Category > Anime
We've just been sent the details of a new mobile manga subscription service. Mangamo promises more titles than any other legal mobile manga service.
It's currently on iOS Devices (iPhone and iPad) with subscriptions costing $4.99 USD a month. The Tokyo based company has partnered with 11 publishers to bring the wide range of titles, including Attack on Titan, Battle Angel Alita, Somali and the Forest Spirit, along with Fire Force and many more titles. A full list of current titles can be found here. They also promise regular updates to the titles available.
Mangamo is available on the Apple App Store globally with the exception of Japan, China and Korea. Currently all titles are in English.
As this is a legal service you can be certain that the money goes back to the original creators helping fund the manga industry itself.
Read More... | Souce: Mangamo
Category > Anime
The good folks from anime streaming service Crunchyroll have sent us some exciting details about their latest venture - Crunchyroll Originals. We're told the shows, produced with respected publishers including Kodansha, animation studios such as MAPPA, and from Crunchyroll Studios, represent Crunchyroll's continued commitment to delight fans and expand the global anime community through fresh stories and unique perspectives from a global slate of creators.
They've got some original anime content that you can watch now, including In/Spectre, which mixes monsters and mystery.
Interestedly they've also sourced some great content from other parts of the world. UK based fans may already be familiar with with the excellent FreakAngels graphic novels from Warren Ellis & Paul Duffield.
Read More... | Souce: Crunchyroll
Category > Anime
If you like your anime with a musical twist, you can't go wrong to catch Carole & Tuesday on Netflix. From Bones and Shinichiro Watanabe it charts the story of two girls brought together by chance to make music. Watanabe is the supervising director for this show, while Motonobu Hori is also directing.
Music is a constant recurring theme for Watanabe, with the sound track dominating he shows such as Cowboy Bebop, while he's also been responsible for Kids on the Slope anime about two boys coming of age and exploring jazz together.
The 12 episode Carole & Tuesday is out now on Netflix dubbed into English, French, German, Italian, Brazilian Portuguese, Spanish, Castilian Spanish. It's available subbed in many languages too, including English. So yes, you can watch it in the original Japanese and one of 28 different languages.
Catch it now!
The studio are also lunching a fanart contest. First prize is 100,000 Japanese Yen Prize money!
Read More... | Souce: Carole & Tuesday Offical Website
Category > Anime
Not all quests are epic. Which is why we've been sent details about Chris and Kyle, two Americans who share an apartment in Tokyo. One day their toilet seat broke, which leads onto their adventures to find a suitable replacement. The trouble starts when they realise they don't know the Japanese word for toilet seat! Want to know more? Then you can find out by watching The Benza a 6 series comedy on Amazon Prime currently streaming in the US, UK, Germany and Japan.
Made on a budget of 2,000,000 yen (about 18,840 USD) the show explores what it's like to go hunting for a toilet seat in Japan.
Read More... | Souce: Tokyo Cowboys
Category > Anime
Streaming Service Netflix have just revealed that they will be showing anime Neon Genesis Evangelion worldwide starting from Spring 2019. Announced on their NXOnNetflix Twitter feed as a teaser trailer of the show.
The original Neon Genesis Evangelion TV Series is generally regarded as one of the greatest anime TV shows of it's era. In the mid 1990's it lit the flames for a new wave of anime that still carries on to this day. Without the anime boom it caused the anime industry itself would be very different. Australian Anime Distributors Madman Entertainment owed their early success to Neon Genesis Evangelion. For many it was the watershed title that helped them discover anime.
Written and directed by the otaku's otaku Hideaki Anno the multi-layered story blends a bleak future mixed with giant robots, nostalgia for 1960's adventure, along with Christian symbolism and nods to Tokusatsu, Thunderbirds, along with a special blend of whiny teenage angst and reasons to hate your father. You'll never listen to Ode to Joy the same way again.
The hugely influential show, spawned some movies, plus the rebuild series of new movies retelling the story with a different take, various manga spin offs, plus an endless stream of merchandise.
Souce: Offical NXOnNetflix Twitter
Category > Freaky Things
Sitting on a train travelling home, a man wearing a trench coat walked past me, I couldn't see his face, it was covered by the brim of his hat, I could see he had a moustache. I thought this was strange attire for the middle of June. I didn't know who he was, but he clearly knew me. Just as the train pulled into the next station he passed me a plain brown envelope and left the train before I could process what happened.
