Event Guides(?) 2023-2024 edition.

オタ活 | March 2024Read in Outline

As always, I like to write things for my future self to cringe at. Hopefully I can finish this article somehow.

Disclaimer: This is written mostly from my experience visiting most kinds of events especially in the past year. This guide might not be valid for everyone and your mileage may be vary. What is allowed and not allowed vary event to event so best to check before you go. Hopefully you can find something usable from this article.

Introduction

If you happen to stumble upon this article for some reason, you are probably already going to events, or planning/ interested to do so. Welcome !

Attending events in Japan can be a challenging experience, but also a very exciting one ! To be honest, when arriving Japan, I didn't plan any events to go at all. But after just casually going to a few, the momentum kinda builds up and now I'm somehow going outside every weekend.

Knowing Japanese can be handy in a lot of situations but it should not stop you from enjoying the content if you don't know Japanese. This article will with the assumption that you know some Japanese to navigate around, though knowing few event-specific words can be very helpful. Besides, going to these event is a great opportunity to improve your Japanese in many ways !

At the end of the day, the goal to attending these events is to enjoy and have fun. In which this guide would not be needed

I have discovered a few small things/ live hacks that contributes to making an event enjoyable for me, so I'll try list them out as much as I could.

General Info / Type of Events

Although there is a lot of events you can attend in Japan, there are usually patterns which is common between them. For example, say if you are already used to seiriken (整理券・queuing ticket) system, every seiriken system will probably work the same. That's said, it's always a good idea to check the details of how the rule/regulations works, since that might differ bit by bit (Ticketing/ Entry/ Regulations/ etc.).

I categorize events I've attended as follows, each events have their own charm and it is up to you which one you prioritize going. Though if you follow a seiyuu, you'll likely to go all of them anyway :upside_down_face:

Concert/ Live

A live performance of a certain artist (One-man live)/ artists (Taiban lives a.k.a Fes lives). The culture differs greatly between groups/category.

  • Small Lives -
  • Big Lives - Bigger fanbases requires big venue and
  • Fes Live/ Taiban

Conventions

A big event with many booths/ stages/ exhibitions with a lot of things to do. Examples includes AnimeJapan, Jump Festa or Comic Market (Comike). Lots of time there will be a bunch of photo spots, stage talk shows/ performances and free stuff getting handed to you.

If you want to fully experience the event, some amount of prior planning is required as time is limited and different booths will have their own time schedule, and some things runs out/ sold out early too. Planning well will allow you to spend time efficiently and get you more things, but it can also be very exhausting from the amount of standing/ walking/ waiting in line and waving through crowds of people you have to do the more you plan. Not planning is also an option as you can just immerse yourself into the event and chill. Big events like the one mentioned above have specific strategies so the more experienced your are the more fun you can get (feels more like going to a battle lol) .

Talk Event/ Radio Events

An event which revolves mostly on the cast talking, can be a radio show, fanclub (FC) events or Birthday event. The content depends on what it's for but it can center around the artist themselves or the works they're in such as anime.

The talks requires some Japanese to understand everything, but if you want to just see your Oshi being cute that's a very good opportunity to do so. If you've seen some seiyuu streams or subbed content, you'll know that these are very funny lots of the time. So being part of the atmosphere is also quite an experience.

Release Events/ Meet & Greet / Sign-kais

These are events where you can get very very close to an artist. Usually when an artists CDs or Photobooks are released, they will also do these kind of events to help boost the sales. Lots of time these differ by the record label/management of the artist but it can range from getting free bromide to getting signed items as an extra for purchasing.

In these events you can interact with the artist and hopefully get acknowledged.

Other kind of events

  • Stage show (Butai)/ Stage reading (Roudokugeki) : It's like a live, but more watching and just letting the plot sink in. There is something cool about watching your oshi perform in-character which is somewhat rare to see in-person. Watching a butai live is quite an experience as you can really feel the action/ footstep/ the atmosphere and so on.(I've only been to 2 so can't tell much)
  • Offkais: This is probably will be available for some artists, but it's a very nice opportunity to spend time with your oshi and talk to them a lot. Lots of time it will be costly but can be a very memorial experience too.
  • Screening Event (Butai aisatsu): Events where you get extra mini-talk show for pre screening of an anime movie or just upcoming anime.
  • Live Viewing/ Cheer Screening: It's like a live, the atmosphere will probably be similar to an actual live, but it's not live.
  • Sports Event Appearance: What, you can take photos !!??

Searching for Events/ Getting Tickets

I'll not go into details about the logistics of getting hand of a ticket since that could be its own article by itself.

Before the day

Preparation

Learning the content

  • Listen to music/ Predicting Setlists/ Study past lives
  • Study calls (Anisong/ Idol Lives)
  • Watch the related anime/content

Plan the day

  • Planning the routes, getting there
  • Setting up Alarms

Strategize ( Fes Live / Conventions )

Study the Venue

Sending In Mails/ Preparing Gifts ( Talk Event / FC Events/ Birthday Events )

Flower Stands

One day…. One day I'll do it…

Packing up/ Handy Items to bring

Tickets

Binoculars

Penlights

Good/ Itabags

At the Venue

The Morning/ Before The Live

Lining up for goods

Trading Goods/ Meeting up people

  • Twitter
  • Setting up mini trading stands

Flower Stands

Taking photos

Entering the Venue

During The Event

Live

Big Live

Fes Live/ Tai-ban

Conventions

Talk Event

Meet & Greet

Post-Event

More photos

Off-kai

Post Event Resonation(?)

Appendix: Going to multiple events in a day

  • Transport Time
  • Start-Time/ End-Time

Appendix: Expedition/ Going to an Event somewhere far

Note: I'm incredibly cheap person and cut costs everywhere

Luggage

Tourism/ Pilgrimage Spots

Appendix: Collab Cafe


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