Forum - View topicTokyopop recent quality issues
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Shirogane
 Posts: 55 |
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Yeah, I've noticed on the latest volume of Chibi Vampire that the pages seemed really thin and they upped the price from 9.99 to 10.99.
However, if it is true that they switched paper suppliers to guarantee timely product release dates and to prevent future price increases, then I'm okay with it. I'd much rather have a slightly more expensive manga with a different paper stock than having them drop the series altogether. |
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magicalgirlj
 Posts: 106 |
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same here, I have been very disapointed with them recently. I mean they raised their prices abd the quailty is cheaper. But I will still support them |
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chinabean
Posts: 32 |
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All I can say is that Tokyopop lost me when they stopped production of the Missing light novel series
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rolancehack
Posts: 2 |
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I recently stopped buying new TP releases all together, I will buy the rest of series I already have books from, but nothing new. If it's true that they're lowering quality and increasing price, I might just have to stop buying TP altogether. (As much as I like GTO, I can pass on "The Early Years"...)
I'd also like to see which other publishers are vying for paper you can see through... Every "new" publisher from Del Rey to Yen press have been using pretty decent stock paper, that looks better then anything I've seen from TP. It's kind of sad to see how far they've fallen, back when they first started they were the cheapest manga around, $10 was a drop in the hat compared to Viz and Dark Horses $16 to $30 manga, plus it was unflipped, and released fairly fast. Now they're middle of the road priced, poor quality (at this point I think only Dr. Master looks worse then Tokyo Pop), have sporadic releases (assuming they release at all), have a terrible web site, and in general just seem to be floundering. I am absolutely disappointed in Tokyopop, you'd think that if they were smart they'd take a hint from Del Rey or Yen Press and maybe add in some decent translation notes or something if they're going to double tap us with poor quality and higher prices. |
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bahamut623
 Posts: 1463 |
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The "recent" part of the thread title made me laugh.
I bought Planetes volume 2 several months ago, and the printing and paper quality were horrendous. The paper felt thin and flimsy, but worst of all the printing looked like cheap Xeroxing. Any large black areas look faded and such, and in a manga set in space...that's quite a problem. I don't how long ago that particular book was printed (is the series OOP?), but it was just really poor quality for such a good series (or for any series). It's a shame. The first several manga I ever bought were all from Tokyopop. They did things better back then, or maybe I just didn't know any better. They had their act together, and now...yea. |
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Generic #757858
 Posts: 1354 |
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Pretty much, Tokyopop doesn't seem to have any interest in reprinting it. I hope some other company will pick up the license when it (or Tokyopop) expires, it's a great series. (Though IMHO the anime is better.) |
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Unknown Memory
 Posts: 155 |
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I'm not too surprised on this. Tokyo Pop has been loosing quality ever since they transitioned from being Mixxzine -> Tokyo Pop magazine -> to being what they are now. They took in a high amount of titles under their belts in this decade alone. Their other competitors are smarter by working with a smaller amount of titles.
The lowest paper quality in manga, that I'm use to, is from CMX. There are a few titles that I like from CMX so I don't mind them using a cheaper amount of paper quality. (Also, their lettering/type-setting isn't the greatest but I don't care about that either.) With Tokyo Pop, you don't expect to see CMX-like paper. You expect a little more quality. I don't expect translation quality with TP since they have too many titles. *sighs* But, it's a shame to see TP go down like this because they were one of the first to start the manga revolution out of Japan. Gakuen Alice is the only TP title that I'm collecting. I have old TP titles of when they used cheaper paper in their golden days. But now, they made so much money so I couldn't imagine them going back to "that time". With paper quality issues, I can understand so I don't mind that actually. I'm just not comfortable with both TP and Del Rey (who are so much better) raising their prices. I hope the other good companies, at least, lower their paper quality rather than jack up the prices if they fall under financial situations. (Although, I would like to see any kind of company try to experiment on lowering prices for once... Not through sales but actually lowering prices.) |
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littlegreenwolf
 Posts: 4796 Location: Seattle, WA |
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Heh, you probably aren't old enough to remember how TP was in the late 90s. They had some real serious quality issues. The pages fell out when the manga was exposed to the slightest bit of heat, the manga was all flipped, the opted for the American cartoon translation of names, the format was smaller than what we have today in some cases, and their volumes went for around 12.99. They also tried releasing some in monthly comic book format with a few chapters here and there, sort of like Darkhorse did at one point. I remember Smile magazine... liked it a heck of a lot better than Shoujobeat. Wish that never died. Still... I'd almost kill somebody to have all my TP Sailor Moon manga back. Damn fangirls I loaned them out to never returned them. |
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zawa113
 Posts: 7358 |
