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NEWS: Strike Witches BD Box Sells 5,000 to Top Weekly Chart


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vega427



Joined: 12 Dec 2005
Posts: 80
Location: lansing, MI
PostPosted: Tue May 17, 2011 5:26 pm Reply with quote
Look, I love the Witches as much as the next guy(provided he likes the witches as well), but there's no way in hell I'd be willing to part that kind of scratch for a re-issue.
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fsunole90



Joined: 29 Oct 2010
Posts: 21
PostPosted: Tue May 17, 2011 6:23 pm Reply with quote
good maybe its success will let the US get the second season and movie faster. c'mon funi. dub away
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jojothepunisher



Joined: 04 Sep 2007
Posts: 799
PostPosted: Tue May 17, 2011 7:05 pm Reply with quote
The cover art looks damn serious and cool, but $450 is in my opinion just way too much, I didn't make that much even from working in university for 3 weeks.
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Jarm



Joined: 04 Dec 2007
Posts: 87
PostPosted: Tue May 17, 2011 7:15 pm Reply with quote
451 * 5000 = $2255000 Shocked

Guess there are plenty of crazy SW fans to support the franchise. Here's to an excellent SW movie!
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PetrifiedJello



Joined: 11 Mar 2009
Posts: 3782
PostPosted: Tue May 17, 2011 7:33 pm Reply with quote
$451.

For Strike Witches on Bluray.

That's an upscale.

*tosses out quote regarding fools and their money.
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asimpson2006



Joined: 13 May 2008
Posts: 3151
Location: USA
PostPosted: Tue May 17, 2011 7:36 pm Reply with quote
I don't think I would pay that much for Strike Witches on BD (I don't care if it is an upscale they can look better than the DVD) and it is a favorite of mine.
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here-and-faraway



Joined: 21 Jun 2007
Posts: 1528
Location: Sunny California
PostPosted: Tue May 17, 2011 8:08 pm Reply with quote
How much would a normal complete series run of an anime Bluray season run in Japan? I know in the States we're used to paying around $40-50 for a Bluray release if we buy our anime at an online retailer like Rightstuf or sometimes amazon. But I've also heard that Japanese releases tend to be more expensive. I'm just wondering if the hefty price tag is so shocking over there as seems to be here.
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enurtsol



Joined: 01 May 2007
Posts: 14746
PostPosted: Tue May 17, 2011 8:47 pm Reply with quote
fsunole90 wrote:
good maybe its success will let the US get the second season and movie faster. c'mon funi. dub away


Makes the license even more expensive! Laughing


jojothepunisher wrote:
The cover art looks damn serious and cool, but $450 is in my opinion just way too much, I didn't make that much even from working in university for 3 weeks.


Yet people are willing to pay it, and that's why prices won't go down. Laughing
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Megiddo



Joined: 24 Aug 2005
Posts: 8360
Location: IL
PostPosted: Tue May 17, 2011 8:51 pm Reply with quote
No, that price tag is pretty normal. It may even be considered pretty cheap. The singles were 8,000 yen each, and I believe there were six of them. So the BD box for 36k yen (which Amazon has on sale for 26k) is quite a bargain over there.
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hissatsu01



Joined: 08 May 2006
Posts: 963
Location: NYC
PostPosted: Tue May 17, 2011 9:23 pm Reply with quote
No, that isn't a very normal price. Maybe normal for Kadokawa price, but it's on the very high end of BD box prices for a 1 cour series. I can't think of any 1 cour series BD box that has retailed for more. It's about 10,000 yen higher than the average price for a 1 cour series, and quite a few 2 cour series BD box releases list for around that price. It's just Kadokawa continuing their generally very high pricing scheme. Saying it's a "bargain" compared to the singles pricing isn't saying much when just about every other BD box offering a similar amount of content is far cheaper - and many of those aren't upscales that barely look any better than the DVDs.
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Megiddo



Joined: 24 Aug 2005
Posts: 8360
Location: IL
PostPosted: Tue May 17, 2011 9:49 pm Reply with quote
Looking at upcoming/recent BD boxes

Kurenai - 30,000 yen
Working - 33,000 yen
Shana - 31,500 yen (two-cour)
Clannad - 62,000 yen (two-cour)
Sora no Otoshimono - 28,000 yen
Sayonara Zetsubou-sensei - 20,000 yen
Kara no Kyoukai - 55,000 yen
Aquarion - 44,000 yen (two cour)
Serial Experiments Lain - 32,000 yen

Not sure which of those are Kadokawa, but other than Zetsubou, Aquarion, and Shana, they're pretty much in the same ballpark as this Strike Witches release.
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The Nagabuchi



