New York Comic Con is many things: long lines, shoulder-to-shoulder crowds, panels, cosplay, and, of course, merch...so much merch. Eric and I took a few trips around the floor this year to get a load of all the random knick-knacks, art, statues, and cosplay items that were proudly on display, and Comic Con 2023 did not disappoint.
Seriously, it was a ton to take in and we’ve got a lotta photos to share, so let’s waste no more time and get straight to the pics.
Hatchet in hand, blood-drenched snow, a Betsy Ross Flag, and one mean-lookin’ hound makes up this cool 1:4 scale Connor statue from PureArts.
Video Game Shadow Box’s dioramas immediately caught our attention. Here’s one featuring Baby Mario from Yoshi’s Island: Super Mario World 2.
It’s hard to pay attention to anything else when you see a baby Yoda, or “Grogu” as some people seem intent on calling him for one reason or another. This one was wearing an adorable shirt of “Beskar” chainmail courtesy of Siouxsiequeue.
Even when you shrink her down to statue form, Lady Dimitrescu is still hard to fit in a single photograph. Behold this PureArts 1:4 scale (if you can believe it) figurine that still manages to tower over everything around it.
The Pixel Empire booth had a number of cool art prints and items on display, such as this neat Fallout New Vegas sign with caps and caps cases.
CDH Creations was selling a number of sweet works of wooden art featuring iconic video game characters and scenes. This one featured all three evolutionary stages of a certain well-known fire-type pokémon.
Ezhobi Co. Ltd. had a wonderful display of Godzilla figures of various sizes, but we just had to obsess over these little guys. So cute!
Equipped with necessary orange tips (aside from, uh, those random guns that look totally not fantastical), here’s a pretty sweet lineup of replica rubber firearms from a variety of iconic franchises. The Destiny guns in particular looked the part in person.
That Guy with the Coasters had some pretty sweet NES-cartridge lookalike coasters, featuring Kirby, Castlevania, Ninja Gaiden, Duck Tales 2, and more.
Pixel Empire had this neat-looking Ray Gun replica on display at its booth. It probably won’t do well against zombies, but it would look good on a mantlepiece.
These carved NES controllers featuring the stylings of Zelda, Mario, and Metroid from Spitfire Labs were another highlight of this year’s con. The d-pads felt a little stiff if we’re being honest.
CDH Creations had a number of awesome franchises on display at its booth this year. Check out this one featuring a certain box-smashing bandicoot and his arch-nemesis.
The Honkai Star Rail booth had a few figures on display that are currently available for preorder, with expected arrival dates in 2024. This one featured Dan Heng and is expected to be available in August of next year.
Of all of these, that Sunshot hand cannon to the right was perhaps most impressive, but the Zelda armaments were pretty sweet too.
It was nice to see some Deathloop at this year’s con. PureArt showed off its renditions of the two main characters next to that guy who yells a lot in Skyrim.
PureArts had a number of Assassin’s Creed characters, including Kassandra from the ancient Greek-themed Odyssey.
Here’s another diorama from Video Game Shadow Box, this time featuring the memorable final boss fight from Final Fantasy IV. (The music is now playing in your head.)
CDH Creations’ wooden recreation of the iconic cover art from Final Fantasy VII had me immediately figuring out where I was going to hang one in my living space.
There’s some lovely color work going on here with this wooden display of Gastly’s trio of evolutionary forms .
Though we didn’t see her spin in person, this adorable chibi figure from Honkai is expected in May 2024.
I don’t know if I’d fully say that Hibana was my main in Siege, but she was up there. It was nice to see some Siege figures amid the Assassin’s Creed characters from PureArts.
Though the aesthetic looks more befitting of Crash Bandicoot, this Mario Tiki from Great Scott Designs caught our eye.
Though I think I’d struggle to tell some of these figures apart in a heated chess match (which would see me lose because I always lose), I did very much consider taking this Minecraft chess set home. The green board in particular stands out.
It might be a struggle to find shelf space for this epic Nergigante statue from PureArts, but damn it would look impressive almost anywhere.
I’d be personally terrified of losing all these little pieces, but PureArts’ real-life set of Orlog as featured in Assassin’s Creed Valhalla sure is cool-looking.
While you probably can’t show up to a game of Pokémon with these, they do look cool and aren’t under assault from scalpers, so that’s nice.
Just like in the game, I died when I saw this at the PureArts booth.
Assassin’s Creed’s first protagonist, Altair, isn’t lookin’ so hot in this scene. At least his skull form looks pretty awesome in this PureArts recreation.
The Sand Land booth had an enormous tank outside of it, but there was also an adorable little one behind a glass case.
The rockerboy stands tall (but less tall than in real life) in this 1:4 scale recreation from PureArts.
More R6 love! Unfortunately, that nerf that took away Ash’s ACOG looks like it transferred over to PureArts’ statue. RIP those beautiful headshots.
This PureArts statue of Idris Elba’s character in Cyberpunk 2077’s Phantom Liberty expansion looks pretty sweet, though it doesn’t come cheap!
Here’s another sweet diorama from Video Game Shadow Box, this time featuring the visual stylings of Sonic’s third game.
We loved seeing various scenes brought to 2.5D life in Video Game Shadow Box’s framed artwork, but there was something special about seeing these classic maps in person. Tempting.
Fem V is the real V, but both get some love here from PureArts.
Again, it might be smaller than it is in the real game, but PureArts’ Dark Souls III recreations definitely killed me.
Assassin’s Creed Mirage only came out a short time ago, but Basim was already at New York Comic Con courtesy of PureArts with another sweet 1:4 scale statue.
Check out these video game title screen recreations from Video Game Shadow Box, featuring Zelda and Sonic. Don’t try pressing start, it’s a trick.
These rubber replica weapons were abundant on the con floor, but some would just stick out and immediately grab your attention. Case in point.
Ezhobi Co. Ltd. showed off a few prototypes of upcoming Godzilla statues. This one of Space Godzilla was striking despite the lack of paint and finish.
There were too many Godzillas to count, but this other one from Ezhobi Co. Ltd. breathing a devastating atomic breath ray was pretty sweet.
Look at the eyes! This guy wasn’t getting by me without at least a few pictures.
No, not actual flames. But Ezhobi Co. Ltd.’s rendition of a burning Godzilla was certainly a hot look.
With dead beasties, this Gamera statue from Ezhobi Co. Ltd. was both hilarious and awesome.
Don’t bother typing “Grogu” in the comments, I won’t read it and I don’t know who that is. But what’s more adorable than Baby Yoda? Baby Yoda killing things for lunch, of course!
Nanoblocks have a wonderful way of making these figures look like real-life pixel art. And while Crash wasn’t a pixel-art game, he sure does look good in this format.
Geekthirst’s Halo energy sword is the perfect way to use super-heated plasma to open your drink (without risk of burns).
This assortment of Final Fantasy swords might get you in trouble with the TSA, but at least you’d look cool while the agents are pestering you.
How do Cloud and Zack wield these things? Rubber buster swords were for sale all over the show floor, but damn were they still a strain on the arm every time I picked one up.
It might not be the model favored by a certain moody teenager, but these replica FF14 gunblades were pretty cool (and way lighter than the buster swords).
More from Geekthirst, I wonder if these could also help slice cheese and other snacks that’ll pair well with whatever bottle you’re cracking open.
And that’s our list of cool artifacts that we saw at this year’s New York Comic Con. Were you there this year? Did anything catch your eye?