January 2023 Livestream!
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If I had to guess anything of any high value is typically sniped by Yen Press. Now that J-novel is more or less another arm of Kadokawa. Anything more niche I find in my experience seems to be picked up by Seven Seas when J-novel doesn't get their hands on it.
To this day I cannot understand why Yen wasn't able to pick up half the long running GC Novels catolog series and somehow Seven Seas did.I can understand the sentiment that picking up some series is a waste of money and time (namely due to the nature of axed novels ending prematurely and how horribly rushed they tend to be) But I do however agree from the outside looking in, that it seems like stuff is getting ignored. Especially since these days 95% of the current isekai and LN stuff seems to have no problem getting subtitled and aired on crunchyroll as well as other streaming services and then the books never see the light of day.
On the plus side this happens less often now, but I agree its frustrating when it doesn't.
On another note, J-novel from my point of view seems to specialize in bulk licensing stuff they think might go big or simply they pick up abandoned work(see slayers among others).
For J-novel this means giga bank when the anime airs, especially if it does well. -
@myskaros said in January 2023 Livestream!:
As Sam said on the stream,
we have license announcement events planned through September of this yearwith stuff already populating each event.I must have missed that part, but seriously?
That is a lot of series sitting in the pipeline not yet ready to go live for one reason or another...
Along with what I assume must be several that are almost worked out but the contracts haven't been signed yet...Green's Theorem
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@Konchen said in January 2023 Livestream!:
But I do however agree from the outside looking in, that it seems like stuff is getting ignored. Especially since these days 95% of the current isekai and LN stuff seems to have no problem getting subtitled and aired on crunchyroll as well as other streaming services and then the books never see the light of day.
I can sympathize, but the only answers I can give you are found in my previous post.
- Are some things getting ignored? Yes, I won't deny that, but that's because from the inside, we have more data than the general public does, and things that fans think are popular aren't necessarily profitable.
- Then there are the ones that fall into the "we bid but didn't get it for reasons" bucket. It feels rather unjustified to single out JNC for not getting a series that a different publisher already licensed but hasn't announced yet for whatever reason.
- Even series that get anime aren't necessarily going to do much for book sales, as evidenced by the numerous series JNC and other publishers have licensed with older anime adaptations that frankly don't sell gangbusters like fans swear they will.
In the end, I know it's annoying that there's no visible movement on certain series, but there isn't anything we can do to help with that in most cases. If we (JNC) do actually have it licensed or in negotiations to license, you'll just have to wait until we're ready to announce it D:
Whoever said nothing's impossible never tried slamming a revolving door.
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@piisfun You might have missed this message on Discord too:
https://discord.com/channels/320950114355118090/885244724460535849/1068702798050500688
Quarkboy — I said explcitly that we're budgted to put out 25% more books in 2023
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@myskaros I went trawling through the general channel after that comment (something I normally avoid: it moves too fast), so I did.
Those points definitely say a lot of stuff is moving behind the scenes awaiting debut.
It also explains why we can have most of one announcements stream be just licenses from newer partners.
Anyway, time to see if there is anything I like in this batch...
(There usually isn't, but why complain? There are much better uses of time... though apparently not everyone thinks so...)Green's Theorem
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@myskaros
All good no offense taken actually, I didn't mean to reply just to you but to the general thread. Thanks for being transparent on the topic.Anyways only thing I'm hoping(ium) on still is beast tamer since the author seems to have a thing for turboing books out. For now Im waiting for ryuyus the the demon lord LNs to catch up to the fan tld manga. Almost there...
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@piisfun said in January 2023 Livestream!:
(There usually isn't, but why complain? There are much better uses of time... though apparently not everyone thinks so...)
I honestly never understand this argument. People complain because they care, especially after being frustrated after so many stream announcements that went nowhere. Take the recent WoTC and DnD event recently. If nothing was raised, no complained, no backlash, we wouldn't have what just occurred today. And reading the above, it doesn't sound like complaining to me, just some frustrated opinion.
