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Why No Company for Light Novel Localization?




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Soundmonkey44



Joined: 25 May 2010
Posts: 1243
PostPosted: Mon Jan 24, 2011 6:06 pm Reply with quote
my question is simple we have alot of manga companies..that do afew light novel sereis once in a blue moon. but we dont really have any companies that do exclusivly light novels, why not?

Personally I would love to see a company that specialzied in Light Novel localization, because there are a number of LN's that I for one belive could do well if localized. i mean sure I know the whole, regular books dont sale as well as comics for the most part bit, but still I think it would be nice.

Because I dont know but I would kill to see some more LNs in the states (ecspecially the LNS for Disgaea, FOZ, & Toradora.)
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GeorgeBerger



Joined: 21 Jan 2011
Posts: 4
Location: Minnesota
PostPosted: Tue Jan 25, 2011 1:08 am Reply with quote
Simple. There's (almost) no demand for the books, and what books do sell are damnably hard to market in any effective manner.

Seven Seas thought there was a big demand for English-language translations of popular light novels, and licensed a lot of well-known franchises, including the Familiar of Zero series. They quickly discovered otherwise, and cancelled everything. As far as I know Little, Brown have never published sales figures for any of the Haruhi novels, but there have been plenty of rumors that their light novel sales were disappointing.

I doubt either of Del Rey's NisioisiN volumes published so far has turned a profit, and I'm similarly skeptical about the sales of, say, Spice & Wolf from Yen Press.

Then again, most works of fiction, regardless of genre, never turn a profit; the big A-list bestsellers subsidize the rest of the industry. If Yen didn't have Maximum Ride and Black Butler (and now Twilight) to fill their coffers, odds are they'd never have touched the Spice & Wolf novels, for instance.

Think about it for a minute and I think you'll realize that specializing in nothing but commercially-unviable products is a recipe for disaster... hence the lack of light-novel-only publishers. Alas.
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