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when others here started to import blu-rays how did you convince yourself?
i'm looking at titles from 2013-2015 that never popped up here and probably have a low chance of it but i feel like there are 3 things putting me off doing it

1.price:
a lot of these titles despite being 4-5+ years old are still £25-30+ on import sites, i'm kind of a cheapass when it comes to buying stuff and i think most of my collection is basically on a £15 limit

2.regioning/geolocking:
i have a region free blu-ray player but recently i've been looking at getting another one because this one seems like it's on its way out and cheap does not seem to be a key thing with them always clocking in at around £150+

3.getting rid of them in the future if i decide to or don't like the series:
i often see people selling on here for months on end without ever actually being able to sell their imports and places like musicmagpie offer peanuts when it comes to imports but i will totally avoid ebay for selling stuff after previous experiences with other stuff
 
I wanted to watch Fairy Tail dubbed back in 2014 and it was in America then went A locked
Price is why I bar discotek dont blind buy anymore.
The imports that never came out here people did snap up from me.. Maid dragon, Geass Akito, AoA as it Always holds value.
 
thedoctor2016 said:
I wanted to watch Fairy Tail dubbed back in 2014 and it was in America then went A locked
Price is why I bar discotek dont blind buy anymore.
The imports that never came out here people did snap up from me.. Maid dragon, Geass Akito, AoA as it Always holds value.
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i'd say some of the stuff is more niche than those like Heaven's Lost Property and Seven Heavenly Virtues, with MVM they said they had no plans to bring the rest of their releases on blu-ray over
 
Yeah its why as I said now dont blind buy imports I need to like something enough to pay that extra say £20. Sarazanmai cost £48 im never gonna make that back if I sold it
 
I REALLY wanted to watch the rest of Monogatari so I swallowed my pride and just did it. I still hate the prices for Aniplex but I got to admit the collections are nice.
 
Yeah, I don't think anyone in this government is intelligent enough to plan and implement a worldwide hoax.
Remember the Doctor who did the Cells at Work reaction videos, he's been doing the occasional vlog on what's been happening at his hospital with lots of information on the virus and how ventilation works. Think I'll trust professionals on the front line more than any other source whether that be the government, press or crackpot conspiracy theorist!
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Oldmario said:
when others here started to import blu-rays how did you convince yourself?
i'm looking at titles from 2013-2015 that never popped up here and probably have a low chance of it but i feel like there are 3 things putting me off doing it

1.price:
a lot of these titles despite being 4-5+ years old are still £25-30+ on import sites, i'm kind of a cheapass when it comes to buying stuff and i think most of my collection is basically on a £15 limit

2.regioning/geolocking:
i have a region free blu-ray player but recently i've been looking at getting another one because this one seems like it's on its way out and cheap does not seem to be a key thing with them always clocking in at around £150+

3.getting rid of them in the future if i decide to or don't like the series:
i often see people selling on here for months on end without ever actually being able to sell their imports and places like musicmagpie offer peanuts when it comes to imports but i will totally avoid ebay for selling stuff after previous experiences with other stuff
Click to expand...
For me I started properly getting into purchasing anime on home video during the latter half of 2013 (basically when I started going to University), before I bought anything I did a ton of research to see what was around and this included a bunch of anime Blu-rays from the US that were available to own in Region B.

My decision to import at that time came down to the poor quality that both Manga Entertainment and MVM Entertainment had at the time, such as defective discs, poor subtitling, bonus content that wasn't included in the UK release, and most importantly the lack of a Blu-ray release. I also understood Aniplex's model early on so I was more accepting of their expensive titles compared to most people, which is why Madoka Magica LE volumes were among the first that I bought.

This trend continued for years until around 2017 when Manga Entertainment slowly improved their efforts. MVM was doing better as well, but I always nitpicked on their packaging artwork because it just did not fit my preference for my collection. Anime Limited was practically the only distributor I was willing to support as they were trying to make changes to how UK releases were being handled, but they are not perfect - Gurren Lagann is one of their worst releases period and I stand by that statement but as it was one of their first titles it was more forgiving from a retro perspective.

Fast-forward to present time when Manga Entertainment was bought by Funimation, I was more willing to support them because they are basically taking the US sets and add the BBFC logo on them, nothing else was changed outside of the limited edition artwork on the Amaray case replaced by standard edition artwork (though they did add slipcovers for their recent sets which were a nice inclusion). Given the currency exchange rate, a Manga release is a solid alternative for my anime hauls and helps me speed up the pace as I am still behind even though I have been collecting for 7 years now.

Pretty much my current position on anime collecting is that I want to sort out the Aniplex stuff sooner than later due to their current constant change of model. It's still not cheap but I am almost there (2 Monogatari arc sets remain, and 4 Fate sets remain, and if there are enough time and funds left - the Anohana TV set as well). Funimation and Sentai are up-to-date outside of a few titles and I'm changing my stance on Viz Media as it's just not worth the shelf space. 7 years ago I would say I was about 5-10 years behind on anime purchases, and at the present day, I am about 1-2 years behind.

In terms of the location of spending, I generally avoid eBay unless the items are sealed. Rightstuf is practically unusable due to the high postage and custom fees. Amazon US is pretty decent as a back-up plan and United Publications helps with the more expensive titles. Due to living at my flat which was relatively new, I could no longer use Deep Discount as their system didn't have my address and my home in Yorkshire will also continue the trend because that too is brand new, heh.
 
Neil.T said:
I've wanted to ask this for ages, but do the Japanese or US releases have the same problem with the damaged master copy? And if so, what were they patched up with? Not DVD video, I assume.
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Now here's the weird part - only the UK release was affected. I can't remember the exact details as this was 6 years ago, but apparently Aniplex did not give them the chance to provide them with the fixed materials so AL had to use the DVD masters to fill the gaps of the episodes that were affected to make up for it.

The US release uses the Japanese discs like the other Aniplex titles, but it only comes with the textless songs and the director's cut episode. The Japanese BD-BOX release of the TV series, which is the version I would like to own (yes it has English dub and subtitles), has the extras that were on the UK release plus a few others like the Nintendo DS OVA (which never got subbed anyway) and that Yoko Music Video which AL did try to get but wasn't allowed. Aniplex US don't even have the Parallel Works which I believe are on the Japanese BD-Box of the movie compilations.
 
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