Waiting for JNC announcement used to be really fun as they had some gems that shined like My Sister Can Read Kanji, Kokoro, Grimgar, Dendro, etc. Now just a bunch of one-two-and-axed series. And I don't even want those uber popular series or anything, just give me some fun, whimsical series like Gear Drive, which ironically got axed after 1 volume.
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Thanks for the stream. I'm excited to give these a read and don't feel "insulted" by the selection at all.
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@Microdynames said in January 2023 Livestream!:
@Daxar When the bean counters report that Quiet Blacksmith Life has swept the top of the sales rankings whereas Rebuild World is languishing with the loss-making rejects, one can't be surprised when licensing strategies are adjusted accordingly.
No no no. D: Really? But Rebuild World is amazing... x_x This is terrible. I need to leave amazon reviews or something.
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@DarKraD
Two very different cases.
The WOTC issue was a case where complaining could actually have an effect, and did.The problem here is a case where complaining can't have any real effect, hence why I called it a waste of time.
I read quite a few web novels.
Japanese publishers typically start with web novels and turn them into light novels, so some statistics should work here:- Over half of all web novels never get enough chapters to even consider publishing.
- Of the remaining ones, half are garbage.
- Out of that, 30% are smut, pornography or other difficult to license material, none of which the English market will touch.
- Most of what is left is probably getting tried out by the various Japanese publishers.
The "gems" you talk about... there is honestly only dozen or so of those per year. There are two major reasons the number has decreased:
- The English market has heavily depleted the backlog of these "gems," meaning that they are now much harder to find.
- Market competition is increasing. Slowly, yes, but significantly.
Finally, in a market where you vote with your wallet...
Our votes may count for the English publishers, *but they barely count for the Japanese publishers... the ones who control the actual supply of titles that JNC and others are trying to license.
That is to say, our votes have no effect on the supply, only on what the pipe brings from that supply. And when the problem is mostly the supply itself, that doesn't help very much.With a system like that, and with multiple layers of corporate interactions required, there is only so much that can be done. Complaining, even complaining in mass, isn't going to move a system with so much inertia unless, like a certain issue mentioned above, it blows up in the media and threatens to take the company with it.
Green's Theorem
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@DarKraD True, people may complain because they care, but those same people aren't necessarily worth listening to. And if it really is just a frustrated opinion, then it's likely something that people probably shouldn't even waste brain cells on. It should be acknowledged but forgotten, since the only reason they even bother giving their opinion is to validate their ego.
As for the gems you've mentioned...
My Sister Can Read Kanji
What's good about that one? To me it's just another sequence of 5 words. Nothing motivating me to look any further.
Kokoro [Connect?]
... I remember watching the anime, but I don't remember the anime being something to write home about.
Grimgar
I dumped the anime pretty early on. I just wasn't entertained by it. So how is it a gem?
Dendro
Ugh... that series was interesting in the beginning, but frankly, it just turned into a slog of words, pointless actions, and unhinged idealizing on what's-his-face-Ray's part. And if everything is just going to leave you with a bad taste, perhaps the problem is with your taste buds not what's going into your mouth.
And I'm guessing I just dumped on some of your favorites, so here's a sampling of mine so you can return the favor if you want: (Older) Invaders of the Rokujouma (bite me), Mixed Bathing, Me a Genius (Newer) Making Magic, Invincible Little Lady, Sometimes Even Reality Is a Lie.
FWIW, I've probably read about a solid third of what JNC has put out, online and offline. Most of it meets my expectations, but then, I'm also expecting 90% of everything being crud... Plus, everyone has different tastes so one person's treasure is another's trash...
As for what was announced this stream, other than the Lady Albert LN, there's a couple more that look interesting, but I'm likely going to wait awhile before looking at them. Weekly serialization sometimes does injustice to a story when they aren't written to be scrutinized in piecemeal. Monster Tamer and Trash Mapping Skill got killed for me because of that; I Surrendered My Sword would've likely been another victim if I hadn't read the Sol Press version and learned that the skill BS was called out as BS within the story itself.
