Bandai news non-news

[Chris Beveridge]

I'm seeing several posts over at AVS that Bandai is now a big deal for support for HD DVD. I'd reply but I've had my access killed there.

Bandai Visual (Japan) has been neutral for some time. They've made noise about releasing on HD DVD more than BD but it's a weird thing because there is practically no HD DVD support in Japan. The "format war" there in general is really messed up as very few announcements have been made since the PS3 launched, giving it a wait and see mentality. HD DVD hardware sales are Xbox sized though.

Bandai Visual has numerous subdivisions, something they cleaned up a bit after the deal with Namco last year. In the US, there are 3 subdivisions. Bandai America handles the toys, deals with the game division and so forth. They also handle areas like Power Rangers and other live action material that gets shuttled around for broadcast. Bandai Entertainment is where the anime division deals with things. A new company was also started last year called Bandai Visual USA and opted to use a specific label called Honneamise. This is a boutique publisher right now that is looking to try to do some potential theatrical stuff in the future while handling DVD movies and OVAs. Right now, they have two releases out for all of 2006 and one set for 2007. They all are gorgeous and top quality, essentially ports of the Japanese release. Hell, everything was authored and replicated in Japan.

The US anime industry in general is slowly - very slowly - coming out of the biggest downturn yet. Every company I've talked to at conventions, email and on the phone has said that they're sitting this out for awhile. There's no incentive on either side at the moment because of the very limited audience compared to Hollywood movies. It's all being watched and there is certainly interest because of the potential, but unlike DVD they don't intend to jump and there isn't the same incentive level. DVD was ideal because it removed two SKU's from their inventory (subtitled tapes and dubbed tapes) and moved it to just one.

The "news" of Bandai Visual Japan intending to bring out HD DVDs is just a repeat of the last CES where they showcased boxart of Ghost in the Shell TV but then never released anything

To date, anime releases in Japan are:

Brave Story - both (Warner)
Project Papo - both (Gonzo; HD DVD available directly only, BD via retail)
Ghost in the Shell 2: Innocence - Blu-ray
Air TV Box Set - Blu-ray

Bandai Visual certainly has plenty of projects they can do on both, but like DVD, I would in no way expect to see things with subtitles or dubs. The dynamics simply don't work that way because of pricing, distribution, contracts and so forth.

I'm excited to see more anime in HD, but this is some of the biggest non-news of the show yet to me.