Now when it comes to cosplay, Kathleen and myself are inspired by our favorite games and anime. Most often than not, it's a case of one putting forth the suggestion and then trying to convince the other into doing so. And the convincing usually involves showing an anime, a game or even a picture (as was the case with the Link and Zelda). Which now brings me to Skies of Arcadia. I played this, on my Dreamcast, and loved it before we met and I was interested in cosplaying as Vyse - cos he rules and I liked the game a lot.
I then did a second playthrough, this time with Kathleen watching, and she seemed interested enough to cosplay as Fina to match.
Now seeing as we've done recognizable characters in the past, to suddenly do characters from a Dreamcast game would seem an odd move. But it mattered little: We liked this game and we both took great pride in cosplaying as lesser known characters - after all, if pulled off well, any cosplay can make the unfamiliar curious to know more.
Much like previous efforts, this cosplay was a combination of the manufactured and the assembled: The boots were from the Link cosplay (which subsequently fell apart on the day), the turtleneck was from an anime cosplay and the jeans were my own. The jacket was crafted by Kathleen (as was her Fina) and the eyepiece was crafted from swimming goggles!
Also pleasing is for once I was now able to actually do a cosplay using my real hair! As much fun as it is to wear wacky wigs, they eventually do create a strain on my head and it does get irritating at times. So whilst chances to use my real hair are slim, when they do come about, I seize upon them :D
If any of these photos seem a bit difficult to see, I'm afraid that these are the only photos that were taken of us at the con (that being AI-Con) itself. Remember what I said earlier about cosplaying as lesser-known characters? Well as it turns out, we were not recognized at all. Of course we have only ourselves to blame as this was in AI-Con, a much smaller scale con then, say, Manifest. As such, many people were left puzzled as to who were cosplaying as. This was particularly telling when I participated in a roleplay event and ended up winning. Also telling is whereas we had grown accustomed to be continually recognized and stopped for photos, this time it didn't happen at all. Indeed, it is hard to say whether it would've different had this been done at a larger scale con.
So is the Vyse a failure? I don't think so. I thought the end result was great and I don't feel ashamed to have worn it at all. Okay so yes being unrecognizable may have prompted a rethink in doing lesser known characters but I'm not too bothered (and after all, you can't win them all). We liked the game the characters are from, Skies of Arcadia, and we wanted to tell the world we did so - which is pretty much the entire point of cosplay.
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