Full list. 398 DVD threshold, 339 BD.
2015 09/28 – 10/04 Anime DVD List
| Anime Rank | All Rank | Last Rank | Week Sales | Total Sales | #Wks | Title |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 17 | 2 | 2,831 | 9,603 | 2 | ONE PIECE Log Collection 'Shirahoshi' |
| 2 | 18 | 2,772 | 2,772 | 1 | Gintama° v3 | |
| 3 | 19 | 4 | 2,585 | 5,835 | 2 | Kuroko no Basuke 3rd Season v6 |
| 5 | 23 | 1,997 | 1,997 | 1 | Senki Zesshou Symphogear GX v1 | |
| 6 | 24 | 1,834 | 1,834 | 1 | Prison School v1 | |
| 7 | 25 | 3 | 1,808 | 6,595 | 2 | Youkai Watch BD Box v3 |
| 8 | 31 | 1,380 | 1,380 | 1 | Jojo no Kimyou na Bouken Stardust Crusaders Egypt-hen v6 | |
| 13 | 46 | 872 | 872 | 1 | Gate: Jieitai Kano Chi nite, Kaku Tatakaeri v1 | |
| 14 | 47 | 867 | 867 | 1 | Tokyo Ghoul OVA 'JACK' | |
| 15 | 48 | 856 | 856 | 1 | Akagami no Shirayuki-hime v1 | |
| 16 | 49 | 832 | 832 | 1 | Durarara!! x2 Ten v2 | |
| 17 | 52 | 778 | 778 | 1 | Aoharu x Kikanjuu v1 | |
| 18 | 54 | 754 | 754 | 1 | Nisekoi: v4 | |
| 19 | 55 | 51 | 748 | 1,372 | 2 | Arslan Senki v3 |
| 20 | 56 | 41 | 734 | 1,415 | 2 | Overlord v1 |
| 21 | 57 | 62 | 715 | 1,251 | 2 | To Love-Ru Darkness 2nd v1 |
| 22 | 58 | 703 | 703 | 1 | Dungeon ni Deai wo Motomeru no wa Machigatteiru Darou ka v5 | |
| 23 | 63 | 617 | 617 | 1 | Pripara v13 | |
| 24 | 64 | 23 | 609 | 128,810 | 13 | Youkai Watch: Tanjou no Himitsu da Nyan! |
| 25 | 65 | 595 | 595 | 1 | Ushio to Tora v1 | |
| 26 | 67 | 11 | 589 | 2,111 | 2 | Funasshi no Futafutafuta Biyori/Nyaosshi to Asobunasshi! Funafuna ver. |
| 27 | 70 | 31 | 557 | 1,341 | 2 | Junjou Romantica 3 v1 |
| 28 | 71 | 66 | 548 | 1,071 | 2 | Owari no Seraph v4 |
| 29 | 72 | 13 | 546 | 2,001 | 2 | Funasshi no Futafutafuta Biyori/Gresshi to Shoubu Nasshi! Funafuna ver. |
| 30 | 80 | 506 | 506 | 1 | Ranpo Kitan: Game of Laplace v1 | |
| 81 | 32 | 496 | 1,275 | 2 | Gangsta. v1 | |
| 86 | 472 | 472 | 1 | Joukamachi no Dandelion v1 | ||
| 100 | 79 | 398 | 848 | 2 | THE IDOLM@STER Cinderella Girls v5 |
| Other releases (concerts etc) | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 10 | 4,256 | 4,256 | 1 | Love Live! μ’s Go→Go! LoveLive! 2015~Dream Sensation!~ Day 1 | ||
| 11 | 4,150 | 4,150 | 1 | Love Live! μ’s Go→Go! LoveLive! 2015~Dream Sensation!~ Day 2 | ||
| 14 | 2,937 | 2,937 | 1 | Persora Awards | ||
| 27 | 1,667 | 1,667 | 1 | Persona 3 the Weird Masquerade ~Souen no Kesshou~ | ||
| 29 | 1,545 | 1,545 | 1 | Matsuoka Yoshitsugu Shokugeki no Souma ~Oshokujidokoro Matsuoka~ v1 |
2015 09/28 – 10/04 Anime BD List
| Anime Rank | All Rank | Last Rank | Week Sales | Total Sales | #Wks | Title |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 2 | 15,821 | 15,821 | 1 | Senki Zesshou Symphogear GX v1 | |
