World's largest Otaku festival, Comic Market 77 (C77) opened at TOKYO BIG SIGHT at Tokyo's Ariake area on December 29th. It will be held until the 31st.
Comic Market a.k.a. "Comiket" is the world's largest handmade comic book fair, held twice a year, in August ( a.k.a. "Natsucomi") and December (a.k.a. "Fuyucomi") . It rents out the whole Tokyo Big Site, the largest convention facility in the country for 3 days is called "Otaku Festival".
The participants numbers this couple of years has reached over half a million, twice as much as Tokyo Game Show (about 200,000 participants). In the grueling heat or the severe cold, and the overwhelming number of people and the hours of waiting in line to reach the booth, it is truly "Otaku Jihad".
to pics from Fuyucomi 2008
to pics from Natsucomi 2009
About 12,000 groups of manga, anime, Gundam and game related circles participated on the opening day on the 29th. Many groups featuring "Hetalia" has become a genre on its own from this comiket. There were many cosplayers seen in "Hetalia" at costly square. The company booths in the west area had many otaku related companies participating. Booths for "Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha" and "Fate/stay night" which the theatrical feature is coming up were seen.
The second day, 30th, will feature 12,000 groups for boys comics like "REBORN!", "One Piece"and "Gintama", handmade games/software like "Toho Project", railroad, military, history and original stories. Ladies are expected to rush to areas with BL groups while guys might rush to "Toho" related groups that are popular among younger people. Groups for adult audience, educational comics, commentaries, tokusatsu, entertainment and sports are expected to participate on the final day, the 31st. As usual, a total of 36,000 groups and 500,000 participants are expected.
（* pics from the opening day. Report article will contributed later）
