ENIGMA Halloween Mixer: UCI Cosplayers' Time to Shine

"HOW DARE YOU!?" a girl screams as she watches her precious raffle ticket go to the

person beside her. Moments later, her expression softens and a smile tugs at her lips. She, and everyone at the game table, erupt into fits of laughter before moving on to the next game.

Beside them, a boy tries to remove a wooden block from its tower, praying it does not tip

over. The small audience that surround him keep their eyes glued to his movements. His efforts are to no avail, it seems, for seconds later, several loud screams escape the group, and the wooden tower's collapse reaches the ears of almost all 60 people in the room. Jenga wins this round.

It is the fifth of November on a Thursday night. The UCI campus is filled with students

socializing and pretending to study. However, in the Student Center, a large room near the building's main entrance is gradually filling up with alchemists, witches, ghouls and characters from different shows and games. ENIGMA is hosting its Halloween Mixer and has brought the university's cosplayers together. (A cosplayer is a person who dresses up as one of his/her favorite characters from anime, video games and shows.)

ENIGMA, which stands for Energetic Nerds In Gaming, Making and Anime, is a

coalition of numerous special interest groups at UCI, including Dumbledore's Anteaters, Whovians/Sci-Fi, Role Playing Games Club, Cal Animage Epsilon and Comic & Manga Association. Each quarter, the large group of clubs hosts an event, wishing to bring students with similar interests but part of different campus organizations together.

This quarter's event is a Halloween mixer. Current students and alumni as well gather

dressed as their favorite anime or video game characters in hopes of winning the cosplay and table games contests.

"I'm a shy cosplayer." admits Caitlin Creekmore, a computer science major dressed as

Kaneki Ken from the popular anime Tokyo Ghoul. "So it's nice to see other people walking around like me, dressing up. I've talked to a lot of people. I didn't make any lasting impressions to, like, get their number or anything, but I talked to everyone."

While there are those who walk around aimlessly or have their eyes glued to their phones,

waiting for the human interaction to commence, a lot of the cosplayers are meeting one another and planting seeds of friendship that will surely blossom soon after. A Mermaid Man and Barnacle Boy, characters for the beloved cartoon Spongebob Squarepants, thrust their arms into the air to pose for a picture. To their right, Dumbledore, dressed in a cloak and a lengthy white beard that reaches his stomach, chuckles as he hosts one of the games and invites others to play. A circle forms in the corner and students from all five clubs gather to be part of a murder mystery.

"I feel like there's a bigger turnout, definitely." says Brandon Rawson, a physics major

who has been to a previous ENIGMA mixer. "I'm just here for the food. Just kidding. Most of the people I know that I haven't spoken to are from past clubs, so it's good to see them again, and it's good to get to know people because I mean look, they're all so fabulous. Don't tell them I said that."

The games tables are the biggest attraction, however, with so many groups enveloping

the games, a few of the students do not even know what the large number of people are surrounding until later on. "What we could've done is put signs in front of or behind these games and also every once in awhile advertise it verbally. That would have just improved the circulation of the games and people walking around." says Lindsay Mendez, an undeclared second year.

Standing beside the candy and pizza tables is Arashpreet Gill, a transfer student. "I'm

actually learning a lot more about the clubs themselves. It's been really cool to see all the costumes and meet all these people dressed as different things. It's been a really good experience so far. I think the two things it really does is it gives people that feeling of acceptance because in high school, the kids that were into this kind of stuff were either like the nerds, or the geeks or the people that didn't really fit in. That may not have been the case for everyone but it certainly was for me. Now I come here and see that yeah, I'm not the only person who loves Harry Potter on this campus. I'm not the only one crazy about it. And I think another thing it does is that it opens a gateway of just friendships. These kind of mixers expose you to other things, so they kind of expose you to different kinds of people. It's great."

One table that all the participants recognize, however, is the prize table. A mountain of

comics, novels, t-shirts, posters and other collectibles decorates the the front of the room. A John Cena action figure stands at the peak of this mountain, looking over his kingdom with pride.

After a couple of hours of pizza, games and socializing, it's time to announce the winners

of the the costume contests and find out whose raffle tickets have the lucky number on them. One by one, the winners cheer as they make their way to the table and choose their prize.

The day ends with a goodbye and a thank you from one of the heads of Gryffindor,

Heather Hermesman, and it's time for everyone to go home.

“The ENIGMA mixers are an opportunity for members from like minded clubs to mingle

and establish a broader sense of the nerd community at UCI.” says Heather. “It's also an opportunity for club leaderships to share resources and ideas and learn from one another's style. The first mixer was November 8th 2013. The first mixer was more of a live game, a murder mystery where participants search for clues. We've evolved into a more open mini-game format, running Taboo and Pictionary and One Night Werewolf. At the core of the events though, it's still an opportunity for nerds to meet fellow nerds and have a good time.”