Macross Zero Limited Edition Blu-Ray (US ver?)

[Seto Kaiba]

https://store.crunchyroll.com/products/macross-zero-ova-series-blu-ray-limited-edition-crunchyroll-exclusive-5037899090947.html

It looks like Crunchyroll has put up preorders for a domestic release of Macross Zero now.

 

EDIT: Crunchyroll's store has automatic discount pricing for members, and @Master Dex found a coupon code CRAFF15 that will knock 15% off the top for you at checkout.

Edited September 13 by Seto Kaiba

[Master Dex]

Easy sell for me, hope people share coupon codes like with Plus. I'll get it anyway though.

I decided to look at Honey, and I tried CRAFF15 and for about 15% off so use it while it works. 

Edited September 12 by Master Dex

[azrael]

$89.99 for Zero vs $189.99 for Plus. 🤨 Talk about a price difference....

[Seto Kaiba]

2 hours ago, azrael said:

$89.99 for Zero vs $189.99 for Plus. 🤨 Talk about a price difference....

No kidding... I have to imagine that a fair amount of that difference is not having to license pre-existing dubs from the 90's and not including extravagant extras like a ~200pg art book.

This appears to be basically the exact same box set as the Japanese "Premium Remastered Edition", but MUCH cheaper.  That was around $151 US (¥21,478) when it came out.  With the CRAFF15 discount code that @Master Dex found and the Crunchyroll "Mega Fan" discount, it's $81 shipped, so a bit more than half the Japanese retail price.

Looking back at it, the Japanese edition was actually more expensive than Macross Plus's Blu-Ray Complete Edition in Japan... that sold for $119 (¥17,000) with both the movie and OVA.

[sh9000]

Cool.  Preordered with 15% off.

[Cowboy17v2]

90 dollars for 5 episodes??????  God I hate Anime Limited, do NOT give these FOMO artists your money.  Christ. 

[Seto Kaiba]

1 hour ago, Cowboy17v2 said:

90 dollars for 5 episodes??????  God I hate Anime Limited, do NOT give these FOMO artists your money.  Christ. 

It's actually more like $80 because of the automatic and optional discounts.

Mind you, that $80-90 is actually a pretty typical asking price for a complete season box set of a new anime series nowadays.  Western distributors seem to have got the Limited Edition bug, so every new release seems to have to be a Limited Edition set with extra features from the JDM release and art cards and other "bonus" goods and they seem to all average around $75-95.  It's not Anime Limited, it's everyone.  They're ALL doing it.  My Dress-Up Darling is $89.98 plus tax, so's Re:Zero season 2, SPY x FAMILY, Your Name, and Mieruko-chan.  Overlord IV's $94.98.  Weathering With You is $79.98.  Jujutsu Kaisen is $99.99!  Oshi No Ko is $129.99!

Even if you wait for the cut-down box sets that have none of the extra features, the asking price is still easily $40-50 for newer titles.  It feels like Japanese physical media prices have finally started to creep their way into the western market.  Ouch. 😵‍💫

Edited September 13 by Seto Kaiba

[Cowboy17v2]

17 hours ago, Seto Kaiba said:

It's actually more like $80 because of the automatic and optional discounts.

Mind you, that $80-90 is actually a pretty typical asking price for a complete season box set of a new anime series nowadays.  Western distributors seem to have got the Limited Edition bug, so every new release seems to have to be a Limited Edition set with extra features from the JDM release and art cards and other "bonus" goods and they seem to all average around $75-95.  It's not Anime Limited, it's everyone.  They're ALL doing it.  My Dress-Up Darling is $89.98 plus tax, so's Re:Zero season 2, SPY x FAMILY, Your Name, and Mieruko-chan.  Overlord IV's $94.98.  Weathering With You is $79.98.  Jujutsu Kaisen is $99.99!  Oshi No Ko is $129.99!

Even if you wait for the cut-down box sets that have none of the extra features, the asking price is still easily $40-50 for newer titles.  It feels like Japanese physical media prices have finally started to creep their way into the western market.  Ouch. 😵‍💫

 

Difference being is that most of the time you can just get the blurays only without all the extra crap for 50 or thereabouts for a 12 episode season.  Not less than half of that for twice the price, only available in a FOMO set.  

 

Anime Limited friggin' SUCKS.  

