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NEWS: Funimation, BioWare Work on Animated Dragon Age Film

enurtsol wrote:

No, anime will make the creepy Little Sisters into loli moe, and you know it.

This actually brings up the reason I've been against a Mass Effect anime from the get go. I can just see the horror:
Shepard is an obnoxiously loud teenage boy with shounen-hair. Ashly would be the token Tsundere, Kaiden the pervy-otaku, Liara the clutz, Tali the nerdy yuri, and Dr Chakwas would be the ridiculously busty drunk who's sensitive about her age. And I'm sure they would find someway to throw a moe-bait loli in there. I shudder at the thought of it all .

Since the other thread about this seems dead, I'll repost a couple of questions here.

First, what is the intended market for this show? Will it be in English and marketed primarily in R1? I thought Funi's co-production venture would be taking properties that are well known both in North America and in Japan and producing them with a Japanese studio for both markets. Is that true for Dragon Age? Bioware seems pretty much an R1 type of company, or am I wrong?

Funimation's co-production focus is the American market and not Japan. They're working with properties that are big in the US and have the potential to become mainstream hits (selling hundreds of thousands of copies, if not a million; etc.).

While Japanese anime studios will create the content, appealing directly to that country isn't the goal.

Well, people are gonna like what they like....

Titles like Air, Clannad and Kanon do indeed have a plot, but didn't the animation company completely change things around from the source material so that they would have a plot?

I didn't buy them because the character designs in those shows is just too weird. The male and female characters look like different species. Too distracting for me.

DA:O eh? Well that is not a really strong title to test the co-production waters with and still direct to dvd?
Bioware uses great VAs for their RPGs if the DA:O anime uses the stock Funi VAs and writing crew I will be heavily disappointed.
Maybe disappointed is a bit much because this news of a DA:O anime is kind of ho-hum.

I think there is a value in a Dragon Age anime. The game is not out in Japanyet. Seeing how Bioware other RPG, Mass Effectdid so well in Japan, and ending up getting the Platinum Collectionin Japan. I think Funimation and Bioware is making a good decision on this, using Dragon Age anime to help promote the game's Japanese release (as soon as they announce the release date). I wish both of them a good luck.

Did you forget some of our anime VA did lend their voice for Dragon Age: Origins. Beside I don't mind Funimation lend their VA, and they might outsoruce their Voice acting and bring back some of the VA from the game to reprise their role.

This is a great first project. I'm a huge fan of Dragon Age. I can't really figure out why, but I just love that game.

mdo7 wrote:

I think there is a value in a Dragon Age anime. The game is not out in Japanyet. Seeing how Bioware other RPG, Mass Effectdid so well in Japan, and ending up getting the Platinum Collectionin Japan. I think Funimation and Bioware is making a good decision on this, using Dragon Age anime to help promote the game's Japanese release (as soon as they announce the release date). I wish both of them a good luck.

Mass Effect is a platinum 360 game, period. Microsoft did not back the platinum editions separate by regions. Once a game gets enough sales MS makes a platinum edition, simple story.
The sales of ME1 in JP were nothing special for a typical Western RPG, saying it did well is an exaggeration.

There has been no mention of getting an JP localized DA:O or Mass Effect 2 by EA or Bioware from the twitter/forum.
"The film is slated to ship on home video in 2011."
Where does Funi state that this NA home video is going to be used as a precursor for a JP localized DAO? Nowhere.

In fact a 2011 release of the anime movie would more likely be used to get more interest in DAO2 what has a confirmed 2011 released date.

Quote:

Did you forget some of our anime VA did lend their voice for Dragon Age: Origins. Beside I don't mind Funimation lend their VA, and they might outsoruce their Voice acting and bring back some of the VA from the game to reprise their role.

Why do you go through such lengths to classify VAs? and "our" anime VAs?
My point is Bioware uses a wide range of voices for their RPGs and the losing that variety would lose part of the depth DAO has.

Yes I am aware of that. If you think the Mass Effect movie will be given the treatment it deserves you are crazy. It needs a massive Avatar sized budget to pull off what it needs to do on the level it needs to and being based on a video game it will never get the budget it needs.

Just because they didn't say that doesn't mean we have to rule out possibility of no Japanese release of Dragon Age: Origins, do you work for Bioware? Do you have evidence Dragon Age: Origins will never come out in Japan? Did you know Mass Effect didn't came out in Japan until 2 years after the US release and now the fans in Japan probably demand Dragon Age: Origins to come out in Japan (some Japanese could have imported the game). So I think The Dragon Age anime can be used to probably help promote the game for it's Japanese release, just because it doesn't say that doesn't mean it they'll never do it unless you have evidence. Western RPG are very popular in Japan as much as JRPG. Also Did you forget when Funimation licensed the 2 recent Slayer series, Slayer Revolution and Slayer Evolution-R. They didn't used their VAs to voice Slayers, they outsourced the dubbing to NYAV Post and got all the original cast back together. If they can get the original Slayer cast back, then Funimation can use the VA from the game to voice the anime would be possible.

mdo7 wrote:

Just because they didn't say that doesn't mean we have to rule out possibility of no Japanese release of Dragon Age: Origins, do you work for Bioware? Do you have evidence Dragon Age: Origins will never come out in Japan? Did you know Mass Effect didn't came out in Japan until 2 years after the US release and now the fans in Japan probably demand Dragon Age: Origins to come out in Japan (some Japanese could have imported the game). So I think The Dragon Age anime can be used to probably help promote the game for it's Japanese release, just because it doesn't say that doesn't mean it they'll never do it unless you have evidence. Western RPG are very popular in Japan as much as JRPG. Also Did you forget when Funimation licensed the 2 recent Slayer series, Slayer Revolution and Slayer Evolution-R. They didn't used their VAs to voice Slayers, they outsourced the dubbing to NYAV Post and got all the original cast back together. If they can get the original Slayer cast back, then Funimation can use the VA from the game to voice the anime would be possible.

Why don't you visit Bioware's forum or twitter accounts. I have and the questions about any additional localization if responded to by a developer result in statements that the dev team are working on other projects,DLC and a sequel, and that they have no word of a JP localized edition being in the works.
If you want to daydream on possibilities and what-ifs then if you played DA:O and Awakenings then you would know that DA2 is going to come out is 2011, which looks like a more likely candidate to coincide with a DVD movie release.
Let's see a tie-in a DVD movie with a new game that may hit 3 million+ in overall sales or a localized game that may top off around 150k?

Western RPGs are not as popular in Japan as JRPG or even dating sims. Western games normally sell around 100k while JRPGs and dating sims hit millions of sales. You say the 100k people that brought ME1 in Japan are now probably demanding DA:O? Laughable with no proof and zero reason to back it up.

DAO is not Slayers, it is not even clear whether or not it will feature the same characters from the main game or expansion. I merely stated that a franchise like DA:O is known for strong acting and that Funi should not use their voice stable for this project.