Posted under Anime/Manga & Ranting
News from ANN has been all over 4chan’s /a/ today, This is my take on the situation.
Now many people are complaining about the fact that anime is so expensive.
Now on the fact that R1 DVDs are more expensive is not really our concern but the reason why they still sell so well is that the typical Japanese anime watcher will have already seen the episode on TV during its regular broadcasting schedule so they know if they liked the series enough to purchase it.
But since Anime isn’t broadcasted in the US as regularly as in Japan we go into the series with no knowlegde of whether we’ll like it or not. Yes we do have some outlets such as Cartoon Network’s Adult Swim which plays some of the popular favorites such as Bleach, FLCL, Eureka seveN, Blood+, Inuyasha and Fullmetal Alchemist. Also in the US some stations offer Anime Network On Demand, but it’s not as nationally broadcasted and unless you live in more of a city it’s hard for America to watch anime without going out and buying DVDs.
Now the US anime industry must understand that within the US sales of series that are broadcasted aren’t popular to begin with. Plus that they are also much cheaper. Take for example the US show ER, the first season on DVD would run you about $19.99 on amazon.com for 25 episodes. Now take Neon Genesis Evangalion, on Amazon it’ll run you $45.99. They only have a difference of one episode. So why such a difference in price? Both are quite popular, both are about the same age, ER came out in ‘94 and Eva came out in ‘95. Plus ER is still running reruns on TV in the us, so then you can at least watch a few episodes before deciding whether to pay the money for the entire thing. Unless someone has told you that Eva is an interesting show why spend so much on something you’ve never seen? What if you don’t like it, you’ve just wasted $45.99. I do buy series I love to support an industry that I love, but the American Licensing companies need to understand that them raising the prices of anime so high is going to end up hurting the anime Market not only in the US but also in Japan.
