UK Anime Distributor Crunchyroll/Funimation/Manga UK Discussion Thread

Dai said:
If the Crunchyroll Store does stop selling blu-rays, I wonder where that will leave Aniplex of America. Aren't their titles pretty much exclusive to the Crunchyroll Store now or does anyone else still sell them? Considering that they're a Sony-owned brand, I worry for their future.
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I believe they are indeed exclusive. Robert's Anime Corner Store sells them, but at higher prices and I'm pretty sure he buys them from Crunchyroll and not at wholesale prices. The Aniplex "store" just links to Crunchryoll for blu-rays:
Aniplex of America

When it was still Rightstuf selling, besides there, Aniplex USA's website used to link to Tokyo Otaku Mode and I think at least one other place that I can't remember the name of. Tokyo Otaku Mode no longer sells Aniplex or any other blu-rays as far as I can see.

Aniplex is, of course, also owned by Sony, so maybe they will just cease making discs.

The 15th of each month is normally when Crunchyroll makes their US disc announcements, so will be interesting to see what, if anything there is announced tomorrow. It's been pretty pitiful for most of this year. :confused:
 
Dai said:
That's the worry. If so, that would leave the new Madoka Magica movie and the upcoming final Rascal Does Not Dream movie in limbo. Those might never get western blu-ray releases without AoA.
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That's also my personal worry, for Rascal (not a Madoka fan). Some Aniplex Japan blu-rays have English subtitles, but I think they only really do that for things that AoA also releases, so that won't likely be a solution either.
 
If CR are indeed only going to be selling 'convention merchandise' to their MAGA subbers going forward, suppose it has been heading in this direction for awhile; what with them releasing less and less physically vs their streaming line-up and removing low sale / niche releases etc.

The saddest part is that they bought out Rightstuf, and in doing so ended UnitedPublications ez importing... only to not care about and/or kill the physical market, either by design or through incompetence. Maybe both.

AnimeEigo at least filled the discotek void, with the added bonus of some prev OOP titles rediscovered + pointz to offset shipping costs. 'Tis both sad & amusing, seeing a small-scale anime distributor aim a Dominos-Sony tweet at CR. How far anime has come~

Already ended up watching Reze unsure if CR would bother releasing it on blu-ray, before this latest bollox. 'Tis +1 they released Frieren's 🧰 and can't take it back from meee. And I guess S&W's confusing part 1 only LE, also?...
 
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So what was the point of taking over Rightstuf. I though the whole idea was they wanted the biggest chunk of the market

Instead they killed off the well known brand after saying they wouldnt....

And now (pretty much) killing off their own store....

I would almost bet this time next year CR will say theyre closing the store completely due to "lack of demand" or whatever

I know the gaming/playstation side is a different compay. But it does seem like Sony are going out to kill off physical media

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Edit - Wasnt this whole CR x Funimation thing down to CR wanting an easier way to get physical disks in peoples houses rather than having to work with other companies?

Seems like theyre doing the complete opposite over the last 5 years
 
Shadow Cat said:
So what was the point of taking over Rightstuf
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Because having control of a sector includes controlling when to destroy it. Nothing about Sony's recent plans feels like a business with failing branches; it's all too tightly organised and coordinated. This is a planned demolition. And like a typical company, they have the spite and monopolistic desire to try to prevent anyone from filling the gap they leave behind.
 
Shadow Cat said:
Edit - Wasnt this whole CR x Funimation thing down to CR wanting an easier way to get physical disks in peoples houses rather than having to work with other companies?

Seems like theyre doing the complete opposite over the last 5 years
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I don't think so. Remember, it was the Sony-owned Funimation who bought Crunchyroll but then took on the latter's name, not the other way around.

Given that everything they've done since has seemingly emphasized streaming over physical media, the behavior is certainly more like it was CR buying Funi though.