I waited until I got home until opening the envelope, just in case, as it's not everyday mustachioed stranger delivers a letter on public transport. The letter was from on-line retailer United Publications, they wanted to tell us that they've started stocking books for *ahem* mature readers from publisher Fakku. The letter said Fakku are company driven by fans, something United Publications are keen to support.
Not wanting to stop, the letter carried on.
"We know you've met renowned hentai master Toshio Maeda, but are you aware of the Kickstarter to get his most famous work Legend of the Overfiend published in English?"
We weren't aware of this Kickstarter, but now we are. Thank you, kind trenchcoated stranger.
The Kickstarter is due to end on Wednesday 20th July 2016. As of the time of writing $32,919 has been pledged towards the $47,000 (USD) target.
Souce: Fakku Kickstarter
Category > Retail
We've just got news from the good folks at Viewster about their latest Omakase goody box. The concept is simple, every two months they release a new themed box with merchandise from that series / theme. Along with a box of stuff, you also get access to Viewster's high definition ad-free streaming service. They'll ship to the United States, Canada and the UK.
The next box which is due out in March will feature Vocaloid Hatsune Miku and include exclusive Piapro Character Items. The box will retail for $29 USD (plus shipping and handling, which does vary where it's sent).
Previous themes have included Naruto and Kill La Kill.
Read More... | Souce: Omakase
Category > Anime
Streaming Service Viewster have just launched a new package aimed at anime fans. Omakase includes a subscription to their HD Ad-free service, plus a bimonthly box of goodies, including merchandise, music and comics. The boxes will feature limited edition and exclusive stuff. Their launch box will feature exclusive Kill la Kill merchandise.
The Omakase service will be available in the United States, Canada and the United Kingdom.
A subscription currently costs $29 (USD) for 2 months, plus shipping and handling.
Read More... | Souce: Viewster
Category > Anime
The Second Season of Kinmoza is now airing. No sooner than the first episode of season 2 was simulcast on Crunchyroll, US anime firm Sentai Filmworks announced that they have the US rights to the second season.
The second season is called Hello!! Kinmoza, and appears to more of the same moe anime as the first season. The show follows the gentle everyday adventures of Alice a British schoolgirl living in Japan with her best friend Shino. They go to school and talk about how blonde Alice's hair is. The show is based of a 4 panel manga.
We must admit that the Otaku News Team have a soft spot for the show. While it's light and fluffy content wise, the animation studio did it's research in the UK and found a location suitable for Alice's house. Otaku News had the world exclusive revealing the British location for Kinmoza as B&B Fosse Farm.
Kinmoza Season 1 is available to buy from Amazon.com on DVD and Blu-ray.
Readers (include those in the UK) can watch Kinmoza season 1 and 2 on Crunchyroll.
Read More... | Souce: Sentai Filmworks
Category > Anime
North American based readers who are fans of classic anime Sailor Moon will be pleased to hear that you can now watch it streaming on Hulu and Hulu Plus. VIZ Media will premiere SAILOR MOON Episodes 1-4 (subbed) today on its free NeonAlley.com.
Those readers outside North America will note that the streams are geo-locked. So you'll have to find your own local legal rights holder to watch Sailor Moon.
Read More... | Souce: Viz Media
Category > Anime
The big news in anime circles this week has been from Anime Limited and their Kickstarter campaign to bring Mai Mai Miracle to home video.
Within the first 18 hours the Kickstarter hit it's $30K (USD) funding goal. So now they're going for a stretch goal. If they hit the goal of $60K, they'll be able to fund a dub. At the time of writing (with 26 days left on the Kickstarter), they have reached just over $54K. You can keep up to date with news about the Kickstarter here or check out Anime Limited's own website.
Souce: Mai Mai Miracle Kickstarter
Category > Manga
The good folks from the Kansai Club have sent us details of their Kickstarter to get Osamu Tezuka's The Crater published in English. They intend to publish it as a limited edition run of 2,000 high quality copies.
This is not the first of Tezuka's works to be crowd funded for an English release. Last year DMP ran a successful Kickstarter to get Unico funded.
Read More... | Souce: Kansai Club\'s Kickstarter page
Category > Culture
J-Pop fans who can access NHK World will want to tune in for Johnnys' World: Top of the J-Pops.
The documentary focuses on Johnny Kitagawa of talent agency Johnny's Entertainment. The talent agency represents Tsuyoshi Domoto of Kinki Kids and Hey! Say! Jump!.
