As I attended Momocon this year, it felt a little different, but I couldn’t tell what had changed. Some things remained the same, but something just felt… different. As I was walking around, I noticed they had some pretty big guests this year. Coryxkenshin, who has a huge following on his YouTube channel and has a manga. Tony Weaver, an award-winning writer and educator creating diverse stories for young people to feel seen and valued. Katsuhiro Harada, the former head director and producer of Bandai Namco, is now the CEO of SNK VS studio. It was hard to catch a glimpse of these guys because their area was so crowded.
I talked to some of the con-goers and asked them their thoughts about the changes they felt were made. Some said they felt like some of the guests weren’t advertised, while others applauded the con for its growth (it’s gotten way bigger). Momocon this year has taken up the majority of the Georgia World Congress Center (GWCC). Usually, the vendor hall would share the same area with the Gaming and the Hall of Fame. This time, the vendor hall really expanded and is still with the Hall of Fame. The Gaming area has its own separate level, and you can definitely see how big that is. So that was pretty cool to see the sheer size of the con and what it has become over the past 20 years (it started in 2005).
Besides the con being bigger this year, I also noticed a change that was both subtle and glaringly obvious: content creators. I know content creation has been a thing at cons and they’ve been doing it for over a decade. But this year at MomoCon, every hallway, corner, and even outside areas were littered with content creators. With tripods as far as the eye could see, creators were seen doing mostly TikTok dances or recording content. That’s the biggest difference I saw. I have no issue with it; content creation is cool and fun (even I do it from time to time). My issue is authenticity. Are you actually enjoying the con, or are you here to just work?
One of the many fun moments of my MomoCon 2026 experience was speaking with Trinidad Hermida from “Black in Gaming.” Black in Gaming has been around for 20 years. They are a nonprofit organization that focuses on developing and empowering black talent in the gaming ecosystem. They also have their own award show, the “Black in Gaming Award Show,” where they honor and highlight Black people in the gaming industry who do extraordinary things. It’s hosted at the Global Development Center (GDC) in San Francisco. Trinidad also mentioned other Black-owned indie games like Drop Shot, Reloaded, and Avatar Legends. Hopefully I’ll make it out to their award show in San Francisco.
Besides this being the era of content creation and how it’s really growing, MomoCon is still one of Atlanta’s biggest and most popular cons to attend, meet up with friends, and have fun. Over the four-day holiday weekend, the con saw over 67,277 attendees. Celebrating its 21st year in Atlanta, the annual Memorial Day thing-to-do is looking ahead to 2027, and organizers are quietly working on expansion.
-TBZ