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A massive improvement than last year.

Hobbycon is an annual event held every December each year on the weekends in Kota Kinabalu, Sabah. Organized by ClickStartPlay, a popular forum and online hangout frequented by Sabahan youths, it was first launched last year on 8th of December 2007, with Kompleks Asia City (KAC) as its venue. Hobbycon in a nutshell is essentially a gathering of hobbyist with different interest ranging from toy collectors to card players and doujinshi artists. This year’s Hobbycon promises to be bigger, better, and safer than last year.

GETTING READY FOR HOBBYCON 2008

As I’ll be cosplaying this year, these are the gears that I brought to the event:

I’M AN OPERATOR! My cosplay is called “The Pointman”, named after the main protagonist in F.E.A.R.

My 1/6 action figures will commit themselves to a joint ops with Nerdpride’s platoon. Originally, I plan to take 14 figures with me, but had to put 2 figures off the list due to lack of space, thus leaving me with 12.

Elsewhere, on Friday night 5th of December, CSP volunteers and event organizers in KAC are busy setting up the tables and other miscellaneous preparations for tomorrow’s events. Hobbycon 2008 happens to coincide with a Times Book Fair, hence our venue has a natural fortress of tables around it. This helps the booth owners tremendously as the possibility of theft was drastically minimized. No more crowds of people walking behind the booths like last year.

THE BIG DAY

This is why I hate driving: I lost a hubcap when I hit a sidewalk (error in judging corners) as I was turning my car close to the roundabout near Karamunsing. Well, at least it’s better than having to replace a door when I got into an accident in a parking lot on last year’s Hobbycon. Despite the minor hiccup, I still made it in one piece nonetheless.

My 1/6 figures are on this side.

However, on the other side…

…fellow 1/6 comrade Nerdpride flew all the way from Sandakan to join me in this event. While my manpower is the size of two sections (12 figures), Nerdpride brought in a 25-man (and woman) strong platoon. His figures took two large tables while mine took only a single small table.

Nerdpride’s femme fatales.

In last year’s Hobbycon entry that I posted, Moebius commented:
“I was expecting a full armored tactical operative to come to hobbycon with a p90. He did. But he left his body armor and his orange muzzled p90 at home. Duh. You should be if there’s still next year.

Guess what? Your wish has been fulfilled.

Keeping an eye out for civvies with greasy hands. Can you stand up in that gear for nearly 7 hours?

Dasaru’s PVC figures on display.

Various merchandises and PVC figures on sale, also at Bakaneko’s booth. His actual shop, Moeyume, is located at Kompleks Karamunsing. The shop’s pricing is the best in KK.

So I heard you lieks vidya gaems. There’s also a booth showcasing MGS4 and Gran Turismo 5 Prologue, but I couldn’t find pics for it.

Cupcakes and other pastries being sold. The maid booth is on the left next to me and Nerdpride’s booth.

Maid dancing performance. Your typical Haruhi + Lucky Star dance.

CSP’s own doujin circle. Sadly, they won’t do anything NSFW. ;_; I boycotted their doujins because of that.

Card battles are serious business.

The crowd on the first day of Hobbycon: a lot more than anticipated. The front tables are for Magic The Gathering card tournament. Picture was taken during the end of a round I guess. Can’t really tell, cuz’ I’m not into card games.

Right next to me and Nerdpride’s booth is a booth that sells various Gundam gunplas and Fix Figuration figures. They slashed down their prices for this event, up to the point that a number of the items are cheaper than those sold in KL. Unfortunately, I was extremely cash-strapped at the time so I couldn’t purchase what I wanted.

Continue to Part II: Cosplays!