The increased arc length and massive backlog may partly explain why readership is on the decline, but I don't think thats the whole story; the highly increased inter-connectedness of arcs can also present a barrier to casual fans.
By virtue of its island/arc format One Piece actually used to be fairly welcoming in that regard, as every new island served as a soft reset, a fresh beginning on a new adventure you could enjoy in and of itself. If you didn't like Alabasta, you could come back a year later and it'd all be about this crazy sky island. There was carryover between arcs, of course, but by and large you didn't need to know the CP9 saga inside out to appreciate Thriller Bark, and so on. But now, we're in a saga that has plot-threads and characters stretching back several years. Theres Big Moms crew from the preceding arc, okay fair enough, but even Zou, which introduced the Minks just two arcs ago, is literally 4 years in the past. Even longer ago for Laws whole plotline, even longer for Caribou, Kid and the other Supernova.
Even among the wanoese characters, several of them rely on setups hundreds of chapters ago for the readers to be invested in them; Like, Imagine that you don't have a perfect recollection of the Punk Hazard and Dressrosa arcs, or even Zou, maybe didn't even follow them that closesly at the time - would Momonosuke and Kanjurous big moments recently even work, based on just their depiction within this arc?
Greg: Teacher of SUPER " OP " course !
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Greg, do you have any idea of how Tamas devil fruit power will come into the play against Kaido and his crew? And what did you think of all memes about Tama taming Kaido?
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This is for Greg, I guess. With how much Demon Slayer has benefited from such a great anime, do you think this will be the strategy going forward for the series Jump is really trying to push?
That has always been their strategy.
Shueisha never sold anime rights and thought, "Well, hope this is a complete failure!" Hehe
There's nothing to take away from Kimetsu's success. It is what it is and that is great news all around.
But…a looooooooooot of ppl, esp. talking YouTube heads who didn't have pubic hair a decade ago, are forgetting that this same thing happened before with the successful launch of the Attack on Titan series.
When the anime hit and was a tremendous smash hit bc of the gore which elementary students thought was super cool and mature, they instantly bought the entire manga set.
Think about that for a sec. If you have two tanks out, and suddenly a new audience is buying two volumes, you're easily able to double your sales. Now imagine that when your series has 10 volumes. Or 20.
The same exact thing is happening to Kimetsu. I am happy for Kimetsu's success. Really. But series completion aside, it's almost unthinkable that it would produce the same numbers a second year in a row unless it created and equavalent number of new fans. It's an impressive feat that shows the series hit as a fad, but I'll be imrpressed only when a series does that twice in a row. THAT is when OP has been officially beaten. That shows not only are fans keeping up, but it created an equal or greater of new fans in the following year.
Now. Chew on this for a sec. OP created one of these phenomena for itself about 12 years into its run thanks to Strong World with somewhere around 52 or 53 volumes of material.
How many volumes did AoT have when the anime created a boom?
How many volumes did Demon Slayer have when the anime hit?
OP had fifty. For every new dedicated fan that's 50 freaking tanks.
That is...disgusting. It's absurd. But it happened.
Now, OP is struggling to create new fans, and -as fads go- losing fans along the way. But...it retains enough ubiquity and enough fans to still break records and come damn close to booming series like Demon Slayer with its yearly sales of 5ish tanks per fcn compared to entire sets of Demon Slayer being bought up.
That's impressive.
So all the gloating and strutting going on, viewed by someone who's been watching these trends for almost two decades now seems...really short-sighted.
Yes! Be happy about the succes! I welcome to light a fire not only in Oda, but the other authors too! At the end of the day, I wanna read fun stories and if losing sparks that fire then PLEASE show these authors up!
But...pretending like it's a crushing blow that signals the end of days or decline of fandom? Oof.
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Well, KnY is beating OP two years in a row. They've already sold more than 30mi volumes in 2020, so they'll eat the cake at the end of this year as well.
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@Daz:
The increased arc length and massive backlog may partly explain why readership is on the decline, but I don't think thats the whole story; the highly increased inter-connectedness of arcs can also present a barrier to casual fans.
By virtue of its island/arc format One Piece actually used to be fairly welcoming in that regard, as every new island served as a soft reset, a fresh beginning on a new adventure you could enjoy in and of itself. If you didn't like Alabasta, you could come back a year later and it'd all be about this crazy sky island. There was carryover between arcs, of course, but by and large you didn't need to know the CP9 saga inside out to appreciate Thriller Bark, and so on. But now, we're in a saga that has plot-threads and characters stretching back several years. Theres Big Moms crew from the preceding arc, okay fair enough, but even Zou, which introduced the Minks just two arcs ago, is literally 4 years in the past. Even longer ago for Laws whole plotline, even longer for Caribou, Kid and the other Supernova.