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@DarKraD I mean, I liked that some of the older licensing streams had significantly more titles that I was interested in, but I also have to bow to the fact that what we think sells and what they actually see sells is apparently vastly different so I can't fault them for not giving a smogusboard of what would probably amount to being net negative series.
@Ran said in January 2023 Livestream!:
@Microdynames said in January 2023 Livestream!:
@Daxar When the bean counters report that Quiet Blacksmith Life has swept the top of the sales rankings whereas Rebuild World is languishing with the loss-making rejects, one can't be surprised when licensing strategies are adjusted accordingly.
No no no. D: Really? But Rebuild World is amazing... x_x This is terrible. I need to leave amazon reviews or something.
I think the problem is that it's just too outside the norm of what's popular. I would have thought that it's slightly more unique setting would be a draw, but I guess not.
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@jpwong said in January 2023 Livestream!:
@Ran said in January 2023 Livestream!:
@Microdynames said in January 2023 Livestream!:
Daxar When the bean counters report that Quiet Blacksmith Life has swept the top of the sales rankings whereas Rebuild World is languishing with the loss-making rejects, one can't be surprised when licensing strategies are adjusted accordingly.
No no no. D: Really? But Rebuild World is amazing... x_x This is terrible. I need to leave amazon reviews or something.
I think the problem is that it's just too outside the norm of what's popular. I would have thought that it's slightly more unique setting would be a draw, but I guess not.
Rebuild World is long, somewhat dark, and complex.
Furthermore, the first half of Volume 1 Part 1 can be rather hard to push through.
By comparison, Quiet Blacksmith Life is a lightweight series that starts relatively strong and gets weaker from there. It has romance and harem elements, and might as well be a wish fulfillment series...Yeah, makes sense to me. Unfortunately.
Green's Theorem
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I'm glad we don't have too many tryhard works myself, LN's are silly fun not seriousserious.
Some of the announcements look fun, and I'm about to dip into the ones that dropped Friday.
Don't let the bastards grind ya down!
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@piisfun I've seen people mention that bookworm's first volume is also a bit of a turn off, so I guess there's hope that it'll pick up a bit once more volumes are out. And yeah, I liked blacksmith vol 1, but it kinda stopped appealing to me after that.
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@jpwong said in January 2023 Livestream!:
@Ran said in January 2023 Livestream!:
No no no. D: Really? But Rebuild World is amazing... x_x This is terrible. I need to leave amazon reviews or something.
I think the problem is that it's just too outside the norm of what's popular. I would have thought that it's slightly more unique setting would be a draw, but I guess not.
I strongly suspect that post-apocalyptic settings are a considerably harder sell to begin with; the End of Everything As We Know It is inherently depressing, and depressing generally doesn't sell well. I know it was a factor for me; it generally takes really strong writing and a good hook to get me into a post-apocalyptic story. Rebuild World's didn't work for me.
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@Travis-Butler - for me, there's enough grimdark in reality as well as much of American media, so it's not what I'm usually looking to read from JNC after a day at work.
I didn't get into Rebuild World, and I avoided Grimgar after reading bits about how much it messes with the characters after the events in the anime. Some people enjoy the Saw movies too, but vicarious torment isn't my cup of tea.
Blacksmith is not great, but it's relaxing to read at lunch or the end of the day.
In short, lowbrow harmless fun sells to me when some "better" works do not.
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Logically, this is a stream announcement. Compared to JNC's convention appearances, where the big guns are actually announced, it makes sense to see a lot more less known titles than what exist over at License Suggestions.
If a big title is announced, it's more feasible to announce it at a convention panel than say, a stream attended by 2 digit audiences.
ie, expecting anything big outside of conventions is like developing psychic powers to 'predict what goes on behind the scenes'.
Chill.
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@akashicwiki said in January 2023 Livestream!:
2 digit audiences.
3 digit... but the point stands.
(All-time peak is now 350!)Green's Theorem
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@piisfun Ooh, now that's poggers
