UK Anime Distributor Anime Limited Discussion Thread

Girls with Guns said:
So then, not that much of an anime fan, I'm guessing?
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On the contrary, I have been a big anime (and manga) fan since 2003. It's just that AL hasn't licensed/released titles which I am interested in, for example battle shounen stuff is not my thing, I don't care about stuff like Attack on Titan, Bleach, Demon Slayer or Naruto. I have given all of them a fair chance but they just weren't to my liking and I ended up dropping them at some point. I tend to be that type of collector who only collects and buys anime which I really like and which I know I will rewatch multiple times. Yohane the Parhelion is the first (and so far only) exception to this rule of mine cause I really like the first half of the show and while the second half (or end half) of it was meh it is still enjoyable and I just really love the Love Live franchise, haha.

And it's not like I have not ordered/bought anime from other companies at all this year. I ordered Mobile Suit Gundam: The Witch from Mercury, Lycoris Recoil and The Ancient Magus' Bride Season 2 from Crunchyroll and I am planning on ordering The Apothecary Diaries when it becomes available. (CR, when will you give a blu-ray releases to MagiRevo and MyGO??). And I ordered The Executioner and Her Way of Life from Sentai via Amazon.

I like stuff like Revolutionary Girl Utena, Princess Tutu, Neon Genesis Evangelion, March Comes in like Lion (still waiting for season 2 to be licensed 🙏), The Rose of Versailles, Dear Brother/Oniisama e, Sound! Euphonium, Love Live, Sailor Moon. I like magical girls, mecha, slice of life, iyashikei, yuri, shoujo, josei and some seinen too. Shounen is the demographic I watch and read the least but I do like stuff like Aria and Magus' Bride. There is actually a lot of anime I would like to collect (for example The Rose of Versailles, Dear Brother/Oniisama e, MagiRevo, MyGO) but they just are not licensed in UK/EU and I don't have a region free player to play Discotek Media's releases. I would buy more anime from AL if they were releasing titles I am interested in.
 
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Looking at my order history, I'm surprised to see the only title I've ordered from AL this year is Godzilla Minus One. Over the last few years I've bought most of their back catalogue titles that interest me, but most of their 2024 slate hasn't interested me. I haven't even bothered buying the handful of 2024 releases that do interest me, through a combination of increasing prices, worsening quality assurance making early bird purchases feel more of a risk, and my own dwindling storage space.
 
Dai said:
Looking at my order history, I'm surprised to see the only title I've ordered from AL this year is Godzilla Minus One. Over the last few years I've bought most of their back catalogue titles that interest me, but most of their 2024 slate hasn't interested me. I haven't even bothered buying the handful of 2024 releases that do interest me, through a combination of increasing prices, worsening quality assurance making early bird purchases feel more of a risk, and my own dwindling storage space.
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Suzu said:
On the contrary, I have been a big anime (and manga) fan since 2003. It's just that AL hasn't licensed/released titles which I am interested in, for example battle shounen stuff is not my thing, I don't care about stuff like Attack on Titan, Bleach, Demon Slayer or Naruto. I have given all of them a fair chance but they just weren't to my liking and I ended up dropping them at some point. I tend to be that type of collector who only collects and buys anime which I really like and which I know I will rewatch multiple times. Yohane the Parhelion is the first (and so far only) exception to this rule of mine cause I really like the first half of the show and while the second half (or end half) of it was meh it is still enjoyable and I just really love the Love Live franchise, haha.

And it's not like I have not ordered/bought anime from other companies at all this year. I ordered Mobile Suit Gundam: The Witch from Mercury, Lycoris Recoil and The Ancient Magus' Bride Season 2 from Crunchyroll and I am planning on ordering The Apothecary Diaries when it becomes available. (CR, when will you give a blu-ray releases to MagiRevo and MyGO??). And I ordered The Executioner and Her Way of Life from Sentai via Amazon.