It'll be broadcast on NHK World on:
Saturday 26th January 2013 - 23:10 (UTC)
Sunday 27th January 2013 - 3:10/ 7:10/ 11:10/ 15:10/ 19:10 (UTC)
NHK World broadcasts content in English and is free to access. It's available in many countries.
In the UK if you have Sky you can access NHK World on Channel 507. If you've got FreeSat you can access it on channel 209.
Failing that, you can also watch the show on-line on the NHK Website, JIB TV, or on the NHK World App on iOS Devices (iPhone, iPad, etc) and Android Devices.
Souce: NHK World
Category > Manga
The good folks from GEN Manga have just release their latest Issue GEN 16.
This issue continues the instalments of Psycho, Android Angels, Stones of Power, Anomal and Alive.
Read More... | Souce: GEN Manga
Category > Current Affairs
The folks at FrontTowardsGamer.com have got in touch with us to spread the word about their charity auction. They've got a copy of the Cowboy Bebop Movie Script, which has been autographed by the US voice actors.
The charity auction aims to raise money to build video game stuffed care packages for troops in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Souce: FrontTowardsGamer.com
The good folks at Viz have sent us details of the up coming US release of Naruto Shippuden The Movie: Bonds which is due out on DVD and Blu-ray on Tuesday October 25th 2011.
To celebrate US based readers can watch on-line for a limited time a marathon of all five Naruto movies! The stream is avaiable this weekend until Sunday October 23rd 2011.
Read More... | Souce: VizAnime.com
Category > Manga
The good folks at Viz Media have sent us details of their latest title to appear on VIZManga. They've just launched Neon Genesis Evangelion with weekly digital chapters for $0.99. It's available on PC and Mac, iPhone, iPad, iPod Touch and Android phones and tablets.
Read More... | Souce: VizManga.com
Category > Manga
GEN Manga the company bringing us indie manga from the Tokyo underground have sent us reminder that issue 4 is out today.
They've also released issue 2 for free. They're even extending their subscribers discount. What makes GEN Manga interesting is that each issue is published on PDF, so you can download it and read it on any device that'll handle PDF documents. There's no nasty DRM to worry about, or installing extra naggy software, just one file per issue.
Read More... | Souce: GEN Manga
Category > Anime
The excellent folks from Right Stuf/Nozomi are now streaming the anime Emma: A Victorian Romance on YouTube. They'll be showing one new episode of Emma per week for the US, Canada, UK, Ireland, Australia and New Zealand. They're showing the episodes subtitled. So if you fancy an anime series set in Victorian England, now's your chance to watch it for free.
You can get Series 1 and Series 2 from Amazon.com. You can also pre-order The Complete Series Limited Edition Bundle, which features Season 1 and Season 2, it's out on September 13th 2011.
Souce: Right Stuf
Want zombies with your anime? The good folks at Sentai Filmworks and Anime Network are willing to provide you with infected flesh eating monsters! Sentai Filmworks have the license for High School of the Dead. and will be releasing it subbed and dubbed throughout North America.
The Anime Network will also be showing the first and second episode from Monday July 5th to subscribers in North America.
Read More... | Souce: Sentai Filmworks
Category > Manga
Multi-National Manga Anti-Piracy Coalition Formed
We've received some very interesting details from VIZ Media about the formation of a Multi-National Manga Anti-Piracy Coalition.It seems that the industry has grown tired of Scanlations - manga scanned into a digital format and distributed without the copyright holders consent. The coalition include the 36 members of Japan's Digital Comic Association, Square Enix, VIZ Media, TOKYOPOP and Yen Press.
Originally scanlations were manga translated by fans into their native language from Japanese. This can be seen as the manga equivalent of anime fansubs. Some scanlation sites branched out to scans of manga that was already official translated and licensed outside of Japan.
This has cost the manga publishing industry significant amounts of money, not just in lost book sales, but lost opportunities in the relatively new market of eBooks and mobile devices.
The coalition intend to target scanlation sites and aggregators of scanlation sites. They've drawn up a list of 30 sites to targeted for action. First they will ask the sites to cease distributing scanlations. If the sites fail to cease distributing further action will be taken depending on the jurisdiction of each site. Actions include legal injunctions against the sites, reporting the sites to governmental anti-piracy units of law enforcement, including the US Justice Department, local law enforcement agencies and the FBI.
Fans curious about piracy in the anime and manga industry should read the Pirate Anime FAQ.
