Nordsken 2023 – This is not the way

 Hello nerds!

This year is almost over but I still managed to cram in one more event into my list. I just got back home from my first Nordsken which was held on 28-29th December in Skellefteå, Sweden. Nordsken started its life as a LAN event and then it slowly incorporated other aspects of nerd culture into its existence as it grew over the years. This year, as far as I know, was the first time Nordsken was a free entrance event and that's partly the reason why I was lulled over to take a look.

Let's move on to the summary!

Nordsken 2023 official poster.

I wouldn't have been able to even attend Nordsken if it wasn't because my friends Sallukka and Dongrieg were going too and I managed to hitch a ride, tysm! ;u; I woke up early af on Thursday morning (4 hours of sleep woo!) and prepared myself for departure. Yes, the con was actually held on a Thursday and Friday and not on a weekend as is customary. I think we left a little bit before 8:00 and the drive down to Skellefteå took roughly 4 hours more or less. Once we arrived at Skellefteå we found a suitable parking spot without too much difficulties thankfully and headed straight into Sara Kulturhus where Nordsken was held this year.
I went casual this time because I didn't feel up to cosplaying and, in hindsight, I'm so relieved I didn't bother because it wouldn't have been worth the effort.

Sara Kulturhus.

The con building is located smack dab in the middle of centrum and it stands out because of how tall it is and how it's all wood and glass, it looks quite modern and inviting. I was a bit perplexed though by how there were no outside signs nor posters at the entrance telling you that Nordsken was held inside.

View directly from the entrance.

One thing I immediately noticed was that there was a library in the same building and it took up a majority of the base floor and the rest belonged to a restaurant to the right side of the entrance. Nordsken's cloakroom was on the base floor behind the main stairs and that's where we headed to drop off our jackets. I had to return a second time to the cloakroom because of that silly and very unconventional new rule in Sweden which states that you're forbidden from carrying any kind of bags in events over a certain size and yeah, I wasn't even allowed to bring my camera bag upstairs. So uh, you had to come prepared and have pockets on your clothes to be able to carry your most vital belongings with you (phone, wallet, glasses etc). My personal opinion is that this enforced rule is ridiculous but I understand it's done by the Swedish police department because of the currently raised terrorism threat level nationally. This is not something unique to Nordsken nor something they had contol over but yeah, it's a rule that complicates things unnecessarily and made for example shopping awkward because you couldn't even bring tote bags or anything to carry your purchases in.

General view of the main area on the upper floor.

General view of the main area, one of the vendors to the left.

Skellefteå map made in lego near the entrance to the main area.

As soon as we got upstairs we were overwhelmed by how horrendously overcrowded it was! It was difficult to even move or check anything out because people were crammed everywhere and bumping into you constantly and it was just way too much to handle. I felt really anxious because I kept losing track of my friends even when I looked away for just a few seconds and it could take many minutes to find them again in the constant barrage of people. I literally wondered if it's even legal to have so many people inside the building at the same time, I mean imagine if for example the fire alarm went off and they'd have to evacuate – it would create chaos and massive bottlenecks and people would get trampled over in the panicked frenzy. Surely every public building has an allowed max capacity in place for safety reasons? I mean for real, there were several instances on Thursday when I couldn't even move at all because the main hall was too fucking full and it was honestly an awful first impression of Nordsken and just made me want to leave and not look back. I seriously wonder why there wasn't any limits put in place on how many people were allowed into the upper floor at any one time...

In the upper floor immediately after the stairs there was also a little cafeteria and tables where you could build lego together with others or play oversized versions of games like four-in-a-row and such. It was pretty cool because Nordsken offered quite many ways for visitors to socialize while also being entertained simultaneously.

General view of the back half of the main area.

Lego build display at the back half of the main area.

The main hall was split to one half being mostly vendors (think Dealer's Hall) and the other half being for association booths and workshops, exhibitions and some activities like the ice hockey games on the photo above. Some of the association booths were clearly aimed for the younger audience, for example one let you paint your own t-shirt and another one was a workshop for badges and a third one let children color in papers with printed lineart of popular characters on it. There were also some aimed for younger adults and late teens like one booth that looked like some kind of animation sfx studying opportunity? I personally got the feeling that the whole event felt more like a "look at this local culture thing X we offer" exposure exhibition rather than a typical geek convention. Especially because it felt very strongly marketed for kids and adolescents over the adult population, which honestly felt a bit weird because I bet a majority of the visitors were adults. One clear example of this is that there was a cosplay competition for kids but none for adults like what in the actual fudge is dis?? Yeah I know I'm starting to sound like a grumpy old man here but it was honestly pretty mindboggling how it felt like adults were lowkey sidelined in favor of children. Like I understand you want to involve kids into creative culture and get them involved in local clubs and shit and that's wonderful, really, but please show the same energy for the grown-up nerds too.

