Forum - View topicManga's current state?
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darkhunter
 Posts: 2992 Location: Los Angelas |
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So are we oversaturated with titles, especially by big name companies like Viz and Tokyopop? What's happening to smaller publishing companies?
Gutsoon (on hiatus) and Ironcat went under. Comicsone, CPM and ADV just scale back on many of thier titles. Their titles are selling poorly. Media Blaster titles are weak and have yet to make any real mark. Bandai has yet to release any title. Oh yeah CMX, no explaination needed. |
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Kagemusha
 Posts: 2783 Location: Boston |
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I think it's safe to say that the market is at this moment oversaturated. Many of the books really don't have any aspects to set themselves abart from the rest of the pack, and most of them are mediocre. Obviously this isn't a good state for the market to be in. Alot of ADV's troubles come from adopting this "flood" strategy. But where Tokyopop pays attention to popular series and what fans are saying on the internet, ADV seemed to just grab a bunch of titles with little thought to how they appeal to US fans. Comicsone has been in the manga market for a while, but despite the fact that they have many quality titles, they just couldn't find an audience for most of them. The other lines last year (Media Blasters, CMX, CMP) didn't have any standout titles. On the other hand, Del Ray enjoyed great success with a few carefully selected titles with built in audiences. Hopefully other companys will take this example to heart and licence series more carefully. I think that Tokyopop is licencing titles much more carefully lately, which is a good sign. They definitally know how to listen to what fans want; and they seem to be making better choices with their shonen/seinen titles as well.
One aspect of the market that remains largely ignored is adults, as well as comicbook readers. After all, Super Manga Blast! is still going (it's carried only in comicbook stores). Blade of the Immortal sells very well despite being carried in few bookstores, and Buddha has recieved tons of praise from both the comicbook community and mainstream press. Handled properly, there are definitally titles with the potential to reach a new audience. |
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littlegreenwolf
 Posts: 4796 Location: Seattle, WA |
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For those of us who look for quality titles to read in manga, yes, we're oversaturated. The readers who are just getting into it, and the Japanophiles who will buy anything Japanese on the other hand probably don't think so. I know a guy who will buy any manga as long as it has big breast and fanservice, and somehow I don't think he's alone.
Tokyopop could be blamed for oversaturating the market, but pretty much each of their titles have a fanfollowing. I may not like the manwha titles as much as most of their other titles, but I know many girls who just eat them up. ADV I think is more to blame for oversaturating the market with just buying whatever they can in bulk with no concern about what kind of fans may be over here. |
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cboudreau
 Posts: 69 Location: Regina, Saskatchewan, Canada |
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I think the market is oversaturated too. There is definitely a demand for manga, but I think it's getting more and more difficult to find the quality reads without having to do some serious research or spending lots of time standing in front of the book shelves.
Yeah, I think I am complaining a bit. I think the large numbers of manga on the shelves wouldn't be a problem if there were more diversity among the titles. Yes, there is more diversity in English translated manga than North American mainstream comics, but there are lots of other types (genres) of manga that we are not seeing. |
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Ryusui
 Posts: 465 |
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One of my pet peeves with the state of manga is that the classics are getting overlooked. Viz has cancelled Phoenix, leaving it gathering dust alongside Black Jack (which needs to be continued), Galaxy Express 999 and other legends which have been blissfully ignored by the western market. Cyborg 009 is possibly the single oldest manga you will find on the shelves. (On a tangent, it sucks that the anime got the finger. No DVD release beyond the first volume and the TV airing got cancelled. Way to not release a series.
 )
A second peeve would be the sudden trend of non-translation. Tokyopop, Del Rey and Dark Horse are taking their cues from the reams of half-translated fansubs filled with gibberish honorifics and meaningless Japanese vocabulary. I know enough Japanese to understand what's being said, but 95% of everyone who tries to read this stuff-.hack//Legend of the Twilight and Trigun Maximum being the two examples I'd like to point out-is going to be scratching their heads at every "onii-chan" that comes up, and it comes up a lot. Del Rey's translation of Tsubasa scores points for the guide to the honorifics, something Tokyopop and Dark Horse never even considered, but they all also suffer from one problem with fansubs: the fact that their translations are being written by people with just enough knowledge of English to create something that sounds like a first-year Japanese student would write. You thought "Southern Master" in Negima was bad? Try "Orca" instead of "Ouka" and "Zawan Shin" instead of "The One Sin" in .hack. Any idiot who's bothered to play even one of the .hack games could point out those mistakes. (If you ever pick up a copy of UdeDen volume 3 and it says "The One Sin", you can thank me for it. I sent 'em an e-mail calling them on it...and chewing them out for their mishandling of Groove Adventure Rave and Pet Shop of Horrors, too.) ADV Manga is the only company that has done nothing that really pisses me off...yet. Still, I have hope that some day my gripes will be fixed...and that Tokyopop will get off its high horses and realize that we the fans will lynch them for Groove Adventure Rave. Someday. |
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darkhunter
Posts: 2992 Location: Los Angelas |
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I agree that we are flooded with typical shonen and shoujo titles. You can add TenTen to that list now among the others like Daemon Hunter, Legendz and Gamerz Heaven. We need diversity. But even then, when Raijin was release Slam Dunk and Fist of the North Star, thier company went under. With all the big name fan favorite manga titles already license and release, it's interesting to see what else would can or will come for this industry in the next 5 year.
