up versions of peoples favorite characters, Five Nights of Freddy, and Genshin Impact see the day to day pages for more cosplay

Cost

So how much did it cost to attend the convention? Well, the hotel was $1033 not including parking. The round-trip airplane ticket cost $320. There is no shuttle to the Gaylord from DCA. To uber to the hotel from the Airport lucky cost, $25 but the ride back jump to $58, which was a hard pill to swallow. Food in the area to get a decent meal is around $15+ but the convention/ hotel had food going for around $10+ which was more efficient since the wait times in restaurants were about 30min to an hour. I always buy grocery to hold me down through out a convention. This year around we had construction at the breakfast buffet which also moved the marketplace to the other side (entrance side) of the hotel and Starbucks was also missing in the middle of the atrium.

Thursday

On Thursday the crowd did not show up in the atrium till 5 p.m. Till then it was just more photographers than cosplayers around the Hotel. Shoutout to Chad for his time coordinating with the hotel to get the press booth open. Once the pre-registration line open it was a two-hour wait from the end of the line which stretch to the exhibit hall exit.

Katsucon.(2022) Gaylord Katsucon Meetup Location. Guidebook. edited by me.

Convention Layout and Entrance

Another thing to note is that once the convention started the only entrance to the hotel for people without badges or Gaylord room keys was the entrance close to pre-registration and the atrium doors were one way only. Which made it extremely difficult for first-time attendance that did not understand the layout of the hotel. I was also stopped a few times and asked where they go to enter the hotel for pre-registration while I was outside on Friday.

You can literally see the Gyro Zeppeli( JoJo character) cape being picked up easily by the wind.

Friday

Friday seem very steady and something to note was that if the group meet-up did not happen at the Gazebo after the staff announced the meetup and asked for the leader/coordinator then it was open for grabs for anyone to take pictures which was a common occurrence on this day. The weather also took a turn for the worst today as the winds started to gust and even made some meetups and photoshoots outside to be canceled. One thing I forgot to check out was the Con-moms Olympics which just shows that the convention takes the time to make events for all ages. This day was also filled with a majority of the horror cosplays as it had the meetup with horror at 630 p.m.

The Ballroom floor. Which also had an interesting wristband idea of wearing color-coded wristbands to see if someone was open to dancing with strangers. This idea was a plus in my book and the MC reminded people what each color meant.

Saturday was filled with ballroom dance lessons and had the ballroom dance at night. The Masquerade also occurred at 1 p.m-5 p.m. Some people also mentioned that the Masquerade was happening during the middle of the day and we’re not going due to wanting to do other things. Which is the hardest part of going to a convention. Sacrificing what you want to go to for other panels/meetups. The ballroom didn’t have tables to sit at but did have chairs for people that needed a break from all the dancing. It also had an array of music and the master of ceremonies announced the next dance movement to perform. The lighting was also not that great and it was the same dark as the rave which is not normal for ballroom dancing. There also was an incident where everyone has kicked off the gazebo level a little before twelve. The general public blamed it on the school field trip that was going on but there are stories of the con asking the hotel to shut it down and a mystery fluid being passed around. All in all, this was a first for the convention.

Sunday

Sunday was extremely light in the morning as people were trying to check out and get all their belonging back into their vehicles but the exhibit was still packed as people were trying to buy their last-minute merch, plushie, and PVC figure. I was originally from the Virginia area and was glad to see the normal stores around that survived the covid pandemic such as Trilogy Comic based out of Norfolk, Va. I did notice that there was a dance lounge by the gazebo but sadly it was empty. The overhead chandelier lights and wall lights give it more of a ballroom aesthetic but the size prevents it from being used as such.

Post Con there was no reports of Covid cases increasing due Katsucon and no announcement has been made about a surge on social media and people I follow had only negative test result. So all in all the Con’s Covid policy was a success.

Since the convention felt lighter, we can expect a huge turnaround next year.

Pros about the con are the history it has at the Gaylord, the beautiful layout, and the staff knows what works.

Cons: Is the weather which this year was extremely windy compared to other years. The single entrance (which is a smart move to prevent ghosting) but inconvenient. They also didn’t have the back parking like in 2019 which is a money saver compared to the garage parking. The ballroom didn’t have tables (potentially due to Covid). The hotel had some construction this year which wasn’t the fault of the convention.

Will Station Unity become Katsucon 2.0 one day with the more favorable weather? Who can tell with other conventions such as Awesome Con and Otakon happening in the DC area around June and July.