 

Pokémon themed photo booth.

Swedish Garrison (501st Legion) Star Wars booth.

Star Wars themed photo booth.

My favorite thing at the con was the 501st Legion's get-to-know-us-and-what-we-do booth and display near the entrance on the main area. For those not in the know the 501st Legion is a global fan-based organization consisting of screen-accurate Star Wars costumers and they generally make volunteer appearances in promotional and charity events. The Swedish Garrison is the name of the local unit based in Sweden and they focus on charity work like showing up in costumes to children's hospitals and donating money to good causes. It's honestly both awesome and wholesome. There were different characters present on both days and you could pose with them for pictures together and ask about the group, how to join if interested and such. The costumes are really amazing up close!

There was also this Star Wars themed photo booth just next to the 501st Legion's display where anyone could borrow a jedi robe and a light saber (free of charge) and take photos together and there were cool props like tie fighters in the background too!

General view of the corridor passageway on the upper floor.

 

The main area on the upper floor hosted essentially the whole event including all the vendors, photo booths and association tables. If you walked past this one corridor pictured above you found some LARP association booths at the end of it and this one dark room (it was a cinema saloon) filled with retro video games and a few arcade pinball machines. The gaming room had surprisingly good air circulation and by that I mean it didn't smell like sweaty nerd cave deluxe the moment you stepped in lol.

 

Nerd warning! :D

Arcade pinball machines.

The gaming lair was pretty awesome because it consisted of a generous array of the retro gaming consoles of yesteryear. There were a lot of NES, Super Nintendos and other oldies. I think the newest console I saw in there was a Nintendo Gamecube or Nintendo Wii? Which are both considered old by today's standards. Fuck I aged like 20 years just by writing that. It would have been nice to stay and play a bit but as you can see on the photo it was crammed in there too so yeah, no chance unless you were willing to wait for an unknown time. 

One of the few LARP booths.

At the end of the corridor were a few LARP booths to educate and lure over visitors into this hobby. One table was medieval themed and had some outfits on display and the other was this friendly woman dressed as a witch who offered you mysterious elixirs in return for a high five. It was clearly meant to invoke a casual imaginary session where you got a little brightly colored drink mixed for you that gave some kind of supernatural quirks. I got a kraken slime drink blend that was supposed to make me hot but mean. xD

Because of the crowding issue it was really hard and uncomfortable to try to browse any of the shops in the main area and thus I didn't end up buying anything. I gotta say though that based on what I heard from Sallukka and Dongrieg it sounded like this iteration of Nordsken was notably poorer in the vendor department, apparently there were a lot fewer sellers this year and several other interesting booths and activities were completely missing. I can't really compare because I didn't visit Nordsken last year myself but it sure sounds like this year was a disappointment for many with previous Nordsken experience. I gotta admit that we didn't stay very long on Thursday and that's because there were simply too many people for its own good and we were overall quite disappointed.
One of the bigger issues was the clearly false information on the website about there being an Artist's Alley but in reality it was just a few artworks on display in that corridor I mentioned earlier. I mean it was literally called Artist's Alley on the site but there were no sellers, just an unmanned tiny art display and that was so fucking disappointing like holy shit. I mean for real, dunno if it was intentional or not but it seemed like whoever was in charge of the website didn't know what Artist's Alley means in con speech – it's not a literal artist's alley but artists selling their self-made artsy stuff! If what you have is an art display then, for the love of god, just call it exactly that –an art display or art exhibition or whatever– instead of baiting people with misleading connotations.

Super Mario Wonder demo booths.

We left Nordsken early on Thursday, after having spent between one or two hours in there. We just were really let down and yeah, going out to visit Café på Bit in town and then going out for dinner was a lot more appealing to us at this point. I've never visited said café before but it was honestly super cool – it's like a mix of a video game store and a cafeteria that also has a lounging area where visitors can pay a fee to play retro consoles, VR or arcade machines and there's also tables for board games and card games. Yes, you can play for hours or even book the whole evening if you want. Basically it's nerd heaven and a must visit if you're in Skellefteå!

Café på Bit entrance view. <3

Honestly I loved that place, it was so cozy and unapologetically geeky and I want one to pop up in my home town now lol. You guys and gals and thems who live in Skellefteå need to make sure that this business stays afloat, you have no idea how lucky you are to have such an unique experience in town! If it dies I'm gonna legit cry fr.

