Today, in a panel for Cosplay Day, ReedPop announced that the EuroCosplay Championships and the Crown Championships of Cosplay are joining forces as The Cosplay Central Crown Championships.
With the break in the competition circuits for both the EuroCosplay Championships, whose final has been held at MCM London Comic Con since October 2010, and the Crown Championships of Cosplay, traditionally held at C2E2, the ReedPop cosplay team have been using the time to think about how to develop the competitions and we realised that they were stronger together as one global competition.
The new Cosplay Central Crown Championships builds on the craftsmanship foundation of both competitions, but also adds some different options for participating cosplayers. We’ll also be working closely with the Cosplay Central editorial team to bring you more about the incredible finalists and an exclusive behind-the-scenes look at the competition.
As part of the announcement we highlighted some of the changes to the format for any of you already familiar with either EuroCosplay or the global Crown Championships of Cosplay, and how we are bringing the two competitions together.
Taking to the Stage
One of the things we’ve always loved about the EuroCosplay Championships Final is our incredible stage show. In recent years this has been packed with amazing performances, whereas for the Crown Championships of Cosplay, it was a much simpler stage presentation, albeit with equally incredible costumes.
For the new Crown Championships there will be a score for ‘Stage Presentation’, but if creating a scripted performance isn’t for you, I completely understand I’d be the same, you still have the option of just showcasing your costume. You’ll have a little more time and freedom to get creative, show your character and really make sure the audience see all of the incredible features of your costume.
Costume Design or Accuracy
For the costume side, we are shaking things up a bit. In recent years there’s been a really exciting trend of cosplayers making incredible original designs or interpretations of their favorite characters. So now entrants for the Crown Championships will be able to choose to accurately recreate an existing pop culture character design and be judged for ‘Accuracy’ OR create their own design based on a recognisable pop culture character and be judged on the ‘Design’ and interpretation from their given starting point.
To help illustrate this is Akellyz Mario from the Crown Championships of Cosplay at C2E2 last year. This is a great example of a strong original concept that would fit into this ‘Design’ category.
It’s such a cohesive and well put together design with so much detail. The character is instantly recognisable as Mario, and even without the description you can clearly pick out all of their points of reference for their interpretation to take Mario into a post apocalyptic world. You can view more of their costume in our gallery
We will have a detailed appendix in the published rules for the final with a suggestion of how the scores can break down so you can get a better understanding of what the judges will be looking for in all of the score categories. Make sure to check out the rules if you are interested in taking part.
The Circuit
We also revealed that the global final will now be held at MCM London October from 2022 and beyond.
The finalists that had been selected for EuroCosplay 2020 that haven’t been able to compete yet have been offered a place in that final and we hope they will join us in London next year.
For the UK – instead of having regional selections across all of the MCM shows we’ll move to a single round at MCM London May 2022 – Look out for more news from MCM early next year if you hoping to compete in the UK.
For the US – The local qualifiers start at Florida Supercon 10-12 September, then NYCC 7-10 October, and ECCC 2-5 December. Those winners will all travel to C2E2 in 2022 where there will one last local qualifier before selecting the overall winner to fly to London for the global final in October.
Applications for Supercon and NYCC open soon so make sure to check those websites for more details, and look out for ECCC towards the end of August. We’ll have more news on C2E2 registrations later in the year.
Note: Because of the disruption to the show schedule this year and the proximity of C2E2 2021 to the other shows there will not be a qualifier in December, the qualifier for the 2022 Crown Championships will be at C2E2 2022 (Dates to be announced).
For Australian Fans we are delighted to announce PAX Australia will be selecting a finalist down under in October – Make sure to check out their social channels for registration announcements coming soon.
And for followers in Europe and elsewhere, we’ll have more news really soon about which events you can take part at if you wish to join the championships.
We are really excited about the new Cosplay Central Crown Championships and getting to show you so much more from the brilliant cosplayers that take part. If you have any questions you can reach out to the cosplay team at [email protected], but make sure to check out cosplaycentral.com for more news and updates over the coming weeks.