I like stuff like Revolutionary Girl Utena, Princess Tutu, Neon Genesis Evangelion, March Comes in like Lion (still waiting for season 2 to be licensed 🙏), The Rose of Versailles, Dear Brother/Oniisama e, Sound! Euphonium, Love Live, Sailor Moon. I like magical girls, mecha, slice of life, iyashikei, yuri, shoujo, josei and some seinen too. Shounen is the demographic I watch and read the least but I do like stuff like Aria and Magus' Bride. There is actually a lot of anime I would like to collect (for example The Rose of Versailles, Dear Brother/Oniisama e, MagiRevo, MyGO) but they just are not licensed in UK/EU and I don't have a region free player to play Discotek Media's releases. I would buy more anime from AL if they were releasing titles I am interested in.
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Well said.
I can't imagine we have many members on here that aren't anime fans.
 
I was going to have a look at what Anime Limited have released this year by looking at their Latest Releases section

- Last updated 19th April 2021.... Ok maybe I wont use that

So I'll go to Products - Anime Limited titles. Then sort by New to Old

- Better but I think it sorts by Date added to website rather than Release Date. Or so I thought until I saw preorders on Page 9

So if anyones got a list of AL stuff released so far this year, would be good to see
 
Otomo said:
Well said.
I can't imagine we have many members on here that aren't anime fans.
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From the perspective of someone that is new to collecting physical media (I only started a little over a year ago now), I learned that purchasing every physical release that I even somewhat may like, for the sake of it, was a bad move. For me personally anyway.

Last AL Christmas sale, I purchased 19 sets, including two mystery boxes. Since then, I've probably only fully watched maybe 5 of those sets. Between work, family and friend commitments, doing other hobbies and activities, and simply just existing, it can be a struggle to get through the anime you want to watch. Of course, everyone has different circumstances and priorities, and some people can steamroll through series after series. However, I can't do that. Looking back, I don't know how I used to watch so many series like it was nothing when I was younger/a teenager. I also have an interest in 'regular' films and TV shows, so that can also add to the pile!

Now, I'm definitely curating my collection more and being selective in what I add. I'd say 75% of my current collection is nostalgia, I like to buy series that I used to watch when I was younger, as I know I'll watch those over and over again (e.g., Outlaw Star, Dragon Ball, Naruto, Bleach, Digimon, Beyblade, Death Note). I also have an affinity for stuff that was made around the mid/late 2000s and early/mid 2010s, as that was when I was becoming an adult (so things like Kaiji, Beck, Durarara, Bakuman, Sword Art Online, Nisha Rokubou no Shichinin, and Log Horizon, I have fond memories of). 80s and 90s stuff I enjoy as well. I've bought some newer stuff like Spy x Family and Mushoku Tensei and tried to watch it, but I just can't seem to get into the modern stuff as much (maybe I'm just getting old and am a nostalgia merchant).

The issue is, Anime Limited releases are £40-£50 a pop for the CE and around £30/£35 for the SE, so unless you've already seen part of the series and you know you like it, I'm not sure many are willing to take a punt on the synopsis for those prices. Which is why I like MVM's DOTW so much, it gives me a chance to try something new for cheap without having to of seen it before. If I don't like it, then it was only £10 or so and I can sell it to cut my losses. Crunchyroll streaming is good too, I got that relatively recently, and it's nice to just be able to flick on something new or different. However, unless it's something that really hits me, I wouldn't really have a desire to own it physically.

My fondest memories are from watching anime on Toonami and on pirate sites in 360p on my computer late at night. I've come to learn that I have no desire to physically own a random series that I will likely never get round to watching and may not even enjoy (which is most of AL's catalogue for me 😂).
 
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Joe said:
Not perfect, but blu-ray.com lets you view releases by a company and sort by release date: Anime Ltd Blu-ray Movies and Releases
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Thanks. Also in the same opinion that this years releases so far have been pretty meh. Only think I've ordered is Arcane and thats only because it was a decent price on Rarewaves

I might consider getting Blue Thermal

Main regret was not buying Place Further than the Universe CE tbh
 
Girls with Guns said:
So then, not that much of an anime fan, I'm guessing?
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Suzu said:
On the contrary, I have been a big anime (and manga) fan since 2003. It's just that AL hasn't licensed/released titles which I am interested in.
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Ha, sorry, my question was actually made tongue-in-cheek, as humor - I probably should have put a wink emoji after it to make it clearer. I fixed my post. Like Otomo said, who wouldn't be an anime fan on here? Except maybe Rui, who seems to dislike almost every anime he reviews, lol... ;) <-- required wink emoji, again!
 
