Keith

Wow.

Rule #1 for getting the fanbase to stop laughing at you Tommy Yune: STOP WITH THE FREAKIN' SPANDEX ALREADY!!

Totally worth it, It was my birthday present to myself last year. As far as purchasing the disc's if they put subs on them, hell yeah. At this point in mylife, I've little to no use for bootlegs, and am quite willing to support awesome shows with my money. It's just that when companies refuse to recognize that we the fanbase will gladly throw hard earned cash at them if only they'd take it from us that it infuriates me. At this point, Bandai Visual know's they have a U.S. fanbase illing to pay out to them, they tip toed enough in the U.S. to be certain of that. I can't imagine Unicorn sold badly.

I can't even tell you how much value I've gotten out of MGS4 & MGS online. Adhoc party, Ratchet & Clank, SFIV & SSIV, not to mention the bluray & dvd upscaling benefits. If you have an HD TV and no bluray player, you'll only stand to benefit from a PS3.

The first release was, the later collector's edition was improved.

I'll be waiting for indivdual releases of Alien & Aliens as per usual.

No, I'm pretty sure Big West already began production before Tatsunoko was involved, we were all pretty deep into this crap during the whole court dealings. The final word was definately: -Big West: Story, concepts, designs, etc. -Tatsunoko: International distribution of the completed animation.

It all ties back to SDM:TV, whoever owns the story rights to that, is in the right to derive it for sequals.

It's strictly designed to make sure you don't order/pre-order from another shop.

I don't want to sound like a broken record here, but again, the only place we've seen Tatsunoko claim story copyright ownership is here in the U.S. If in fact they had full story ownership in Japan as well, they'd be able to pwn Big West & Studio Nue over derivative sequals, which they obviously hae not. Might I also point over two obvious examples of Tatsunoko "not" owning the Macross story (in addition to not owning the designs), i.e. "The Sentinels" & "The Shadow Chronicles." Both HG produced & Tatsunono "ok" Robotech sequals danced around the Macross issue like the source material was a plague. The Shadow Chronicles especially, with vague references to "aliens," and all backstory referring to Mospeada alone (which Tatsunoko hands down owns). Even the making of documentary made leaps to "not" mention Macross story or characters.

Those again are U.S. copyright listings, not Japanese ones. Filing for U.S. copyrights on a Japanese property is dubious at best for Tatsunoko. Again, i'd go with the actual Japanese court rulings, not the U.S. copyright filings.

Going by the citings in the link you posted, and seriously not trying to go off into a licensing debate tangent, the only copyright for the "story" shown being owned by Tatsunoko is in the U.S. While the Japanese rulings also shown there list Big West/Studio Nue as having the Intellectual property. Main Entry: intellectual property Function: nounDate: 1845Results 1845property (as an idea, invention, or process) that derives from the work of the mind or intellectalsoan application, right, or registration relating to this i.e. "Story." In Japan, while Tatsunoko only has the distribution rights for the completed animatoin.

Sidenote: Zero looks freakin' awesome on bluray

In the U.S., under dubious pretences. The Intellectual property is still owned by Big West in Japan, which in a knock out brawl would supercede claiming ownership in the U.S.

You sir, are welcome.

Stupid Global not being the Macross....

Honestly, I'm already planning on picking up Blue Sub 6 on bluray when it comes out, and I'm sporatically picking up Frontier bluray volumes, I may just wait and see if Haruhi eventually gets a U.S. bluray release.

That's definately something Anno has a serious lock on as a director. I think i first noticed it during the last episodes of Kare Kanno when new characters kept popping up left & right, but he has the uncanny ability to make you care about characters in obscenely short periods of time.

FMA:B is finally over. Very satisfying epilogue, and it makes far more sense than "The Conquerer of Shambala." And thankfully regardless of how predictable it is {spoiler]Ed & Winry end up together , probably the stupidest mistake of the last series was that not happening.

Play-Asia is cool, they've been around for quite a while, and I've never had a problem with them.Though I usually only go with them for used stuff, which is always in surprisingly good condition.

For those who haven't heard yet, check out your favorite importer, and you'll see both seasons of Haruhi in one bluray set this October for about $300/$400 (depending on where you go). So tempting, but still so damned expensive. I'm torn on whether or not I can afford it As for dissapearance, it actually was officially licensed by Bandai, it's just a matter of when we'll get it.

We have a conventions forum? Who knew? lol.

Did anyone get a chance to see them at AX yesturday? I hate having to be a responsable adult & work...

We're not the fans they're doing the right thing for, we're still not even technically seen as a market. Though if anyone, you'd think Bandai Visual would have figured it out by now, since they've been the biggest tip-toer in by lagnual bluray releases. I'm hoping Gundam Unicorn will finally turn their heads, but we'll see.

Unfortunately, the day of the decent quality HK set was killed around 7-8 years ago, when sars hit. Not specifically by sars mind you, but authorities took the opportunity of trade routes being closed to bust up wherehouses, and those who ran them. Basically, the few HK dudes who actually cared about shows & quality were scared out of the business, and all that remained since are TV rippers, & R1 rippers, which are totally useless. An odd result of this being the revival of U.S. fansubbers, taking their oldschool VHS mentalities into the digital download age, with umpteenth generation tape copies being replaced by HD rips & decent fansub translations. Basically what I'm saying, is anything bootleg you get at this point isn't worth the shipping fee you'd pay for it, let alone the rest of the cost. If you really want to go that route, bittorrent and the like are your only real option, though I've never gotten into the know of how all that stuff works, I do know that's the only place you'll find the quality you're looking for.