Anime Blu-ray & DVD Sales in Japan Drop 8% in H1 2011

by dtshyk
Jul 21, 2011 6:50 PM | 25 Comments

According to Oricon News, the sales of anime DVD & Blu-ray in Japan have dropped 8% in the first half of 2011, compared with the year-earlier period. Oricon attributed the decrease to the lack of big hit titles comparable to Evangelion: 2.22 released in May 2010.

Chart: The H1 sales of anime media in Japan from 2008 - 2011

Chart: The Breakdown of anime DVD & Blu-ray in H1 2011

The anime Blu-ray sales rose 22.8%, while the anime DVD sales fell 24.4% in H1 2011. The anime Blu-ray made up 57.2% of the whole Blu-ray media sales.

Source: Oricon News

20 of 25 Comments Recent Comments

jmal said:

x15 said:
Anime these time ,,,most of them bullshit so i do not blame the Otuaka baying the BR,I hope anime comes out like those in 2006 " The Golden Year " Code Geas come out and When they cry etc .
Most of the Animes are ecchi only and weak comedy .

How about reading the thread before commenting? No, your subjective opinion of the quality of anime actually has nothing whatsoever to do with the numbers, and misreading a news story in an attempt to validate your feelings does not make it true.

Then WHY anime sales drop 8% if is not do with anime it self ??

Jul 26, 2011 9:28 AM by x15

jmal said:

You actually deciphered what he said? I'm impressed.

Jul 24, 2011 9:41 AM by Leon-Gun

Anime these time ,,,most of them bullshit so i do not blame the Otuaka baying the BR,I hope anime comes out like those in 2006 " The Golden Year " Code Geas come out and When they cry etc .

Most of the Animes are ecchi only and weak comedy .

Jul 24, 2011 8:24 AM by x15

from what i can understand in the chart only the DVD sales become less on sales because more people are buying blu-rays so i expect it to pick up, i mean i can see this chart as people transitioning on buying blu-rays now a days

Jul 24, 2011 2:03 AM by deg

tough time everywhere

Jul 22, 2011 11:08 AM by Mr_Gutts

Why can't we just count the Special Edition sales of Idolmaster 2 for PS3 for the BD sales? I'm sure there will be numbers that come out for the special edition, and at 250 dollars, anyone who is buying it is obviously buying it for the anime volume.

Jul 22, 2011 10:13 AM by RyanSaotome

jmal said:

Hoppy said:
If all sales of Idolmaster vol 1 would be counted it would be a 40-50k easy, but with the game pack cut that expected total by half and that doesn't account for the other volumes.

Right, we'll have a better idea of Idolmaster's actual sales from the second volume on. BD numbers for the first volumeare only going to reflect the version not bundled with the game... and how many people are going to buy that? Well, I would if I were importing Idolmaster because I don't own a PS3 but I assume most will want the bundle. And more importantly many people who buy the game, even if they didn't plan to buy the anime, will likely go for the LE release anyway because it has a bunch of other stuff in it. And, well, otaku just buy LEs. So it would inflate the numbers to count every bundle purchase as equal to a normal BD purchase.

Volume 2 should be a normal release though and give us an idea of how many volume 1 would have sold. Vol. 2 sales + 10-15% is probably a pretty close estimate of what volume 1 "really" would have done.

Pretty much sums up the case, I am most likely buying the bundle myself for convenience and cost reasons (cheaper to get the bundle than both individually) and the extra disk made me drool.

Jul 22, 2011 8:10 AM by Hoppy

If all sales of Idolmaster vol 1 would be counted it would be a 40-50k easy, but with the game pack cut that expected total by half and that doesn't account for the other volumes.

Jul 22, 2011 7:59 AM by Hoppy

chiuchiu said:

dtshyk said:
According to Oricon News, the sales of anime DVD & Blu-ray in Japan have dropped 8% in the first half of 2011

Anime is dying.

