this post was submitted on 12 Sep 2023
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Don’t You Know Who I Am?
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Lmao Invincible isn't an anime
By the japanese definition it is. It isnt by the bastardized western definition of it.
It’s not “bastardized”, it’s what “Anime” means in English (and arguably every non-Japanese language). It’s a way to differentiate them, like here in Italy we call US cartoons “cartoons” instead of the Italian word for it.
Because people decide to colloqiually change what it means in context, but the problem is, most people cant even agree on a definition of what is and isnt anime because there usually exist some counter example to show that that focused definition is incorrect.
For example, if someone defined it by being animated in japan, Batman the animated series, would be considered anime due to it being animated by Sunrise (which shares the same art style to The Big O, an Anime). Its a borrowed word whose definition was changed from the original definition because people are too lazy to say japanese animation. You them go through the rabbit hole of what would you call animation studios that are purely outsourced.
While other countries animated studios already have their own word for their animation (Aeni for Korea, Donghua for China), the choice for japans is breaking its original meaning.
I think most of the anime community agrees on more or less MAL’s definition: “An animated work created in Japan for the Japanese market”.
Sure, there’s animation studios that outsource a lot, but it’s usually just inbetweens, rarely Key Animation. Directors, screenwriters and other positions are almost always Japanese.
Has exceptions, where some anime like Cyberpunk Edgerunners is primarily designed for westerners, and published on a western companies streaming service(netflix). Is Edgerunners not anime?. Like i said, there are always exceptions to more strict definitions that arent the japanese one. Keep in mind, thr average japanese person hasnt even remotely played or heard of cyberpunk 2077. Japans pc business isa growing market by still severely smaller than other asian countries, and home console adoption in japan is low. (And abysmally low if you count xbox in japan) Cp2077 is also not on the switch.
Then you have examples that are not as favorable in japan and run because they are extremely popular outside of japan like Vinland Saga. Is Vinland not anime because the target audience is mostly people outside of japan at this point.
CP2077 even won GOTY in IGN Japan. And yes, Pc and Xbox aren’t that common, but PS4 is extremely widespread. It was definitely a success in Japan as well.
And both Edgerunners and Vinland Saga launched with a Japanese Dub on Japanese platforms. They might’ve bet more on the oversea market to get the budget back, but they were still made as products to be watched in Japan, unlike Batman, My Last Day or other “borderline” cases.
Ps4 adoption in japan is lower than the vita(around the time where marketing was relevant) vita is at 6m sales, ps4 is at 9m now, but at the time of marketing, was about the same.
Let alone, the experience of 2077 on the base ps4/xbox to be abysmal. The practical size of the userbase that would be even able to play the game is extremely low.
Theres a HUGE reason why the head of playstation decisions is from the American branch and not the japanese one.
That’s because Japan is pretty much the only country where the Vita sold well. More than a third of its sales are in Japan.
And they even mention in that article that despite the launch issues on ps4, the game was well-received.
Plus it doesn’t even really matter since Edgerunners has been announced 5/6 months before the game was even released, so the actual reception in Japan was probably not a factor in distribution.
Its not a factor... because it wasnt the target audience. It has dubs because thats what they have access to on hand and that some people would enjoy it in japanese. But the target audience was definitely western.
But that other stuff didn’t get dubbed. Dubbing is a choice, and not a cheap one, especially in Japan. They even got KENN and Aoi Yuuki for the lead roles, it wasn’t some second-thought dub “just because”.
The MAL definition has been tested for years and has proven to be pretty effective (most other sites have a similar one afaik), the biggest detractors are the ones who think stuff like ATLA or RWBY (main series) should be considered anime just because of the style, but they’re generally ignored in database matters.
having a dub is just a choice, like having any american cartoon having a japanese dub is a choice (e.g if you've ever heard japanese dub of spongebob or king of the hill for example). It's a choice that trigger made because they were targetting people who watch anime, but not necessarily for japanese people. as the end target regardless was westerners.
Studio Trigger has history of targeting the western audience for its random projects. Take for example Little witch academia main and side projects were all kickstarters(over japanese alternatives). One of the side projects was a VR game, something a lot of Japanese people do not have their hands on.
KENN is barely known outside Japan because his most famous anime work was on Yugioh GX (which everyone watched dubbed) and the rest of his fame was mostly live-action musical performances. He’s not a seiyuu you pick if you want to appeal to westerners.
And yes, they do stuff on Kickstarter because it’s more known in the rest of the world, but that doesn’t mean they’re only targeting the rest of the world. They just wanted as much budget as possible.
LWA having a VR game is also barely relevant since even Kaiji has a VR game and the amount of people who know Kaiji outside of Japan is probably less than the Japanese people with an Xbox.
The Kaiji VR game had a switch port, as well as has a mobile port, both which would have much larger japanese audiences, something the LWA vr game lacks.
But, as you said, those were ports. The game was made to be a PSVR exclusive, and was funded according to that. I don’t think they’d do that if they didn’t know it was worth even without the ports.