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Dranxis
 Posts: 591 Location: Ohtori Academy |
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Viz cancelled Phoenix?! Darn, I was looking forward to reading that series.  Not to mention that they cancelled the Nausicaa 2nd edition box set, have completely abandoned Urusei Yatsura... I agree, we definetly are at a need for some proper treatment of classic manga. The publishers should spend less time advertising petty series, and more time trying to give classic manga some publicity. As Kagemusha mentioned, Buddha has been getting more attention because of good reviews and press reports. I'm certain other classic manga could get that kind of attention if the publishers didn't leave them to decay in the dust.
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alice20th
Posts: 74 |
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Yeah, well here's the problem. Old manga and anime don't sell. For whatever reason, the U.S. market just does not pick these stories up. It could have been written by Shakespeare (and it Tezuka's case, it's pretty friggen close!), and still not enough people seem to buy the books to make it come close to breaking even. Lupin III, UY, Phoenix, Fist of the North Star, City Hunter... and in anime Astro Boy, the original Gundam series, Lupin, Saint Seiya... Anything that was made before the late eighties seems to be thrown on the trash pile of manga. I'll bet CMX's classic books are selling at the bottom of Bookscan's charts too (without any help from the recent controversy). There have been enough examples of classic manga and anime flops to teach anyone but the newest companies to stay away from them. Thankfully there have been exceptions like Lone Wolf and Cub and Maison Ikkoku, but that doesn't negate the trend. Personally, I'd love to see Touch come out, but not in the present atmosphere because Touch will fail. I would rather they put out Katsu or some other recent Adachi manga that has a chance of succeeding rather than put out a classic with one strike against it the moment it steps up to the plate. I have a different view of the classic manga market. I appreciate any company that is willing to take the risk of publishing an old manga on the strength of the story. And I am cynically not surprised when the manga is canceled. |
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Kagemusha
Posts: 2783 Location: Boston |
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Where did you hear this? I though that they were going to continue the series (since volume 5 was released last December), but it really says something about the state of the market when something like Phoenix gets canceled. Viz definitally could have done a better job promoting it. While it probobly would have never sold better than Buddha or Astro Boy (the former will always recieve more attention because of subject matter and the latter is considered a classic because of the anime), they should have at least managed to sustain decent sales by selling it to the right audience. The majority of todays "manga only" readers want familiar art and familiar story cliches, so selling it to them isn't going to work. |
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darkhunter
Posts: 2992 Location: Los Angelas |
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I say classic comedy and romance manga are the hardest to sale. Something funny back then might not be so funny by today's standard. A new and original romance novel back then might feel cheeesy by today's standard. Also a lot of the new manga being license arn't that exciting any more. Aside from 20th Century Boy, I can't imagine anything else I'm really excited about that I must get. I'm sure big name titles like Kenshin, Fruit Basket, Berserk, hellsing generated tons of excitement when they were announce, and people were buying them up. Last edited by darkhunter on Fri Jan 13, 2006 2:39 am; edited 1 time in total |
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Kagemusha
Posts: 2783 Location: Boston |
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A company has to sell classic manga to the right audience. While things like Lupin and Phoenix haven't sold very well, Samurai Executioner and Buddha have done great for themselves (not entirely sure about Buddha, but Vertical is continuing it and releasing a softcover, so I'm assuming it's making them a profit). SE has a built in audience because Lone Wolf and Cub has become a classic amongst comicbook readers, and Vertical targeted alternative comix readers (as well as some mainstream publications) rather than the current manga fanbase. But increasingly I think it isn't the question of "Will this make a profit?", but "Will this make more of a profit than a clone of an already successful manga?". I think alot of companys are following this mentality and not expanding their markets. I'm releaved to see that Tokyopop is making an effort to expand its library's appeal to more than just the shojo and shonen demographics. I hope companys are going to wake up to the fact that titles that target adults are commercially viable with the huge success of things like Berserk and Hellsing. Hopefully 20th Century Boys and Blame! will be big hits, as thist will help seinen that doesn't have a hit anime proerty attached to it become licenced.
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