University of the Philippines Anime and Manage Enthusiasts (That’s UP AME, for short) held AME Monogatari the latest in its long-running yearly cleebrations of Japanese anime and manga culture this Saturday at the World Trade Center tent in Pasay.

Weirdly enough, no one seemed to be on hand to go and for the heck of it, I took it upon myself to go check out the event myself. The result? An afternoon and early evening well-spent and a batch of cosplay photos, which you’ll see after the jump.

Most of my time on the event floor was spent with a motley crew of people that I normally meet at Banchetto including our good friend Chad of Reimaru Files. I swear I wrote that with a smile on my face and not while gritting my teeth and pounding on the keyboard like a begrudged, angry god.

Convention staples such as group and solo cosplay competitions, artists’ alley and booths of merchandise and random trinkets came in full force. But of course, the main reason why I was there in the first place was to run around the venue like a headless chicken and take gaming-related cosplay photos. Now, the term “gaming-related” is a little broad, since so many anime/manga properties get the licensed game treatment every year, so we’re trimming back a bit on that branch… just a bit, though.

With all that said, here we go:

Jin Kisaragi asks, "Dude, where's my ice car?"

Final Fantasy Type-0's Class Zero also happened to have their class picture taken that evening.

MC Hammer jokes in 3, 2, 1...

Unfortunately, I'm not Vocaloid-savvy enough to say something witty here.

Estan mas que nueve mil!

Dude clearly looks pissed, so I pointed him in the direction of Ninja Theory's offices.

Dragunov didn't say anything, he just pulled a gun on me.

Final Fantasy X-2's Rikku says 'hi'.

Here's Terry Bogard, making sure everyone's okay.

Shoutout to the good folks over at Blazblue Philippines

It took a while to find this dude in the crowd.

Count Dracula and Richter Belmont... BFFs, fer realz.

One assassin! No! Two assassins! AH! AH! (What can I say, I grew up on Sesame Street)

For the rest of the set and other shenanigans, feel free to head on over to the Google+ album that I put up. Got any interesting stories from AME Monogatari to share? Sound off in the comments!