15 March 2008, 4:32 AM
@ Brian: I have to say, I don't find your example to be very good. Your example only deals with a niche market of PC games, not the entire videogame industry. If you take the rest of the videogame industry into account you'll find that it's an extremely different beast to that of the anime industry altogether.
The anime industry is ruled by piracy which is what gave it life, but is also what will ultimately destroy it. Of course I'm talking relative terms here. While an "official" industry is hurting because of this, the "unofficial" industry thrives.
The difference between the foreign anime industry from when it was born and today is that piracy has become an extremely efficient process, you can do it oh so easily nowadays. Not 30 minutes after an episode of the latest anime is aired in Japan, it'll be on the net and distributed all over the world in its raw form. I'm not exaggerating about this either, and I know some of you here know very well that I'm not. Then a day later you'll begin to see the first fan subs of that anime episode and then later you'll see the more quality subs appear.
In the space of a week to a month, you have an anime released on the net and distributed to all kinds of people for free. It's the perfect way to bypass everything that is capitalism. The people who started the US industry are the people who used to do this kind of thing in oldskool terms, back before the Internet was used this way. So, as I said, what created the industry can also destroy it.
The videogame industry on the other hand doesn't work this way. The industry does have piracy issues in some areas, but they also have ways of fighting piracy because they're able to take control of their media a lot more than you can with anime. You should also take into account the fact that the videogame industry at the moment is rivalling Hollywood which the anime industry isn't even coming close to.
As for the specific issues with videogame demographics, they're different from the kinds of issues that anime faces.
For those who don't want to read any of what I typed up there, I'll sum it up.
You can't compare the anime industry with the videogame industry because of this point: The anime industry thrives because of piracy, however the videogame industry thrives despite piracy.
The anime industry is ruled by piracy which is what gave it life, but is also what will ultimately destroy it. Of course I'm talking relative terms here. While an "official" industry is hurting because of this, the "unofficial" industry thrives.
The difference between the foreign anime industry from when it was born and today is that piracy has become an extremely efficient process, you can do it oh so easily nowadays. Not 30 minutes after an episode of the latest anime is aired in Japan, it'll be on the net and distributed all over the world in its raw form. I'm not exaggerating about this either, and I know some of you here know very well that I'm not. Then a day later you'll begin to see the first fan subs of that anime episode and then later you'll see the more quality subs appear.
In the space of a week to a month, you have an anime released on the net and distributed to all kinds of people for free. It's the perfect way to bypass everything that is capitalism. The people who started the US industry are the people who used to do this kind of thing in oldskool terms, back before the Internet was used this way. So, as I said, what created the industry can also destroy it.
The videogame industry on the other hand doesn't work this way. The industry does have piracy issues in some areas, but they also have ways of fighting piracy because they're able to take control of their media a lot more than you can with anime. You should also take into account the fact that the videogame industry at the moment is rivalling Hollywood which the anime industry isn't even coming close to.
As for the specific issues with videogame demographics, they're different from the kinds of issues that anime faces.
For those who don't want to read any of what I typed up there, I'll sum it up.
You can't compare the anime industry with the videogame industry because of this point: The anime industry thrives because of piracy, however the videogame industry thrives despite piracy.
You've read it! You can't unread it!
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