07-09-2004, 11:55 AM
Well Vicious, although I agree with a lot of what you've been saying I don't agree with you when you say:
The truth is I can, and (unfortunatly) I'm not fluent in Japanese. In the same way I can tell when I'm listening to something spoken in Chinese, Korean, German or Italian. Do you speak French? Let us assume you don't for the sake of my example. Can't you tell when someone's speaking in French, even though you can't speak the language? See my point?
Now, about this whole dub vs sub subject. I really don't understand what this discussion is all about. Isn't it a personal matter? People will never agree with each other on account of different personal choices, you can argue about it till kingdom come! I personally don't like listening to dubs. Not that there aren't good dubs out there but I always try listening to series and films in their original language the same way I always try reading books in their original version (if I know the language, and I only know 4 languages). It's a personal choice, to me things are more real in their original form, in the way they were intended to be. The 1st country in Europe to broadcast Neon Genesis Evangelion on TV was Portugal and the dubs were carefully supervised by Gainax. They were great! Really! I like the Portuguese voices much more than the Japanese or the English ones and yet when I bought the dvds I re-watched the series in Japanese.
Reading subtitles has never stopped me from appreciate the art, but then again 90% of whatever's on tv here is subtitled so I grew up reading subtitles and am quite used to them.
The thing is people, there are good and bad dubs and there are people who will prefer them and others that won't so there's no point in arguing about it.
Now, on to the real subject of this thread.
I complain more about the fact the anime companies put 3 episodes (okay, sometimes more) on a single dvd than about the price they ask for them. I rather have a 26 episode series in 6 dvds (like .hack//sign) than in 8 (like X TV series). And don't tell me it's a matter of quality because most of the GTO's dvds have 5 episodes each and the quality is good. I know they can't afford to lower their prices much more because they have a lot of expenses to pay and they need to make a profit or they're out of business. The truth is some companies like ADV are already selling entire collections at very good prices, like Steel Angel Kurumi ($59.98 list price) and Soul Hunter ($49.98 list price). If they're doing it it's because they can. We can't forget this is their job and they know what they're doing. I personally can't ask them to lower their prices more than this, especially because the prices I mentioned are the List Prices and these series can be bought for less than this. If people want to buy this cheaper sets than they just have to be patient and wait for them to come out. Don't blame them for selling these sets only a month after the whole series is released in seperatly sold dvds, blame yourselves for being such junkies you can't wait some months. The choice is yours, either you pay more but watch the anime earlier or you save some money but watch it later. If other companies started selling their boxed sets at a more accessible (not overly cheap) price like ADV is doing I believe they would increase their sales a bit. I mean, ever since the Steel Angel Kurumi set came out I've seen a lot people buying it, myself included.
Although I support HKs because they allow me to watch a lot more anime than if I was just buying the R1s I totally understand why companies like Bandai are trying to sue them. It's their right!
Quote:Originally posted by Vicious
They could probably mix some Cantonese or Swahili in there and none of you would know the difference.
The truth is I can, and (unfortunatly) I'm not fluent in Japanese. In the same way I can tell when I'm listening to something spoken in Chinese, Korean, German or Italian. Do you speak French? Let us assume you don't for the sake of my example. Can't you tell when someone's speaking in French, even though you can't speak the language? See my point?
Now, about this whole dub vs sub subject. I really don't understand what this discussion is all about. Isn't it a personal matter? People will never agree with each other on account of different personal choices, you can argue about it till kingdom come! I personally don't like listening to dubs. Not that there aren't good dubs out there but I always try listening to series and films in their original language the same way I always try reading books in their original version (if I know the language, and I only know 4 languages). It's a personal choice, to me things are more real in their original form, in the way they were intended to be. The 1st country in Europe to broadcast Neon Genesis Evangelion on TV was Portugal and the dubs were carefully supervised by Gainax. They were great! Really! I like the Portuguese voices much more than the Japanese or the English ones and yet when I bought the dvds I re-watched the series in Japanese.
Reading subtitles has never stopped me from appreciate the art, but then again 90% of whatever's on tv here is subtitled so I grew up reading subtitles and am quite used to them.
The thing is people, there are good and bad dubs and there are people who will prefer them and others that won't so there's no point in arguing about it.
Now, on to the real subject of this thread.
I complain more about the fact the anime companies put 3 episodes (okay, sometimes more) on a single dvd than about the price they ask for them. I rather have a 26 episode series in 6 dvds (like .hack//sign) than in 8 (like X TV series). And don't tell me it's a matter of quality because most of the GTO's dvds have 5 episodes each and the quality is good. I know they can't afford to lower their prices much more because they have a lot of expenses to pay and they need to make a profit or they're out of business. The truth is some companies like ADV are already selling entire collections at very good prices, like Steel Angel Kurumi ($59.98 list price) and Soul Hunter ($49.98 list price). If they're doing it it's because they can. We can't forget this is their job and they know what they're doing. I personally can't ask them to lower their prices more than this, especially because the prices I mentioned are the List Prices and these series can be bought for less than this. If people want to buy this cheaper sets than they just have to be patient and wait for them to come out. Don't blame them for selling these sets only a month after the whole series is released in seperatly sold dvds, blame yourselves for being such junkies you can't wait some months. The choice is yours, either you pay more but watch the anime earlier or you save some money but watch it later. If other companies started selling their boxed sets at a more accessible (not overly cheap) price like ADV is doing I believe they would increase their sales a bit. I mean, ever since the Steel Angel Kurumi set came out I've seen a lot people buying it, myself included.
Although I support HKs because they allow me to watch a lot more anime than if I was just buying the R1s I totally understand why companies like Bandai are trying to sue them. It's their right!