If you thought after three conventions in a row that I’d be crazy to do a fourth, you’d be right, but I did it anyways. So a lot of you know that I’m a huge Blue Lions fan from Fire Emblem: Three Houses but what a lot of you might not know is I’m also a moderator for another Fire Emblem actor’s twitch and discord, Alice Himora. Well Queen City Anime Con brought her and the voice of Dimitri, Chris Hackney plus some other amazing guests. Combine that with an event I’ve already enjoyed once before and you have an event I just had to go to.

Given the intro it makes sense to start with the guests. This was the first convention for Alice and it was honestly a fun opportunity to meet her. Then you have Chris Hackney who’s someone I always enjoy chatting with. The event also featured other incredible actors including Kiba Walker, Kira Buckland and performers like ProfessorShyguy and The Living Tombstone. The guest list as a whole was on the smaller side but it featured some of my personal favorite actors. Now one thing I also liked is how the autograph situation changed from my last trip here. Instead of set one hour timeframes for the autographs the actors now have dedicated tables that they stayed at anytime they weren’t busy doing panels, lunch etc. So instead of one brief conversation with the actors like last time I ended up having multiple chances to chat with everyone.

Next I’ll talk about the panels. You had some incredible fan made panels including one about anime minigames, social events like speed friending and a higher than average variety of guest specific panels. A lot of events tend to do a few Q&A type panels at most for guests and they are often about their most well known roles. Here we got some of that but also some really fun interactive stuff like playing video games with Kira Buckland, gunpla with Chris Hackney, and reading bad fanfiction with Kiba Walker. I really enjoyed the creativity we got from this event. There was only one thing I didn’t like about the panels and that involved panel rooms two and three. Those rooms were small and the front row was very close to the stage. I ended up in the front row of the Fire Emblem panel with Chris and Alice and it felt like being in the front of the line for an autograph table. It was a fun panel and a highlight of the event but it also felt a bit awkward being that close and just sitting there taking photos.

I’ll move onto vendors next. As for the vendors themselves I got to see some cool stuff. While it wasn’t a massive room full of vendors you still had a lot of room to walk around in and some great merch to choose from. I found some new artists I plan to follow, imported snacks, swords, magnets and so much more. Plus the vendors definitely knew what fandoms were represented by the guests and I found a lot of merch geared towards some of their most notable characters which I thought was a nice touch. Though we did have an issue with the line to the vendors hall. I can’t recall any event where I found a line to the vendors hall long after the vendors opened but I did this weekend. To my understanding it was because they were only allowed to have so many people in at a time for fire safety regulations. Now I’m all for safety regulations so I don’t want to be too hard on them for this as it was for the right reason but because this happened and it did make it harder to get to the vendors and it’s a clear sign that the convention is too big for the venue. Thankfully towards the end of the day the line calmed down and I did all of the shopping I needed to do.

Now another thing I want to talk about is the VIP pass. Where everything else about the convention is mostly good the VIP pass is something I didn’t care as much for. I know in my last review I said you really didn’t need one and I should have stuck with that but after going to several events this year where having a VIP pass was vital for autographs I was afraid I would miss out if I didn’t get one. The truth is that fear was completely unwarranted.

I got the pass for the line skip options for the guests but most of the time they didn’t have any lines. I used the pass once on Chris’s line and even then I was near the front so it didn’t save me a lot of time. As for the other guests I met I ended up just walking up to their

tables and talking to them right away multiple times during the day. It was great for me because it meant more time with my favorite actors, but at the same time it was clear I didn’t need the perks of the VIP pass to do that. Now it did help to skip the lines for the main event panels and did come with an exclusive panel with The Living Tombstone, but that was the only time I saw value in the line skip ability.

As for the other perks it came with some goodies but this was a huge downgrade from 2022. Here all I got was another lanyard, a fan and a small convention themed water bottle. A noticeable change from my 2022 pass that included a pin and a nice light. Plus the design of the pass was just a standard pass with a ribbon saying VIP attached to it. Looking at this made me realize how much I appreciated the attention to detail you often get at cons that go the extra mile to create a separate pass for VIP pass holders.

So overall I had a great time here. I got plenty of time and some unique experiences with my favorite actors. I got to find some amazing merch at the vendors and meet some amazing people. The event is getting bigger and while that is a good thing with it’s increased attendance it needs more space. Now I did hear they are moving to a new venue next year which is something I’m excited to see as I think it will be a huge improvement. The major downside is there’s simply little incentive to splurge on a VIP pass when it gives you the ability to skip lines for guests that rarely have them, offers very little merch and few additional perks. Now I think there is plenty of incentive to get a standard pass as this was a lot of fun I just felt like I didn’t get anything more from the VIP pass versus if I just went with a weekend one.