| 2 | 3 | 7,202 | 7,202 | 1 | Jojo no Kimyou na Bouken Stardust Crusaders Egypt-hen v6 | |
| 3 | 6 | 7 | 4,877 | 8,920 | 2 | Overlord v1 |
| 4 | 7 | 6 | 4,699 | 9,020 | 2 | THE IDOLM@STER Cinderella Girls v5 |
| 5 | 8 | 4,481 | 4,481 | 1 | Gate: Jieitai Kano Chi nite, Kaku Tatakaeri v1 | |
| 6 | 12 | 4,072 | 4,072 | 1 | Prison School v1 | |
| 7 | 14 | 3,860 | 3,860 | 1 | Dungeon ni Deai wo Motomeru no wa Machigatteiru Darou ka v5 | |
| 8 | 18 | 12 | 2,882 | 5,160 | 2 | To Love-Ru Darkness 2nd v1 |
| 9 | 19 | 2,861 | 2,861 | 1 | Gintama° v3 | |
| 10 | 23 | 2,632 | 2,632 | 1 | Nisekoi: v4 | |
| 11 | 26 | 2,381 | 2,381 | 1 | Sore ga Seiyuu! v1 | |
| 12 | 27 | 8 | 2,331 | 5,758 | 2 | Kuroko no Basuke 3rd Season v6 |
| 13 | 29 | 1,997 | 1,997 | 1 | Ushio to Tora v1 | |
| 14 | 30 | 1,836 | 1,836 | 1 | Shimoneta to Iu Gainen ga Sonzai Shinai Taikutsu na Sekai v2 | |
| 15 | 31 | 1,737 | 1,737 | 1 | Joukamachi no Dandelion v1 | |
| 16 | 32 | 1,717 | 1,717 | 1 | Houkago no Pleiades v4 | |
| 17 | 33 | 1,689 | 1,689 | 1 | Tokyo Ghoul OVA 'JACK' | |
| 18 | 35 | 1,517 | 1,517 | 1 | Aikatsu! Akari Generation BD Box v3 | |
| 19 | 36 | 10 | 1,496 | 4,298 | 2 | Hello!! Kin-iro Mosaic v4 |
| 20 | 37 | 1,460 | 1,460 | 1 | Maison Ikkoku Movie & OVA BD Box | |
| 38 | 19 | 1,435 | 2,743 | 2 | Gakkou Gurashi! v1 | |
| 39 | 1,396 | 1,396 | 1 | Durarara!! x2 Ten v2 | ||
| 40 | 1,384 | 1,384 | 1 | Shokugeki no Souma v3 | ||
| 42 | 1,362 | 1,362 | 1 | Plastic Memories v4 | ||
| 43 | 3 | 1,285 | 7,572 | 2 | Charlotte v1 | |
| 44 | 9 | 1,257 | 4,241 | 2 | Fate/Kaleid liner Prisma Illya 2wei Herz! v1 | |
| 46 | 13 | 1,215 | 3,454 | 2 | Code Geass R2 5.1ch BD Box | |
| 47 | 1,199 | 1,199 | 1 | Akagami no Shirayuki-hime v1 | ||
| 50 | 26 | 1,053 | 2,110 | 2 | Arslan Senki v3 | |
| 55 | 33 | 835 | 1,616 | 2 | Owari no Seraph v4 | |
| 56 | 11 | 808 | 3,200 | 2 | Kidou Senshi V Gundam BD Box v2 | |
| 65 | 14 | 613 | 2,820 | 2 | Saint Seiya -soul of gold- v3 | |
| 66 | 612 | 612 | 1 | Ranpo Kitan Game of Laplace v1 | ||
| 67 | 17 | 611 | 2,093 | 2 | Nagato Yuki-chan no Shoushitsu v4 | |
| 69 | 4 | 601 | 6,196 | 2 | Shigatsu wa Kimi no Uso v8 | |
| 70 | 32 | 600 | 1,402 | 2 | Okusama ga Seitokaichou v2 | |
| 73 | 23 | 548 | 1,626 | 2 | Gangsta. v1 | |
| 74 | 544 | 544 | 1 | Aoharu x Kikanjuu v1 | ||
| 77 | 41 | 513 | 1,135 | 2 | Gatchaman Crowds insight v1 | |
| 81 | 476 | 476 | 1 | Tezuka Osamu Collection -Jikkken Animation- | ||
| 85 | 27 | 466 | 5,438 | 3 | Non Non Biyori Repeat v1 | |
| 86 | 38 | 459 | 1,124 | 2 | Junjou Romantica 3 v1 | |
| 87 | 28 | 408 | 1,323 | 2 | Koufuku Graffiti v6 | |
