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XxSkyxX

MFF 2015 InDepth Review

Sky's Review of Midwest Furfest 2015
( Furaffinity: www.furaffinity.net/user/xxskyxx )

-Hotel
-parking
-hotel room
-staff
-food


-Convention
-Atmosphere
-registration
-people
-fursuiters
-Artists and Dealers
-general
-Duo
-Gideon
-Panels
-Opening ceremony
-"My first convention" panel
-MST3K
-Rock Band 4
-Friday Night Dance

-Fursuit Parade
-Amadhia Charity Concert

-Narrative in Video Games
-Science Fiction and Fantasy
-Closing Ceremonies
-General
-Charity
-Redneck
-That moment
-Overall Conclusion

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-Opening Statement

Let me just start off by saying two things. The first thing being that this is the first. Meaning this was my very first furry convention ever, I have always wanted to go to one, however it had never been in the cards and now that I've moved to a place with better opportunity, I jumped at the fact that I could go to this one.

The second thing being that I had a great time. I loved going to the con, being at the con and was sad when I had to leave the con. I loved my time there and fully intend to go next year, and perhaps also be a sponsor or maybe even a shiny sponsor to help support the con.

I say these things because I intend to make this an honest review. While the events and everything were fun, I'm not just going to gush about all the fun times I had, there will be plenty of that in the review, I also want to name off some things I think could be improved on. So sure, I suppose I hope that the right people will see this review and take my opinion into consideration. All this said, let's get started.

-Hotel

For those of you unfamiliar, the convention itself takes place inside the Hyatt Regency hotel in Rosemount, Illinois, just outside the city limits of Chicago. The hotel itself is fantastic and very open aired. The main building is basically just one big giant room with a pool of glass elevators in the middle. The room hallways for the main building are around the wall. In other words, if the room you're staying at is part of the main building and not around the stairwell, you can walk out the door of your room, lean over the railing and look down at the hotel lobby below. It's a very open and interesting design.

-Parking

We got there early, Thursday morning, so parking was not an issue for us. We didn't even have to use the parking garage. However we were told this that I think is important to pass on. Once you're parked, STAY! PUT! True you just got a parking spot, great and then everyone comes in behind you and fills the rest of the parking spots. Now say the next day you want to leave the hotel, after all that's perfectly reasonable.  The hotel isn't the only thing there, after all the great city of Chicago is a stone's throw away. But then you have to come back... and now you can't find a place to park. Best thing I can recommend is, if you want to do more than be just at the hotel, then I recommend you extend the vacation beyond the convention time, that way after the convention you can enjoy Chicago and still have a room at the Hyatt hotel without having to worry about a parking space when you get back.

-Hotel Room

The room itself we stayed in was great. It was pretty standard with two twin beds, desk area, large TV and of course closet and full bathroom. If you're OK with sharing a bed with someone, then you can quite easily have four people in one room. Not only that but the hotel staff seems perfectly fine with you bringing your own, like an inflatable mattress. I like my elbow room, so I brought my own air mattress to sleep on. Not only was I able to do so without hearing any complaints, but after coming back from breakfast on the second day, I looked and saw that the room attendant even MADE IT BACK UP by orientating the pillows and blankets back on it and even left me the extra blanket I requested at the foot of the bed.

-Staff

The hotel staff REALLY surprised me. They were very inviting of the convention, to the point where some of them even had on animal ears. The hosts and waiters at the restaurant were always attentive and inviting and often had smiles. The people at the front desk were always nice and courteous and even got a few laughs out of me while there.  

They also had some kind of mascot at the front desk, however I think they need a few pointers in how to make things not creepy. It lacked curves and what I mean by that is, it looked like a character from the Spy vs Spy universe. I'm reminded of the behind the scenes features of Lilo and Stitch, where the art director explains how curves make things more inviting and easy to look at, hence why the movie is so inviting to watch and why things that would be sharped edge, such as Lilo's camera, are curved rather than pointed.