[Seto Kaiba]

22 minutes ago, Cowboy17v2 said:

Difference being is that most of the time you can just get the blurays only without all the extra crap for 50 or thereabouts for a 12 episode season.  Not less than half of that for twice the price, only available in a FOMO set.  

Yes, I made the same point... though, as I noted, that cut-down release without the extra features and "bonus" goods usually comes out a few months to a few years later once the initial release with the extras sells out.

I wouldn't say it's driven by FOMO given that the edition isn't that limited, the "bonus" goods are mostly cheap low-effort merchandise like posters or art cards, and the existence of subsequent releases without that extra content are basically a given.  It's just an upsell to people who liked the series enough to buy it right away.  Or in this case, to fans who have been waiting literal decades to get Macross on home video in the west.

It's still within the normal price range for a western release and a 50% discount vs. buying the Japanese edition of the same box set... never mind the shipping cost.

 

22 minutes ago, Cowboy17v2 said:

Anime Limited friggin' SUCKS.  

They don't suck any worse than any other distributor, so stop whining about it.

[azrael]

3 hours ago, Cowboy17v2 said:

Anime Limited friggin' SUCKS.  

Then don't buy it. No one is pointing a gun to your head to buy this release. While I may buy this release, I'm not buying the Macross Plus set cuz I'm not paying $200 for stuff I don't want (yes, you can coupon it but it doesn't change the fact it comes with stuff I have ZERO interest in). I'm fine with that choice.

[The Shade]

 Preordered with the discount code. Thank you for sharing that.

[MikeRoz]

I'm shocked. Nozomi Crunchyroll finally delivers on a Macross title, and it's not even one of the ones that was previously announced. Here's hoping whatever logjam was there is now broken and we see Frontier soon too. And yes, even Delta and 7, I suppose.

[camk4evr]

I wonder if the release date of Feb. 10, 2025 is so Disney+ can be the exclusive source to watch it for a couple of months?

[GGemini]

The deal breaker for me was that they crammed all the episodes into one disc.

[Big s]

2 hours ago, GGemini said:

The deal breaker for me was that they crammed all the episodes into one disc.

Aren’t there only 5 episodes? Is it really crammed?

[Seto Kaiba]

3 hours ago, GGemini said:

The deal breaker for me was that they crammed all the episodes into one disc.

OK, I'm curious... why is that an issue/dealbreaker?

Macross Zero is only five episodes long, and each episode is only about 30 minutes long.  The advertised total runtime is 158 minutes.  For perspective, Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire is 157 minutes.  It should fit neatly onto a single dual-layer Blu-ray with plenty of room to spare.

[GGemini]

I was hoping for a US version of the remaster. Each episode of the Japanese remaster is 10+ GB each, ep. 5 is 11+ GB. Since the Crunchyroll version includes also the extras, the eps need to be compressed to fit everything in one 50GB disc. If I am going to buy physical media, I prefer to get the best version available. The compression hopefully will not be so obvious visually, but why not release a 2 disc set? 

[Seto Kaiba]

20 minutes ago, GGemini said:

I was hoping for a US version of the remaster. Each episode of the Japanese remaster is 10+ GB each, ep. 5 is 11+ GB. Since the Crunchyroll version includes also the extras, the eps need to be compressed to fit everything in one 50GB disc. If I am going to buy physical media, I prefer to get the best version available. The compression hopefully will not be so obvious visually, but why not release a 2 disc set? 

Hrm... that is a very well thought-out reason.

I'm intrigued, and will reach out to the distributor directly to inquire as to whether any content has been stripped or reduced in quality vs. the Japanese release.  I kind of question the math there, though, since it seems to be assuming that the video and audio stream will be continuously at the maximum rate for a Blu-ray (48Mbit/sec).  Given that anime is given to a lot of static frames with minimal changes, I kind of doubt that'd be the case... esp. considering live-action 1080p bitrates tend to be closer to 25-30Mbit/sec.  That would yield a size that'd fit on one dual-layer Blu-ray (about 36GB).

[themarvelknight]

I know this is a Blu-ray release, but has any heard of there being a 4k or is that even possible or worth doing? I was considering getting this but would wait for a 4k if that might be coming. 

[CollectorCanine]

I know this reply is late, but no, a 4K of Macross Zero would not be worth doing. As far as I know, it was animated entirely digitally and mastered digitally, so Big West had to upscale it to even make it HD.