| 88 | 104 | 406 | 582 | 2 | Gochuumon wa Usagi Desu ka? v3 -Halloween Box- | |
| 91 | 57 | 391 | 794 | 2 | Akai Koudan Zillion BD Box | |
| 92 | 31 | 387 | 1,196 | 2 | Triage X v4 | |
| 94 | 48 | 385 | 5,239 | 3 | Monster Musume no Iru Nichijou v1 | |
| 95 | 25 | 373 | 10,198 | 3 | Kekkai Sensen v4 | |
| 98 | 46 | 349 | 6,917 | 3 | Hibike! Euphonium v4 | |
| 99 | 348 | 348 | 1 | Wakakozake |
| Other releases (concerts etc) | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 49,382 | 49,382 | 1 | Love Live! μ’s Go→Go! LoveLive! 2015~Dream Sensation!~ | ||
| 25 | 2,478 | 2,478 | 1 | Uchida Aya 1st Solo Live Apple Mint 'Baby Are you ready to go?' | ||
| 59 | 783 | 783 | 1 | Love Live! μ’s Go→Go! LoveLive! 2015~Dream Sensation!~ Day 2 | ||
| 61 | 728 | 728 | 1 | Love Live! μ’s Go→Go! LoveLive! 2015~Dream Sensation!~ Day 1 | ||
| 82 | 43 | 475 | 5,550 | 2 | fripSide Live Tour 2015-2015 Final in Yokohama Arena | |
| 86 | 1,548 | 4 | Uchida Aya Nakibeso Panda wa Doko e Itta ~Haruka Kanata Kuchibue no Tabi~ |
Everything is fixed! Clearly last week’s missing Amazon data is back, given that Deremas/Overlord/TLRd2 doubled their BDs and others like Kinmosa saw much bigger wk2s than they would normally.
Summer update:
Symphogear s3 v1 sells 15821/1997, total 17,818 (4/6% overestimated). Event ticket. Spot on estimate. Normally BD is heavily underestimated but the Amazon-exclusive box contributed almost half of the estimate which will generally neutralize any storefront bias. Should pass 20k easily (maybe even next week?) and definitely beat s2’s average even once the event ticket drop kicks in.
Prison School v1 sells 4072/1834, total 5,906 (17/30% overestimates). Event ticket, may drop somewhat heavily, at least on DVD (not so much on BD). Maybe looking at a 5k average?
Gate v1 sells 4481/872, total 5,353. Don’t see anything about an event ticket so it might stay somewhat consistent.
Ushio to Tora v1 sells 1997/595, total 2,592 (31/36% overestimated). This one is a 13 volume slog and slightly expensive per disc, so I expect this will slide very low by the end.
SoreSeiyuu v1 sells 2,381 BDs, DVDs do not rank (28% underestimated). The DVD estimate was basically nothing so I’m not sure if we’ll even see them in the extended rankings, but given the underestimation it’s possible. This series is going the route of DVDs being much cheaper than the BDs (¥3800 vs ¥6800).
Joukamachi v1 sells 1737/472, total 2,209 (27%/44% overestimated).
Shirayuki-hime v1 sells 1199/856, total 2,055 (10% under/3% overestimated).
Aoharu x Kikanjuu v1 sells 544/778, total 1,322 (83%/29% underestimated).
Ranpo Kitan v1 sells 612/506, total 1,118 (13%/26% overestimated).