Definitely not factual and only my impression, but I've always believed what started this was back when AT&T bought Crunchyroll, and arrogant AT&T appeared to not want to work with Sony, which led to the split between the two companies. Before that, at least viewed from the outside, CR and Funi seemed to have a symbiotic relationship with Funi releasing discs of properties CR streamed. Funi's lower profile streaming service shared some things or had the dub versions while CR had the subtitled versions, and I'm not sure how that part worked out. This comment is more about the US side as Crunchyroll buying and rebranding various other countries' services is complex and I don't know as much about it. Admittedly, I have a pretty strong hatred of AT&T so my view is likely biased. My hatred of the company only grows over the years, especially as their data breach has led to my own little personal hell of identity theft.

sniper_samurai said:
New Steelbook listed for October.

https://twitter.com/x/status/2077306496845541567
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I wonder if this means they have nothing releasing in September except for the first Sailor Moon steelbook? The other non-steelbook announcements only go through August.

This is getting pathetic. I haven't bought anything from them since Konosuba S3 and Spice and Wolf S1 P2 that released in January, and the only upcoming thing I want is Dr. Stone. Compare that 3 to 2025 when they released 27 titles I wanted.

Maybe their attempt to push people to their streaming service works for some, but it doesn't work on me. When they don't release discs, they don't get any money from me.
 
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My fun prediction is that Crunchyroll will continue to do home video releases - but only selective high-price premium sets. I reckon they want to do away with selling the large majority of their bog standard amaray sets.

If you look at where physical Blu-rays are thriving, it's in the premium boutique market (think steel books, extravagant collector sets, etc).

I don't think Crunchyroll want to kill off discs, I think they just want to focus on higher profit margin products they can sell for stupid prices to their captive subscribers.

Like, they'd rather you buy a Crunchyroll store exclusive premium blu-ray set for £80 than a £15-£20 standard edition from Amazon for example.
 
BrokenPhoenix said:
My fun prediction is that Crunchyroll will continue to do home video releases - but only selective high-price premium sets. I reckon they want to do away with selling the large majority of their bog standard amaray sets.

If you look at where physical Blu-rays are thriving, it's in the premium boutique market (think steel books, extravagant collector sets, etc).

I don't think Crunchyroll want to kill off discs, I think they just want to focus on higher profit margin products they can sell for stupid prices to their captive subscribers.

Like, they'd rather you buy a Crunchyroll store exclusive premium blu-ray set for £80 than a £15-£20 standard edition from Amazon for example.
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You may be right, but they've really cut down on any kind of collector's editions as well, but are kind of doubling down on steelbooks, though that seems more common with Crunchyroll UK than US.

It remains to be seen what they're going to offer on this new version of the store though.
 
As far as I'm concerned crappyroll/sony can go to hell, I was a Rightstuf customer for many years and the very last thing I ever got there were the 3 bluray sets of El Hazard while they were still available. Since then what I've gotten has been mostly Sentai releases and odd stuff from ebay. I've gone full "digital" in my own way.
 
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Gigabomb said:
Paying for the right to buy merchandise. What an awful world we are entering.
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So I just signed up for an annual Ultimate Fan subscription with Crunchyroll earlier this year; I had been paying monthly for the Ultimate plan before that. I use the Ultimate membership specifically to get 15% off Blu-rays from their store. The streaming access is just an added side-feature for me, although I have been using it more and more every season. But, any further cutbacks in the number of physical Blu-ray releases they put out each month and/or them ceasing Blu-ray production completely at some point will eventually cause me to drop my subscription to just the lowest streaming-only membership available at that time. For now, the changes Crunchyroll are making do not really affect my situation at all, so I will continue to monitor what Blu-rays they decide to offer inside their new paywall store at least during the remainder of my Ultimate Fan annual subscription.
 
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Here’s hoping the backlash on twitter over ps5 discs makes them reconsider, seen that companies paying for sponsored posts on their twitter are not happy. I think even if they do leave they will return anyway eventually, I read somewhere they are converting the disc factories for components for ai which is still no where near profitable and the ps6 will probably have terrible interest initially (1k for a gaming pc you can’t mod your games on paying only garbage Sony digital prices on a vastly restricted catalog vs a pc?) which should push them to reconsider discs in a few years. Potentially losing aniplex is terrible though but it may be a case of us having to pay the ridiculous USA prices on their big releases like madoka and monogatari rather than not getting them at all. Whether or not to support that vs wanting these titles enough physically will be the hard part.
 
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