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Well, I finally got a chance to go to Borders and look at the new Tokyopop books. What can I say, wow are they bad, I think that they were even worse then than the descriptions everyone had been giving. I also found a CMX series, which I know also uses thinner paper, and I have some Dark Horse series at my house to compare the thinner paper too. I looked at Gakuen Alice 7, Future Diary 1, Return to Labrynth 3, and Petshop of Horrors Tokyo 4 and compared them to other Tokyopop volumes sitting nearby. The Tokyopop ones had:
superior see through-ness, you could see the other side of almost every page! Sometimes even to the page behind the one you can see the other side. Comparatively, neither CMX nor Dark Horse's aren't as see through, it was a page every so often where there was white on one side and black on the other, but even then, you couldn't clearly see actual letters. inferior paper quality. I could just feel it while flipping through, my fingers were not pleased with how it felt, like slightly stiffer tissue paper or something. In Stuckinfresno's posted reply from Tokyopop, Tokyopop's reply said that they were using the same outer cover paper, but I'm not entirely convinced. The cover paper seemed to want to bend outward more than the normal covers on the previous ones and it felt thinner to me too. I don't just think it was because the paper was thinner either, if anything the thinner paper should have made the covers feel thicker than normal, but they felt thinner than normal to me still. Seriously, the cardstock I use in my papercrafts all the time felt thicker and are less affected by just sitting on the shelf than these. I personally think that of the 4 volumes I looked at that Future Diary and Return to Labyrinth were probably the worst (in terms of quality issues), I was afraid that they were going to fall apart or burst into flames in my hand because it was just so poorly made. I don't know why I thought those two were quite as bad, maybe I thought they weren't as different as the other books in the series right next to them. Future Diary being a vol 1 didn't have anything in the same series next to it to make it look somewhat ok. Since I'm not currently buying anything form Tokyopop, I'm not about to start now, I used to get most of my manga from them in the past when I first started collecting (so around 2003 or so), but now they might as well consider me a lost (potential) customer. I just had to know how bad their quality issues got though, I don't like buying half broken things, I don't care how good the series may be right now (although none of them interest me or I'd probably be getting them already). The only early Tokyopop manga I have are the first 6 volumes of Cardcaptor Sakura, and I definitely think that those are better than these (yeah, I'm a bit wary of the pages maybe wanting to fall out, but they're all intact still. The ones at the library aren't so lucky. I don't really mind that the books are smaller though, they're still perfectly clear in the images and whatnot. |
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Tamaria
 Posts: 1512 Location: De Achterhoek |
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My friends and I visited a few comic book stores yesterday and we had a good laugh at the new Tokyopop releases, especially Future Diary. You know the paper is of poor quality when you can read two pages at once.
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Kikaioh
 Posts: 1205 Location: Antarctica |
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Well, I've always unfortunately taken Tokyopop titles with a grain of salt. =\ I've never been a fan of the fact that they 'reinvent' the covers for the American distribution - the Japanese Et Cetera and Sgt. Frog covers were much more wacky and fun than their darker-looking, more serious American counterparts. And ever since Del Ray established their manga line with such vigorous attention to detail and exceptional liner notes, it's been hard to really go back to TokyoPop's titles (I will, however, still finish off my Chibi Vampire collection!
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Kruszer
 Posts: 7984 Location: Minnesota, USA |
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This is why I never loan anything to anyone....ever. I've learned after a couple bad experiences. Plus, if you do manage to get them back they have coffee stains on them, scuffed covers, or dog-eared pages.  
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HyugaHinata
 Posts: 3505 |
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I haven't read any of TP's recent mangas, so I can't comment on the paper quality, but I do have a gripe regarding some of their translations/adaptation. They could be slightly more polished.
As an example: spoiler[In Furuba 1, Yuki says "My being kind is selfish" of words to that effect. Such an adaptation/translation is highly cumbersome and no one I know of speaks like that in real life. It would work far, FAR better as "My kindness is selfish" or "I'm only kind for selfish reasons."] |
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Aura Ichadora
 Posts: 2284 Location: In front of my computer |
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I have to admit, most of the titles for Tokyopop that I'm either collecting (Jing: King of Bandits, Chobits), or am going to collect (King of Thorn, Cardcaptor Sakura) are older titles, so I'm not exactly worried about quality with those. However, in the next few months, Tokyopop will be releasing Maria+Holic, and actually, I kinda don't want to buy it because of the possible quality. I don't want to be reading one page and be also reading another at the same time; kinda ruins the experience.
I'll still buy it though since it is a hilarious series and I do enjoy it, but I'm going to hope for better quality than what I'm hearing about so far. |
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Imperialkat
 Posts: 227 |
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Yeah. I checked out Future Diary in the bookstore the other day. I kid you not, Shonen Jump has better paper. I could deal with a drop in paper quality but that is a pretty severe drop in comparison with the TP titles currently sitting on my shelf.
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