Gurren Lagann Bluray and DVD Aniplex Release

So Aniplex of America is releasing Gurren Lagann on Bluray and DVD.....
http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/press-release/2013-04-01/aniplex-of-america-brings-back-the-fan-favorite-tv-series-gurren-lagann-on-dvd-and-blu-ray

This makes me very unhappy. I bought Bandai's Gurren Lagann release a while back, but now I want Bluray. But it'll cost me a whopping $500 to get it. This is why I can't stand Aniplex. My top three favorite anime (Gurren Lagann, Puella Magi Madoka Magica, and Durarara!!) have all been released by Aniplex of America, and they are all expensive. I wish Funimation would be the ones to aquire these licenses instead of Aniplex so that I could enjoy good prices and decent quality box sets, rather than Aniplex's insane prices.
On the bright side, the Gurren Lagann Bluray and DVD releases both come with cool stuff!
I'll be happy to get the nice box, the drama CDs, the music videos, the two GL movies, and the special DS episode with the GL series.
But still, these prices are insane.
Oh, and look, the DVD release gets a few things different, most interestingly, Gurren Lagann soundtrack CDs. Also, the DVD release seems to be about 130 dollars.

What do you guys think?

In my opinion, the series is too old for me to spend 130 dollars on it, 500+ is out of the question even if it was my favorite series.

Aniplex enjoys overpricing their stuff by adding a "Import" label everywhere, pretty annoying.

They're also charging $100+ for a double pack of the two Madoka movies, it's ridiculous. I have no idea why people put up with Aniplex's shit, but I guess some folks are actually willing to pay these prices.

I can understand a little bit expensive if imported though. Even the DVDs here are expensive, and they don't even have the import label on them.

Wrong thread, but whatever - This is a direct import of the Japanese set which is why it costs so much.

There will most probably be an official American BD release later on for around 150 dollars (ala Durarara)

Ah, that makes some sense I suppose.

That's still rather expensive for anime in America. I mean, Funimation, Sentai Filmworks, Viz Media, and whatever Rightstuf calls the part of it that licenses anime all are much, much cheaper.

It's expensive in today's market certainly, but $150 for a complete anime series was the norm as little as five years ago. Aniplex's pricing scheme is stuck in the past.

I dont like Gurren Lagann enough to spend that kind of money on them. I would rather use money on buying hockey tickets or something.

no

I often hear how Funi and Sentai halfass their releases because they're on the cheap, they dont spend a ton of money on them. That is the difference. Though Aniplex do go out of their way to make their releases PREMIUM to try and make up for the high price point.

I'm just glad we dont have to pay 500+ or even 600+ dollars to get ONE show on Blu Ray! The Japanese are CRAAAAZYYYYYY with their money xD

But who knows, maybe Funi will get the US rights to the show and release it on the cheap, while Aniplex retains it in Japan.

Yeah I had a hard time coughing 120$ for steins gate bd box set here(13% tax here in canada >_<), Can never see myself dropping half a grand on one anime show

The DVD isn't an import.
Therefore they at least seem to have the rights to Gurren Lagann's physical DVD releases. They also once asked on their Facebook page if people wanted Gurren Lagann to be on Toonami.
I think they have the rights to Gurren Lagann in the US.
Sadly.

Absolutely not. Sentai releases their blu-rays with a hardcover artbook. Many of the Aniplex releases have a instruction manual-like booklet with episode summaries and a short director's note. The Durarara!! lunchbox is cool, but it isn't much different than Funi's Trigun tin a while back. Inside of it is the standard box with thinpak blu-rays. Bakemonogatari, Nisemonogatari, and Baccano!, etc., all come in a regular thin slip material box, whereas Funi "limited edition" comes with a thick chipboard box. It's easy to see what has the higher quality.

Too expensive for me even if I watched this and was a diehard fan. xD

I only seen like 2 episodes of it and never went back. xP

lol.
The show starts out bad and slowly builds up and gets better and better.
At some point it even stops being a silly action show and gets really serious.
But yeah, very expensive.
I'm hoping to try and buy the limited edition bluray though.

I think you're making stuff up here:

-Sentai dont do anything special for their releases. No special cases or books. (I think you're talking about NIS America whose releases also can get pretty expensive)

-Bakemonogatari and the others mentioned comes in hardcover artboxes with extras like info booklets and posters. They also utilize way more discs than any other company, making the quality of the transfer less crammed. (Baccano was later re-released in a single case with a slipcover for less money. Maybe they'll do same the with other shows down the line.)

