So how come Japanese releases are never on sale?

[bruceames]

sup with that? Any particular reason why Japanese retailers stand their ground and refuse to participate in the HD DVD clearance sales happening everywhere else? Did they print less copies or something or are they just content on selling at full retail until doomsday if that's what it takes? Just wondering...

[Master X]

Yeah I want Reign of Fire but not for $50....

[HD-DVD_4_Me]

Agreed, The Machinist is one of the very few movies I haven't double dipped on yet. I like the movie a lot, but when I've got the DVD already and the is $50ish it's hard to convince myself that's it worth getting.

It does seem like most Japanese releases have been OOP for a while though and that could be why they are so expensive. BoB, Equilibrium, Machinist, Reign of Fire AFAIK have all been OOP for some time.

EDIT: BTW MasterX: I got my copy of Reign of Fire via a trade, I traded my Hooligans for it and then just re-ordered Hooligans for $35 shipped, not a bad deal at all, and I only paid about $20 for my original Hooligans. Hopefully you can get lucky and find a good deal like that too.

[ShinLupinSan]

Yeah it's nuts. I really want the 2 Patlabor movies but everyone still thinks HD DVD's are supposed to be $90+....sorry but that's absurd.

[bruceames]

Originally Posted by HD-DVD_4_Me

Agreed, The Machinist is one of the very few movies I haven't double dipped on yet. I like the movie a lot, but when I've got the DVD already and the is $50ish it's hard to convince myself that's it worth getting.

It does seem like most Japanese releases have been OOP for a while though and that could be why they are so expensive. BoB, Equilibrium, Machinist, Reign of Fire AFAIK have all been OOP for some time.

EDIT: BTW MasterX: I got my copy of Reign of Fire via a trade, I traded my Hooligans for it and then just re-ordered Hooligans for $35 shipped, not a bad deal at all, and I only paid about $20 for my original Hooligans. Hopefully you can get lucky and find a good deal like that too.

Yeah it's possible that they underestimated foreign demand and they didn't print up as many copies as did the European distributors. It sure would be interesting to know how many copies of each title got printed. Also perhaps the Japanese aren't so quick to pull the trigger on cleareance sales (or any sale for that matter).

[ilovenola2]

Originally Posted by bruceames

Yeah it's possible that they underestimated foreign demand and they didn't print up as many copies as did the European distributors. It sure would be interesting to know how many copies of each title got printed. Also perhaps the Japanese aren't so quick to pull the trigger on cleareance sales (or any sale for that matter).

I think your last sentence probably comes closest to the nail on the head!

[kannisto]

I think it's a combination of small production runs and Japanese customers not being quick to reject formats that might be considered dead by some. There are lots of old game and other formats that are still appreciated and have content availability in various specialty shops here. I think the online and B&M stores never had any excess stock of these HD DVD releases either, they just ordered a few more from some distributors when they ran out and it seems many of the Japan exclusive releases are out of print / out of stock already anyway. I guess they have no reason to try to clear out all their stock quickly .

There have been some minor sales going on here but no firesales. E.g. Warner titles (not much Japan exclusive stuff) were discounted in Amazon JP and Yodobashi Camera for a while (50% off MRSP) and Sofmap was selling most HD DVDs at 50% off from MRSP in their B&M stores but they had few interesting ones left when I noticed that. Yodobashi Camera sold many at 20% off instead of their usual MRSP prices.

Many stores still haven't discounted HD DVDs beyond their usual small discounts at all.

Personally I already bought pretty much all the Japan releases that I wanted so I've not been that much on the lookout for cheap Japanese titles anymore. There are some Japan HD DVD + DVD releases that I'd still be interested in at low prices but those haven't been cheap anywhere as far as I've noticed, e.g. I'm still missing Wings of Honneamise and I could buy some more Virtual Trip titles. It seems anything that includes a DVD is exempt from being part of any special HD DVD price reductions here.

[AOD]

Yeah, I would love to get The Machinist, but it's a hard buy at $50+.

[DCSholtis]

I know what you mean I bought Equilibrium off eBay for $51 and that took some consideration before bidding on it.

[AOD]

Originally Posted by DCSholtis

I know what you mean I bought Equilibrium off eBay for $51 and that took some consideration before bidding on it.

You didn't get your copy from this guy did you? Can you say spelling/sentence errors. Guess he's never heard of spell check. "Japanize"

http://cgi.ebay.com/Equilibrium-HD-D...QQcmdZViewItem