-Food

The food at the hotel was top notch and it even had choices. What I mean by that was. The grill at the lobby had menus and it also had a buffet. Now if you wanted best quality then you could order off the menu and get it to order. However if you just wanted to get in and eat and get out at a good price then you can choose the buffet. In general each time you got the buffet it was sixteen dollars for cons goers, and this meant you could fill your plate as much and as many times as you wanted for that one price. In terms of feeding a large number of people this is much MUCH easier for the staff to manage. Max and me sat at a table and we told our waiter, who was filling our glasses with coffee and orange
juice that we'd take the breakfast buffet. After getting a plate full of food and returning to the table our check was already there. This means everything is extremely streamlined and the food itself was still good. This allows the hotel to feed a bunch of people very quickly and I think it's the best option they could do. After all the faster you feed everyone, the faster the money comes in, and of course, the quality of the menu is still there as an option if you want it, so everyone wins.

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-Convention

Now onto Midwest Furfest proper. I learned I would be able to attend the convention about a month in advance, so I was able to request the time off work, save up a bit as well as get items I would need for the con such as a sketchbook. At the time I didn't know just how big this particular con is, but from what I've gathered, a lot of people say it's second only to Anthrocon in terms of size and popularity, yet many people argue that MFF is better due to the fact that the convention takes place within the hotel itself, while Anthrocon takes place in a convention center and con goers have to find residency elsewhere nearby.

-Atmosphere

The overall feeling of the convention was definitely a good one. While you're at panels and events and even if you're just walking around the hotel, it's hard to not have a smile on your face. Everywhere you go people are doing their own little things. You can walk by a group of people playing some form of card game on the carpeted floor in a circle, walk by a fox in a fursuit playing The Song of Storms from the Legend of Zelda on his trumpet, and walk by people taking pictures, all in the short space of one hallway, let alone rooms that are capable of handling other things. If you find yourself with time because you've already eaten, there's no panels you're interested in going on, and you have some free time, then simply walking around the hotel is a perfectly viable option because you never know what interesting things you'll run into. This makes having some form of camera an absolute MUST.

-Registration.

Registration was surprisingly fast as well. Now of course you can pre-register for the con by going tothe website and registering and paying then. This makes registering five dollars cheaper, which is what me and my roommate did. However you still have to go to registration so they can finalize your registration and give you your con badge. However, I wasn't in line for as long as I expected and I think they handled it as best as they possibly could. You get in line, then you get in line based on your last name, your pre-register name is found, they give you your badge number and then you use that to get your badge, simple as A-B-C. At that point, you're legit and the convention is your oyster. If you don't pre register then you have to wait in a total different line in order to register from start to finish, I don't know how that works and I don't know how they get their badges, there for I highly recommend pre-registering for the con. No doubt it makes it easier on the con staff and they even make doing so five dollars cheaper as an incentive to get you to pre register. Bottom line is, pre-registering is the way to go. The con staff will be happy they can streamline you through it and you'll be happy that you got in and out registration faster and saved five bucks because of it.

-People

So what about fellow con goers. This is a convention after all, so this means that there are people EVERYWHERE. The people are half of the reason for the convention, meeting people with minds like you and I'm happy to say that they are as inviting as you'd hope. True sometimes it is hard to just randomly say Hi, but sometimes when you get on an elevator with a stranger, you almost feel like you have to. You see them, see their badge and you can't help but smile and nod and ask them how they're doing. More often than not it will lead to a conversation, and you find that the elevator got
you to your floor sooner than you wanted it to. During my time at the con, I never had a rude encounter with anyone, and not only that but I didn't SEE any rude encounters either. Now I know it'd be unrealistic to think that everyone was always happy in a building with over five THOUSAND people in it, and I'm pretty sure some attitudes did arise, but I wasn't around to see them, and I have a feeling they were rare enough that a lot of people can say the same thing...

-Fursuiters

And of course, the mascots of the furry fandom themselves. I'm happy to say they are just as inviting as pictures and videos make them out to be. It's not just the outside of suit that's smiling, you can tell the person in the suit is doing it because they genuinely are having a good time, despite how hot it must get inside them. Anytime I requested a picture or a hug it was invited with a nod and or open arms. They were all inviting and looked great, many times I was worried my camera would run out of storage space because there were simply so many that deserved photos. So long as you're polite and courteous and ask permission, most likely a fursuiter will agree to your hug or picture, after all they understand that they happen. They know the value of what they're wearing and that it can also be delicate, which is why you should always ask for hugs, and they also know this means they will be stopped often for photo ops, so never be afraid to impose, odds our they will feel honored that you find their suit photo worthy.

-Artist and Dealers

Now of course, one of the big draws of the furry fandom is all the great art from all the great artists. On the lowest level of the hotel was where artists could set up and take sketch commissions and dealers could set up shop and sell their merchandise. When you go to these makes a big difference.

