The US Persona 4 BD release will not contain Japanese audio

I'm not overly keen on Kazé UK's policies on locking content in every way possible so I won't be interested in theirs until after release, when it's been reviewed and found to be of the same standard I had expected from my (no longer on order) Sentai version. There has been sadly very little evidence to date that our being in a different region is anything but a disadvantage for us. And I'm starting to think that the reason so many exports from the US to the UK are being banned is to protect other foreign distributors rather than Japan itself, which again smacks of control and puts me off supporting the show when I can instead just buy something else and be treated like a customer rather than a sucker.

I really hate this, and worry about the implications of the logic that making things worse for buyers is going to stop home video sales from slowing to a crawl. Aniplex and co are just racing to alienate their most devoted customer bases outside Japan entirely as quickly as possible.

R
 
CloudedMinds said:
sean morrison said:
I'm going to be slightly optimistic and think that since our release is like three and a half months after the American release kaze may be able to have the Japanese audio on the UK set (hopefully).
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Considering that the problem is the US and Japan are Regions 1 might make it possible that Europe (Region 2) hopefully won't suffer the same problem...but i am being optimistic here. Im not fussed to much about a dub only but i do expect the English Dub to be of high quality to compensate.

The only way this will ever change is if and when the japanese realize that if they stop buying the blurays at such ridiculous prices at 2 episodes each, maybe then the production companies over there would think twice about how they do their releases but thats a long shot
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Someone linked really good article about why prices are like they are a while back.

All the money is made from merchandise and in particular BR/DvD sales. Gone are the days when a TV station would pay to have something made, or you'd get good money selling rental copies to shops. Worse yet it often takes years to cover a shows costs, assuming they ever recoup what was spent.

The moment the DvD/BR market collapses in Japan is the moment Anime dies.
 
It's also interesting to compare the reversed situations of the Japanese and US comic industries, and the relative prices there. Could you see Japanese customers not lolling at the idea of a fiver per chapter of a comic when they pay about half that for the twenty-odd series running in Jump each week combined?
 
Section 23 Films Cancel Persona 4 Blu Ray Japanese Dub

Just received an email from rightstuf regarding the persona 4 blu ray collection 1 -

Due to a restriction from the Japanese licensor, Section23 announced the upcoming release of Persona 4 Collection 1 on Blu-ray will contain the English-language audio but not the original Japanese-language audio. The company has reduced the SRP of the Blu-ray collection to $59.98 to reflect this change. Persona 4 Collection 1 on DVD will continue to feature both English and Japanese audio, along with Japanese episode commentaries. Both sets will be available to fans in the U.S. and Canada.

Please contact our customer care team if you would like to update your order to Persona 4 Collection 1 on DVD instead of Persona 4 Collection 1 on Blu-ray or make changes to your order.
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My guess is this is to stop the rampant reverse importation of Sentai filmworks blu rays. I doubt this will be a problem anyway, considering the original voice cast of the game will be making a return to dub the anime.
 
I was just thinking a few days back that this is probably a likely option to happen next to stop reverse imports of US BDs to Japan. Not that I mind in the slightest as I never watch Japanese tracks, if I had my way, all releases would be dub-only and thus, would be cheaper. Unfortunately, I don't really care for P4.
 
You know what I think? WHY IN THE NAME OF F*CKERY DID THEY DECIDE TO GIVE JAPAN AND THE USA THE SAME BD REGION CODE IN THE FIRST PLACE? Even if I might not agree with it, surely region coding is what is supposed to protect regional markets and stop stupid things like this from being necessary?
 
While that's certainly true and the logic behind putting those particular regions together completely bewilders me (region A also includes a bunch of other Asian countries known for cheap BDs), there's evidence that being in the less desirable region with the other leftover countries is no advantage too. BDs cost so much to create that we still barely get anything, and the things we do get often have bits missing, or UPOPs, or they're in the wrong language because the most powerful anime countries in region B don't use English. Our DVDs are often purged of extras or functionality too despite being converted to PAL and of little interest to the home market in Japan.

And even if regioning worked, at some point someone important is going to realise that anyone in Japan can simply buy a region B player for the cost of a single BD disc (it doesn't even have to be a multiregion one, they can just buy a second player). They'll have made a sound financial decision in doing so by their very first foreign BD purchase. Blocking export sales won't change anything; grey importers already sell US anime releases in plain sight on Amazon Japan. This whole situation is a house of cards which is going to collapse at any moment.

R
 
Rui said:
...even if regioning worked, at some point someone important is going to realise that anyone in Japan can simply buy a region B player for the cost of a single BD disc (it doesn't even have to be a multiregion one, they can just buy a second player). They'll have made a sound financial decision in doing so by their very first foreign BD purchase. Blocking export sales won't change anything; grey importers already sell US anime releases in plain sight on Amazon Japan. This whole situation is a house of cards which is going to collapse at any moment.
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If we're talking models of economic and societal collapse, I'm fairly sure what we have now is a House of Cards on a Runaway Train. Fun times.
 
Rui said:
Our DVDs are often purged of extras or functionality too despite being converted to PAL and of little interest to the home market in Japan.
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Jonathan Clements recently re-iterated that story of the UK company who suddenly found one of their titles making 3000 sales on Amazon in a week after someone in Japan realised you could import and blogged about it. He even named the company and title, although it was sadly struck from the record.
 
ilmaestro said:
Surely someone in a less delicate position also knows who/what it would have been?
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Without naming names I can tell you that it was released by everyones "favorite" distributer, that the series had two seasons and featured talking tanks. I'm sure most people will be able to get it from that description.
 
sniper_samurai said:
ilmaestro said:
Surely someone in a less delicate position also knows who/what it would have been?
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Without naming names I can tell you that it was released by everyones "favorite" distributer, that the series had two seasons and featured talking tanks. I'm sure most people will be able to get it from that description.
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Heh, awesome, nice one.
 
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