Contests

  • Draw Opuntia or Rio in a flashy new outfit! Flex those artistic muscles and make a cool outfit for next year’s mascot! Best design will win!

  • Singing is fun for everyone! Whether you have the voice of an angel or struggle to hold a tune, join the karaoke contest!

  • Bring your best handmade cosplay and show it off for everyone! While store bought costumes are fun, we want to honor those who put in considerable effort into the creation of their costumes! If you would like to show off your store bought costume, you can walk on stage, but you will be disqualified from judging.

  • Fan of Magic the Gathering? Come join our tournament and test your skills against others!

  • Make your best anime music video! Music must be age appropriate and content must be PG. While we love the darker side of things, this is a family friendly event!

  • See if you know the steps to some iconic k pop dances! Choruses only, no need to learn the whole thing unless you want to! Don’t only watch new dances, we’re gonna go through all generations of idol groups!

  • Think you’re an expert on all things anime? Prove it! Compete against others to see who is the reigning champion of anime facts!

  • Super Smash Bros. Tournament. Choose your best fighter and dominate the others!

Contest Rules

Contest Rules

ARt Contest

Draw new costume designs for Opuntia and Rio!  They will become next years official outfits!

  • Must use the official color palate

  • No late submissions, if you miss the deadline you will not be considered.

  • have fun with the design, but make sure our mascots are recognizable as themselves!

  • ability is not considered, only the design, this gives everyone equal opportunity.

  • Must be PG! Absolutely nothing suggestive or NSFW.

  • Entries must be traditional art (drawings, painting, digital art, collage, and sculpture); absolutely no photo-manipulated, AI-generated, or photography pieces. Scans, photos of traditional art, and digital works will be accepted online.

  • The person entering the piece must be the person who created the piece. No tracing or recoloring of another person's art.

  • All work should be original.

  • Only completed works are allowed to be entered. Sketches are allowed as long as they are refined.

Deadline for entry: March 1st, 2026

Entry Form 
Best Performance wins! Give it all you got and be a star!

Karaoke Contest

Deadline for entry: March 1st, 2026

  • All aspects of the act, including, but not limited to: costume, conduct on stage, and song lyrics, are to abide by no more than a PG standard.

  • If any violations of this policy occur, Karaoke Staff reserve the right to disqualify offenders from the contest or terminate the act mid-song. In extreme cases, offenders may also be subject to convention penalties including loss of badge and removal from the convention.

  • During the contest, no interaction with the Emcee is allowed. Contestants may not touch or approach the judges' table. Contestants may not go into the audience or use an audience member in their act. Actions that encourage general audience participation as a whole, such as asking the crowd to clap, are allowed.

  • The only persons allowed in the performing area are the Emcee, Iro Con staff, judges, and contestants. Friends, relatives, fans, mascots, managers, agents, and any other persons not actually performing in the contest are not allowed on stage.

  • Contestants may not sing a cappella style—you must have a backing track.

Entry Form

Cosplay Contest

Three Categories: Beginner, Journeymen, and Master's

Deadline for entry: February 28th, 2026

  • No glitter, confetti, streamers, fire, smoke, fog, dry ice, fans, laser lights, strobe lights, or pressurized gas or liquids.

  • This is a family friend event, please keep any skits or walk on music PG rated.

  • Walk on presentations will be limited to 30 seconds. Skits are capped at 2 minutes.

  • Any and all sound must be prerecorded and sent to staff before the competition.There will be no live mics available!

  • One foot on the stage at all times! No jumping on or off the stage. No acrobatics on the stage.

  • Your costume must be at least 75% made by the competitor, a competitor in the group, or if the person who made the costume is not the one wearing the costume, they must be present during prejudging for questions.

  • No original characters or original redesigns of characters please.

  • Build books are not required but heavily recommended, please provide at least 3 images of the character/design you are creating.

  • No costumes that have won at other contest.

Entry Form 
Best fan edited anime music videos! Three Categories: Action, Romance, Comedy

AMV Contest

Deadline for entry: February 28th, 2026

  • This is a “family friendly” event, please keep this in mind for all submissions and try to stay within a PG 13 rating

  • No ai or ai generated content will be accepted.

  • The majority of your submission must be Anime/video game/manga styled content.

  • Please do not add bumpers, or credits.

  • All submissions must be between 30 seconds and 3 minutes.

  • No subtitles, watermarks or other visible studio trademarks

  • Please submit videos via the google drive or dropbox.

  • Submissions should be in MPG, MP4, or AVI format.

Entry Form 
Love K-pop? Dance to your favorite songs, and show us what you got!

k-pop dance challenge

  • working on it

  • working on it

Deadline for entry: March 1, 2026

Trivia

Show us how much you know, from general facts to guessing the anime opening!

MTG Tournament

The card game? IDK

  • Contacting local game shops and waiting for them to come up with house rules. Please check back soon! TT

sSB TOURNAMENT

  • there’s official rules…I’ll find them hahaha

Deadline for entry: February 28th, 2026

get em

Deadline for entry: March 1, 2026

Deadline for entry: March 1, 2026