News

Magazine Z, Comi Di Gi+ Manga Mags Ending in Japan

Kodansha will end publication of Monthly Magazine Z with its March issue on January 26. The magazine debuted in June of 1999 with 150,000 copies, but its circulation has been falling since then to 50,000 copies in 2003 and to 22,500 this year. It currently serializes the manga version of the Ryoko's Case File, Real Drive, and Mobile Suit Gundam 00 anime. Notably, the Gundam 00 anime is scheduled to launch its second half-year run this October, but no announcement has been made on where the manga version will go after Monthly Magazine Z ends.

In the past, Monthly Magazine Z also carried Ryusei Deguchi's Abenobashi: Magical Shopping Arcade, Sukehiro Tomita and Haruhiko Mikimoto's Baby Birth, Hitoshi Ariga's Big O, Shinya Kaneko's Culdcept, Takuya Fujima's Deus Vitae and Free Collars Kingdom, Hajime Ueda's FLCL, Chiaki Ogishima's Heat Guy J, Yuuichi Kumakura's Jing: King of Bandits - Twilight Tales, Asuka Katsura's Le Portrait de Petit Cossette, Aki Katsu's Psychic Academy, Ikku Masa's Sakura Taisen, Atsushi Soga's Turn A Gundam, Toshitsugu Iida's Wolf's Rain, and Kia Asamiya's Batman: Child of Dreams. All of these titles have been republished in North America.

The 15th volume of the bimonthly Comi Di Gi+ manga magazine announced on August 21 that it will be the last one released for the publication. Softbank Interactive spun off this magazine from Softbank PC Japan, although Comi Di Gi+ has roots in Kadokawa Shoten's defunct Quarterly Di Gi Charat magazine and Jive's Comic Di Gi Charat magazines. In the past, Comi Di Gi+ carried Koge Donbo's Gema Gema Gekijō Di Gi Charat and Kamichama Karin+, Kanan's Galaxy Angel 3rd, and Asaki's true tears.

The two publications join a list of recently ended manga magazines that include Shogakukan's Monthly Young Sunday and Judy.

Source: animeanime.jp, Jiji Press, Chuosha