Pop culture, gaming, and music converged for CONQuest Festival’s three-day event, from June 2 to 4, across five locations in Pasay City. Spearheaded by AcadArena, the convention brought together international and local talents, thousands of attendees, and issues that left attendees, guests, exhibitors, and artists with a bittersweet experience.
CONQuest had its humble beginnings in Iloilo City as a high school project in 2017. It set a significant record as one of the largest events in the city with around 2,000 people attending the event. In 2022, when pandemic restrictions eased, CONQuest moved its location to Pasay City, Metro Manila, becoming a very successful event that year. With high hopes and plans to return bigger, CONQuest Festival 2023 was held across five locations, namely: the SMX Convention Center, Conrad Manila, Seashell Lane, “Food Street,” Mall of Asia, and the National University Mall of Asia (NU MOA).
This year’s CONQuest Festival featured iconic guests and talents such as popular streamers Valkyrae, Sykkuno, Pokimane, and Newt. They were also accompanied by content creators and streamers like Yvonnie, Fuslie, Michael Reeves, and LilyPichu to name a few.
In terms of homegrown talent, the organizers also extended their invitation to the likes of voice actors, Vanille Velasquez and Filipino-American voice actor Anne Yatco. Attendees were also able to witness local content creators Razzie Binx, GLOCO, MaggieKarp, and KrisRey. Several of the guests had segments throughout the festival in which attendees could watch from various stages across the five locations and even meet them at their respective booths.
Swept away into the worlds of cosplaying, art, and music
Similarly, the event also welcomed notable talents in cosplaying. Attendees were able to see Kitz Cua, Charess, Hikarin, Yosuke, and Rurusama among others, who were all notable cosplayers in the community.
Additionally, CONQuest had some iconic Virtual YouTubers (VTubers) such as Bao, Shoto, and Demenishki. For the local comics and art side, the event welcomed Hunghang Flashbacks, Sskait, Little Things PH, Libreng Komiks, and other artists. The list of talents in this year's CONQuest Festival just goes on. With that in mind, this roster of major guests certainly piqued the excitement of attendees even before the event.
Besides the usual guests from the streaming, cosplaying, and gaming communities, the organizers further heightened expectations by inviting music guests and having a new segment called “Music Night” after each day of the festival. Attendees who availed of this add-on could watch bands such as The Rose, Autotelic, Oh Flamingo!, and Carousel Casualties performed. Besides the bands, solo artists such as James Reid, Timmy Albert, Lesha, and James Landino also displayed their musical talents to guests.
Another thing to note is that this year’s CONQuest Festival expanded some of its activities, including arcades in the Freeplay and Retro Arcade zone, and partnered with advocacies like Make-a-Wish Philippines, One Million Lights, and Gamer Girls Philippines. On the second floor, con-goers could also witness an expansive tabletop area if attendees wanted to sit down and play tabletop games such as “Dungeons and Dragons” and “Magic The Gathering.”
Besides that, there was also an Indie Zone wherein game studios could promote their upcoming games and even let attendees try them out.
Benilde’s Interactive Entertainment and Multimedia Computing program partnered with the International Game Developers Association-Gamers Union for Innovation and Leadership Development organization to showcase a game demo at their booth during the event.
Cracks seep through the fantasy
Despite the fun and excitement, these were overshadowed by several issues that arose throughout the festival due to safety hazards and overcrowding. Many have speculated that this was caused by poor ticket management as the event originally sold out pre-sale tickets, but the organizers announced a restock the night before the festival’s first day.
Because the second day of the festival was held on a Saturday, there were more people lined up to enter the SMX Convention Center, which required the convention staff and security to take proper crowd control measures by limiting entries and carefully letting people in by batches. With that, long lines ensued at the entrance, lobby, and escalators, creating another issue after the other.
In an interview with The Benildean, ID 120 Multimedia Arts students Anna Flores and Elisha Manalo shared their experiences and observations from the event. Flores recalled that “I wasn’t able to fully enjoy it because I got tired from waiting as I waited for almost four hours in the line. So as I got in, I felt little to no motivation to check out the other booths because there was even a line to go up the second floor using the escalator.”
As more people arrived to enter, it also became more challenging for those already inside to leave due to the lack of a reliable re-entry system—meaning people had to line up again if they decided to exit and re-enter the venue.
As entries were suddenly not permitted by 6 p.m. on that day, the organizers of the festival then announced that those who weren’t able to enter on Saturday were allowed to convert their passes for the third day of the CONQuest Festival. Rather than alleviating the issue, this caused a domino effect on the third day of the event, where people could be seen lining up as early as seven in the morning—hours before the opening of the festival.
Heat waves crash through attendees and exhibitors alike
On Sunday, people would be waiting for hours just to try to get into the convention center being the primary location of the festival. The post-summer heat also put attendees at risk of heat stroke and dehydration, with the festival’s staff stretched too thinly to accommodate more than 60,000 people lining up to get inside the venue.
According to Manalo, “I talked to someone who had a premium pass and was a competitor in Day 2’s cosplay competition and he said he couldn’t get back in to get his cosplay which he left. He also told us two people had fainted.” Manalo also shared that, “Someone had fainted while waiting in line and despite people shouting for medics there were none present.”
Additionally, the attendees had a challenging time navigating the Quest Market—the venue for local artists and merchandise sellers to sell their products—as there was no clear separation between areas. Manalo also found out that “No screenings were done to ensure that exhibitors weren’t selling bootleg or stolen merchandise,” as seen from local artist Misu’s post on Twitter, who had their designs stolen and resold despite the supposed screening of artists and merchandisers upon registration.
On the last day of the event, Manalo also noticed that “by 4:00 p.m., food stall operations were being halted, with their electricity also being cut off.” This left attendees, exhibitors, and some guests unable to have proper meals during the event. She also shared local vtuber Tala’s post on Twitter, saying that “she [Tala] was able to talk to the people managing one of the food stalls, and they were told by CONQuest staff to not sell anything at 2:30 p.m earlier that day and don't sell until 6:00 p.m. But then the staff also told them to shut down early. They never broke even.”
Despite the organizers issuing refunds to affected con-goers, these may not be enough to compensate for the money, time, and effort spent by supposed attendees to have a “premier convention experience” as advertised.
A bittersweet adventure coming to an end
Overall, this year’s CONQuest Festival reached for the skies but fell hard on the ground. Despite the number of attractions during the event, not every con-goer had the best experience. Attendees, exhibitors, artists, media, and guests alike were affected by the lack of management and planning. It’s also noted that one of CONQuest Festival’s co-founders, Justin Banusing apologized for the “overpromised and undelivered” event as seen on a Twitter thread posted during the festival’s last day.
While all the time and effort can’t be compensated enough, hopefully, CONQuest learns from this year’s convention, returns with better measures taken, and listens to its patrons to truly give the “premier convention experience” to the Filipino crowd in its coming events.