I used to buy loads and loads and loads and loads of anime DVDs and BDs. Now I'm at the point where I've got hundreds of the things clogging up my house. Shows from years ago that I still haven't found time to watch - and most of them, I'll never rewatch anyway.

I've slowly been getting through some of them (as well as streaming newer shows), keeping the few I really liked and offloading most of them to the charity shop.

Now all I buy is the Gundam CEs from AL. Of course, I'm behind on watching them too but I like the boxes and stuff!
 
Like a number of you have mentioned, I've started cutting down on what anime I buy due to various reasons as well such as space, cost, actually watching / re-watching them and that I'm at a point in my life where I want to focus on other things I want to do as well which is why I've been selling off a number of titles over the past year or so.

I actually feel I'm more happy with my collection at the moment being more curated to my favourite titles or anime I really do want to check out, especially older titles and if I end up not enjoying them I can always sell them off as well.

I'm finding it hard enough as is to keep up with a few seasonal shows (I'm still only one episode into DAN DA DAN and I really liked the first episode), so getting through my physical backlog is going to be a long time coming at this rate and with that I have a huge video game backlog as well and a lot of those are JRPG's.

I still adore anime though so I'm definitely not stopping, just being a bit more selective with what I buy.
 
Concerning physical releases, I'm at the point where I respect AL's mission statement but less so how they carry it out. The whole idea of having luxurious, meticulously crafted physical releases is very admirable...but it's rarely what we get. Poorly remastered video, subtitle glitches, booklet typos, packaging art where they've left a graphic from a previous template use, etc.

All of these don't really help when I'm already at a point where I increasingly prefer the convenience and space saving of digital. And yes, I know if that digital is streaming it's not really secure. But waiting months/sometimes years for stuff you are being told is a high quality release when clearly it isn't? I'd rather just have the content faster if this is the end result of waiting for 'premium'.
 
HellCat said:
Concerning physical releases, I'm at the point where I respect AL's mission statement but less so how they carry it out. The whole idea of having luxurious, meticulously crafted physical releases is very admirable...but it's rarely what we get. Poorly remastered video, subtitle glitches, booklet typos, packaging art where they've left a graphic from a previous template use, etc.

All of these don't really help when I'm already at a point where I increasingly prefer the convenience and space saving of digital. And yes, I know if that digital is streaming it's not really secure. But waiting months/sometimes years for stuff you are being told is a high quality release when clearly it isn't? I'd rather just have the content faster if this is the end result of waiting for 'premium'.
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I agree with this. Anime Limited are already marketing themselves towards a comparatively small market in the premium boutique media sector (i.e., those that enjoy anime>those that enjoy anime but also enjoy physical media).

For years, I would either stream or sail the high seas if I wanted to watch something (I still do in some cases when the legal options aren't up to standard or simply do not exist). Hard drives and SSDs have never been cheaper, buy a handful and you can get access to most anime, rather than waiting months or even years for some physical releases. The space is another key thing you mention - we can store loads of series on a few hard drives, the drives themselves take up very little room, compared to these often times, large boutique sets.

Anime distributors are essentially competing against pirates, who often times, deliver a much better product than the licensors. Why spend money on a poor quality physical release with typos, glitches, and other errors, when I can get a super clean pirated release with no errors for free, and also back it up on my hard drives to keep for the foreseeable future?
 
I've really pulled back on the amount of stuff I've been buying over the past year or two. This year I've only bought 10 things off the AL shop (which they've recently butchered too) where I'd used to buy every release they'd put out.

This is partly for space reasons but also the CEs don't really stand up in terms of quality and value for money now. When you're paying so much extra for a little booklet and a fancy box is it really worth it? It also doesn't help that on-disc extras are pretty much non-existent now so you're getting basically the same thing that's on a streaming service. At least it's yours to own but just the overall quality of releases these days feels so bad, especially with all the errors we've seen industry wide over the last few years.

