Manga Ent cancels further Blu-ray Fullmetal Alchemist B

ilmaestro said:
ayase said:
(which begs the question: why hasn't the Japanese domestic market collapsed?)
Click to expand...
It requires only a rudimentary examination of anime on BD releases in the two countries to find the answer to this question. I would explain further, but I feel like if I leave it a little longer someone else like Reaper might come along and save me the effort. ^^;
Click to expand...
lol
tl;dr version:
Japan needs to sell less to break even, US releases suck, are much later, might not even happen and the Japanese release will be OOP before you can tell.


1 Japanese sale of a seires =$400 (more if singles)
1 US = $80, but has cheap reissues at $20
More of that sale goes to the licensee Japan side due to less middle men.

Other musing on the subject:
The US release will be later, years later; the impatient will pay.
Existence of rental and second hand market pushes first hand purchases towards collectors only, not to mention that it's been released publicly on TV already.
There's no guarantee a US one will happen, otaku won't want that risk (same as buying R1 if no UK one anounced).
US release will have no extras, or comparatively no extras.*
US release will often f*** up the video quality.
Japanese BD releases are often LE only (due to minimum print runs), so hold value, there aren't reissues normaly (Air's reissue costs more for example).
As a result that pre order discount is the cheapest it will ever get, so you preorder. Releases are anounced ages in advance to allow for this, also gives you time to save up for it (remortgage, prostitution, selling your internal organs etc.).


All of which alows them to maintain the very high price point and still get sales.
Also (non-drastic) reduction in prices does not up sales significantly enough; the Haruhi S2 part 1 LE with 80%(?) off did sell very well, but that was flogging overstock.

*there's often store exclusive (double dipping? :roll: ) ones as well, on top of pre order and LE bouses.
 
It is with sincere regret that Manga Entertainment has decided to discontinue the series, Fullmetal Alchemist Brotherhood on Blu-ray. This difficult decision had to be made in light of the high production costs of producing the series on Blu-ray and the disappointingly low sales of Part 1 and 2 on the format. To clarify, this will mean that there will be no new Blu-ray sets released by Manga Entertainment after Fullmetal Alchemist Brotherhood – Part Two. However, the series will continue to be released on DVD with Part Three released on 23rd February 2011, Part Four to be released on 25th April and Part 5 released on the 12th September (to be confirmed).

Jerome Mazandarani, Marketing Manager from Manga Entertainment has offered his sincere apologies to all fans that will be disappointed with this decision:

“It is never our intention at Manga Entertainment to disappoint our very loyal customers who we appreciate enjoy collecting a complete series on their favourite format. However, the exceptionally high inception costs involved in releasing the series on Blu-ray and the relatively small sales we enjoy in the UK have made the endeavor unviable. I cannot apologize enough to the fans that have already started collecting the series on Blu-ray for the disappointment this may cause them. I sincerely hope that you will continue to collect the series on DVD.”


From Manga's press release.
 
Reaper gI said:
lol
Click to expand...
Heh, sorry, I just didn't really have time to elaborate when I posted that. :D

But yes, my favorite example in the current market is the dub-only Kurokami, or even the hard-subbed Fullmetal Alchemist release. The Japanese market survives by crippling the US market as far as the Japanese consumer is concerned.
 
just thought id post my thoughts.

I dont see why they cant work around this for atleast 1 more set to see if it improves. People, myself included bought the Funimation version due to price and release times. The fact we wont have that option anymore means we would have to buy Mangas version. Then they can decide if its not worth it or not. And would give them a rough idea of how many where buying funimations.

Also if they could have taken orders and made xx amount depending on the orders.
I can see how this is a kick in the teeth to people buying Mangas version. Never know if you show the demand is there they might look into some of these options.

If funi had locked theres from begining this wouldnt have happened. And region codes will never go away sadly, just stupid how they set the regions up.
 
Southe said:
just thought id post my thoughts.

I dont see why they cant work around this for atleast 1 more set to see if it improves. People, myself included bought the Funimation version due to price and release times. The fact we wont have that option anymore means we would have to buy Mangas version. Then they can decide if its not worth it or not. And would give them a rough idea of how many where buying funimations.

Also if they could have taken orders and made xx amount depending on the orders.
I can see how this is a kick in the teeth to people buying Mangas version. Never know if you show the demand is there they might look into some of these options.

If funi had locked theres from begining this wouldnt have happened. And region codes will never go away sadly, just stupid how they set the regions up.
Click to expand...
BD was going to be region free, but European distros complained, so they made Europe+ other PAL countries region B.
China's market is f'ed up so have to make it a region as relases have to be realy cheap to compete with bootlegs, huge parallel import risk otherwise.

