retromania retrospective, man...ia

Trough reasons I'm not gonna delve into, I ended up visiting a convention dedicated to nerdy retro stuff called "Retromania". It's got it all you'd expect: Old video games, Pokemon cards, physical movies, Pokemon cards, artist alleys, Pokemon cards, Pokemon games, Pokemon cards, a potion themed shop, Pokemon cards, toys of different kinds, even Pokemon, and, shockingly, Pokemon cards.

 

Did I mention Pokemon cards? I'm somewhat conflicted over the dominating presence of that. On one hand the franchise is over 30 years old so naturally it would count as a retro thing, and people (especially the kids) do love their Pokemon cards. On the other hand: good lord it seems to be an easy market for people to establish themselves and make money out of. The price of some of the cards I glanced over cost more than my monitors. As an outsider it feels like the card game trading market for Pokemon has gone way overboard. I think that all of the expensive modern cards do have cheaper and easily attainable alternatives for people who just want a card for play or they aren't too picky with their collection, but it's a bit ridicolous that some of these things can eat up at least 10% of most peoples monthly salaries. My own spending was fairly modest, got myself a Gameboy magnet by an artist who makes/sells a bunch of pins/stamps/magnets related to nerd media. And if there's anything I want, it's a magnet from a event/place I went to. I also got a Scissor model kit. I did not know they even made those for Pokemon. Of those that were available, pokemon love, and general Cool Toy Vibe, Scissor won with a solid competition of Metagross. 

Beyond that, it was pretty cool to see all the old consoles and games. Primarily the retro TV-consoles, since some were hooked up to CRT TVs and I saw some people playing them. It really does make a difference in how the games look and feel as they are played. I don't have a CRT TV or any old consoles besides a Game Boy Advance SP. Which, while neat, is replaceable with either modded consoles or just plain emulators. But the physical medium of a TV can't be digitally replicated. At least, not to the extent it's indistinguishable from what it's copying.

So overall I'd say it was pretty cool to visit, I also realized it was basically me poking a lil look into some fandoms I have barely any connection to. While I'm lightly entertained by the spectacle, I don't think I'd get much of it unless I actually did collect retro games/consoles.