Anyway, I wanted some clear stats for Edgerunners so I dug up Netflix. This is its third week, and at the bottom you can see only 7 countries had it in the top 10 for 3 weeks, most of them being asian. It went pretty damn well there too.
other countries in asia is different than japan because virtually all other countries in Asia are very PC centric. Japan is the extreme outlier in asia.
That doesn’t change that, at least in relation to Netflix viewership percentage, it went better in Japan than in most western countries. It didn’t even get Top 10 on launch week in the US.
its better in japan, because its essentially a netflix exclusive, where usually other anime is watched via their local networks. it's induced popularity through exclusivity.
It’s a Netflix exclusive everywhere, but it still worked better in Japan. It was undeniably a success, and I think that’s enough to qualify it as a product made (also) for the Japanese market.
Keep in mind, at everywhere else, they also have to compete against netflixs definition of anime (which is a step below japans definition of it) which also has marketing tied to it.
Prime video in japan is more popular than Netflix (which is BY FAR not thr case in the west for the most part)
Sorry, I didn’t really understand the first paragraph (I just woke up so that might be a factor), what’s Netflix’s definition of anime and why does it matter for marketing?
Also yes, Prime Video is more popular than Netflix in Japan, but that’s also the case in the US, which has around a third of the streaming service userbase, so it’s not really that much of an outlier.
Netflix definition of anime includes shows like Castlevania, which some people do not consider anime. Its only a step back from japans definiton as it doesnt include all other kinds of animated work as to a japanese, Spongebob for example would be considered anime.
Yeah, now that I see what’s included in the catalog it is pretty weird, but how is that relevant in Edgerunners’s reception in Japan and/or outside?
How people consume media on said platform and all platform affects rankings. The average japanes person watches anime off local network like ATX, Tokyo MX and such, which devalues some anime on atreaming aites in japan, unless they are exclusive. This is not the case for other regions where having a channel with a lot of anime options is not really a thing, so everyone is primarily watching it via streaming. This then gives more viewership to mainstream anime because the tv option is no longer/was never viable, thus mainstrean anime float up rankings in outside media. But sink in japan because theyre watching it elsewhere.
But none of the series in the US top 10 for those three weeks were anime (or animated at all).
Meanwhile in Japan, LycoReco and Spy x Family still went well on streaming services even if they already passed on TV (even there, a lot of people prefer watching stuff on streaming to having to schedule your day in order to watch tv programs at a specific hour).
In particular with Spy x Family, it had a broader appeal, and was not limited to just anime fans. Its of the few shows that were watched universally by japanese audiences. So habits of watching it on tv werent necessarily done by those users. Very very few shows reach that benchmark
That’s true… but I still don’t get how this would support the fact that Edgerunners didn’t do well in Japan. Because it did, even in relation to other, more Japanese-tailored Netflix exclusives like Kotaro lives Alone or Romantic Killer.
Its not that edrunners didnt do well in japan, its just that the shows target audience wasnt initially japanese or pitched in a way that they were expecting a lot of japanese people to watch it. Having japanese is something tagged on due to the game supporting several languages, and it being worked on by studio trigger, who already has a history of working with western companies who do projects like these.
Studio trigger on its own brings a lot of specific people to watch their show, regardless of target audience. Its of the few studios to get people who "hate mecha, but actually has almost never gave mecha a shot in the first place" to watch mecha (via indirectly with TTGL, or Directly via Darling in the Franx, or Promare). Its this audience on why they had also included japanese dub because some of that audience has some pretty strong opinions on dub vs sub, even though realistically speaking, japanese dub would only make sense if all the characters were from the Westbrook district of Night City.
And they were expecting Japanese people to watch it exactly because Trigger is a popular name in Japan too (and because CP2077 was eagerly awaited there as well).
I think the difference between Edgerunners and stuff like BTAS is pretty clear (not to mention Sunrise and TMS only worked on a small selection of BTAS episodes from what I’m reading, the large majority was produced in the US)
Its the time period. Various 90s and some early 2000s shows used japanese animators to animate the show. Xmen Evolution used Japanese/Korean talent to animate it.
Mook animation was one of the major studios who were japanese and animated several shows in the 90s/early 2000s.
But again, one thing is using Japanese animators in an American production, and another is an entirely Japanese production that just has a distinct western influence. Most of those shows didn’t even get broadcast in Japan later. I think the difference with Edgerunners is still pretty clear.
The definiton never states that the producers had to be japanese, and is rarely what people say about what constitutes what is and isnt anime. That's why the western definition is a super bastardized term, as there is no concensus about the definition, even between companies, and the ONLY consistent definition is the japanese one
Arguing wether production matters is the argument of which is more inportant for item production, who designed it who produced said object (e.g Apple is an american company, but not all people agree that an iphone is "made in america")
“Created in Japan” means that the production company (or at least one of the leading production companies if multiple) is Japanese.
And yes, the definition is muddy around the web, but when it really matters for stuff that needs to be definite (like databases), there is one, pretty much universal definition. Outside of that, if people like to call Castlevania an Anime in casual discussions it doesn’t really hurt anyone.