After our nerd stop we went back to Nordsken for some unknown reason and this time we entered through one of the other staircases which, weirdly enough, wasn't even guarded by any of the crew members. None of us bothered to drop off our jackets or stuff because we were just going for a quick shopping run and well, I was a criminal because I had my camera bag on yet I wasn't stopped or told to remove it. I saw several crew workers on the upper floor but no one seemed to care and I also saw numerous other visitors with bags and carrying cases in the upper floor (where bags were forbidden) so yeah, it seemed like they stopped giving a fuck at some point or not enough workers to guard all possible entrances to the upper floor. Either way I couldn't help but notice the inconsistency.

Maginarium's vendor table.

Café på Bit's vendor table.

Legend's vendor table.

Retrobokklubben's vendor table.

After our quick sneak attack to grab some D&D dices we then exited the con to check out an electronics store for more video games and after that we all concluded that we were hungry and so it was time to do like the Turtles do and stuff our faces full with pizza. At this point we had also kidnapped a Swede from Nordsken and so our otherwise Finnish gang was one nerd stronger now; he was really funny though and I totally understand why he's a friend of Sallukka and Dongrieg.

This pizzeria was our chosen target.

After we ate and returned our voluntarily abducted Swede to the streets we headed for our airbnb stay. It was a nice apartment near the campus area and we spent the rest of the night watching Scooby-Doo and playing card games together. It was cozy and fun and we had a good time!

On Friday morning we had to leave the accommodation at 11:00 and then we headed back to Nordsken to give it a second chance. We were not too hyped considering yesterday's unenjoyable experience but we wanted to check the vendors a bit better and so we returned to Sara Kulturhus. I was in my mind already dreading another instance of being stuffed like sardines in a can but when we passed through the entrance it looked like there were less people around. We dropped off our jackets and headed up and I think we all collectively gasped in relief when we saw that there was an agreeable amount of people upstairs. One could actually see what was in front now! It wasn't crammed to hell and back! A miracle had happened!
No but really, this significantly improved my experience and I think the other two agree as well. Otherwise Friday had pretty much the same activities as Thursday except for the addition of a cross between a visitors' thrift store and a pseudo Artist's Alley appearing in the corridor. Maybe it appeared already later on Thursday but when we were around it wasn't there at least. It was just a few tables but because there were so few vendors to begin with anything extra was very much welcome in my opinion.

I'm such a nerd but I had to have a photo with the 501st!
(sorry phone quality, didn't have my camera on Friday)

Because Friday wasn't so crammed me and Sallukka actually managed to snag a 10 minute demo session at the Nintendo Switch promotional booth to play some Super Mario Wonder together. Neither of us had played it before and it was genuinely fun and now I want to buy the game even more!
We didn't stay very long on Friday either although this time we utilized the cafeteria in the building and my two dice goblin friends bought some more dices lol. After we were satisfied we went for some sushi nearby and then we went for some desserts at Café på Bit in town again and after that it was time to steer the car back up north and leave Skellefteå behind.

I can't stress it enough how much better the whole experience got once you actually could move around freely and didn't constantly have people walking into you from all possible directions. Now I even got that con feeling to rear its head a little although the low amount of vendors was still a big mood bummer because yeah, I didn't find any loot to buy and it feels weird to return from a con empty-handed.
Of course I still feel like Nordsken has a lot of improvements to make for next year but Friday elevated my score from massive disappointment to okay-ish. I was told all the awesome stuff Nordsken had at 2022 so of course I was disappointed when a lot of the hyped up things were completely absent but I'm happy with some of the stuff we got like obviously the 501st Legion, the Super Mario Wonder demos and the gaming room with a delicious selection of oldies. For a free event it was a decent experience I guess (especially if you are new to this kind of stuff) but for veteran congoers it felt off as several key activities were missing and there were some other issues too like poor information and lack of signs. I kinda got the impression that Nordsken blew its budget on a few things and then had to cut a lot of corners elsewhere, if that makes sense? I can only imagine the excellency of the 2022 edition and I do hope that what we got now was a test-run on a new formula and that they learn from their mistakes and return to the glory they had because apparently Nordsken 2022 had all the good things 2023 had plus much more. I also feel like Sara Kulturhus might not have been a very good host building – it has a good central location and it looks pretty with decent air circulation but that's about it, the layout is awkward and made the event feel incoherent and scattered and the lack of signing made it worse. But most of all it felt like the building was way too small for the event. I also have this gnawing feeling in my butt that I probably missed some activities simply because I didn't know where they were; I didn't even see a map anywhere.

I'm sorry if this comes across as overly negative (and trust me when I say that it feels bad to be a critic) but yeah, the event just didn't live up to my expectations after having looked forward to it for so long. I'm not gonna give up on Nordsken though, I do wish and hope for it to improve and am willing to return for a second take. We need all the geek events we can get in the north so anything that scratches that itch will be on my radar even though I'm cautiously optimistic for now.

Thanks for reading, stay nerdy out there!
Shiro Samurai out~