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A new anime event has been announced that may well change the future for anime events, especially for fans outside of Japan. This new event, based aroundthe extremely popular fantasy animeFrieren: Beyond Journey’s End(hereinFrieren) will take place entirely online. This means that it will not be so limited to people just in Japan’s biggest cities, as many anime events are, but rather is accessible to people everywhere.
This event, titledFrierenOnline Festival, will run from early December through the end of May, though some parts of the event will change after January. Purchased tickets will be necessary to access all parts of the online event, but there will be limited parts of it available for free as well.FrierenOnline Festival will be interactive, and paid tickets include a lot of digital goodies for fans to keep as memories from the event.
TheFrierenOnline Festival
What to Do and What to Expect
TheFrierenOnline Festival seemingly came out of nowhere, with an announcement from Shogakukan dropping just a week before the event is set to begin on December 3rd, 2024. The majority of the event is a digital museum, letting fans explore many parts of theFrierenseries and its intricate world in detail and at their own pace. The event is very accessible, andmeant to be viewed even from a mobile phone. It will also be accessible in both Japanese and English, with a basic schedule of the event even released in English, along with a very detailed English website.
Another part of theFrierenOnline Festival will be interactive.AnimeNewsNetworkdescribes this part as, “The interactive part of the experience allows fans to submit messages to the manga creators, share opinions with other fans, submit art, and design spells.” The interactive element will only be available from December 4th to January 31st, though the digital museum will remain available until May 31st, 2025. Finally, there will also be an AR feature, where you can take photos of Himmel anywhere you want to in your real surroundings.
There will also be an audio guide available for the digital museum portion of the event. In Japanese, the audio guide is narrated by Nobuhiko Okamoto, whovoices the hero Himmel. In keeping with global accessibility, there will also be an English version of the audio guide available, though Shogakukan has not announced yet who will be doing this. While the most basic parts of the experience will be free, you will need a ticket to access the digital museum. Tickets cost 1,650 yen ($11 USD) and include custom avatars and backgrounds.
Anime Becomes More Accessible
Changes for a More Global World
While, of course,Frierenfans are going to be the most excited about theFrierenOnline Festival, all anime fans should be interested in this event. While interest in anime has continued to grow around the world, leading to great opportunities like seeing anime movies in theaters,anime music concerts, and more, anime museums and other limited events are often limited to Japan. And even within Japan, these kinds of events are often only in major cities like Tokyo and Osaka.
But anime is loved by people far beyond the borders of Tokyo and Osaka, and these special events are hard for them to access. Without Japanese skills, they become even harder.FrierenOnline Festival changes that, though, making an event that is accessible to people around the world, people who do not speak Japanese, and people who cannot easily leave their homes. If it is successful, it could bring a big change to the future of events for otaku.
Starting withFrierenwas a perfect plan. The anime has an incredible rating of 9.32 according to MyAnimeList, and ranks as the number one anime in the world on the website. That puts it above evenFullmetal Alchemist,Attack on Titan, andSteins;Gate. Hopefully, that means the event will run well and there will be a huge interest in it, which will then lead to more similar, accessible events in the future for anime fans, regardless of where they are.
TheFrierenOnline Festival will run from December 3rd, 2024 to May 31st, 2025. Details and registration can be found on itsofficial website.
