Thanks. I was unaware of the existence of the Gamers Top 10 list. Just now I
did a little Googling and failed to find it. But I'm glad to hear that Sakura Trick is
consistently on it.
I accept your point that MAL ratings are unrelated to sales of Blu-rays, DVDs and
licensed merchandise, since surely the vast majority of expenditure is in Japan. I
am only interested in the way that money earned will affect future business
decisions of anime studios who might produce more Yuri anime series, at least for
this present discussion.
My experience with Amazon Stalker numbers is based on a few dozen anime series.
I know roughly how to tell "crash and burn" from "runaway hit". Indeed, Amazon
Stalker does not reflect all of the income. In the absence of additional information,
I base my guesses on Amazon Stalker, and I freely admit that I am making guesses.
At this point, Sakura Trick seems to be in the grey area. It is not "crash and burn".
It is not a "runaway hit".
From a business point of view, Sakura Trick is a compromise, since they chose to
combine Central-element Yuri with Yonkoma and of course it is CGDCT. What we
are seeing as a fundamental problem is that there is a split fanbase:
(1) Some fans want to see an actual Yuri story with some kind of plot and
character development. Also, these same people tend to be turned off by the
heavy fanservice of Sakura Trick, even if Sakura Trick has not crossed the line
into technical Ecchi (i.e. no panty shots).
(2) Other fans like the CGDCT. The heavy fanservice goes along fairly well with
CGDCT, particularly if there is no issue with Ecchi. Yet this type of fan might not
have the patience to see a serious Yuri story told. They are basically counting
the kisses, and thinking that kisses equal Yuri.
Sakura Trick tries to win both (1) and (2), and my reading of the Amazon Stalker
numbers is that Sakura Trick has failed to achieve runaway success. To a great
extent, my thinking is based on MAL comments, but of course it is much more
important to know what is going on in the minds of fans in Japan.
Given the divided fanbase, Sakura Trick seems to be a failed experiment. Why
bother even trying to be Central-element Yuri? The path to success is very well
known and it is Yuru Yuri. In Yuru Yuri, they had "Secondary-element Yuri"
along with CGDCT. It was a fantastic series, ran for two seasons and was a
huge hit. in fact, Yuru Yuri was a pioneer in that it was the first 100% CGDCT
series, and it spawned the huge trend of 100% CGDCT that has followed in
its footsteps. Also, basically all of those 100% CGDCT series have Yuri jokes
or Yuri subtext if you look. Want to make money? 100% CGDCT + Secondary-
element Yuri.
As for Central-element Yuri that is aimed at hardcore Yuri fans, I see no market
for it. The heyday of Central-element Yuri followed Maria-sama ga Miteru (2004)
including its four seasons. Most people here seem to agree that Aoi Hana (2009)
and Sasameki Koto (2009) were good Central-element Yuri, but they just were
not quite commercially viable enough. Sasameki Koko was the worse of the two.
Why the end of Yuri? Traditional Yuri, which goes back a century, depended a
lot on angst, social stigma, family rejection, internal struggle and tragedy. But
this is 2014. Quite a lot of this has disappeared from the world between 2009
and 2014. So in 2014, a Yuri romantic story is not qualitatively different from
a male-female romantic story.
For those of you who love the Yuri genre, you have a century of novels, forty
years of manga and dozens of anime series. So . . . enjoy. |