But don't worry, Yamakan is going to save the anime industry.

Heard of drops like this in the 90's, you're overreacting, there just needs to be a very good series to boost sales, it will get better.

Jul 22, 2011 6:32 AM by Hoppy

Does 'Others' include pornography?

Jul 22, 2011 4:53 AM by Yanoflies

dtshyk said:
According to Oricon News, the sales of anime DVD & Blu-ray in Japan have dropped 8% in the first half of 2011

Anime is dying.

But don't worry, Yamakan is going to save the anime industry.

Jul 22, 2011 3:25 AM by chiuchiu

mikhailn said:

dtshyk said:
Oricon attributed the decrease to the lack of big hit titles comparable to Evangelion: 2.22 released in May 2010.

Sure. I'm surprised the earthquake, nuclear threat and tsunami have had no effect on sales

/sarcasm

They likely didn't have any noticeable effects. It affected less than 1% of all Japanese residents, in terms of people who lost power during that time. It would be like blaming Hurricane Katrina for America having less DVD sales during that time.

Jul 22, 2011 1:17 AM by RyanSaotome

dtshyk said:
Oricon attributed the decrease to the lack of big hit titles comparable to Evangelion: 2.22 released in May 2010.

Sure. I'm surprised the earthquake, nuclear threat and tsunami have had no effect on sales

/sarcasm

Jul 22, 2011 1:10 AM by mikhailn

Anoki said:

Leon-Gun said:

kisami said:
well duh, recession and other things will have an impact on sales of such items...

The title is deceptive. BR sales are up, DVD's are down and overall sales are slightly lower due to no huge release this year in comparison's to last year Eva movie. If anything, the fact they kept this sells despite natural disasters goes to show it wasn't a bad period. Don't be deceived by appearance and simple headlines.

I totally agree. And even if there was a big release this year and it still dropped, I wouldn't be surprised with everything that has happened over there this year.

same here...

analyzing the chart, i immediately noticed that BD sales are actually higher...

it's the DVD sales that went down... combining both figures, you will really see a drop...

considering BDs are more expensive than DVDs, i'd say the industry's doing quite well..

the title is indeed misleading... it gives the impression that anime industry is going down...

Jul 21, 2011 11:58 PM by agent535

Leon-Gun said:

kisami said:
well duh, recession and other things will have an impact on sales of such items...

I totally agree. And even if there was a big release this year and it still dropped, I wouldn't be surprised with everything that has happened over there this year.

Jul 21, 2011 9:18 PM by Anoki

RyanSaotome said:
The more "techie" people are anime fans. Most normal people haven't shifted to blu ray yet.

Well not to beat the "physical media is pretty expensive in Japan," bit to the ground, but...... well, physical media is pretty expensive in Japan. Not to mention most shows every season end up late night between 11pm and 3am I think (might've gotten the times wrong) and are usually 12-13/24-26 episode shows released in two episode, DVD/blu-ray sets at a time. So you really have to wonder how many people in Japan are obsessive "techie" anime fans, who aren't salary men or kids or teenagers, who don't care for cerfew and are able to keep blowing their income on hundreds of dollars on just late-night anime shows on DVD or blu-ray, if they have that kind of money.

Jul 21, 2011 8:10 PM by Hypeathon

kisami said:
well duh, recession and other things will have an impact on sales of such items...

Jul 21, 2011 8:02 PM by Leon-Gun

BigSimo said:
wow didn't realize anime dominated the market in japan though. especially the bluray sales

The more "techie" people are anime fans. Most normal people haven't shifted to blu ray yet.

Jul 21, 2011 7:53 PM by RyanSaotome

well duh, recession and other things will have an impact on sales of such items...

Jul 21, 2011 7:39 PM by kisami

domestic music went up. shouldnt japan be happy about that? and anime sales should go back up if there are quality animes to buy. its been mostly crap so far

Jul 21, 2011 7:23 PM by amginex

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