Forum - View topicANNCast - Sols Eater
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Cutiebunny
 Posts: 1747 |
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I like, and support, the idea of a group of people funding these projects. I've pledged to several Kickstarter projects myself, many of these at the upper tier levels. However, with AnimeSols, my donation has varied from the low tier (Creamy Mami) to the highest tier (Dear Brother) simply because the latter included an original sketch, while the former didn't feature artwork as an option.
I'd like to see more original artwork options in the future. I don't mind dropping $200 to support AnimeSols campaign, but I'd like the reward to be something I'd actually enjoy, and not something I'd have 0 use for, such as the Creamy Mami shoes. While I can understand that, with older series, that's impossible if the original character designer is sick or deceased, for an active artist, like Akemi Takada, the ability to own an original sketch available at a higher pledge level would have made me pledge $1000+ instead of the $40 I did. |
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Cptn_Taylor
Posts: 925 |
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It is marketable but not with your standard anime fan, and not by publishing 100 episodes all at once. This is an epic that to be viable has to : - be published 20 episodes per year (so that you can dub it section by section) - be marketed as a science fiction epic, the faithful animation transposition of a series of science fiction novels that were highly praised in Japan. Hence you market it primarily to science fiction fans (those that read the so-called books) at science fiction conventions. - of course you also market it to anime fans (but as a last resort). If you chase only your 14-20 year old anime fan it will all come down crashing and burning. No anime publisher in america has the GUTS to do it, so its moot anyway. |
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samuelp
Industry Insider
Posts: 2231 Location: San Antonio, USA |
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In other words it needs to be a labor of love by someone with a lot of money and time to spend. Name one other show (anime or otherwise) which has been successful with a marketing/sales plan like that. You could probably sell 1000 copies if you went to 30 conventions a year, and lose money in the process before even getting to royalty payments. To support a dub you'd need sales more like ~2-3,000, and that's barely breaking even. Plus Legend of the Galactic Heroes is NOT a cheap license. It might work for a sub only barebones release and eventually make decent money on streaming services that want large catalogs. But a dub? No way, never happening. |
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Cptn_Taylor
Posts: 925 |
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Of course it would be a labor of love and cost a pretty penny. Undertaking such a project is not easy especially since there is no built in audience for it in the States. That said, LOGH is the closest thing there is to an animated epic novel (hence why a dub is such a fundamental thing). And has to be sold as such. In a country of 300 000 000 people, science fiction literary fans are not a niche. Lots of people read science fiction novels. It is as mainstream as it gets. And these people contrary to anime fans don't shun a work because of its age. Even 40-50-60 year old science fictions novels are still being read if they have a solid story. Anime fans unfortunately by the way that animation evolves so rapidly are always chasing the last thing. 2000-3000 potential buyers for LOGH ? No. Think 10x more. The publisher would have to go to let's say the biggest 2-3 science fiction literary conventions with a booth that illustrates what LOGH is about as well as show its literary origin. It's an epic of the future history of mankind. It's a confrontation between two political systems modeled on prussian aristocracy and democracy. It's about the story of 2 young men that find themselves at the center of historical events and will shape them. There's history, tactics (battles modeled after real life 18th and 19th century battles), politics etc... Show 1 or 2 episodes, or maybe one of the films. The first one where the 2 young men encounter in battle for the first time. That film is superb, great classical score, great battle thinking, lots of science fiction goodies sprinkled all around etc... Those elements appeal to the science fiction fan. Selling 20 episodes per year becomes a necessity because you can then price each release to 200-300 $. It's more sustainable in the long term then being asked to give 1500 $ all at once. You have to create interest in this thing. But the main target has to be the literary fans. They are the only ones who could appreciate such a work. Anime fans forget about them, unless all you want to sell is 100 copies if even that. |
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Fronzel
Posts: 1906 |
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That's very expensive. Would people really go for that? |
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Blanchimont
 Posts: 3448 Location: Finland |
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No they wouldn't. Cptn_Taylor is just dreaming of cloud castles... Even the Japanese BluRay boxes are only ~$200 piece, and that's for ~26 main episodes/box, along with the Gaiden episodes, as well as apparently some spin-offs, divided between the boxes... |
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Cptn_Taylor
Posts: 925 |
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Well maybe not at 300$ but in range 200-250$ why not ? You have to consider 20 episodes + dubbing, and dubbing doesn't come cheap hence why any comparison with the price in Japan is nonsense. I really think that 200-250 $ for what are 20 OVA quality episodes (let's remeber this, the episodes were OVA quality not tv broadcast quality) dubbed is a fair price. And a once a year release is good for the buyer and the publisher. The big big big problem is getting LOTGH known outside of a small anime niche. I think there is a a market for this, it's just not the anime fandom. |
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Blanchimont
Posts: 3448 Location: Finland |
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If you want to keep your delusions, well, go ahead, not like I can stop you... You're also forgetting that although there certainly is a market segment for science fiction in the west, they certainly aren't accustomed to Japanese prices. Whatever allure LOGH might have for them, do not expect them to lay down ~$10 for every ~20 minutes of animated stuff. If you do, then I have this bridge to sell to you in Brooklyn... |
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penguintruth
 Posts: 8461 Location: Penguinopolis |
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A licensor could always test the waters for LoGH by licensing My Conquest is the Sea of Stars, the "prologue" movie to the OVA.
