Bioware and Funimation have announced they will be adapting the hit Dragon Age RPG franchise into an anime movie, due for DVD release in 2011.
EA furnishes the usual glib press release peppered with vapid quotes – Bioware begins:
“Anime is a great medium for us to continue the robust Dragon Age story. Partnering with FUNimation ensures that we are delivering the exceptional quality and entertainment value that our Dragon Age fans expect.”
Funimation continues:
“We are thrilled to be working with EA and BioWare on the production of the Dragon Age anime feature. We are going to be bringing the classic visual and storytelling techniques found in anime to create a film that will extend the narrative of the world BioWare has created.”
Bioware’s decision to abandon the (presumably expensive) use of Dungeons & Dragons in favour of its own painfully generic “dark fantasy” setting was generally expected to result in a minor mixed media franchise with novels and similar, but an anime adaptation is quite unexpected – although perhaps logical, given the overlap in fanbases.
Funimation for its part is said to be set on creating a variety of original anime-style productions of its own in future – given the rather dismal history of western produced movie adaptations of games, they may have picked a challenging area in which to start.
I Hope it turns out alright. I know that when america gets a hold of anything Japanese… and or try to turn something Japanese it usualy fails. But I have a felling it will be okay maybe not ground brawling but just okay. Also f♥♥k!! all you weaboos complaining about how it shouldn’t be called anime that’s starting to get so fuckin annoying!! Who cares where it’s from if it’s tight it should be looked at as a higher tier animation than just a retarded cartoon you see on Saturday morn. I mean damn I know it’s not but boondocks is like one step away from being Anime.
It just needs to stay away from being a cartoon (like Batman the animation) and actually be fully anime-ish to be anime, which happens to be Japanese.
This should be very interesting.
Yea. I hate funimation. They get mad when people are distributing the stuff they are trying to sell to people for free. I know a great many of you think they are out to rip the consumer off, because they are trying to make a profit. …
But you know what happens when they don’t make a profit? They go bankrupt. When they go bankrupt, that hurts the Anime Studios. Eventually the anime studios go bankrupt too.
I know you like to think that the anime industry is booming and all. But anime’s are expensive to make. You might think, “no they aren’t”. But there are a lot of people that have to be pay rolled to make the anime. That just doesn’t include production teams, but Seiyu and, yes Broadcasting companies. A HUGE chunk of an anime’s budget is put towards the TV Broadcasters. Until DVD sales, there is no profit in the anime. Usually it’s debt.
Since it cost sooo much to broadcast an anime, this is why in recent years, certain titles have been skipping tv broadcasting and have been experimenting with alternate ways of promotion. Think of the Manga+OVA promotions of Negima and To Love Ru. They are trying to bring out a more direct and less middle man approach to bring anime to consumers.
Meanwhile, Funimation has been making huge strides to keep the anime industry over here alive. They have been going for add revenue online streaming. If you go to hulu btw, you will see they have finally started to stram in subs rather than dubs now. (Thank god).
And if your not a total prick and actually try to put money back into the industry by supporting the anime with dvd purchases, You will also see that Funimation prices their DVD’s at very very affordable prices. You can generally grab an entire 12-26 episode series for under $30 these days. That is a HUGE improvement from past sales where companies would slap you with a 4-5 episode DVD for $20-$30.
Agreed man. But Funimation’s dubbing isn’t that bad. I mean, Americans dont have the same accent or style of speaking like the Japanese. Actually thats the problem, they like to slang words a lot. Like Orihime, they pronounce it “Oh-ree-HEE-may” (WTF). And it doesnt sound natural.
I think they should experiment with voice actors outside of America, and use people who can say Japanese words properly -.-
Funimation doesnt sound too promising…
i thought Japanese really hates any main hero with bread and main heroine with boobs.