Hello to all, it's NormanicGrav here and I am going to provide a quick update for what's been going on lately over the past week and what has been planned for the rest of the year.
First of, I was away for a week on holiday and just returned so everything should progress like normal (like it has always been). In case you ask it was a great holiday, not abroad like a lot of people but it was a nice holiday resort in the middle of a forest (you can probably guess what it is if you live in the UK).
Now getting to the point of the matter.
- Otaku Collection July 2014 didn't appear because I was away on holiday. Instead it will be merged with August since I didn't have much arriving in that month, they were big items but merging the two will make the post more interesting.
- The reason for the lack of unboxings was because there was nothing arriving at that time or I didn't get anything so I apologise if you were expecting one every day since I generally do get a lot of titles (2014 so far has been the most out of all the years I've been collecting). I can tell you now that I have ordered another item which is expected to arrive this weekend or early next week. I will be getting some more over throughout this month.
- In terms of Limited Edition collecting, I pretty much nearly completed my goal of getting all of the Funimation sets that are available (about 12 left to pick up, not including Attack on Titan Part 2 since that's been ordered). Once I've done that I'll go for whatever is accessible next, Viz Media titles are probably the next ones since they cost just about the same.
- Aniplex wise, I will not be getting the US versions for Kill la Kill and Madoka Magica Movies. A few reasons with this decision. Starting with Madoka Magica, I already own the TV series in their LE form which is fine but the films themselves aren't getting the better treatment. The Japanese Limited Edition set for The Beginnings/The Eternal had both films with the booklet and OST while the US version only provides a lackluster booklet, no OST, both Blu-ray and DVDs and DTS audio (not DTS HD like the Japanese dub) for the English dub. As such I made the decision to go for the Imported versions instead as seen with my recent unboxing just before I left for my 1 week break. As for Kill la Kill, Aniplex are releasing the sets in 5 parts for about £45 with Set 1 and £50 onwards likely for Set 2-5. They each have the same treatment with the Madoka movies by which the box is not chipboard and has lackluster content. Set 1 does have an OST but they're Remix/Rearranges which generally aren't as good as the original soundtrack. So instead I'll be getting the upcoming Anime Limited UK release which is split into three parts with 8 episodes each, over 100 pages of an artbook and a planned chipboard artbox for Part 3. Each part goes for an MSRP of £59.99 on Blu-ray alone.
- UK wise, I will be getting some more UK titles in the future. The purchased sets include Ultimate Edition versions for Gurren Lagann, Mai Mai Miracle and Patema Inverted; all of which have chipboard box with dozens of content (i.e. Movies & Parallel Works on Blu-ray for Gurren Lagann, OST & Translated Booklets straight from Japan for Patema Inverted). I also have plans for HAL & Royal Space Force: Wings of Honneamise as well as the secret untitled film that is currently scheduled for December (suspected to be Giovanni's Island). As for Manga UK sets, I'll get some of their older titles and that will be it for them as the other versions are more superior. MVM I'll be leaving out due to cover designs and QC issues.
- Light Novel and Manga wise, I'll get some in the Autumn time. I would like to get the anime stuff out of the way before I get some more manga and novels.
I hope you will all forgive my lack of appearances on my blog but I may do some more experients some time like News on UK/US sets and much more. And I will be updating the BD/DVD regions whenever there's major changes.
