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2009 anime sales slightly up thanks to bluray


3:00 PM on 01.24.2010
2009 anime sales slightly up thanks to bluray photo



There's been a lot of talk lately about the "anime bubble" and how it has burst. Some are blaming it on piracy, and others on the declining quality of anime in recent years. Whatever the cause, recent news from Oricon indicates that the worst might be behind us.

DVD and bluray sales in Japan increased 6.8% in the last year, thanks largely to anime. Furthermore, bluray sales alone increased 500%, with anime making up 60% of that figure. Bandai saw a 5.2% increase in sales, and Aniplex's were up 4.7%, catapaulting both companies into the top 5 market share of Japanese media makers.

So, what does this mean for the anime industry? Well, it looks like it has entered a recovery, albeit a very slow one. In the last few years, most studios have been playing it safe by churning out an endless stream of slice-of-life and moeblob shows, which (despite their general lack of quality) tend to sell well. Hopefully, this increase in sales will convince a few directors and producers to start taking a some more risks with future productions. It might be a while before the industry is confident enough to make the next Macross or Gundam... but at least they're well along the road back to prosperity.

[Via Cartoon Leap]






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Legacy Comments (will be imported soon)


Maybe this will mean we'll start getting more blu-rays here in America as well as Europe.
Yeah, now that I have a blu-ray player I don't want to buy DVDs anymore. If I have the choice I'll always go to blu-ray.
I only buy BluRay for movies that I feel really benefit from BluRay. Like the Planet Earth documentary is amazing on bluray, but why would I need to replace my copy of "Tommy Boy"?

Furthermore, I have about 5 different devices at my place that can all play a DVD disc, compared to the 1 bluray player in my house. So basically I would be paying more money for less versatility.

The benefits of DVD over VHS justified the extra cost to adopt the technology. However, I don't see me ever replacing my collection of DVD with Bluray.

So unless anime is somehow significantly better on BluRay (like it creates less discs and costs less money), I don't see me caring about BluRay anime.
I think Blu-Ray is a great thing for anime. Some series are much longer than the standard 26 episodes, so on Blu-ray you can just shove all of the content on one disc if you want to. Good stuff! Won't need to get a massive cupboard to store an anime collection.
i've only purchased sword of the stranger on blu ray which is a phenomenal movie to begin with so blu ray is a no brainer. I'm not even a big movie guy to begin with so i'd probably just end up buying anime on blu ray. but i feel like i'd buy more movies than series because i'd be more likely to watch the movie over again than a series. either way, even though its a art form thats becoming more rare now, i feel like a lot of blu ray anime series won't come with any goodies like soundtracks or mini artbooks or little sturdy blu ray anime boxsets. unfortunately bandai is the only one that really does this anymore, but even the code geass r2 limited editions are lacking in comparison to r1. but i'll just point at the economy and blame it on that. haha
Meh, higher sales in Japan don't equal higher sales in America. They can do as well as they want but it won't make a difference over here. Blu-ray quality is amazing though, I was at AX watching Yukikaze and it was vastly better sound and video than the dvd they played after.
Less discs + Lower Price = happy me.
More eps per disc is always good. As long as an anime series can be released in at least 720p in half-season sets on 1-2 Blu-ray discs, this will be win. If this happens, I'll just buy a Blu-ray player and stop waiting for that fabled PS3 firmware update.

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