Durarara x2 Ten v2 sells 1396/832, total 2,228.
Shimoneta v2 sells 1836/213, total 2,049. DVDs from extended.
Overlord v1 adds 4877/734, total 10,335. Missing data restored. And a big restore it is, both formats are higher than wk1. It being Amazon heavy + having a strong wk2 besides puts this over 10k, back where you’d expect from the estimates.
Charlotte v1 adds 1285/359, total 9,050.
TLR Darkness s2 v1 adds 2882/715, total 6,411. Missing data restored. This also doubles wk1 sales. Still on track to drop by half from s1, but now two thirds.
Monmusu v1 adds 385 BDs, total 6,257.
Non Non s2 v1 adds 466 BDs, total 6,028.
Prisma Illya s3 v1 adds 1257/176, total 4,682. DVDs from extended. Missing data restored, even on DVD. Now looking like it could end up closer to s2.
Gakkou Gurashi v1 adds 1435/386, total 3,474. Missing data restored. Nice to see it go well over 3k.
Gangsta. v1 adds 548/496, total 2,901. Missing data restored.
Junjou s3 v1 adds 459/557 DVDs, total 2,465. Missing data restored.
Okusama v2, final volume, adds 600 BDs, total 1,402. v2 over v1 due to an event ticket. Series average: 1,320.
Crowds s2 v1 adds 513 BDs, total 1,135. Missing data restored. But damn that’s a very very very harsh drop from s1.
Spring update:
Jojo s3 v6, final volume, sells 7202/1380, total 8,582. Series average: 9,697. 10k is not out of the question but a peak of 9.9k looks more likely. Dropping below 10k for the first time, but only barely.
Gintama° v3 sells 2861/2772, total 5,633
Danmachi v4 sells 3860/703, total 4,563.
Nisekoi s2 v4 sells 2632/754, total 3,386.
Shokugeki no Souma v3 sells 1384/391, total 1,775. DVDs from extended.
Pleiades v4 sells 1,717 BDs, DVDs do not rank.
Plasmemo v4 sells 1362/213, total 1,575. DVDs from extended.
Kekkaisen v4 adds 373/186, total 14,193.
Euphonium v4 adds 349 BDs, total 7,464.
Kinmosa s2 v4 adds 1496/169, total 4,712. Missing data restored.
Arslan v3 adds 1053/748, total 3,482. Missing data restored. Brings the ticket drop to only 24%, though that’s on v2 that already dropped 23% on v1.
Owari no Seraph v4, final volume, adds 835/548, total 2,687. Missing data restored. Series average: 3,802.
Yuki-chan v4 adds 611, total 2,323. Missing data restored.
Triage X v4 adds 387 BDs, total 1,374. Missing data restored.
Past seasons:
Deremas v5 adds 4699/398 standalone, total 23,155. Missing data restored, BDs more than double. Now its standalone sales are right on par with v2-3, but the G4U is a bit low for whatever reason. Still crossing my fingers for additional G4U data across the board one day, so we get more than a single week.
Kurobas s3 v6 adds 2331/2585, total 11,593. Missing data restored.
Kimiuso v8 adds 601/175, total 7,307.
Koufuku v6, final volume, adds 408 BDs, total 1,469. Missing data restored. Series average: 1,649.
Gochiusa v3 re-release with Halloween artbox adds 408 BDs, total 582, meaning it sold 174 in wk1. v3 total is now 11,125. Series average: 11,292. I’m counting this special release with the initial release instead of as a re-release because it’s only 1/6th of the series and counting it as a full “re-release average” would inflate numbers.
OVAs, Movies, Boxsets etc:
Tokyo Ghoul OVA v1 sells 1689/867, total 2,556.
Geass R2 5.1ch BD Box adds 1215, total 3,454. 16,948 total with the first box.
V Gundam BD Box adds 808, total 3,200.