-Funimation utilize outdated masters, cram as many episodes onto individual discs as possible and rarely include booklets or artbooks. They do artboxes once in a while, which are cool but that's about it. On top of that, both Sentai, NISA and Funi likes to split up their releases in volumes as well, essentially moving the price into the 80-100+ dollar range for an entire series.

It is indeed easy to see what has the higher quality...

Last I checked, it was cheaper to import the Box set from Japan, than buy Aniplex of ameircas import of Gurren Lagann. There is no way I would buy this from aniplex of america.

Yes, NIS releases have large hardcover books.

Bakemonogatari and Nisemonogatari does have the same chip board boxes as Funimation's "limited edition" releases, my bad. Baccano! (the limited edition one) has a cheap cardboard box. None of the aforementioned releases have any posters or extras, besides a paperback episode summary booklet. Bakemonogatari has commentary tracks on the disc, but none of the other releases have any kind of video extras whatsoever. Funimation's Chaos;Head has thicker Euro-style keep cases that feel much more substantial than the cheap thinpaks with eco cutouts used in Bakemonogatari and Nisemonogatari and Durarara!!

As for file size, what you must understand is that Japanese discs are designed to inflate price, so they can sell more discs. I'll give you an example. Funimation's Chaos;Head blu-ray comes with 8 episodes on Disc 1, utilizing about 40GB out of a BD50. Steins;Gate is 5.5-6GB per episode, 8 episodes per disc adding to 43GB.

Nisemonogatari has 2 episodes per disc, utilizing 15GB on a presumably BD25. First of all, larger file sizes do not necessarily mean higher quality -- considering that most anime are essentially closer to 720p source resolution, it's ridiculous that they'd need 8GB to fit 26 minutes. Second, they have a little more than a third of the data per disc compared to Funimation releases. They could have fit 5-6 episodes on that disc and use up the same disc space as Chaos;Head.

There's no such thing as "outdated" masters. All the shows are sourced from Japan and they have the same masters. Only shows that came out before HD had to be upscaled, and sometimes Japan has rescanned "updated" masters. We're talking about new shows, and there's no reason to expect that they should look any different than the Japanese versions. If by "artbook" you mean a paperback booklet with episode summaries and character intros, then I say people aren't missing much. NISA release of AnoHana, for example, has a large hardcover booklet with full-page art scans and character sketches. Funimation discs regularly go on sale for down to $30 per half season, which adds up to $60 per season, compared to anywhere between $120-700 per half season (13 episodes) worth of anime with Aniplex.

Yes, indeed it is. I'll take a NISA release any day of the week.

By the way, the Baccano! re-release was only like $5 less, and rightfully so... How much do you suppose it costs them to include an extra case? I can buy one of those for $1-2 without the bulk discount.


Yes, that is a 38-page 11" x 7" hardcover book!


That's the standard blu-ray sized 38-page paperback booklet that comes with Nisemonogatari, showing character introductions. You will find no full-page art here, even though the booklet is half the size of the NISA one.

Am I the only one who doesn't mind spending $100-200 on complete shows that are actually good? Gurren Lagann's DVD set is more than worth it. The Blu-Ray is a little steep even for me, but I can manage $150. Especially considering Bandai's release is going up in price dramatically being that it is now OOP. Also, there are extras worth considering with Aniplex's release.

A lot of people spend $60 for a game. Most games aren't near as good as they should be. But for those that are, I'm willing to pay that price and more. Same for books and movies and TV shows. People just have to learn to pick their battles. You don't need to collect everything! I don't buy into a lot of anime, but when I do I pick up my favorites: Madoka Magica, Garden of Sinners, Baccano!, etc. If I really love it, I might even import it to support the publishers and devs, which is really all I care about. For example, I absolutely adore Psycho-Pass. To me, that is well worth paying $400. Especially when by buying in I am making a statement of what type of shows should be broadcast more often.

I'm not rich. People just need to learn to pick and choose their battles. I don't buy every game, or book, or movie, or album off iTunes. Some people do because it's cheaper. I think its a waste of time unless you really love it.

I'd need blu-ray. I can't have DVD if there is better quality available. No way~
But it's too expensive. I'll wait for a standard edition blu-ray if it ever happens. If not, oh well. I don't have $500 just to casually spend on one series. I could buy heaps of other from other companies for that amount.