On the first day in this area, of course everyone was down here and it was all tightly packed. This is understandable although it creates a unique dilemma. Despite the fact of how tightly packed it is, everyone is in a sense of movement. Once you hit the escalators to the dealers floor you can enter the "stream". This stream will then flow you into and out of every room, walking directly in front of every artist and dealer there. While you get to see everyone and who all is there, it gives you this big feeling that if you stop, everyone will get mad at you for stopping the flow. This makes it weird to deal with an artist you're after cause everyone is brushing past you to move on. That's inconvenient enough, now think about the dilemma that's created when several people want to stop and deal with one particular artist.

This isn't as bad as say later in the day or on a later when there are less people throughout the rooms and it looks more like a market to do business rather than a stock car track at a fair.

In terms of the merchandise itself, I didn't really see anything I was interested in, granted I didn't really get a good look at all the t-shirts about and their probably would have been a few I would have enjoyed. At the same time though I needed to remember to keep my money in check and save it for the things that I did want. Being that it was my first con and I was being careful with my money, I took the time instead to take it all in and look around. Now that I know what I can expect for next year, I can save up an appropriate amount and go down into the dealers den with desired purchases in mind. For this first convention of mine there were two people on this floor I dealt with.

-Duo

Once I met Duo, he struck me as a guy that was straight to the point, which I can totally understand and respect, because especially at a time of a convention like this, such an attitude is what gets shit done. I myself went to see him on the first day of the con, yet despite this Duo already had a chair next to him stacked up with sketchbooks. Despite this I still offered my own just in case, however he seemed worried that I didn't understand this meant he would have my book for a while, and offered the compromise to do it digitally. The though hadn't crossed my mind but it made sense once he brought it up and it was very nice of him to do so in fact.

I'll admit I was a bit nervous, because there was a lot of firsts going on in this scenario for me. It was my first con at all, my first time at MFF, my first time in an artists alley, my first time dealing with an artist face to face, offering him to be the first one to draw in my first sketchbook. Needless to say, my thoughts weren't exactly coming to my head smoothly, so some of my oddity was most likely recognized by Duo.

After a bit of rocky road we finally agreed on the point and I paid him for the service he would inquire. Needless to say, once I walked away I felt so much better for having gone through with it, because on my way down to the alley with my book, Duo had been my goal from the start, yet I was still nervous due to all of the "firsts" of the situation. It was some thick layers of ice, but I'm glad I broke them. I just feel kinda bad that Duo was the one that ended up being the one to put up with breaking me into the swing of things at cons.

Still he handled it all very professionally. I even saw him the next day. He told me he had tried to work on the piece the night before, which surprised me greatly, because I wasn't even expecting him to remember that I had commissioned him until after the con had ended. Basically it was a case of artist block and he couldn't really make any progress, which in my honest opinion is best. I'm perfectly fine waiting patiently for an artist to find their muse, because once they do it really shines through in the art.

I highly recommend commissioning Duo if you see him at a con. Not just because of his great art quality but because of his professional attitude. He's a no nonsense kind of guy, which means everything gets straight to the point. You can approach his table and commission him swiftly, and if he's full he will kindly let you know, so you can go on about your convention.

-Gideon

If you're at a con and you know Gideon is there, be vigilant. If he's not in the artist's alley then he's in the dealer's den selling his art CDs. However, you can still sketch commission him as well. I asked him so and he kindly told me he was, and the small stack of books next to him confirmed this.

Gideon himself was a joy to commission, swap details with and make sure everything was in order. He made it clear that leaving the book with me meant I'd get it back the next day, something I was perfectly fine with. This is a great way to control you expenses on art. If an artists has your book already then you can spend more money on more. While this does mean you have to be a bit picky it also means you'll still have money.

Just as he said, Gideon had my book for me the next day. I noticed he did what a lot of artists do and forgot Sky's glasses. When I pointed this out to him he was very polite about it and I handed the book back to him and he added them in in about ten seconds flat. All this combined meant that he's a great artist with a great attitude and I gladly bought a couple of his art CDs, not just for the art on them, but knowing that the money is going to help support an artist. Gideon also has my recommendation on convention artists you should commission.
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-Panels

-Opening Ceremony
Not much to be said here. Everybody that wanted to gathered into the grand ballroom so that the main staff of the con could welcome everyone to the furfest and get everyone acquainted. The did a good job on getting everyone up to speed on changes since the last furfest, such as rules changing as well as stating why some special regulations had been taken.