Upcoming Releases for 2015 10/05 – 10/11 Anime DVD List
2015/10/07 Bishoujo Senshi Sailor Moon Crystal BD v13
2015/10/07 Bishoujo Senshi Sailor Moon Crystal DVD v12
2015/10/07 Devilman BD Box
2015/10/07 Dragonball Z Fukkatsu no F
2015/10/07 Fate/stay night Unlimited Blade Workd Part II
2015/10/07 Hanasaku Iroha BD Box (2015 re-release)
2015/10/07 Kyoukai no Kanata -I’ll Be Here- Mirai-hen
2015/10/07 Naruto no Senaka ~Chuugen no Kiseki~ v2
2015/10/07 ONE PIECE 17th Season Dressrosa-hen v16
2015/10/07 Tamayura Sotsugyou Shashin Movie 2: Hibiki
2015/10/07 Uta no Prince-sama Maji Love Revolutions v4
2015/10/07 World Trigger v8
Symphogear only has a lottery to purchase a good seat, not a real event ticket.
That’s standard practice, yeah. It’s what I mean when I say “ticket” or “event ticket”, i.e. shorthand for “event ticket application” or “event ticket lottery entry” basically.
How’s that work anyways? Like, is it every set gets a number and they pull numbers from the ones that were bought?
Being a foreigner I’ve never tried applying for one, but typically what I see is a little slip of paper in the BD case with a number on it and a URL. Go to the site, enter the number and your contact info, and find out if you’re one of the lucky ones.
Isn’t Sore ga Seiyuu’s DVD just a normal version without event ticket? it most likely won’t rank at all. BD has event ticket and has a version with both ticket event and dubbing kit
Sore ga Seiyuu, Dandelion, Aoharu x Kikanjuu are all with event ticket, im surprised Dandelion didn’t make it to DVD top 30 eventhough it estimated around 800 DVDs
Sore Seiyuu’s DVD is definitely bare bones, I’m just thinking that with the extended ranking threshold now being like 123 discs or so, that’s not an impossible number. The Top 300 this week will likely be higher than that, though.
Do you know if Oricon has an extended ranking for the CDs and where I can see it? I think it would be interesting for Symphogear since CD sales are very important for the producers.
Nothing that we can reverse engineer in the same way we’re able to do for anime DVD/BDs, no. And the sheer number of CDs would make it mindbogglingly difficult to track.
CDs aren’t so bad because thresholds get pretty low (~300) relative to how much a decent-selling CD sells. And Symphogear CDs sell very well so they rank plenty of times.
Also the CD lists already go to Top 300, so I dunno how much farther back they track beyond that.
CDs do not need an extended list like BD/DVD, since Oricon only counts up to rank 200 for singles and rank 300 for albums (this is obvious because i’ve seen CDs reappear in the full ranking with no change in sales except for that weeks addition), and the full lists released on Wednesday afternoon on Oricon Youtaiju is also up to rank 200 for singles and rank 300 for albums.
If you want the Symphogear sales, here they are (if you can figure out what the abbreviations are):
シンフォギア
278/56827 水樹
217/14058 高垣
286/25278 マリア×翼
310/16783 立花響
387/20383 風鳴翼
455/16193 雪音クリス
524/15472 暁切歌
781/15411 月読調
1129/14491 マリア
13483 キャロル
KeroTV also covers all the sales for anime-related CDs from 2009 and onwards (but you can easily search for sales before that on Oricon Youtaiju):
http://www20.atwiki.jp/keroro00innovator/
Thanks, that source was pretty useful.
While we wait for the full list, some updated v1s based on skimming the extended rankings for DVDs or BDs that didn’t make the prelims yet:
9,009 – Charlotte wk2
4,534 – Prisma Illya s3 wk2
3,473 – Gakkou Gurashi wk2
2,899 – Gangsta wk2
2,462 – Junjou s3 wk2
1,132 – Crowds s2 wk2
2,209 – Joukamachi wk1
2,048 – Shirayukihime wk1
1,321 – Aoharu Kikan wk1
1,118 – Ranpo Kitan wk1
Real numbers may be a few discs higher when we get the formal full list.
Glad to see Gakkou Gurashi more than double its dismal 1.6k wk1. It too was heavily hit by the Oricon/Amazon issue. And Charlotte ought to bring at least the Vol. 1 10ks to 3 for Summer. Now, can it and Overlord hold?
Oh. I’m surprised Prisma suddenly went 4.5k. Didn’t expect that.
That’s the missing data from week 1 mostly.
