The Last Cons (of 2020)
When I first thought about writing of my con experiences in 2020, I thought the title would be 'March of the Cons'. I had decided that in 2020 I would attend as many of the local DC/Baltimore conventions as I could. I had started out with Super MagFest, a gaming (mostly video) and music convention in early January but in February there was three distinctive conventions one right after another. KatsuCon, a large twenty thousand-ish anime con with a strong cosplay focus at the National Harbor just outside DC on the Potomac. Next was Farpoint, a thousand attendee sci-fi/Star Trek convention that was just north of Baltimore at the Hunt Valley Inn, home of many local cons. Lastly, ScrumCon a new tabletop gaming convention in Silver Spring just inside the DC Beltway with only a couple hundred (if that) attendees. With these three different cons with contrasting focuses and sizes, I thought it would be a good comparison of local cons and be fun to write about them. But after ScrumCon I was tired and put off writing about them figuring it could wait a week or so.
Two weeks later Maryland shut down and things have not been quite the same since.
Let us put aside all the bigger changes that have happened and focus on what we really care about here, the conventions. On the fan level a lot of cons were and continue to be affected not only because their venues were closed but also because guests canceled due to health or travel concerns. Some of the conventions have rescheduled (AwesomeCon first rescheduled for December then again to 2021), some chose to do virtual events (BaltiCon did so on their traditional Memorial Day weekend) and a few just wrote off the year and confirmed 2021's dates (BlerdCon). Thankfully for the moment none of the local cons have been killed off.
There have been concerns on what are the short- and longer-term consequences for conventions, how they will be held going forward or even whether the current bunch of conventions and their organizations can survive. I started writing about that but stopped when I realized after thousands of words, I had barely even touched on some of the problems.
All I can say for certain is that back in February I attended “The Last Cons” for a while so I will share my experience with you.
Since I am talking about three different conventions, and will have some photos to share, this article will be split over several blog posts, so as they go live just go to newer one or check the relevant tags and/or categories.