Anime Sales in Japan - 2011

[Draneor]

Originally Posted by something

I have to wonder if Shana III has any hope of making a profit at two cour, because the production values seem easily on par with other big-name JC Staff shows. Preorder rankings don't look promising at all.

They waited too long, basically. Shana may have been one of the first popular light novel adaptations, but now we've seen dozens of others. And thanks for pointing out that F/0 is also split cour since I missed it.

Originally Posted by something

And as far as romance visual novels go I'd be surprised if we ever see a major hit again other than probably Little Busters.

Well, that's kind of my point. I don't think it's financially possible to adapt LB in a way that does it justice. I see popular but lesser known titles still getting low-budget adaptions to help promote console ports and big titles continuing to get short OVAs and movies due to their dedicated fanbase (Aquaplus/Leaf and Typemoon). What I don't see is another adaptation that actually does a visual novel of Clannad's length justice.

[something]

Originally Posted by Draneor

Well, that's kind of my point. I don't think it's financially possible to adapt LB in a way that does it justice. I see popular but lesser known titles still getting low-budget adaptions to help promote console ports and big titles continuing to get short OVAs and movies due to their dedicated fanbase (Aquaplus/Leaf and Typemoon). What I don't see is another adaptation that actually does a visual novel of Clannad's length justice.

Right, I was agreeing with you. Of all the various media out there, it seems like success as a visual novel has the least correlation to success as an anime... Wiki says Majikoi was the #1 selling visual novel of its year (not sure how comprehensive the source is) and yet it's sold 2.7k BDs first volume and I doubt anyone expected much better... I guess being a top selling visual novel doesn't mean nearly as much as being a top selling video game or manga or even light novel though. Very different market size. All of which makes supporting two cour an even riskier proposition, let alone four and a movie like Clannad eventually got.

That said, I don't know how long LB is compared to Clannad but I'm sure it'll get two cour when its adapted. Unless KyoAni somehow disappears before then, there should be at least 15k buyers ready to pick up the next Key/KyoAni adaptation.

[Draneor]

Originally Posted by something

That said, I don't know how long LB is compared to Clannad but I'm sure it'll get two cour when its adapted.

With the two EX stories, it has almost exactly the same amount of lines.

[something]

Originally Posted by Draneor

With the two EX stories, it has almost exactly the same amount of lines.

In that case is really just comes down to the structure of the story I guess. Clannad stood well enough on its own with the first two cour, though certainly getting After Story animated was one of the best things that's ever happened.

But if there's any visual novel I wouldn't be worried about, it's Little Busters. If anything is going to get a full-scale adaptation with appropriate production values, it's that, as much because there's a proven market for their stuff as anything. It's just everything else I'd continue to expect low-to-medium budget one-cour adaptations for. Not that I can complain too much, plenty of those shows have been quite enjoyable (Fortune Arterial, Hoshizora e Kakaru Hashi, Mashiro-iro Symphony for recent examples) but then visual novel adaptations getting top class treatment have always been a rarity.

[DiGiKerot]

Originally Posted by superdry

Looks like Idolmaster G4U vol. 2 bundle did not rank at all for week 47 of sales on the Media Create charts. So, that means the only number we have right now is it sold at most 13000 copies unless someone like yaraon or another blog can get more specific numbers.

Source - NeoGaf

The figures reported via Dengeki have it at 15,688. It'll be curious to see if we hear anything in future weeks given the reported stock shortages.

[Suzuku]

According to the DVD wiki the vol 2 G4U sold 15,688 copies. It says at the bottom that the info is from the ASCII Comprehensive database and is tentative.

EDIT: http://yaraon.blog109.fc2.com/blog-entry-5637.html

[something]

Originally Posted by DiGiKerot

The figures reported via Dengeki have it at 15,688. It'll be curious to see if we hear anything in future weeks given the reported stock shortages.

Okay, good to have some numbers. I'd still estimate "real" sales of a "normal" release at around 15k, albeit with a little more leeway. Obviously it'll drop over the next 7 volumes.

[superdry]

Originally Posted by DiGiKerot

The figures reported via Dengeki have it at 15,688. It'll be curious to see if we hear anything in future weeks given the reported stock shortages.

Nice to know there is a source that we can look at when the subsequent volumes do come out. Interesting that neither Oricon nor Media Create tracks the sales of the bundles.

[something]

http://yaraon.blog109.fc2.com/blog-entry-5711.html
http://0taku.livedoor.biz/archives/4036609.html

Dec 2-3 (2 days)
137 screens
¥316,310,000 i.e. over $4 million USD

For comparison, over 4 days, The Adventures of Tintin did virtually the same on 895 screens.

Or compared to anime movies, this is first half of 2011 and this is all of 2010. Basically, after day 3 or 4 it should be ahead of what Nanoha did in a year. I wonder if it'll even pass Haruhi Shoushitsu (¥846m)... I'm trying to get comparable opening weekend or opening week numbers for Haruhi but stupid English websites are reporting it in $ instead of ¥ so exchange rates makes comparisons pointless. But Haruhi also only opened on 20% of the screens K-ON! did. I do see $2.7 million for Haruhi over the first 9 days, so whatever the exchange rate was, K-ON! will have a much much bigger opening week regardless.

Obviously it still can't be compared to kids' films like Conan or Pokemon Ghibli or other more mainstream stuff, which is why Haruhi or Macross or Nanoha are better comparisons.

[ultimatemegax]

Originally Posted by something

http://yaraon.blog109.fc2.com/blog-entry-5711.html
http://0taku.livedoor.biz/archives/4036609.html

Dec 2-3 (2 days)
137 screens
¥316,310,000 i.e. over $4 million USD

For comparison, over 4 days, The Adventures of Tintin did virtually the same on 895 screens.

Or compared to anime movies, this is first half of 2011 and this is all of 2010. Basically, after day 3 or 4 it should be ahead of what Nanoha did in a year. I wonder if it'll even pass Haruhi Shoushitsu (¥846m)... I'm trying to get comparable opening weekend or opening week numbers for Haruhi but stupid English websites are reporting it in $ instead of ¥ so exchange rates makes comparisons pointless. But Haruhi also only opened on 20% of the screens K-ON! did. I do see $2.7 million for Haruhi over the first 9 days, so whatever the exchange rate was, K-ON! will have a much much bigger opening week regardless.

Obviously it still can't be compared to kids' films like Conan or Pokemon Ghibli or other more mainstream stuff, which is why Haruhi or Macross or Nanoha are better comparisons.

In those posts, they list the first weekend's amounts in a table. The first weekend's sales are located in the fifth column. Shoushitsu earned 89,010,100 yen in 24 theatres for 2010/2/06-07.

Edit: Interesting. While K-On! obviously has Shoushitsu beat in pure amounts, the latter actually earned more money per theatre (with likely less showings too):
Shoushitsu: 3,708,754 yen per theatre
K-On!: 2,308,832 yen per theatre