Ugh, those Ushio to Tora sales hurt… it’s a shame it was overestimated by that much. But ah well, it won’t affect the fact that they are going to the end of the manga anyway.
full list…. (The site only allow Japan IPs to visit, so I check it through Google cache….)
http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:6BDU_sZxH4YJ:yaraon-blog.com/archives/71144+&cd=1&hl=ja&ct=clnk&gl=jp
Surprise news: “Okusama ga Seito Kaichou!” (My Wife is the Student Council President) Vol 2 is selling better than Vol 1….. (Vol 2 has event ticket, but still…..)
You should be able to view yaraon without a Japanese IP, I’m on there quite often. http://yaraon-blog.com/archives/71144 Urisure still slow to update so I guess I’ll use this for now, thanks. Might as well knock the post out tonight since I’ve got the extended rankings all prepped anyway.
I’ve been the one who is actually updating the full list thread at urisure for many weeks now. The original guy used to be so prompt at doing this.
I wonder if they’ve abandoned it entirely, but the dailies and such still update so I dunno.
Updated for the full list. (Still tweaking some numbers from the extended rankings as I go through it)
So Okusama had an event ticket in volume 2 but not volume 1? Is that a good strategy? I guess you can tell if a bunch of people are buying it just for the ticket…
Okusama volume 1 also has some leg and sold over 1014 BDs, so I guess word-of-mouth has some effect, too.
Dream Creation is the major financier and distributor of Okusama. I check the record, and I find that Okusama is actually one of Dream Creation’s best-selling animes.
Therefore, I guess the season 2 of Okusama is likely to get made.
I have a feeling v1 is still the best bet. The closer you are to airing, the more people are going to be thinking of the show at all. While a later ticket might offset normal volume drop-off, you’ll still have lost some people that aren’t actively thinking about the show anymore.
I doubt it’s a significant effect either way though, probably comes out about the same. Especially for v2, because it’s only a month difference.
Seems to make sense. I would have thought you get it started with something exciting in vol. 1 then maybe a few more people decide to buy the rest of them since they already have the first one or something like that. Whereas if you didn’t buy vol.1 and bought vol. 2 why would you go back and get vol.1 (unless you forgot to get it or something)?
Checked the extended rankings for this week. About 75 DVDs and 125 BDs were new or added a week of ranking.
Updated volume 1s
9,050 – Charlotte
5,260 – Umaru-chan
4,682 – Prisma Illya s3
3,474 – Gakkou Gurashi
2,653 – Shimoneta
1,625 – Wakaba Girl
1,326 – Okusama Seitokai
769 – Kuusen Madoushi
677 – Danchigai
Updated averages for finished shows
15,521 – Shirobako
11,292 – Gochiusa
9,836 – Saekano
9,754 – Jojo s3
5,004 – Nanatai
1,364 – Okusama Seitokai
807 – Gunslinger Stratos
677 – Danchigai
Updated BD boxes/re-releases
10,365 – Anohana
9,264 – Love Live s1 (singles re-release)
411 – Noragami
Updated films/OVAs/etc
45,304 – Anohana
12,524 – K Missing Kings
8,262 – Haikyuu recap
Shirayukihime did better than I expected. 2k for a shoujo anime? That’s actually not bad. Plus it got a good manga boost and it will still get the second season manga boost, though it’ll be smaller. Come on Hakusensha, give AkaYona a season 2! I’ve still got to watch the Kekkai Sensen finale. That’s another one which needs a season 2. Arslan doing alright, it even got a new season announced, yay! And thank goodness KuroBasu is back to normal numbers. Phew.
Ouch for AoKikan. I knew it wouldn’t do well because of it having a main girl but still…ouch. Oh well, at least it got a decent manga boost. Ranpo Kitan, another ouch, though that series was weird sometimes.
Gangsta. didn’t do too badly either. Still, we’ll never get a second season, RIP Manglobe. ;_;
Yona is an ongoing manga right? I don’t know if the weirdness that happened with the discs would affect the likelihood of a sequel, but hopefully not. Will there be enough material to adapt post OVA?
Oh, there’s MORE than enough material for a second season. The manga is quite slow paced, but not in a annoying way. It takes time to cover the stories of almost all its characters, including side characters.
