Forum - View topicAnswerman - Why Don't More Publishers Take A Chance On Older Titles?
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dark13
Posts: 562 |
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Food for thought but There was a Time where Viz actually had JoJo part 3 in 2010
( manga at least) but it didn't do well it wasn't until after 2012 show was a success that they got the master license in 2015 and while we are on the topic of REBORN and Gintama Jump in particular has been giving them a lot of spotlight for the 50th anniversary even giving the their own fan days along with naruto, One piece, Bleach,Death and MHA clearly your doing something right if your getting that kind of treatment, as for why both failed in manga ver in the first place ? I can't speak for Gintama but I know for REBORN's case the translation for that was pretty awful ( I wouldn't be shocked if that's why JoJo part 3 didn't do well in the past) and lots REBORN fans weren't happy about that also cool to hear Justin worked on those blu I have Faith their in good hands 
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belvadeer
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As with all businesses, companies have to look at where the money lies. Taking risks is part of business, but companies can't afford to take too many of them, especially these days.
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CatSword
 Posts: 1489 |
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If Funimation expects the things they license to sell at least 10,000 copies, then I'm really surprised they pulled a Discotek and got Zillion.
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dragonrider_cody
Posts: 2541 |
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Bundling or licenses is still a thing, so it’s likely Funimation didn’t plan on licensing Zillion. It could have been included with another show, like Speed Racer. Rather than just sitting on the show, Funimation may have decided to do small print run of the show without the usual English dub and other costs. With minimal expenses, they can probably make a profit on just a couple thousand copies, especially since the title won’t pop up in Walmart and other locations. |
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EricJ2
 Posts: 4016 |
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Another column where Justin could take a big rubber stamp of "BECAUSE MONEY", ka-chunk it down on the poster's question, and move on to the next one.
It's one of the problems that caused the 00's Bubble in the first place: In the early days of anime, after small companies could only get unwanted features and icky OVA's, Bob Woodhead could spend AnimEigo's money to get Urusei Yatsura, because Japan literally didn't think any American would want to watch it, and Saban could get Power Rangers and Sailor Moon because it was just one more foreign TV-export. Viz had an easier time getting Ranma 1/2 and Maison, since they were already licensing the comic manga, and Pioneer's tech company already had a foot in the US to sell Tenchi Muyo. Ten years later, when Japanese licensors started smelling an entire new gold rush of undiscerning export money, all of a sudden that made the "classics" hot properties at a price. Companies didn't have the money or leverage to get Doraemon, so they began spending their money on new currently-airing shows (based on bragging-rights from their licensors about the TV ratings they were getting) that weren't classics yet...But hey, never know, might be! After the Bubble popped, we now have Crunchyroll to filter out the real fan-favorites from the chaff, and we have boxsets to release them quicker, but that doesn't mean the classic licensing prices went down, over there. |
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Lord Geo
Posts: 2665 Location: North Brunswick, New Jersey |
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There's what Cody mentioned with license bundling, but it's also possible that FUNimation sees how Discotek is doing, and is dipping its toes into that same kind of market; why ignore a segment of anime fandom that's only been shown to exist? Sure, something like ZIllion won't sell the amounts that they normally expect out of other releases, but at the same time it's a sub-only release, so it doesn't need to sell as much to make back its money. Don't forget that FUNi was also part of the consortium that lead to the restoration of Momotaro: Sacred Sailors, a release that really didn't scream "FUNimation", and instead felt more like something Discotek would try out. It's not like FUNi's going to suddenly try to be the next Discotek, so they'll probably only do the occasional old-school, sub-only release, but at the same time it's not unreasonable that FUNi is going to want a small piece of that vintage anime market pie for themselves. |
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NJ_
 Posts: 3101 Location: Wallington, NJ |
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Speaking of Zillion and package deal, here's hoping FUNi isn't expecting big sales with that like they probably made with Speed because in addition to being old and not having a dub, the Japanese Blu-ray release was a mess video-wise. It was reported to be a film remaster but with A LOT of DNR applied (similar to the Galaxy Express 999 movies).
