Aniplex's New Sales Strategy For Blu-ray Releases

by dtshyk
Jun 10, 2009 6:36 PM | 32 Comments

Aniplex has been reluctant to release Blu-ray of their anime titles. "FLAG" was the only title released in Blu-ray last year. Blu-ray Disc Association Interviewed Aniplex staff about their sales strategy this year.

Aniplex sent out questionnaires to those who purchased Fullmetal Alchemist Box Set Archives and surveyed the demand for Blu-ray releases. Here are the results:

Q1. When a new title is released in DVD and Blu-ray formats, which media do you buy?

Men
Blu-ray 50%
DVD 45%
Both 4%

Women
Blu-ray 29%
DVD 63%
Both 7%

Q2. Do you buy Blu-ray of old titles, which you have already purchased?

Men
Yes 6.9%
Yes, if possible 53%
No 40.1%

Women
Yes 2.7%
Yes, if possible 43.9%
No 53.4%

In conclusion, Aniplex decided to release the Blu-ray of new TV series targeting at male fans simultaneously with the DVD. As for the old titles, they also take a positive action toward the release of Blu-ray, especially ones for men.

They admitted that the high production cost of the Blu-ray is problematic. 1000 yen rise in the price barely cancels out the additional costs. At the end of the interview, they mentioned the possibility of the Blu-ray releases of "Kara no Kyoukai" and "Valkyria Chronicles".

Edited
BDA erased the part of the article about the blu-ray release of "Kara no Kyoukai" and "Valkyria Chronicles". They apologized for a misleading expression.

Source: Blu-ray Meister

According to Takayama Katsuhiko, the authoring cost of Blu-ray is four times higher than that of DVD. He said releasing new titles in Blu-ray is highly risky.

Source: Takayama's list mania

20 of 32 Comments Recent Comments

cyruz said:

De-JaY said:

Roxkis said:
<snip>

L O L

That means you also dislike Panasonic, Pioneer, Philips, Thomson, LG, Hitachi, Sharp und Samsung, Dell, HP and Apple.

How did you manage to go online? lol

And besides that, you're willingly missing out on bluray quality because you don't like Sony? Dude you're so missing out. It's not it matters to Sony if you buy the bluray or not. Might as well enjoy the quality. It's worth it.

Fansubs had hd before blue-ray came out.

@De-JaY

A Toshiba laptop and a self built desktop. Though my desktop has a LG dvd burner.
I have a1st gen iphone but that's what sparked my hate for apple.

Jun 11, 2009 9:05 PM by Roxkis

why do some people think sony owns blu-ray?

Jun 11, 2009 5:40 PM by arkarian

Torisunanohokori said:
I grew up with VHS, btw. I still buy them. The picture was visible enough then.

Haha, well said. My feelings exactly.

I don't blame Aniplex for not releasing more Blu-ray titles. The risk isn't worth it at this stage of the game.

Jun 11, 2009 3:57 PM by eternal_blue

Roxkis said:
I"ll stick to dvd + upscale

I know blue-ray > upscale but my distaste for Sony is strong.
So much so that I only bought a PS3 because its Sony lost money on the
purchase. And I'm will pirate games out of sprite...

won'ts they get sticky?

Jun 11, 2009 3:40 PM by windy

De-JaY said:

Roxkis said:
<snip>

L O L

That means you also dislike Panasonic, Pioneer, Philips, Thomson, LG, Hitachi, Sharp und Samsung, Dell, HP and Apple.

How did you manage to go online? lol

Jun 11, 2009 3:37 PM by cyruz

L O L

That means you also dislike Panasonic, Pioneer, Philips, Thomson, LG, Hitachi, Sharp und Samsung, Dell, HP and Apple.

How did you manage to go online? lol

Jun 11, 2009 3:35 PM by De-JaY

When all Anime goes to Blu-Ray, I'll say that its worth it - I mean, video quality is nice but not the most important thing to me. But Kara no Kyoukai is already good looking, so Blu-Ray will be a nice format for it.