-"My First Convention" panel
Of course, seeing as how this was my first convention, I felt almost obligated to come to this one. I was a bit surprised to see that several of the staff in charge were heading this panel, including the chairman himself. There was only about two dozen people or less in the room so it made it really easy to keep things a bit more personal with this.

They covered a lot of important topics, and made sure to cover that this first convention meant there was a good chance some of the people were in Chicago for the first time, and let everyone know that Chicago was a dry area and to be sure and stay hydrated. They also covered a few tips on being cons in general, for example the minimum rule of 6-2-1; at least six hours of sleep a day, two meals a day and one shower a day, at LEAST.

-MST3K
Okay, I may ruffle a few feathers with this one but I think it's best to state my mind as it is. This was one of the few panels I was looking forward to. Even when I originally first thought it was just watching an episode of the show I was happy, but when I learned that we'd be watching a crappy movie and doing the riffing ourselves, I was THRILLED.

When i got there, I learned that we'd be riffing the film, and at the same time the judges would be doing a drinking game, and by donating money to charity, you could add in another rule for them. At first I thought this was a great idea and it would be a way to fill in things between riffing but then time showed how this wasn't great.

The panel quickly became about nothing but the drinking game, leaving nothing for actually riffing the movie. Now I don't want to ruffle feathers by putting down the portion that was donating to charity, but I do want to tell it like it is. Over the course of the movie I heard some very funny riffs, however the vast majority of the movie was taken up by people screaming "TORCH!" "OUTSIDE!" "BALD!" all for the sake of the judges drinking. While this is kind of cute, it meant that if there was a bunch of rules going on and you had a riff in mind for the particular moment on the screen you were
pretty much SOL due tot he crowd of people shouting over you. It's a real downer and the moment goes by. If the right people are reading this I have a proposed fix.

Make the riffing and the drinking, two different panels. From what I saw in the scheduling, there was plenty of room left for other panels so it seems like this i a very real possibility. Take a movie that's not so popular and use it for the riffing panel, where only riffing happens. Then take a movie that's a bit more popular and use it for the drinking game panel, this way the drinking game can still happen and people can still donate to charity while at the same time a movie can be riffed in good fun by a bunch of people and everyone has a chance to tell their joke. I for one would certainly love to attend both these panels.

-Rock Band 4
YES!!! Rock Band. It had been so long since I played Rock Band I was so excited to see this in the listings. I could finally play the drums I loved again. When I arrived they had already started an hour ago, so it meant they were already rocking out, which was great cause it meant there was no waiting on the set up for me. After a couple songs I let the drummer know that I'd take over when he was finished and he let me know he was pretty much playing until someone else came along so i happily relieved him of the drum sticks. Everything about this was well and good except for one critical
thing; sound.

The game audio was being played through the little speaker on the projector. Often times this meant the song playing was hard to hear. This was a HUGE let down, and often times while I was trying to play the song, I'd loose the beat and stop what I was doing to have to listen tot he audio to find the beat again. I know this may sound like a minor gripe, but in a game that's all about music, it's actually a pretty big deal. I ended up leaving after about six or so songs.

I propose a fix to this one as well, if the right people are reading this. The projector seemed pretty straight forward, I'm sure there had to be some audio output on it that could be lead to some speakers. Now I'm not telling the rock band owner to invest in some speakers for the sake of the con, however I am proposing that I'd personally be more than happy to help him acquire some. If the owner of the rock band panel would like to get with me at some point I'd gladly discuss things with him and help him have a decent set of speakers for next year. I'm not saying the whole hotel has to hear the game, but at least the room the game is in. If this happens I know I'd spend a lot of time at this game at the con.

Which brings me to my last point on this panel. The con book seemed to imply that this game would only be run for one night. That once this was over some other game would be set up here for the other days, so I never really had a mind to pass by the room again, however I did do just that on the last day of the con only to see the game still set up in the room.

-Friday Night Dance
I didn't spend a whole lot of time here, however from what I saw, the music playing was definitely stuff that you could dance to and many of the people and fursuiters on the floor were doing just that. I figured while I was there I'd try to find a girl to perhaps get to know, but the one that I found that seemed like she'd want to dance, got scooped up by one of her girl friends when I asked her to the dance floor. All in all, I think it's a great way to meet some out going people that aren't afraid to get up and move around.