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Greed1914
 Posts: 4618 |
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I'll give him credit for not leaving it there, though it is frequently the basic answer to questions since anime is a business. Leaving it at that doesn't provide much insight for the readers. |
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GeorgeC
Posts: 795 |
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They must have done fine with Speed Racer because I haven't seen it selling for over $15. A lower price-point isn't always a sign of bad sales... It means they expected it to sell and Speed Racer is a popular old show whether people accept the old dub or not. The Japanese series itself is bizarre. They still have copies at Best Buy of the basic Speed Racer set. Can't imagine they'll go much lower than $14.99 but they don't need to... They'll sell. I MIGHT still pick it up myself. I don't think the Japanese series is different enough to warrant a separate purchase for it nor am I that big into pre-1970s series. I can't imagine they sold too many of those $300 Speed Racer sets with Mach Go Go and its remake even if it was an "LE". I would imagine whatever hasn't sold will eventually get liquidated. I personally didn't think it was worth $300 nor did I really want the 1997 remake. I saw a few episodes of it and it wasn't very good. LE doesn't mean jack for units sold... Comic book shops can tell you the difference between quantity shipped to store and actual sales -- that's why over 50 comic shops have gone out of business in the last year in the US! Right now, Right Stuf is basically doing liquidation of a lot of LE Funimation starter sets that just haven't sold. I got one or two actually cheaper than I would have paid for the REGULAR edition set at Best Buy. They're nice but I generally don't buy them to save both shelf space and a bit of money... I've also noticed NISA hasn't been licensing anything new for anime lately. I think they may be pulling out of the anime licensing arena if they haven't made that formal announcement yet. There have been liquidations on and off of NISA titles for the past year. |
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Sakura Shinguji
Posts: 197 |
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Something very important to take away from Justin's answer, especially since it relates significantly to the actual question that was asked, is the explanation about what it means to be a top selling title at Right Stuf, or any retailer for that matter.
People like to conflate "top seller" with "big seller" when this is really not necessarily the case. And that goes for both the retailer by itself, as well as total overall sales. Being a "top seller" at a single retailer is purely a relative measure, definitely not quantitative to the point where anyone can say "this title is doing really well." It simply means more people are ordering it from that retailer than other titles from that same retailer at a specific time. And, to be the top seller at a given retailer, it might only have edged out the next title down by a handful of copies. And, more importantly, in terms of pure numbers, there may only have been a couple hundred copies ordered in a given timeframe, which in a slow week could get it to the top of that retailer's top sellers list, but is most definitely not setting the publisher's world on fire. It's like, I could plant some sunflowers outside my house, and proclaim sunflowers are my current top plant. That would be a factually correct statement. That would also have nothing whatsoever to do with whether my house is now surrounded by sunflowers, because you have no idea specifically how many I actually planted, or with whether sunflowers are the top plant in my neighborhood, because you don't know anything about my neighbors. But there are people who would see "top plant" and assume I live in a neighborhood crowded with sunflowers. Just one of those things to keep in mind, is all. |
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MarshalBanana
 Posts: 5500 |
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I suppose Reborn! has few selling points for a publisher, a mid 00s battle shonen by the women who did the character designs for Psycho-Pass. It's not creative enough to appeal to the people who watch Hunter X Hunter and JoJo, and not generic enough to appeal to someone new to the medium in the same way that Black Clover and Booby Tail can.
On the subject of Gintama, I wonder if CR will continue the dub, or was it just part of a group of shows that they bundled together to dip their toes into the dubbing scene(before they joined Funimation). |
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Mr.Shonen
Posts: 269 Location: Brooklyn, NY |
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I got 14 dollars. What does that get me? |
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Sandstar
Posts: 196 |
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An autograph by one of the blue water or monster isle dub actors. |
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EricJ2
Posts: 4016 |
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Unless it was cheap: Just recently, in the last month, I've seen a flood of vintage OOP 80's-anime dubs (Streamlines, Robot Carnival, Beautiful Dreamer, Lily C.A.T. and...Midnight Eye Goku?--I remember that one from the Berkeley Anime Guide!) turning up on free Amazon Prime, from another of Prime's many little struggling independent bottom-feeding digital-streaming rights scavengers that grabbed up a few lost-license titles under their new "Anime Crush" label. Given that Carl Macek was the last one to have Zillion, I'm guessing the series fell into the a similar lost-ownership/lapsed-rights bargain bin, along with Speed Racer. All depends on whether Funi is still using the same Streamline dub, or bothering to spend actual money to do a new one. Discotek can get a lot of great historical rarities digging around in the lost-license/public-domain dumps, such as some of their 70's kiddy-matinee anime, but they at least know the historical value. Funi, OTOH, may have just been taking advantage of a clearance sale. |
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hooliganj
 Posts: 113 Location: Longhorn Central |
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Assuming an average of 21 minutes of material per episode, you'd get 0.256 seconds. |
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