But, odds are, people are going to look at the age of that and blanch. |
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Alan45
 Village Elder Posts: 9841 Location: Virginia |
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There are quite a few reasons Cptn_Taylor's idea is fantasy. I'll just touch on one.
The reason that decades old science fiction novels are still read is that text has not changed. The visual for a science fiction novel are always fresh as they are created on the fly by the reader as they read. LoGH is locked into a specific look. Worse it is a look that non anime fans are not familiar with. Frankly the transition of science fiction to video has always been spotty at best. It is getting better as special effects improve but there is still a gap. People who read science fiction are used to the visual images not being adequate. Not all science fiction readers are fans of science fiction movies. |
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walw6pK4Alo
 Posts: 9322 |
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LoGH has enough ardent supporters of its own now, and My Conquest would look just fine if they were grabbing the remastered version, preferably on BluRay. Just search for the screencaps, it looks just fantastic with the only problem being that it's cropped. Licensing that, Overture to a New War, and maybe just Golden Wings for shits and giggles since it actually has the best looking transfer of the three, would be a nice testbed. If no name OVAs like Choujin Locke can do fine for Discotek, I can't see how LoGH couldn't; the actual number of the people who know and have seen the entire 110 episode OVA run isn't the same as it was in 2005, and I cannot figure out why others keep pretending that LoGH is some entirely unknowable and hidden away secret of anime. It's not. By the way, here's the MAL stats: Watching: 4,575 Completed: 11,329 On-Hold: 3,217 Dropped: 1,165 Plan to Watch: 17,068 Total: 37,357 When I first started watching it in late 2007, fewer than 800 people had it on their lists. I don't think there's ever been an older property that's grown so fast. For contrast, here's a show that never has people like Tim Eldred and others shutting up about it, AND THIS WAS LICENSED AND RELEASED IN THE US: Watching: 420 Completed: 1,895 On-Hold: 427 Dropped: 206 Plan to Watch: 2,169 Total: 5,118 |
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Alan45
Village Elder Posts: 9841 Location: Virginia |
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samuelp wrote:
It sounds like he investigated this and his response probably has some bearing on why the show hasn't been licensed. |
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StudioToledo
 Posts: 847 Location: Toledo, U.S.A. |
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I suppose, even if I already knew that. The book is no different from what you might pick up elsewhere like Preston Blair's famous one (from what I understand, he was the one who taught Tezuka's people who to to an effective TV cartoon in color in the 60's that led to Jungle Emperor/Kimba).
I still use 'em. But I suppose I frown on people who never learn.
Well glad I didn't start there (I'm too OLD for this crap really)
Would've benefited there. |
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GVman
 Posts: 729 |
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The only thing I had watched before Anime Sols was Dear Brother, and I hadn't finished it, either. I just went on and funded all three sets because I would rather watch it on DVD in my bedroom. The other shows I tried to fund, Tekkaman and Hurricane Polymar, I had only seen on the website, though I sort of knew about them going in.
I didn't keep up with many of the streams simply because I'm not a fan of streaming. There weren't really newer and bigger things coming out I was interested in, but rather fansubs of older stuff I could download. In fact, I'd say fansubbing is better today than it ever has been. Instead of five groups all subbing the same show, we have two or three doing that while there's many fansub groups focusing on classic anime. Shit's great. |
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Cptn_Taylor
Posts: 925 |
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@ Gvman : the only early TOEI superhero anime worth watching today is Casshern (the original anime is better than the 1990s OVA let alone the real life film). As for Tekkaman it never had an end, so you end up with a cliffhanger and that's it. Hurricane Polymar on the other hand had a 1990s remake which spot on. That's how you make a good remake (and also the reason to weap because TOEI never went further than 3-4 episodes
 ). As for the original Hurricane well either you've seen it as a kid hence nostalgia calls, else you're a completist. In any other case it's really not worth watching.
Streaming is an interesting solution for hard to localize animes. Think about those 40 year old animes that only 100 people would buy on dvd. That's the kind of anime well suited to streaming. |
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