-Fursuit Parade
This was rather enjoyably even though it took up a great amount of time. It seemed they had a lot more fursuiters than they were expecting because the parade went on for more than half an hour than it was expecting to. Still in the line up were some great suits. Many of the were creative and many of them looked great.

A few of the ones I remember were; this grim looking raven I saw, sort of like a cross between a raven and grim reaper, it was really cool and it reminded me of a mini comic by Zaush. If the character has a origin of it's own I don't know it. There also this pair of red and white crux's that had opposing color schemes, it was really creative and cool and they looked great together. Other ones that stood out were a fur playing tunes on his trumpet and solid snake, walking around with his giant box. Which when you think about it is oddly appropriate, because infiltrating is what he does.

-Amadhia Charity Concert
This was the second night she performed, I had sadly missed the first. The concert seemed a bit short, they only played about six or so songs, though to my understanding though this was because the previous event had gone on for to long and they didn't have a lot of time remaining from the start.

Never the less, the time that they were on stage was really enjoyable, it had a great old time jazz feel to it. Much like jazz and gatsby style mixed together. I could certainly dig it and I enjoyed it well. Each person played well and Amadhia's voice and singing style really matched the genre

-Narrative in Video Games
This one was certainly neat. Funny thing is though there was no one there when we got there and we set up the room for the panel. The co-host arrived and we waited a bit for the person that actually put together the panel but he never showed, so we did it without him. However the co host handled things well and the room became a great discussion about narrating techniques and we talked about everything from how Bastion narrates directly to how games like Portal narrate and tell a story indirectly.

-Science Fiction and Fantasy
This panel was more geared towards writing and a lot of time was spent on good ways to write out such stories and even blend them together. For instance, Star Wars is a good example of sci-fi fantasy, while The Martian is a good example of "hard science" fiction, because a lot of the story can be verified as real science.

-Closing Ceremonies
Alas, all good things must come to an end and while this wasn't the last panel at the con, it could be seen as the last official panel because not much else was going on after this. With a room full of people the con staff gave their thanks and listed off some interesting numbers to the crowd of people

-Redneck
When the Charity reps came on the stage there was the main one and his friend. He introduced his friend as a complete redneck and such before giving him the microphone. The man explained that he hadn't even wanted to come to this con, he didn't think they needed this cons charity due to his closed mind. However he then explained that coming to the con was the most fun he'd ever had and that it just goes to show that "you shouldn't judge things you know nothing about." I thought this was a great moment and it really shows that cons like Midwest Furfest can really show what the furry fandom
is all about. They even showed pictures of him with groups of fursuiters.

-Charity
The charity itself was Save a Vet. In a nutshell, animals in he armed forces, police and other forms of jobs for the people, can get PTSD just as we humans can and a lot of the animals are put down when they get old or simply forgotten. What this charity does is work to give these veteran animals a good home, ideally by putting them in the care of humans that are veterans just like them. The panels throughout the con raised nearly twenty thousand dollars for the charity, and then the staff presented the charity with a big check for forty thousand dollars. After hugs and handshakes, the charity was about to walk off stage when someone in the crowd shouted out a question of how short of sixty thousand
dollars they were...

-That Moment
When they announced they were around four hundred dollars short of that number, they got up and started walking to the front to place money on the table. Then another... and another... and another... at that point it seemed like half the room was getting up to give money to the front. It was one of the most beautiful things I've seen. No one had asked them to do so, but there they were, people getting up and putting money to the front from there own packets. I don't think there was a dry eye up on stage. Had I had any money on me I would have done the same.

-Overall Conclusion
To sum things up, I had a blast at this con, even though it was my first con. I made it a goal to take it easy at this first one and let everything soak in, get a feel for how cons work. That said, I can't wait to go back. I'll take this chance to save up for the next one so I can be better prepared and have a bigger impact next time, now that I know what exactly I'll be diving into.

I hope the critique in this review isn't seen as anything bad or negative, rather it's just my opinion on how to improve on something I love and indeed I only critique it because I do love it and I wanna see it flourish.

I can say for certain that next time I will be doing better to help by becoming a sponsor for the next con or maybe even a shiny sponsor, because I love everything about this convention. I'm looking forward to making new friends at the next con as well as meeting old ones.Midwest Furfest 2016 HYPE!!!
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