Hello fellow Machiners, and Anime fans, on this edition of "Anime Talk" I want to find out how each of you watch Anime? Do you still purchase DVD/Blu-Ray Discs? Do you download (legally I hope) your anime from a service like iTunes, or Amazon instant video? Are you limited to what is on television on channels like the Cartoon Network? or Do you subscribe to a video streaming service like Netflix or Hulu plus ?
When I first got into Anime, I had very limited access to it. I would watch it occasionally at a friend's house who had a goodly sized collection, and on rare occasions when I had some extra cash I'd go to the Mall and purchase a VHS tape of something that really interested me. When I got my first computer I began search the web for ways to watch it, on YouTube or other websites that was streaming it for free, but that process was always hit or miss. First you had to know what you were looking for and it wasn't always available on the web at all!
A couple of years ago I signed up for Netflix just to watch Anime, however with Netflix despite having many great series and movies on it quickly ran out of things I wanted to watch and thus I switched to Hulu Plus which has a much greater selection when it comes to Anime. Recently I discovered a service called ChrunchyRoll that is a video streaming service of Anime and Asian drama series.
Unlimited access to Anime ( and limited access to the drama series which I am not interested in ) on CrunchyRoll costs me $6.99 a month, and Hulu costs me $7.99 a month thus for what I used to pay for a single Anime Tape I have access to hundreds of different series and movies with new titles being added all the time! I find this method of consuming Anime to be the best for me but it might not be the best for you. Tell me below in the comments your viewing method and why you do it the way you do.
I usually watch stuff on the internet, on anime sites, because it’s convenient for the fact they usually have all of the episodes so I can use go from one episode to the next. But I do have Fairy Tail collection DVDs, because why not.
I watch almost exclusively on TV.
Sometimes, I record a show for later or, more rarely, watch a replay.
But then, we are blessed with a lot of anime here, so it’s easy 🙂 If I lived in another country, things could be different.
Mostly DVDs and Blu-Ray, but I’ve also got membership subscriptions to Netflix, Crunchyroll, and most recently, Funimation, so there’s also a lot of streaming going on as well. It might actually sound like overkill (and frankly, it is), but the truth is that each service tends to offer certain anime series that the others will not, and sometimes, if I really like a series, I’d rather own it, rather than just have access to it until the online service decides it doesn’t want it in its library anymore.
This really is a golden age for otakus though. Back when I was in university, anime availability was much more limited. Now there’s far more than I could possibly digest.
I usually buy them, I recently bought the seasons of dragonball z in bluray.
I don’t watch anime too often, but when I do I use a website called Animefreak where you can stream episodes for free. As JR said it is more convenient and they usually have all the episodes, that is until they decide to remove the series that you are halfway through watching from their library. Well that’s only happened once and to be fair Detective Conan has over 700 episodes so I was never going to finish it anyway.
I have Deathnote and a lot of old Robotech on DVD. I decided to skip the bluray generation. Next time I upgrade hardware I’ll skip to digital.
My first real exposure was Akira (the Streamline dub, which I prefer) on the Sci-Fi Channel, watching it every time they aired it. My anime collection isn’t very large at the moment, but what I have is mostly DVD’s and a couple purchased downloads. I didn’t add Blu-ray to my collection until recently (I am usually late to the party, so to speak), so I’ve got nothing there yet for anime, but I’ll get around to adding some to that part of the collection in time. I have Amazon Prime, so I’m sure I could find something that catches my interest there as well.