So I went to go and hunt for Blu Ray versions of the Sword Art Online dub and came across one of the biggest bull sh*ts I have seen for marketing. There are 4 Blu Ray Boxes, each pricing at $90 ((USD currency)) So that means, if I wanted to own all of SAO dubbed, it would come to a total of $360. Now I guess getting to the DVD set would be better? Nope, still a price of $160. Then I decided to look at another Aniplex title: Madoka Magica, though I would get this in sub. Blu ray: $120 DVD: $90 Can someone explain to me why these are so damn much when titles like Fullmetal Alchemist and Soul Eater can be bought at $30-$50? Titles that are about 2 to 4 times the length of these >.<
Because. Fullmetal Alchemist & Soul Eater albeit being classic and all that; are OLD. SAO only releasing last year and the dub being later would be expensive. If you had seen the Zetsuen No Tempest; Blast of the tempest price of bluray edition when it released, you would be crying at that price cause for just one I believe Mahiro's side it was $200 Only advice I can give is Bis or wait till they're old.
WELCOME TO THE BULLSHITTERY THAT IS ANIME MERCHANDISE. But seriously, just torrent it (and don't forget to seed). But piracy is essential to the growth of anime. Do you think the third Madoka movie got a theater release in multiple cities in 25 states and 9 provinces because the Blu-Rays sold so damn well? Nope. Word-of-mouth. People pirated it as it was airing in Japan, spread the word about it over the internet, got more people interested, which indirectly gets the original studio back the money (through figurine, t-shirt, posters, dakimakura, manga and other merch sales). Then, through internet popularity, some western licensing studio picks it up, dubs it, and sells the DVDs for buttloads (the orignal Japanese studio also sells the DVDs/Blu-Rays for buttloads). Take out the middle-man and just buy merch/pirate and tell your friends about it, until the DVDs/Blu-Rays come down to a reasonable price, which it eventually will (or wait until it comes out on Netflix/some crappy legal streaming site). Also, if this is relevant to morals, consider the following: The anime you're currently wanting to watch was at one point available for free, on a major network, for Japanese people with cable. You probably also have cable, but you don't have access to that anime. Not fair, right? So, what is fair, is pirating the anime that you missed out on, and watching it for free, like the Japanese did, and perhaps supporting the studio by buying merch. That's fair, now isn't it?
There are actually more in depth reasons to why I cant do such. Not that I don't want to, but I literally just don't have the means to do so. My parents have some pretty damn good software on my computer to prevent me from doing that. And as I previously stated, I like to own things in hard copy. That includes the case. So stripping it to a disk isn't suffice enough. I can stream it in 1080p on crunchyroll since I have a membership, it just doesn't have the same appeal though. Idk why, I'm just weird.
I'm very frugal with my money and what I want to own. I love having hard copies, to be more exact, I need to have a hard copy of the original version, complete with everything that came with it on its initial release. But like most human beings, I don't have enough money to have everything that I could ever want in physical form, so I prioritize. I buy the things that I want most and can afford and torrent what I can stand to not have in physical form either for good or until I can afford it. I've found this helps me sleep at night. And as pointed out, merchandise is a good way to give back indirectly. I don't own a single Gundam DVD but I've bought many models.
If only it were that simple... If only... To get out of it, I'd need to live on my own, and that isn't happening any time soon sad to say.
Yay! I'm not the only one whose like this! Anyway, the problem is just AniplexUSA. That's how they sell their DVDs and Blu Rays. A lot of the big companies sell their products to be very expensive. The only company that doesn't seem to do that is FUNimation (who own Soul Eater and FMA). For the same price of a few episodes from AniplexUSA, you get the entire series, usually with a limited edition box set from FUNimation. FUNi knows the audience that they are marketing to; that's why they're the biggest contributor to Netflix and other mediums. There's a reason why they almost have a monopoly on the English speaking anime industry.
The Madoka bluray boxset only cost me 20 quid. Yay for living in the UK! The film boxset cost me 60 - 70 quid, though. I have no regrets!