This is not the first time the anime and manga industry has attempted to stop piracy in the industry, but this is the biggest and most coordinated international effort so far. With many companies in the industry forced to make cut backs, closing down offices, laying off staff, we wonder if this is the start of a new approach? Will more companies pursue legal options? Are fansubbers next?
Read More... | Souce: VIZ Media
Category > Anime
US Anime fans can now watch Vampire Knight on-line as it premiers on VizAnime.com. This streamed anime title is only available to people inside the US.
Read More... | Souce: Viz Anime
Category > Anime
The good folks at Crunchyroll have sent us details of their latest streaming deal. They've started to show The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya. Fans looking for aliens, time travelers, and ESPers will be most pleased to hear that they intend to stream the second series later this year too. Crunchyroll's licence covers the Americas, the British Isles, Scandinavia, the Middle East and Africa.
Read More... | Souce: Crunchyroll
Category > Manga
The good folks at Bandai Entertainment have sent us details about their new manga website.
Read More... | Souce: Bandai Entertainment Manga
Category > Fandom
There are tons of dating sites on the internet. Lots are even specialist dating sites by interest. So it should come as no surprise that the clever folks at Fan Crush have set up a dating site for otaku - Otaku Crush.
Read More... | Souce: Otaku Crush
Category > Anime
Anime fans will want to check out RightStuf's latest podcast. It features an interview with anime expert Helen McCarthy who promotes her book 500 Essential Anime Movies. In the podcast she explains how she narrowed down her choices in the book to just 500 shows. Along with how anime production and writing about anime has changed over the years.
Souce: RightStuf Anime Today Podcast
Category > Anime
We've just got an e-mail from the pioneering folks at Genoen who'd like to let us know that they've posted up the latest Geneon Spot audio podcast, featuring an interview with Taliesin Jaffe (the ADR director of R.O.D -The TV-, Hellsing, Hellsing Ultimate, BECK: Mongolian Chop Squad, etc.), who talks about script adaptation work and the realities of being an anime voice actor.
Souce: Geneon Spot audio podcast
Category > Websites
The nice folks at Geneon Entertainment have sent us news that they've launched a website for Hellsing Ultimate, the OAV incarnation of the fan favourite anime series. The website contains some details about the series, it's creator, DVD release dates, along with a host of downloads like desktop wallpaper and chat icons.
Read More... | Souce: Hellsing Ultimate Website
Category > Anime
Bad news for American anime fans. Anime News Network has reported that Anime Forest.com, the popular on-line rental site, will be shutting down after three years of service. An e-mail was sent out to customers of the site informing them of the closing, though reasons as to why were not given. Per-rental services ceased on April 7th, while subscription services will end on April 30. Anime Forest thanks their customers for their support in the e-mail. They will be missed.
Souce: Anime News Network
Category > Anime
Adult Swim to start featuring classic and new shows on website, seven days a week.
Read More... | Souce: Anime News Network
Category > Anime
Unfortunately for us hugely popular gaming site IGN aren't seeking the Otaku News Crew, but they are seeking freelancers who love anime and manga! So if you live in the US, are over 18 and fancy being a freelance writer, why not drop them a line, they'll even pay you! If on the other hand you want to work for free and support grassroots anime fandom then why not contact us! We can't pay you, but we can always give you a sense of satisfaction that is better than money, (honest) and since we're also a lot slacker about deadlines too! ^_-
Souce: IGN
UK on-line retailer's Play.com and Amazon.co.uk have started to take pre-orders for Howl's Moving Castle, they both listing the release date as 13th March 2006. Otaku News had heard rumours about Optimum wanting to release Howl earlier, however in order to qualify for an Academy Award, they had to delay the release. What's interesting to note that the boxshots from Amazon and Play are different, which leads us to believe that both sites have produced mock-ups as they are missing vital details on the packaging such as the BBFC rating logo.
A quick check on Amazon.com reveals that they're taking pre-orders for two different versions of Howl's Moving Castle, which are priced the same, we suspect that Amazon will remove one edition nearer the launch date.
If Optimum and Buena Vista can release Howl's Moving Castle in March, they should be highly commended, since the Japanese DVD has just been released this November and Ghibli titles have been traditonally very slow to get US and UK DVD releases.
Souce: Play.com
Central Park Media have just sent us details about their Kakurenbo: Hide & Seek website. In addition to information about the CG animation's awards, creators, and English and Japanese voice actors (including Junko Takeuchi - the voice of Naruto), there's a special video recorded at this year's San Diego Comic-Con.
The DVD is due for release on October 11.