I don’t think the disc thing will affect it. It’s still selling over 2k, it’s not like it’s selling 500 copies or less.
Hakusensha waited for more than a year to announce KamiHaji’s season 2 so I wouldn’t be surprised if they do the same for Yona since Yona is one of the flagship series for Hana to Yume now.
SoreSekai, KamiHaji, Yona and Shirayukihime are all from the same publisher. I love Hana to Yume and LaLa.
Oh interesting. I enjoyed SoreSekai (this one was a surprise) and Yona, and was thinking of watching Shirayukihime (haven’t gotten around to more than the beginning, though I probably will especially since it’s getting another cour). The multi cour of decent shoujo romance shows we’ve been getting seems like a nice trend.
The fact that Yona’s been selling numbers that aren’t too bad makes the disc thing more perplexing! Why did VAP back out leading to the delayed disc release? It makes so little sense…Well, hopefully that won’t hurt its chances at a sequel.
bit of a stupid question, but are the sales figures in the thousands (ie: 8,000= 8 million) or as they are?
because a few thousand sales across a whole nation is a horrifying statistic, shows how much we fans actually care about home releases of anime. which is not at all.
As they are. 8,000 (reported by Oricon, real sales will be somewhat higher) is quite good. Millions would be insane! Japan has a population of less than 130 million, for 8 million of them to buy a super-niche late night anime is just not possible. Take Bakemonogatari for example. Best-selling show in the modern era (2000 onward), and its average sales are 79,201 units. Multiplying that by 1000 would be over 79 million average units sold. There are roughly 50 million “households” in Japan. Surely we’re orders of magnitude off of what could conceivably be possible.
It’s really not horrifying for a niche luxury good to sell a few thousand units per disc. You have to consider a few central points:
1. Anime is niche, this stuff (well, most of it) airs between about 11PM and 3AM.
2. Anime is nonetheless actually a fairly sizable chunk of the whole Japanese home video market, so anime does really well on a comparative basis. If anything anime fans care more than most people.
3. Anime is expensive. At roughly ¥6,000+ (~$50) a disc, you don’t have to move a massive number of copies to be viable. Especially because of the next item…
4. Anime is just one part of a broader multi-media push for most properties. There’s usually source material (manga, novel, games, etc), spinoff media, merchandise of all sorts (figures, clothes, posters, and so on), international licensing rights, etc.
5. Media just doesn’t operate at the scales you’re assuming here. The most successful releases of any video media ever in Japan are between 2-3 million units sold, and that’s for incomprehensibly massive mainstream successes (Sen to Chihiro no Kamikakushi [Spirited Away] and Frozen) not late night shows.
It’s not anywhere near as dire as it may sound. Even if you compare it to America, with ~2.5x the population and much more emphasis on moving total volume rather than per unit price, it’s not like selling many millions is routine here either. More common for sure, as we just produce and buy tons more media than other countries, but still something only expected of relatively big-budget productions not niche TV series.
So yep, the numbers are what they are, albeit you should usually apply anywhere from a 20-100% increase (depending on a variety of factors) to account for Oricon’s counts not being complete. And that’s actually okay. A few thousand units really can be enough to signal a successful franchise. There are probably only about a few hundred thousand dedicated anime fans in Japan to begin with, and a somewhat larger pool of casual fans who will dip in and out for specific popular shows. With so much other merchandise existing for most series to spend money on, only the most dedicated fans are going to buy video discs for something they’ve already seen on TV or Niconico. Instead they’ll go out and buy a figure or the original manga or whatever. The market accounts for this, expects this, and incorporates it into how anime is funded and produced.
Eventually, in the long run, physical media will go away, yes. But hardcore anime fans are probably going to be among the *last* people to give up their physical media.
Thanks for the answer, man. So economically, home video sales actually make sense as they are as there is a high profit margin per unit good for high outlays and low demand to produce a normal revenue. Thus the collectors satisfy the cost of the anime’s production and the anime’s financial losses (if applicable) are made up easily by the HUGE manga volume sales boost all the concurrent manga series get.