Minimum production run for BD is 5000, you need to sell 2-3000 to offset the production.
 
setochaos said:
:( Now I have to wait until I can get a Multi-Region Blu Ray player for Dragon Ball Kai and FullMetal Alchemist.
Click to expand...

well you could also get the australian version which is code B like the UK. But I guess that would be to easy.

I will wait and see if there will be a complete box in the end, which Manga haven't completly ruled out yet. otherwise I will buy a complete set from madman
 
Shadowguy said:
well you could also get the australian version which is code B like the UK. But I guess that would be to easy.
Click to expand...

Oh really? I didn't know they had the same region code. Looks like I know were I'm getting them from now then. Thanks :D
 
ilmaestro said:
chaos said:
high inception costs
Click to expand...
Confirmed: hiring Leo DiCaprio to be involved in this project was the straw that broke the camel's financial back.
Click to expand...

Give the guy a break, it's tough enough to plant one idea, let alone the entire anime community, even an idea as simple as "buy uk blu ray anime" =P
 
I will admit, as a huge Fullmetal Alchemist fan, I am shocked to see that volume 1 sold so little. However, as a realist, I'm not surprised.

As much as I love anime, it's a very niché market and Blu-Ray players are still awfully expensive. I for one, don't own a PS3 or a Blu-Ray player, so I'm still in DVD land. Anime Blu-Rays would only really work here once the price of blu-ray players goes down and become more widespread; rather than the uber luxury they are now.

At least the series is still being released on DVD.
 
Reaper gI said:
Minimum production run for BD is 5000, you need to sell 2-3000 to offset the production.
Click to expand...
WTF? If you have to sell 3/5 of your stock to recoup your costs, your mark-up is too small or the associated costs are too high (if my company worked off figures like those I'd have to work twice as hard for half the pay). I imagine this means someone else (the manufacturers of the physical discs themselves or the licensors of the technology required to make them) is making a ridiculous profit at the expense of the distributors.
 
The real problem is that they are using a service (BD replication) that is essentially designed to cater to much larger companies who expect their products to sell in the six if not seven figure range. I'd imagine if your company worked in a market with a consumer base in the low four figures, but had to pay for services designed to cater to a massmarket product, you would indeed have to work twice as hard for half the pay. Or, like you say, increase the mark-up on the products significantly. Maybe like they do on anime in Japan. Let's see how many copies they sell over here then. ^_^

/may be watching the pieces all fall into place
 
Which makes me wonder again why anyone bothers negotiating distribution rights for such small marketplaces as the UK. If it's so hard to make a profit then UK rights should be next to worthless: the only reasons I can think of for needing different releases are our different currencies (though Beez manage), region codes and our bloody censorship board. I mean Manga is a subsidiary of Starz, owned by multinational media conglomerate Liberty Media... Why not negotiate US and UK rights and produce one disc for everywhere in large quantities? Then it wouldn't matter if you did only sell 1000 copies in the UK, as you'd have the US consumers there to pick up the other 4000.
 
Gawd Ayase... stop talking sense :p Ya know that sort of multi-national approach to marketing is a ridiculous idea when it comes to the anime industry :p
 
ayase said:
Which makes me wonder again why anyone bothers negotiating distribution rights for such small marketplaces as the UK.
Click to expand...
I have no idea. It's a little bit annoying that video games often get held up in the UK while they finalize European localizations, but it makes more sense than having a dedicated UK anime market imo. I guess the main problem with getting US companies to also handle UK releases is that it isn't worth the extra money and effort they would have to put in to distribution and marketing, and the problem with having a more Europe-wide thing including the UK is that so many series come out in, say, France or Italy without having the English language rights sold to anyone, so they would also not want to pick them up separately. I think UK companies do try to keep costs down as much as possible by cultivating working relationships with overseas companies (Madman in particular comes to mind), but it would be intersting to hear opinion on it from someone in the know.
 
Ryu Shoji said:
I will admit, as a huge Fullmetal Alchemist fan, I am shocked to see that volume 1 sold so little. However, as a realist, I'm not surprised.

As much as I love anime, it's a very niché market and Blu-Ray players are still awfully expensive. I for one, don't own a PS3 or a Blu-Ray player, so I'm still in DVD land. Anime Blu-Rays would only really work here once the price of blu-ray players goes down and become more widespread; rather than the uber luxury they are now.
Click to expand...
Players really aren't awfully expensive now. They can be had for under £100. Amazon have a few under £80 and even under £70. Occasionally the likes of HMV will have an offer of a player for £50.
 
When I checked the HMV sales booklet thing, there were still more than I could afford...especially when almost everything on Blu-Ray atm is available on DVD.

Gundam Unicorn is the only "Blu-Ray Only" release that's piqued my interest at all.
 
BD for anime is not really necessary, unless one doesn't have a DVD player. The amount of gained detail isn't that great at the best of times. How much sharper can a drawn line with painted colours get?. SD is still good enough for me.
 
Back
Top