2024 HAUL - JANUARY CHAPTER: BATCH #2
This week we have some more packages, half of which are two Anime Limited pre-orders from their Christmas sale while the rest are things that I ordered this month (bar one that was from last year).
Anime Limited's 12 Days of Christmas 2023 line-up consisted of seven releases with the goal to release them before the holiday season. This actually backfired because four of them arrived for those who bought them on their own after the holiday season (but before the new year) and the rest didn't appear until this past week.
I ordered six of seven releases as I didn't yet own them on Blu-ray (the only one that I didn't order was Kids on the Slope because I just ordered the Sentai Filmworks release a few months prior, but I probably dodged a bullet anyway since that's missing subtitles on one of the episodes).
The titles that I received are
Akame ga Kill!,
Flowers of Evil,
Food Wars! Shokugeki no Soma Season 1,
Kaiji: Ultimate Survivor,
Parasyte -the maxim- and
SHIROBAKO. All of the titles use the Sentai authors with the Anime Limited logo added to the intro portion of the discs.
The good news is that Anime Limited have used the most recent authored versions for the titles that did receive re-releases by Sentai Filmworks. For instance
Akame ga Kill! is based on the 2020 Steelbook discs and
Flowers of Evil is based on the 2021 re-release.
You can view all of the photos and specs on my blog, but my Region A player is not functioning properly so I won't be able to test Region A compatibility for the next while.
A few days ago I was made aware of a bunch of Nintendo first-party games going out of print over in North America which is sparking conversation about the prospect of a re-release and also panic buying. Since there's been no word about the same event happening over in Europe I decided to act as a lot of games on the list I had yet to own. I decided to focus on four Nintendo Switch games for the time being which were on the top priority list.
I ordered through The Game Collection because I also needed to spend some points as they will start to expire in the coming months. Those games are
Donkey Kong Country: Tropical Freeze,
Fire Emblem: Engage,
The Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening and
Super Mario Odyssey. Yeah it's a surprise that I didn't yet own the big Mario game for the Switch platform. My copy of
Fire Emblem: Engage is unfortunately the European version so while it does have English text it's clearly designed for the Nordic region or so.
Next we have a video game pre-order from back in July if I remember right. Red Art Games revealed back then they had acquired the physical media rights to bring
FANTAVISION 202X to the disc-based format for PlayStation 5, which also includes PlayStation VR2 support.
For those who are out of the know for what this is, this is a remake of the classic PlayStation 2 game
Fantavision that was developed by Japan Studios. Cosmo Machia, the folks behind the re-releases for the
Castle of Shikigami 1 & 2 games as well as
Triggerheart Exelica, were behind the remake for this game. Because of its retro status and the fact that it has VR, I figured it would be a great addition to my collection.
I will admit the radio silence on the physical release status didn't help, but at least they revealed during the new year that it was ready for dispatch. The deluxe edition comes with a slipcase, reversible cover that mimics the PlayStation 2 cover and a double-sided poster. Red Art Games are located in France but there's no customs to worry about.
Next we have another round of Radiance Films catch-up and pretty much the last ones I had left before our upcoming 2024 titles. This is part of the World Cinema collection that I have been building from the distributor, with this lot containing an Italian film and three Polish films.
First up we have Riccardo Freda's 1962 film
The Horrible Dr Hichcock (L'orribile segreto del Dr. Hichcock) in its limited edition 5000 print two-disc Blu-ray release. The first disc consists of the original Italian version with an English dub under the name
Raptus: The Secret of Dr. Hichcock, while the second disc (exclusive to this edition) is the North American version of The Horrible Dr. Hichcock with the English audio for that. This is an awkward release as well because Vingear Syndrome have released a 4K restoration of all the versions for the film (Radiance's restoration is 2K). Either way, a brand new UK distributor with a solid reception is better supporting than a commonly known big US distributor.
Next we have
The End of Civilization: Three Films by Piotr Szulkin limited edition Blu-ray box set. This consists of three Polish dystopian sci-fi films released during the 1980s, each receiving 2K restorations. The films included are
War of the Worlds: Next Century (Wojna światów - następne stulecie) from 1981,
O-Bi, O-Ba: The End of Civilization (O-Bi, O-Ba. Koniec cywilizacji) from 1984 and
Ga-Ga: Glory to the Heroes (Ga, Ga. Chwała bohaterom) from 1985. Also included are a few short films with Jan Lenica's Labyrinth, Miroslaw Kijowicz's Cages and Zofia Oraczewska's Banquet released in 1963, 1967 & 1977 respectively.