But let’s not talk about English anime releases, the piracy is so ripe across the ocean that we animanga fans are simply killing the industry. I knew about Oricon not taking into account digital music sales (which obviously makes things a little inaccurate). But thanks for clarifying this, its amazing how the tens of thousands of Akihabara otaku keep all our shows alive on their own. =D
I often downplay the importance of DVD/BD sales for anime, mostly because I’m trying to dispel one of western fandom’s most common misconceptions (that DVD/BD sales are all that matters). But while they’re absolutely not the only thing that matters, they are important (for most shows).
Because of the way anime production committees are structured, generally with the video disc publisher at the top (i.e. they invested the most money), disc sales are pretty essential for at least part of the committee, but much less so for others.
Gakkou Gurashi! is a good example:
Houbunsha (manga publisher, #2 spot on the committee) saw the manga sales increase roughly 1000% from pre-anime levels – that’s fantastic! It’s the best boost they’ve gotten on a relative basis in half a decade (only K-ON! did better).
NBC Universal (video publisher/distributor, #1 spot on the committee), however, is seeing middling to mediocre video disc sales – not so great. See this post for translated comments by an anime producer describing the phenomenon. What they describe isn’t the exact situation every adaptation faces (for example saying the manga put in zero investment implies the publisher isn’t on the committee at all, which is sometimes but certainly not always the case!), but the general gist – that there can be both winners and losers on production committees – holds true. So even if there were enough material for a sequel, it’s actually pretty unlikely we’d get another season of Gakkou Gurashi, despite the manga’s stellar boost.
If disc sales completely tanked, manga/novel/game publishers would have to take the lead and invest more money per adaptation, original (non-adaptation) anime would become less common, taking risks would be rarer, and the overall number of late night anime productions would likely drop markedly. This would not matter for mainstream/kids shows which already have negligible disc sales and plenty of other revenue streams, but a lot of late night anime really does need those DVD/BDs to sell. The market wouldn’t go away without them but it would certainly change a lot.
Ohhhh interesting tweets. Honestly, it seems like the structure of the industry/scheduling of TV just aren’t very favorable/conducive to anime sequels in general unless a show did extremely well, which is kind of disappointing if you want more of a show (interestingly, the current Noragami sequel seems to be an exception). Interestingly, it seems kind of the opposite of the U.S., where if a tv show doesn’t get a sequel, you can guess that it probably didn’t do well. Though the U.S. TV business is very different from Japan.
Quite a few shows still get sequels with mediocre disc sales, which is another example of why it’s so hard to generalize when talking about production committees. I’d be curious to know how many non-hits (let’s say sub-5k) with sequels had the same company handling multiple roles. For example, Kadokawa doing both source material and video disc publishing on many of their adaptations, or King Records handling both video and music.
Thanks for clearing things up on the nature of Japanese home releases.
Another question: how do we know who has been assigned role and ranking in the production committee of an anime?
You often see it at the end of the OP or ED, for example Yama no Susume 2nd Season, which has a rather large committee at nine listed members.
Other times it’s not so simple. Take Gakkou Gurashi for example, that only gives you a list of people under the Producer credit, and you have to do some digging to determine who they work for (a task I leave up to the more dedicated committee hunters) because the committee entry in the credits is just a collective name, not a list of individual companies.
It’s often (but by no means always) safe to assume that the video distributor will be #1 and if it’s an adaptation that the original manga/game/novel publisher will be #2 if they’re on the committee. Sometimes it’s the same company, as in YamaSusu’s case. Earth Star both publishes the manga and publishes and distribute the DVD/BDs.
As I suspected, producing companies like Genco and EGG FIRM would get lowest rank – but I’m suprised that the studio is ranked 3rd and below the home release distributor.
Could you find out this info for Prison School? I need it for the wiki cos I’m an editor there. Here’s what I’ve surmised already:
Animation Studio: J.C.Staff
Home Releases: Warner Bros. Home Entertainment
Original Licensors: Kodansha
Distribution: Showgate • KlockWorx
Disc Manufacturers: Movic
Production: GENCO • EGG FIRM
Could you go to the OP “Ai no Prison” & ED “Tsumibukaki Oretachi no Sanka” on Youtube and help me out?