Even among the wanoese characters, several of them rely on setups hundreds of chapters ago for the readers to be invested in them; Like, Imagine that you don't have a perfect recollection of the Punk Hazard and Dressrosa arcs, or even Zou, maybe didn't even follow them that closesly at the time - would Momonosuke and Kanjurous big moments recently even work, based on just their depiction within this arc?100% this. Now, I expect readership to increase again once Wano pays off and Oda starts shifting the manga to a new plotline. Wano itself is the end of nearly 400 chapters of plotwork with two Yonko. After this, Kaido and the Samurai/Mink plots should be finished. Big Mom may be finished as well. A lot of what comes next has been setup (Kuma, Vegapunk, Blackbeard, Shanks, Revolutionaries, World Government, Final War business) already, but it is technically new and not yet beginning through an introductory arc like Punk Hazard was. Sure, the next arc may be the "next Punk Hazard" in a way, but it will reset the overall plotline to having less characters again until it builds up to something else. I think once this plotline finishes and Oda spends the next 5-10 years diving out the "climax" or however many arcs after that lead to said climax, readership will rise again.
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Most of us read it weekly. If you needed the sales to remind you of the arc's mishaps, then you were looking for the sales. It's convenient and not believable.
Why does sales matter to you? I understand if you were getting money in the industry, but you haven't said that. You are introducing how sales should be at a certain mark, but didn't provide anything that says it should matter to a fan when judging quality. You're backpedalling away from that.
It's one thing to say "i'm not being satisfied", then it's another to say " unsatisfactory sales reflect my disappointment".
Looking to sales for validation makes no sense because they don't match your taste. Unless you are trying to say that sales match your taste all of the time, this whole discussion about "sales needing to be boosted" is fatuous. I believe you've been able to point out the faults and flaws in writing for One Piece without leaning on inaccurate sales figures.
I don't get what's so hard to understand though. Sales are a showcase of the investment the fans have. If this massive arc according to Oda can't bring at least the readers that left come back then what will ?
Hence why my initial question about what Oda currently thinks about the state of his manga and if he thinks he failed to deliver what he promised. Because given the state of the sales, the current events occurring in the manga, well for me at least he failed to deliver what he promised.
–- Update From New Post Merge ---
The first part of the arc was more concerned with introducing Wano's people. It's a natural part of Oda's writing and outright necessary as many are taking part in the war.
I'm actually pretty interested in the Onigashima half because Oda mentioned several sacrifices are gonna happen, which is something that previous arcs lacked except maybe Whole Cake.
Yeah similar sacrifices with Jinbe. Everyone will get out unharmed.
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@Joy:
I don't get what's so hard to understand though. Sales are a showcase of the investment the fans have. If this massive arc according to Oda can't bring at least the readers that left come back then what will ?
Hence why my initial question about what Oda currently thinks about the state of his manga and if he thinks he failed to deliver what he promised. Because given the state of the sales, the current events occurring in the manga, well for me at least he failed to deliver what he promised.
–- Update From New Post Merge ---
Yeah similar sacrifices with Jinbe. Everyone will get out unharmed.
I'm confused as to what the problem is. It has been on a downward trend since Marineford hype (like nearly 4x less the number of volumes sold by this point). The manga didn't spike in sales until Marineford hit its stride (nearly 40 million volumes per year), and before this one piece was immensely popular during W7/Thriller Bark (less than 10 million volumes per year). Its just returning to the same level of sales it had pre-marineford. Once Wano actually delivers (if it does), then we should see a spike once again in volume sails. The problem is the sheer number of chapters dedicated to setup. 71 chapters and counting, coming from an 80 chapter arc (WCI) that was setup for Wano, coming even further from an additional 170 chapters (Punk Hazard, DR, Zou) that began the Samurai/Kaido plot in the first place.
We haven't gotten to the payoff yet this arc, so we really need to wait before we question if OP's popularity is actually declining or people are in fact waiting for the payoff Oda has been promising for 8 years. Then you have literally everything else after this arc, which is infinitely bigger and setup up to be something else.
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Well, KnY is beating OP two years in a row. They've already sold more than 30mi volumes in 2020, so they'll eat the cake at the end of this year as well.
You're missing a part of that. KnY is in its final arc and its only a 20 volume pickup. It's at the end and people know it. So people are still wiling to pick up the whole series. That is not just from sales of the new volumes, its the whole series. And it's not going to keep that up.