Souce: Central Park Media
Category > Websites
The people over at AOL have just sent details of their new Japanese Pop Station. It seems that AOL Radio listeners enjoyed the Video Game Scores station so much that AOL have added a Japanese Pop station due to popular demand!
Read More... | Souce: AOL
Category > Websites
Here at Otaku News we listen to you, our readers comments and will always try to improve the site based on what we hear. The most common request we've had so far is for a review section. So the Otaku News Crew started to work away, writing reviews and also writing the code for you to navigate the reviews. At the moment we've put up some DVD reviews for you to read, over time we intend to add a lot more. Currently all editions of Otaku News will show all DVDs, regardless of their region. Eventually once we have a substantial number of reviews the UK and US Editions will only display reviews from their region.
We've also adopted a policy of being honest, so far one review already has a rating of 2 out of 10! We hope you find this addition to the site helpful and enjoying reading our opinions, of course if you don't like it and think you can do better, then by all means tell us, we are always looking for talented contributors to write news articles, reviews and anything else of interest to otaku!
Souce: Otaku News DVD Review Section
Category > Webcomics
It's been a busy week for me which is why I haven't posted as much news as I would like on Otaku News this week. So today is catch up day! One of the advantages of running your own news website means that you can plug your other side projects now and again (no Spike that doesn't mean you can start posting about all the yaoi you draw).
OK, first up on Monday November 22nd, Frightmoore University an up-and-coming webcomic I'm the webmaster for, has just made the milestone of posting it's 100th page! Gigi has drawn a little celebratory image of the main characters having a little party. Frightmoore has been running since 2001, and in April 2004 when an updated version of the site was launched on it's own domain name were we able to gauge an idea of how many hundreds of thousands of unique users actually visited Frightmoore! If you have read any of it yet, go on and take a look.
While we're on the subject of plugging stuff don't forget to check out The Journey of Light an independent animation project that is currently underway written by our very own Azure.
Souce: Frightmoore University
Category > Manga
ICv2 are reporting an interesting trend with Amazon.com's manga best seller list. Apparently Yaoi is three of the top five, four of the top ten and six of the top fifteen manga titles. ICv2 point out that these sales are only on Amazon.com as the American Bookscan list doesn't not match with these sales figures, with only Del Rey's Tsubasa Volume 3 appearing at the top of both lists.
ICv2 speculate that people purchasing Yaoi prefer the privacy and relative anonymity that on-line reatilers offer and that the two main Yaoi publishers Digital Manga and CPM Manga don't have the marketing clout or number of titles compared to other publishers with titles at the top of the graphic novel lists.
Souce: ICv2
Category > Manga
Recently we ran a press release about Seven Seas producing original manga. Now their site Gomanga.com is live. So far they've got details of four titles on their site - Amazing Agent Luna, Blade for Barter, Last Hope and No Man's Land.
Read More... | Souce: GoManga.com
Category > Websites
Those happy people at ADV USA have just sent us a press release detailing their recent success with AnimeOnDVD.com readers. Each month AnimeOnDVD readers vote for what they believe to be the best DVD release of that month. Over the past six months ADV have scooped 4 of the monthly awards.
As soon as the press release was sent, it was already out of date, ADV had won the September award for Chrono Crusade Vol. #1!
Read More... | Souce: ADV Films
Category > Websites
At Nan Desu Kan the Anime News Network announced that they are joining forces with independent anime magazine Protoculture Addicts to produce Anime News Network's Protoculture Addicts. This will be the 82nd issue of Protoculture Addicts (out in January 2005).
This is good news for Anime fans in North America (and the rest of the English speaking world too), since Protoculture Addicts has always been an excellent intelligent source of information for fans, combined with ANNs resources it means even better magazine. I look forward to reading this!
Read More... | Souce: Anime News Network
We've just had details in from the folks at Dreamworks.
Mamoru Oshii the director of Ghost In the Shell 2: Innocence will be answering questions posted to the offical Ghost In the Shell 2 Site's forum. Sign up and Join this thread - http://www.ghost2.com/board/showthread.php?t=62.
Fans will already know that Oshii was behind the original Ghost in the Shell Movie, and the first two Mobile Police Patlabor Movies.
Read More... | Souce: Go Fish Pictures
Category > Websites
18th August 2004. Otaku News, a new site dedicated to anime, manga and other cool Japanese things launched today. Yes, that's this site! We intend to bring you news for fans of Japan. From Anime to Zen, with a good dose of informative articles and laughs along the way.
Read More... | Souce: Otaku News