I will never, ever buy anything from Aniplex USA.

They screwed the US on their Madoka release and continue to screw lower income Anime fans here in the US.

I've been lucky though, Other then Madoka and OreImo they have released nothing that I had ever considered buying. {OreImo's second release was actually really reasonable though.}

I'm an AniPlex USA Hater and proud of it. hehe

I would note that after what I´ve heard the average Japanese have A LOT higher salary than the average American and European. Thats why that the Japanese prices are crazy when you put the price into dollars.

JAPANESE PEOPLE HAVE BETTER SALARY THAN THE AVERAGE AMERICAN/EUROPEAN PERSON I REPEAT.

Through I would say that Aniplex of America will maybe be a bit forced to set down their price on some of their products.

Because: They recently got the rights to Vivdred Operation and Oreshura.

Not that those show are incredble bad. But Aniplex have survived with having extremely popular series witch some people find okay to spend money on even through the price is that high.

But even through that Vivdred Operation and Oreshura actually sold well in Japan, I can´t imagine that it will sell that well in USA.

I hate Aniplex of America. Their prices are such a ripoff. The first volume of Madoka Magica costs well over $30, and that's only for like 4 episodes. It's a serious pain in the ass that the only way to buy the series is to waste over $90 for a 12 episode anime.

I just preordered the complete first season of The Legend of Korra, which has the exact same number of episodes plus extras, for $20. I also plan on getting the complete Slayers box set, which has the first 3 seasons, all for a little under $30.

Maybe one day, Aniplex will come to their senses and release anime at an affordable price. It's a shame it's pretty much the only localization company left in LA.

NISA gives epic quality box sets at low prices. Aniplex gives epic quality box sets at insane prices.

Also, I was surprised to find that Bandai's Gurren Lagann DVD release has gone way up in price and is much harder to find.
I bought Bandai's DVD not too terribly long ago pretty cheap.
Wow.

I already have the LE sets for Bandai's release (I paid half price at most for the majority of them, so worth it!), I adore the show, but I can't justify re-buying it at that price.

It also advertises an "unaired" episode as a bonus, but it's really the unedited ep 6 (which is on Bandai's set, except the edited aired version is considered the "extra").

The only reason I have the sub-only $30 MSRP movies is because I found them both for $3 each at a used place. Standard edition, of course (so no parallel works). Also, the Aniplex DVD set won't come with the movies, which they're letting go OOP, but the Blu-ray set will. The blu-ray set is also coming with a bunch of audio dramas, but I'd need a pdf translation to understand them, so that's pointless for I'm sure a lot of us. And they plan to not even translate some of the new blu-ray extras, which seems a gyp for a lot of us.

Maybe if I didn't already own Bandai's set, and that awesome artbox where the mouth opens, I'd be tempted to get Aniplex's DVD set, but the blu-ray set? I could never justify blowing $500 on one 27 ep anime series on blu-ray no matter how much other stuff is there and no matter how much I adore it.
Funimation is putting out older anime series on SAVE bluray, whose max MSRP is $35 a set! They release dual DVD/blu-ray combos for tons of sets with MSRPs no high than $70 (and if you can't find it for significantly less than that, you're honestly not trying). Cheap anime blu-rays are a thing!

That was probably before they got rid of their localization branch.

I miss Bandai. :(

I remember paying somewhere around $130 to get all 6 volumes and the movie of Cowboy Bebop on DVD. At the time, I thought it was a steal. And it was. But there is no reason for western releases of anime to cost that much anymore.

Depends where you live tbh, here in Canada, It costed me around 120 for steins gate, which was mainly because of the 13% tax here...But then again I do shop at HMV instead of amazon or anime stores lol

I added it up, it would cost me 145 bucks not including shipping to buy all of the Aria anime on DVD.

The boxes don't even look like they should cost much. I mean jeez, how much does it actually cost them to print out some dvds? That's an outrageous price even for bluray!

Funmation has the Soul Eater complete blu ray pack on Amazon for like 26 bucks right now. That's more episodes, on bluray, and it's 26 bucks vs. 145.

Sure Aria is way better of a show, but damn.

The average Japanese income in 2005 was $29,304 USD. The average US income in the same period was $32,140 USD, not a significant difference. However, the Japanese cost of living is 15% more than that of the US.