Help with some Sailor Moon imports~

[beans_etc]

Hey all, yesterday I received an order I'd made on shopanimedvd.com for the entire series of Sailor Moon (all five season and the three movies) and was dismayed to discover that 4 out of the 5 boxsets they sent me did not match the pictures they advertised on the site. I spent a long time before I put in the order researching which import version was the best, so I'm pretty chapped that I didn't get the ones I thought I was getting.

http://www.shopanimedvd.com/advanced_sea...on&x=0&y=0

These are the ones I thought I was getting, advertised as being manufactured by MAC. (The five sets on the bottom of the page, plus the Sailor Stars season at the top of the page. The season 1 boxset is the only one that came through as advertised.)

Instead, the boxsets I received look like this (grabbing pics from other sites where I find them):

Sailor Moon R
http://www.animecollector.com/cgi-bin/buy?a0=03238

Sailor Moon S
http://www.animecollector.com/cgi-bin/buy?a0=02815

Sailor Moon Super S
http://www.animecollector.com/cgi-bin/buy?a0=03168

Movie Trilogy
http://import-anime.com/screenshots.php?...em_id=4774

So I'm wondering, are these simply the new MAC packaging or are they completely different import versions? I've looked through import-anime.com and it doesn't seem to have reviews on many of the version that I have, so I don't know who made them or what they're like compared to the other ones.

Any help would be appreciated. Thanks all~

[Amethyst]

The only HK set of Sailor Moon I can verify is the Sailor Stars set, the picture matches the one on shopanime (animekrazy) for MAC, but I have it listed as Anime Cartoon.. it doesn't say on the outside of the gatefold that it's MAC or AC, but it may have had AC's logo on the disks... I don't remember if AC and MAC are the same companies or not... if so, I think they used AC before they changed over to using MAC

bmvtoys could probably tell you exactly what you had... His site lists some sailor moon stuff, but it doesn't list the manufacturers.

http://anotherheaven.biz/inc/searchresul...n&n=267196

[beans_etc]

That site doesn't seem to have any of the versions I have (the movie set is similar but you can tell from the movie titles on the top that it's a different copy.) Can I email the webmaster of that site about it? Do you think he'd actually take the time to look into my question for me?

Damn this is so frustrating. Is there anyone else you know of that knows all about different bootleg releases? If they didn't stop putting their logo on the boxes then it wouldn't be such a pain. *Sigh*

Thanks for the reply though~

[Amethyst]

Yes, you could email the web master of the site, but I don't know when he will get around to responding, usually he's pretty quick about it, but they have been out of town until about now I think... so if you don't get an immediate response, be patient, they may not be back yet...

Have you tried playing one disk of each of the sets? The logos are usually on the intro or even the menus, or on the disk itself around the outside rim or hub, but that may just mean it was ripped from said company... the HK's did that a lot... about the best sets (usually) were FX which is now EZDVD which were usually R1 rips. Unfortunately I traded my daughters HK sets of Sailor Moon when she replaced them with R1's, other than the Stars series which won't be done by any R1 company.

I looked up my notes on HK suppliers and researched this:

Animation Video = AV

Anime Cartoon or Manga Int. Inc are the same = AC or MI dvdshop2001.com.tw usually on the disk hub somewhere

Anime Studio Inc. or Manga Anime Cartoon are the same = AS or MAC

FX is the same as Animation City Int. Limited or EZDVD now since they have some of FX's masters. These are usually R1 rips and came out much later than the others because of waiting on the R1's for dubs.

Here is a link to the various HK sets of Sailor Moon, it doesn't show pictures, but you can see that most of them are very similar in ratings so it really doesn't matter which sets you get.

http://import-anime.com/index.php?page=list&list=S

If you have trouble with the company symbols, you can do the drop down box on top and see which ones are which... (round yellow circle is AS, Green M is MI or AC, MAC is MAC, Red circle with FX is FX, green circle with red is EZDVD.. etc.

There used to be a FAQ about them, but I can't find it right off hand on here or any other forum... sorry.

[Schultz]

There used to be a FAQ about them, but I can't find it right off hand on here or any other forum... sorry.

Its the post right above this one.
http://import-anime.com/forums/showthread.php?t=2560
Titled NEW Rules and FAQ!

[beans_etc]

I think I've figured it out. I went to what I've been told is MAC's official site (animegod.com) and looked at their Sailor Moon releases which match the ones I thought I was ordering. Along with every boxset they carry they also list alongside it the DVD manufacturing number and when I compared the numbers with those on the individual DVDs I received, it turns out they all match up. (With exception of my movie trilogy set -- it was the only set whose numbers were completely different, and after some more rummaging through the review section I found an image for the set I currently have to be the same as EZ's release.)

So I guess the seasons 1 - 5 ones I ended up getting actually are the MAC versions like they were advertised, but the packaging has since been updated. I wish I would have known they were the same ones before, there's a ton of sites I saw where I could have gotten them cheaper, LOL. ^^;

[tanakag]

Tuff luck mate, happens to all of us