The team will be represented by two cosplayers.
The team may consist of cosplayers from the Netherlands and those owning a permanent residency card in the Netherlands.

Your team must be in costumes from the same source.
Your team must wear self-made costumes.
You may use small props that were store bought.
Your preliminary cosplay may be from an animated movie, anime, cartoon, comic, game, live action movie, manga, official art book, stage musical, TV series or visual novel.
Personal creations and fan art are not allowed.
You are not allowed to compete with a costume that has already won any prize at a national or international competition.
Costumes previously used in any AnimeCon preliminary should be altered according to feedback by the judges.

You must perform a brief act on stage that may not exceed 150 seconds.
Videos and background music should be produced by the cosplayers or be royalty free.
Stage ninjas are allowed in some way: our staff can hand you a prop or item from backstage or press a button for you. Interaction with the cosplayers on stage is NOT allowed.
Teams may not use any items that can spill on the stage, like bubbles, glitter, confetti etc.
Teams may not use live fire, dry ice, live steel weapons or other things that could be a danger to yourself or others.
For our cosplay weapons guidelines read the house rules. Dutch weapons law will always apply!
You may not perform an act already done at AnimeCon, it needs to be a new performance.

Once entered, you will receive a form to fill in the details of your performance. This will have to be handed in on May 18th, 23:59h at the latest.
In this form you will have to provide:
- Script with cues
- Work in Progress pictures from all parts of the costume and relevant props,
- Reference pictures,
- Any audio/video you want to use during the skit.
In the case of 3D-printing: add a screenshot with history screen to your WiPs.

You must attend AnimeCon at least on the day of the preliminaries.
You must be 18 years or older on the date of the preliminaries if you want to compete.
Participating in our preliminaries will take up most of the day with rehearsals in the morning, judging in the afternoon and the competition right after that. Please keep this in mind when planning other activities.
Dressing rooms and showers are provided by AnimeCon.
In the case of cancelling your participation within two weeks of AnimeCon without a valid reason, you will not be able to sign up again for one year.

AnimeCon’s Guest Relations team select an international panel of judges ranging in several disciplines. If you have any suggestions or questions, please direct them to guestrelations@animecon.nl
It’s not possible to correspond with the judges about the results of the cosplay competitions, asking for feedback afterwards is encouraged.

Winning teams and solo contestants will receive an entry ticket to the next edition of AnimeCon.
The AnimeCon cosplay competition sponsor CosplayShop Be should always be visible when posting award photos online.
If one member of the winning team cannot go, a replacement will be chosen by the original team members in conjunction with Stichting J-Pop.
If the whole team cannot go, the runner ups who were chosen by the judges will be informed.

You must be available for travel to Japan at the end of July and the start of August of next year.
The winning team must present a valid passport as soon as able after the preliminary.
Your flight will be paid for by Stichting Japanse Popcultuur, the rest of your costs (food, drink, trips, extra luggage, trip to the airport, etc.) will NOT be covered.
The winning team will need to check WCS’s list of allowed properties for the finals, but as a rule costumes must be from anime, manga, video games and tokusatsu published by a Japanese company or IP.
The performance at the finals can be the same as the performance given in the preliminary round, but if it is the same, you should try to improve upon it.
Equipment and props for the finals are limited to those of a size that 2 representative cosplayers and 1 organiser are able to carry on their own at one time to the venue. Only 3 people are able to prepare the performance backstage.
Props may not be larger than 2 meter, the total weight of your costumes and props may not exceed 40kg.
Two or three extra costumes should be brought along for any extra events.
Please join the Facebook group of WCS Team Netherlands to keep WCS fans updated!
For more information on the World Cosplay Summit, please visit: https://worldcosplaysummit.jp/en/