Joined: 18 Apr 2007
Posts: 103
PostPosted: Tue May 17, 2011 10:43 pm Reply with quote
Ah, the way Japanese prices freak people out always amuses me. This sort of price is fairly normal, espcially for something as niche as Strike Witches. Pre-order discounts are the only way local Japan otaku like myself survive really.
But theres definately a pride that fans have hen it comes to owning something like this. Theres a huge stigma about having bootlegs or torrents among the hardcore fans here. Me, I have every single Macross Frontier bluray (series, concerts and movies) which wasnt cheap. But fans support the series and as a result the series sometimes give back to the fans (ie, some of us were recorded for background noise in the Mac F movie). Its an expensive hobby and Id like prices to drop a bit, sure. But hearing fans in the US whine about anime prices never fails to make me chuckle. Sometimes you guys have no idea how good you have it.
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hissatsu01



Joined: 08 May 2006
Posts: 963
Location: NYC
PostPosted: Tue May 17, 2011 11:17 pm Reply with quote
Megiddo wrote:
Looking at upcoming/recent BD boxes

Kurenai - 30,000 yen
Working - 33,000 yen
Shana - 31,500 yen (two-cour)
Clannad - 62,000 yen (two-cour)
Sora no Otoshimono - 28,000 yen
Sayonara Zetsubou-sensei - 20,000 yen
Kara no Kyoukai - 55,000 yen
Aquarion - 44,000 yen (two cour)
Serial Experiments Lain - 32,000 yen

Not sure which of those are Kadokawa, but other than Zetsubou, Aquarion, and Shana, they're pretty much in the same ballpark as this Strike Witches release.


You're rather proving my point. Every single on of those single cour releases is cheaper, most far cheaper. Clannad is Kadokawa, easy enough to tell, since only they charge that much for two cour series.
Sora no Otoshimono is also Kadokawa, charging a more reasonable price than usual for them.

Lain was the result of many months of work doing a new HD telecine and re-animating all the digitally animated portions, plus storyboards available while watching, 2 CDs, and a rather thick book. Working is being recomposited in HD from the original animation. And they're still both cheaper. Meanwhile Strike Witches is a pump and dump BD upscale release that barely looks any different from the DVDs with a premium price.

And some more prices...

Baccano! - 26250 yen
Ga-Rei Zero - 28350 yen
Kamichu! - 26250 yen
Maria Holic - 23100 yen
Mononoke - 26250 yen
Toshokan Sensou - 26250 yen

And some two cour shows...

Mai Hime/Otome Boxes - 30450 yen
Gankutsuou - 33600 yen
Noein - 36750 yen

Anyone who purchases Japanese releases with any regularity would soon notice that Kadokawa pricing is usually at the high end of Japanese pricing. They're the only distributor still regularly doing 13 volume releases of 2 cour shows. Both Nichijou and Gosick will total over 100,000 yen list price if you buy all of it. Like I said, I can't think of a more expensive single cour BD box release than SW.
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enurtsol



Joined: 01 May 2007
Posts: 14746
PostPosted: Tue May 17, 2011 11:24 pm Reply with quote
The Nagabuchi wrote:

But theres definately a pride that fans have hen it comes to owning something like this. Theres a huge stigma about having bootlegs or torrents among the hardcore fans here.


See, there's the big difference.

But since not all anime are shown everywhere, how do ya watch something if you missed it? Laughing


hissatsu01 wrote:

Anyone who purchases Japanese releases with any regularity would soon notice that Kadokawa pricing is usually at the high end of Japanese pricing. They're the only distributor still regularly doing 13 volume releases of 2 cour shows. Both Nichijou and Gosick will total over 100,000 yen list price if you buy all of it.


So you're saying they're the Geneon USA of Japan? Laughing
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Megiddo



Joined: 24 Aug 2005
Posts: 8360
Location: IL
PostPosted: Tue May 17, 2011 11:36 pm Reply with quote
So Hissatsu, why is the Working BD box 33,600 yen? Is that Kadokawa? I know Aniplex is releasing it in the US, but Japan usually has more than one company financing anime.

It's not the company in my opinion, it's the number of sales. Working averaged around 20k copies sold per volume. Strike witches averaged around 18k per volume I believe.

They know that there is demand for the product, so they set the price higher. All the anime you listed (except for Noitamina's Mononoke/Library War I believe) sold less than 10k copies per vol, and they're not really shows aimed at otaku with exception to Maria Holic.

Besides, this is a reissue. I think that's the really surprising thing here. The first time this set was released it sold around 7k copies at 35,000 yen. It's not often that box sets are reissued. I can't recall any at least. Not in the Blu-Ray era at least.
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