I tend to stick more just to series that I love or have been collecting for a while, and even then I'll sometimes just grab the JP release, especially if it has English subtitles on it.
 
I've bought nothing from the AtA webstore this year either. There's been a couple standards that I've picked up here and there (mainly from HMV), but I've just been filling in my backlog from CeX. Definitley running out of space on my end and what's the point in paying £50 for a release and waiting 6 (or more) months for discs that end up being faulty lol.

I still like what they do on the whole, but they're taking the piss as "Europe's Leading Botique Animation Distributor"
 
Similar story here really, I've not been deliberately trying to buy less since I didn't used to buy a lot anyway (just favourites) but the prices the last year have definitely been a big blocker.

There's a handful of things I'd have bought from AL had the prices been lower (and I appreciate that is not their fault, making these things is more expensive than it used to be!). I would have liked to continue with Re:Zero and potentially pick up Sacred Beasts, I skipped Kids on the Slope in last years Christmas sale for the exact reason Onosume mentions above re price vs what you're actually getting for it.

In fact looking back I've bought exactly 0 anime this year from anyone, whereas I'd normally be around 5~ sets. I did ask for Bungo Stray Dogs S4-5 for Christmas, so presumably will end up with one or both of those which I've desperately wanted but could not justify so much for standard editions but I don't think that really counts. 😅
 
Same story as everyone else really. General reduction in purchases overall made much easier by the declining quality of AL’s output.

Shame really because AL is what got me into building a physical collectors edition collection years ago but as pointed out above, so many releases are barebones these days in terms of contents, extras and quality that they just don’t appeal at all, even before you factor in the constant eff-ups and unwillingness to acknowledge or deal with them beyond offer empty promises.
 
Onosume said:
This is partly for space reasons but also the CEs don't really stand up in terms of quality and value for money now. When you're paying so much extra for a little booklet and a fancy box is it really worth it? It also doesn't help that on-disc extras are pretty much non-existent now so you're getting basically the same thing that's on a streaming service. At least it's yours to own but just the overall quality of releases these days feels so bad, especially with all the errors we've seen industry wide over the last few years.
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This is how I feel about the Gundam releases. Early 2000s style collector boxes and inconsistent guidebooks. The Wing set reusing wraparound art from a Japanese release was clearly a labour of love but with others it's random mismatched images. Similar problem with the books- sometimes we get character and mecha guides, other times it's just all the packaging assets they didn’t use.

And all this is exacerbated by how indifferent AL are towards criticism on this specific franchise. I could well understand if the Japanese rights holders are a nightmare to work with, being a headache even on redoes. But when ever people point out a problem with the Gundam releases from missing extras to technical/printing errors, AL always just basically say "...Deal with it." and take no further action. A ridiculous attitude to have on releases that average £60 RRP. Again, I'm open to the idea there are specifics they can't talk about making it a difficult license. But on a consumer level, I continuously feel like my purchase is being taken for granted.
 
What's the usual cutoff point for items being included in the Christmas sale? Six months? I ask because Amazon have additional 20% vouchers for some AL (and CR) releases I'm interested in but I wonder if I should hold out for CEs.

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^ This one for example. That came out in March I think.

Broadly speaking, I'm over wanting a CE for everything. Just my favourites will do, if one's available. This past year I've bought more Sentai and Discotek releases than anything else. In AL's case though, CEs do mean avoiding those awful SE spines. It's petty and the most first world of first world problems, but I want my collection to look nice on my shelves damn it.
 
Adding to the echo chamber here, but I was another day 1 supporter of AL and have spent a lot of money with them over the years, but between space concerns, an increasing backlong, increase of prices for fairly medium collectors editions, and the number of delays. Also having access to more seasonal shows on Crunchyroll, Netflix, D+ etc.

I think the 2 cases that really halted my ordering were the Blood-C situation, with an expensive Ultimate Edition followed so close by the much cheaper and convenient Complete Limited Edition. And then the fact that Ascendance of a Bookworm Seasons 1 & 2 took 11 months from Christmas pre-order to then ship.
 
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