Virtual Journal #10: Vket 2024 Winter

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Summary

Ending the year and recharging my creative energy with a relaxed speedrun of Vket 2024 Winter.

Content

Virtual Market logo at the Parareal Central entrance. Pink and blue-colored cybernetic wires or rails are all over the area, with fancy cylindrical passageways, futuristic buildings and island discs, and jellyfish swimming at the sky.

This year’s Virtual Market Winter was held for two weeks—from December 7 to 22—and it was, once again, such a good trip full of creative wonder.

I didn’t have that much time to go around, starting my exploration just a day or two before the event closed. Despite speedrunning through some of the locations however, I’m still amazed at how many amazing booths there are in the event!

It was hard to only pick a few for this article, haha. You can find the list of locations and exhibitors here.

MusicVket, the music-focused counterpart of the event, was held along with the main event this time as well. I haven’t been to the previous ones, so I was particularly interested in going around in it and discovering new music.

Ichiemon’s booth. In the walls of a seemingly old mansion lies a character, sitting on top of a stair pedestal carpeted with red. The white-haired, pale-skinned creature wears a sophisticated little black dress fit for a demon, with red and yellow tones.

Starting with Lost Civilization Argdella and its gimmicks that were possibly inspired by Breath of the Wild, I first approached Ichiemon’s booth, which showcased one of their newer character models on a fancy pedestal. I really like the cute evil mimic princess design. She can even hide inside a treasure chest!

Resting deep within the ruins was a simple cafe from Mayonaka-do. The water falling down from its roof gave it a relaxing feel, and their item sets of various themes were interesting to play around with. They also have character accessories like night vision goggles or lasers in their store.

Irua’s booth felt like it came from a different time with its modern look, displaying their 3D particles and modular items. It was fun watching the demo videos on how to use the Sleeping Bag and Nebula Staff.

Innoce’s booth. A schoolgirl with long, faint yellow hair, posing inside a minimalistic classroom enveloped in sky blue. A translucent curtain gently sways, covering the windows of the room.

Satiating my desire to randomly walk in malls once again was Sky Park, featuring its giant ferris wheel and a fashionable pool ride. In here was innoce’s booth, which might be my favorite booth from the whole event. Even with just a few little details, it was able to step into the perfect mood and create a scenery where two people meet in a classroom for a special moment.

Ensuiuni’s booth pleasantly transports you into an alley-like setting with their new character model, sitting and posing cutely to the camera. I enjoyed the carefree atmosphere that it provided to the area.

QW_Style had a large poster for one of their ocean-themed avatar clothing designs, so I, being a fan of that kind of aesthetic, will obviously add a place for it in this article. They have a variety of other designs and avatars in their store, too. Their recent fan-made one was quite charming!

Sammy’s booth. Aiming an orange handgun in first person view at a rainbow-colored button UI in 3D, with the word “Shoot” written on it. Pixel art characters in red and black are vibing to the music all around the area. A huge cylinder mimicking a slot machine floats above.

Parareal Mt. Fuji—with its breathtaking scenery and traveling gimmicks—had the best world design for me. It surprisingly had more shooting games that I expected, including the slots-inspired Virtual Groove Shooting game from Sammy, which had stylish pixel art and funky music.

Yaizu City had the same booth as the last time I saw theirs. This year though, they had a shooting game as well, where the fishes you’ve caught will appear in a giant aquarium where you can take pictures with.

I might have spent too much time on Canon’s booth, shaped like a massive camera lens. They collaborated with people to create videos that showcase some of their product’s features, like 180° videos. Travel vlogs and animal videos can trap you into eternal bliss…

A girl with pink twintails poses in front of the colorful AminoθSupple booth, beside the character stands of each of the group’s members.

Speaking of bliss, Gachatopia is a bright and energetic world for gacha-lovers. Random items from previous iterations of the event appear whenever you go to a different section of the world.

The booths themselves are thankfully not randomized, so I was able to find AminoθSupple’s booth. I became a fan of the music of one of their members from a different event, so I was delighted to see the booth which they all worked hard on. They made such a colorful logo, too!

Boo Boo Bougainvillea’s booth uses colors from the opposite side of the spectrum in their upcoming avatar. Her design felt like a protagonist from a difficult, action-packed game, set in a mysterious, tension-filled castle. I honestly wish I could play as her in some kind of game, haha. The poster sold it off so well.

The booth from KAWAII-dou and Hamanosis may have simply had a model wearing the clothes and accessories that they’ve made, but I really like how they look and (possibly) feel! There’s a lot more items over at their respective shops; I especially liked their hairstyle and flower accessory designs.

EP cover of Phantom’s Shirahae EP: A drawing of two small levers with labels of “June” and “July” on top—with the latter being pressed down—in a light green background decorated by tree shadows. The cover is inside a floating UI in 3D, with two vertical speakers at its sides. Different types of audio storage devices are displayed at the back.

MusicVket was held in a professional-looking building, with elevators leading to music-filled floors. At the center of each is an area which had a unique feature of allowing you to listen to all the tracks nearby. You can even make your own playlist from all the songs inside the world!

I like the male vocals from the VR rock band PHANTOM’s Shirahae EP. The tracks feel like something I’d listen to while cycling down the road.

Yukina Kita’s 100 Days was very calming. She also makes free music on her channel, as well as an animated cat series!

Some of Magischer Schnee’s songs in her first mini album had her singing at a slightly lower register, which I was entranced by. I wonder if I’ll be able to go to a physical live venue someday…

Marking the start of an epic adventure was Hukami Aiya’s original fantasy RPG-themed track. Listening to their seasonal piano mini album was also a good breather from all the virtual exploration.

Kotora Aqbi had a refreshing, laid-back singing style in her original song. I listened to her most recent one as well, and everything’s so good in there, too!

A girl with pink twintails standing beside Hiodoshi Ao—a VTuber with short dark blue hair in a black suit—sitting on a blue sofa along with a stuffed toy version of herself. Various pictures and merchandise of her are on the side, while a music video from ReGLOSS plays in the booth’s background.

Here are some other notable exhibitors from other locations in the event:

  • I have to mention the very cool Hiodoshi Ao’s booth in Parareal Odaiba at least once in here. I’ve been watching her videos quite a bit recently, so I obviously had to take a bunch of photos.
  • VSinger group SpookyGirls had an introductory halloween-themed booth at Cirque du Personnage. I wish I could have been at their special live!
  • Rinrin (or Ringring) had a cute dirndl-inspired dress displayed at Isekai Marche: Frontline Stand. I like its flowery design!
  • At Snowman’s Toy Factory, Cloudz’s dynamic, pixel-textured booth has the spotlight. The details of the booth itself and the avatars around it were of high quality.
  • Tategamililha’s booth in Starship Orchestra had a giant version of their newer avatar, a short-haired trendy girl with a rabbit hairpin, chilling on a platform.
  • The avatars and booths created by students at the Jikei COM Group Booth and Avatar Contest world were a joy to go through!

Do note that there might be a handful of booths with AI-generated stuff in the event. I’m not sure about some of the visuals of the locations themselves, but I think most exhibitors who used them have labeled theirs as such, at least.

In any case, maybe I’ll try applying for the event one day… With a web-based booth maker, joining without touching Unity might be possible…

… Though I might end up using Unity a bit anyway, since I think it’s unavoidable when trying to make your own avatars… I’ll look into it more next year.

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