When just the new 4 volumes on their own are matching just the 4 new volumes of OP, that's when there's a real discussion about surpassing it.
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@Gia:
I'm confused as to what the problem is. It has been on a downward trend since Marineford hype (like nearly 4x less the number of volumes sold by this point). The manga didn't spike in sales until Marineford hit its stride (nearly 40 million volumes per year), and before this one piece was immensely popular during W7/Thriller Bark (less than 10 million volumes per year). Its just returning to the same level of sales it had pre-marineford. Once Wano actually delivers (if it does), then we should see a spike once again in volume sails. The problem is the sheer number of chapters dedicated to setup. 71 chapters and counting, coming from an 80 chapter arc (WCI) that was setup for Wano, coming even further from an additional 170 chapters (Punk Hazard, DR, Zou) that began the Samurai/Kaido plot in the first place.
We haven't gotten to the payoff yet this arc, so we really need to wait before we question if OP's popularity is actually declining or people are in fact waiting for the payoff Oda has been promising for 8 years. Then you have literally everything else after this arc, which is infinitely bigger and setup up to be something else.
It's been in a downward trend since Wano. Before Wano OP was always selling at least 2 million per volume. So yes as I've repeatedly said the arc Oda HIMSELF has immensely hyped up, instead of boosting interest in the series, we actually have a decline. Hence why I asked Greg about how Oda himself feels and if he feels that he failed to deliver on said hype.
Personally for me as I said there are major gripes I have with this arc but I like it. It doesn't live up to the hype Oda and his editors build up about it though.
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You're missing a part of that. KnY is in its final arc and its only a 20 volume pickup. It's at the end and people know it. So people are still wiling to pick up the whole series. That is not just from sales of the new volumes, its the whole series. And it's not going to keep that up.
When just the new 4 volumes on their own are matching just the 4 new volumes of OP, that's when there's a real discussion about surpassing it.
Again go see the new volumes numbers. The last volume of kimetsu sales nearly twice as much as a new volume of One Piece.
We are no more talking of backlog sales here.
And Kimetsu has still 3 or 4 volumes worth of chapters while One Piece must delay its next release in order to have enough chapters to make a volume -
@Joy:
I don't get what's so hard to understand though. Sales are a showcase of the investment the fans have. If this massive arc according to Oda can't bring at least the readers that left come back then what will ?
So you're saying that a fan that doesn't pay in some way isn't as invested as someone who bought all the merchandise, boxsets, etc? That isn't true at all. Sales are not only inaccurate and dubious, it doesn't reflect how invested people really are. The fans that read the manga on the internet and are in countries with no access to digital or physical copies to pay for is still invested and engaged in the story. There is no stat to count them.
The craziest part is that the core of your stance reflects Wano Arc. Countries that don't provide the Heavenly Tribute don't count. Yet, Cipher Pol is there to make deals behind the scenes. Everyone has value, but can't be officially counted.
You are basically saying that anyone who doesn't put a penny up isn't invested. That is why you're wrong on this front. It goes back to the topic of getting scans out of the way and only having One Piece on MP, Viz, etc. They aren't the end all be all. They fail to market and give access to many places and i'm not saying that they don't make an effort to change that. They do make efforts to shut down the same platforms that made people fans tho. To become a fan, sometimes it's about the right place and right time. How many people caught themselves giving OP a try because of J Box or MS at the right place and time? There's a chance that if it wasn't there, it wouldn't have happened at all.
Hence why my initial question about what Oda currently thinks about the state of his manga and if he thinks he failed to deliver what he promised. Because given the state of the sales, the current events occurring in the manga, well for me at least he failed to deliver what he promised.
You keep dodging this and i'm not the only one asking you this question. Do sales reflect precisely what the quality is in the story? If it does, you have to prove it. You would have to use what you've gone to. That is Oricon, which is proven to not be credible. Even if you do use the numbers that they post, it still doesn't correspond with what you re implying about sales reflecting Oda's capability to "hype".
Provide the 5 moments that you consider the most "hype" in all of the series w/o searching Oricon. Then check the chart after providing your moments. Do they reflect in sales?
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If Kimetsu really is selling more than One Piece then congratulations. I don't understand why this matters to people though. I'm happy as long as a series I like is selling enough to not get cancelled.
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Again go see the new volumes numbers. The last volume of kimetsu sales nearly twice as much as a new volume of One Piece.
We are no more talking of backlog sales here.
And Kimetsu has still 3 or 4 volumes worth of chapters while One Piece must delay its next release in order to have enough chapters to make a volumeFair enough. I can't readily find numbers and graphs for this year yet, all I'm seeing are total sales for the year, with which it has already broken records.