Jun 11, 2009 2:51 PM by internetotaku

I"ll stick to dvd + upscale

I know blue-ray > upscale but my distaste for Sony is strong.
So much so that I only bought a PS3 because its Sony lost money on the
purchase. And I'm will pirate games out of sprite...

Jun 11, 2009 2:19 PM by Roxkis

KnK on Blu-Ray? I demand it.

Jun 11, 2009 2:18 PM by De-JaY

lol, women are so cheap, and I know it.

Jun 11, 2009 2:09 PM by BlackAssassin

kuroshiroi said:

-synchronizer- said:

mitamaking said:
I think women just are smarter buyers, why pay that much more for animation that really doesn't improve the quality equal to the raise in price.

I say that and I am a guy.

There's not much of an increase in price between DVD and Blu-ray, at least for the consumer. I just took a quick peek at amazon.co.jp and the difference in price between the two for Macross Frontier and Gundam 00 is between ￥ 700 and 800 (The DVDs cost about 4600).
Provided that they aren't just upscales, the difference in quality is usually well worth it. Researching which ones are and which ones aren't is smart buying.

Don't forget that people usually need to upgrade their TV to see the benefit from BD.

True, but you don't need a 50" TV (resolution doesn't increase plus many people don't have the room) and you can just use a computer monitor instead. For the people who buy these DVD or Blu-ray sets, I doubt that they would consider this to be a huge problem as buying just a single 24-episode series on DVD is probably equivalent to this cost.

Jun 11, 2009 1:42 PM by -synchronizer-

-synchronizer- said:

mitamaking said:
I think women just are smarter buyers, why pay that much more for animation that really doesn't improve the quality equal to the raise in price.

I say that and I am a guy.

Don't forget that people usually need to upgrade their TV to see the benefit from BD.

Jun 11, 2009 1:18 PM by kuroshiroi

mitamaking said:
I think women just are smarter buyers, why pay that much more for animation that really doesn't improve the quality equal to the raise in price.

I say that and I am a guy.

Jun 11, 2009 1:10 PM by -synchronizer-

Good to see these companies taking buyers' preferences into account. I have yet to see KnK, but it sounds like it will make a lot of people happy on bluray.

mitamaking said:
I think women just are smarter buyers, why pay that much more for animation that really doesn't improve the quality equal to the raise in price.

I say that and I am a guy.

This is likely it. Most of the men I know are more willing to pay high prices for the shiniest technology, while most of the women prefer saving money.

Jun 11, 2009 12:38 PM by Anomalous

Like others have said, KnK in bluray would be like heaven.

Jun 11, 2009 12:20 PM by LemonLyme

Jure said:
KnK on Blue-Ray

Have fun with Blue-Ray ^^ I don' t give shit about blu-ray, dvd's enough for me, and as I live in shit country there isn' t even normal dvd distributor.

Jun 11, 2009 2:57 AM by ksanders

KnK on Blue-Ray... and here I am, thinking that it can't get anymore awesome.

Jun 11, 2009 2:22 AM by Jure

I'd like Blu-Ray a lot more if the cases weren't so ugly. If I'm going to spend money on something I could selfishly get for free instead, I don't want is case to have a big clashing blue line going all around it. (granted, it doesn't always clash, but more often than not)

Jun 11, 2009 1:19 AM by Devdan

mitamaking said:
I think women just are smarter buyers, why pay that much more for animation that really doesn't improve the quality equal to the raise in price.

I say that and I am a guy.

Yeah, what he said. I grew up with VHS, btw. I still buy them. The picture was visible enough then.

/19yearoldmanrant

Jun 10, 2009 9:50 PM by Torisunanohokori

I think women just are smarter buyers, why pay that much more for animation that really doesn't improve the quality equal to the raise in price.

I say that and I am a guy.

Jun 10, 2009 9:09 PM by mitamaking

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