Is all manga published back to front?

harkins

Adventurer
Can anyone tell me if all publishers release manga in the west in the Japanese format, by which I mean starting at the back? (Sorry if I've worded that badly)

I know ADV do but I don't know about any others.
 
Viz used to flip the Evangelion manga but they stopped doing that and re-released it. The Ghost in the Shell manga is flipped from it's original format too if i'm not mistaken and that was released by Dark Horse.

Though it's rare, some manga is written in left to right format. I think the Blood manga was written like that...
 
Cheers. Glad to know most of it is presented like that as I like it.

Another question I just thought of is to do with the whole importing thing again. I take it that manga bought from UP is imported and is therefore undesirable?

I ask because I ordered the first two volumes of Anne Freaks from Amazon (and they sent 1&3 instead of 1&2) so I ordered the second one from UP and it was identical to the others.
 
Theres nothing undesirable about importing manga.
Most of the manga for sale from United Publications is American issue, but thats where i buy most of mine from, and alot of other people go that way too. Things from Amazon are the same.
Your only problem comes when you are buying a series thats releases both here and over seas by different companies, so they will have different distributer logos.

Also all Korean manga is printed front to back, left to right, just like western publications
 
Charter_Mage said:
Theres nothing undesirable about importing manga.

Sorry about that. I’ve got myself a bit paranoid about the UK versus Imports thing.

When you say stuff from Amazon is ‘the same’ as that from UP, do you mean solely in appearance or that it is all from the same source? (I kinda forgot that books don't have region codes).
 
harkins said:
Charter_Mage said:
Theres nothing undesirable about importing manga.

Sorry about that. I’ve got myself a bit paranoid about the UK versus Imports thing.

When you say stuff from Amazon is ‘the same’ as that from UP, do you mean solely in appearance or that it is all from the same source? (I kinda forgot that books don't have region codes).

95% of all manga you find in shops in town, or on amazon.co.uk, is from America. Your choice would be extremely limited if you chose to buy only UK releases. The UK manga industry is far smaller than it's anime industry.

As for flipping, a few older titles are flipped, for example Inuyasha, but sometimes manga intended for kids is flipped too, as they might not understand how to read it, for example, Kingdom Hearts series (the newer volumes are unflipped though) and, uh, probably Pokemon or something...
 
harkins said:
Charter_Mage said:
Theres nothing undesirable about importing manga.

Sorry about that. I’ve got myself a bit paranoid about the UK versus Imports thing.
The arguements only seems to apply to DVDs, so I shouldn't worry too much about it. Tokyopop's UK releases are the US prints with the UK barcode stuck over the top.

Of the larger companies, only Gollancz and Tanoshimi print specifically for the UK, but they're both re-prints of Viz and Del Ray manga respectively. (there has been the odd UK-only release, but it's quite rare)

In terms of flipping, some people still reverse the work to conform to western practise and some of them are very good so it would be a mistake to ignore work from it being flipped. (Barefoot Gen, Akira and Lone Wolf and Cub for starters...)
 
kupoartist said:
I've been hoping that they'll release an unflipped Akira for years... well, that and an Akira release I don't have to sell my body to afford.
I must admit that I'd love to replace my flipped version but I haven't even collected those yet! I guess the length of the series makes it an expensive proposition and it would be pricey however many volumes they divide it into. We are born with two kidneys for a reason you know...
 
The practice of flipping manga has mostly been phased out by a lot of publishers at this point thankfully. The manga niche market in the West is large enough that they don't need to do such dreadful compromises anymore.

I mean FFS I've seen yaoi/BL/shonen ai/whatever they calling gay comic thesedays on the helves at Borders. The audience is so large now that even niche genres of an already niche market are being translated in droves.

I do prefer larger format books to the the standard manga size though.
 
It's a bit of a bummer having flipped and original format versions. I started collecting eons ago so half the volumes I have are flipped and t'other half isn't (smaller book size also).

I'm currently trying to complete some of the sets, but trying to get hold of the original prints from Viz is getting harder - daft, but I like the continuity.

IIRC (and looking through my collection quickly) Viz's release of Dragon Ball & DBZ were the first mainstream manga to be released in there original (un-flipped) format, though I do have some Neon Genesis Evangelion - special collectors editions that were in original format also, but the collected GN of NGE was in the flipped format.
 
harkins said:
Another question I just thought of is to do with the whole importing thing again. I take it that manga bought from UP is imported and is therefore undesirable?

Whats undesirable about this? Its not like there are local channels where you can get a locally available version. There are a few cases where there are locally available versions as well as import versions. The locally available versions are cheaper, but the import versions are usually more advanced in the series. It balances out really.

harkins said:
I ask because I ordered the first two volumes of Anne Freaks from Amazon (and they sent 1&3 instead of 1&2) so I ordered the second one from UP and it was identical to the others.

Amazon is selling you imports too.
 
Mr B said:
IIRC (and looking through my collection quickly) Viz's release of Dragon Ball & DBZ were the first mainstream manga to be released in there original (un-flipped) format, though I do have some Neon Genesis Evangelion - special collectors editions that were in original format also, but the collected GN of NGE was in the flipped format.
Not sure either but another candidate might be Ironfist Chinmi which came out over here at around 1995 I think. It was quite innovative at the time, to the point where they put numbered blobs around the page to direct you through it. (it was aimed at kiddies after all)
 
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