MTAC in Love has come and gone, but that’s just the start of this con season for 2 Shots! The weekend went by so fast, but I had such a great time! I took this year “easy” compared to previous years, so no contests, no big photoshoots, and I didn’t have to rush to finish such a large part of my cosplays! Kinda. I did rush to get something done for my cousin but all my stuff was pretty much ready to go. Flandre made her debut on Saturday (I once again failed to take my own photos), and I got such a good response even though the base kept breaking on me…but enough about that, lets dive into the con itself! MTAC 2014 was held at the Embassy Suites in Murfreesboro, Tennessee this year, which is about a half hour drive from Nashville. This venue was a tad bit smaller than the convention center MTAC occupied in 2013, and that posed a few issues, but the surrounding area was extremely spacious. Meaning, it was perfect for photo shoots without conflict(as long as you didn’t need a shoot by the fountain…).
So what exactly did I do at MTAC? Well for once I attended panels that weren’t main events. I went to a few fan panels over the weekend, and I really enjoyed them! There were a few little bumps along the way, such as panelists running late, excess noise from the rave, nearly getting booted from the room due to space issues…but a lot of them couldn’t be helped, and I still made it to the main 3 fan panels I really wanted to go to. The only main event I managed to make it to was the Cosplay Contest. I decided against entering this year since last year was a bit of a hassle and I didn’t really have anything outstanding that I wanted to enter. I have to admit I was a little surprised that they changed the awards. I expected the standard tiers: Child, Novice, Journeyman, Master, Group, Best Prop, Best in Show, and a bunch of other minor awards. Well they cut back on the awards to 5: Best in Show, Best Group, Best Stage Presence, Best Couple, and Best Prop. Not only that, from what I understand, there was only one main prize, $500 to Best in Show (if I’m wrong, sorry!). I’m quite curious as to why this change happened, but all I can say is that the cosplayers were very impressive and creative. I tried to take photos, but my camera died and my phone was being rude, so I only have a few decent ones to add to the album.
During the con, I also made it to the main Dealer’s Room once. Maybe twice, but my cosplays were the reasons I didn’t choose to go again. My first time in there involved waddling around people so I didn’t step on them or accidentally release their hearts. Well it was a little too packed for that and I’m pretty sure people need their hearts to fall in love, so until I changed out of Sora, it was a no-go. I made it back later on Friday when I changed back into a more casual outfit, and managed to find cute animal plushies with dumb faces. I was happy enough with that, so I stayed out the rest of the weekend as managing the halls was hard enough in Flandre…
On that note! The halls…Now we all knew that it was going to be crowded; the venue was small and we nearly hit capacity (maybe we did at one point). I was lucky my wings weren’t broken by anyone. There were a lot of people, but everyone was nice enough to be careful as I tried to take up as little room and shuffle about (I seriously have to thank everyone I went with for guarding me at some point). Cosplay aside, I think the only real issue I had with the halls was how hot it was. It’s the main reason I changed out of Sora on Friday, it was just too many layers to be wearing when you’re exposed to so much heat in there. Yeah, there were a lot of lines, those contributed to the heat, but it really couldn’t be helped with all the panels going on and people stopping for photos.
Unfortunately, since it was so crowded I wasn’t able to find a lot of people I would’ve liked to have seen, and I missed a lot of the cosplayers! Regardless, this was one of the best MTACs I have been to. I was with people I really enjoyed being with, I wasn’t in any cosplay rush, nothing broke in a major way, and I was only hassled once when someone I didn’t know grabbed me and tried to steal me away for a photo when I was busy. MTAC was the very first con I attended, so I’ve always had this attachment to it. I was skeptical of some of the changes at first, but I had a lot of fun and I’m definitely looking forward to returning next year!
Keep an eye out for announcements for MTAC 2015: 15 to Life!
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