But one of the big factors in the manga's sales IS the fact that the end is nearing, it's a limited investment. Most manga tends to get a big boost in sales during the grand finale, due to returning readership and a bunch of other things. It's carrying its catch up binge momentum into its conclusion momentum. It's not going to be a long runner so we won't find out how it would have done if it tried to keep this momentum… it'd probably start dropping in the mid 20's like most anga do after they get their anime boost a couple years in.
Be good for it if it can go out on top.
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So you're saying that a fan that doesn't pay in some way isn't as invested as someone who bought all the merchandise, boxsets, etc? That isn't true at all. Sales are not only inaccurate and dubious, it doesn't reflect how invested people really are. The fans that read the manga on the internet and are in countries with no access to digital or physical copies to pay for is still invested and engaged in the story. There is no stat to count them.
The craziest part is that the core of your stance reflects Wano Arc. Countries that don't provide the Heavenly Tribute don't count. Yet, Cipher Pol is there to make deals behind the scenes. Everyone has value, but can't be officially counted.
You are basically saying that anyone who doesn't put a penny up isn't invested. That is why you're wrong on this front. It goes back to the topic of getting scans out of the way and only having One Piece on MP, Viz, etc. They aren't the end all be all. They fail to market and give access to many places and i'm not saying that they don't make an effort to change that. They do make efforts to shut down the same platforms that made people fans tho. To become a fan, sometimes it's about the right place and right time. How many people caught themselves giving OP a try because of J Box or MS at the right place and time? There's a chance that if it wasn't there, it wouldn't have happened at all. What does the internet have to do with this ? Oricon Chart had nothing to do with the internet so no point in bringing up the fans who use the internet to read the series etc.
Question still stands and you are really not giving an answer, instead what you are doing is trying to overcomplicate what I said for no reason at all. I'll quote myself and I expect a discussion over my question, not an answer about who uses the internet to read OP or not.
If this massive arc according to Oda can't bring at least the readers that left come back then what will ?
Hence why my initial question about what Oda currently thinks about the state of his manga and if he thinks he failed to deliver what he promised. Because given the state of the sales, the current events occurring in the manga, well for me at least he failed to deliver what he promised.
You keep dodging this and i'm not the only one asking you this question. Do sales reflect precisely what the quality is in the story? If it does, you have to prove it. You would have to use what you've gone to. That is Oricon, which is proven to not be credible. Even if you do use the numbers that they post, it still doesn't correspond with what you re implying about sales reflecting Oda's capability to "hype".
Provide the 5 moments that you consider the most "hype" in all of the series w/o searching Oricon. Then check the chart after providing your moments. Do they reflect in sales?
What I consider the most hype ? MF, Post skip meeting, Entering the NW, End of PH,first 30 chapters of it and end of Dressrosa and post WCI stuff, Reverie and first 20 chapters of Wano are the most hype moments I've seen personally. All volumes that contain those plot lines nearly have 2,5 million volume sales.
Volume 96 on the other hand is not close to those numbers. Same volume that has Roger, WB etc.
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@Joy:
Volume 96 on the other hand is not close to those numbers. Same volume that has Roger, WB etc.
Cant we not factor a global pandemic to this lol?
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Fair enough. I can't readily find numbers and graphs for this year yet, all I'm seeing are total sales for the year, with which it has already broken records.
But one of the big factors in the manga's sales IS the fact that the end is nearing, it's a limited investment. Most manga tends to get a big boost in sales during the grand finale, due to returning readership and a bunch of other things. It's carrying its catch up binge momentum into its conclusion momentum. It's not going to be a long runner so we won't find out how it would have done if it tried to keep this momentum… it'd probably start dropping in the mid 20's like most anga do after they get their anime boost a couple years in.
Be good for it if it can go out on top.
@Kaizou:
April 20th ~ April 26th (Credit to Kaizou_10 / Negative Syndicate)
05. Kimetsu no Yaiba #8 (73,260 / 2,903,760)
06. Kimetsu no Yaiba #2 (71,848 / 2,910,562)
07. Kimetsu no Yaiba #7 (71,372 / 2,904,386)
08. Kimetsu no Yaiba #9 (71,304 / 2,891,373)
09. Kimetsu no Yaiba #1 (70,559 / 2,992,797)
10. Gotoubun no Hanayome Special Edition #14 (69,983 / 192,035)
11. Meitantei Conan #98 (69,979 / 274,677)
12. Kimetsu no Yaiba #3 (69,574 / 2,870,733)
13. Kimetsu no Yaiba #4 (68,249 / 2,837,776)
14. Shingeki no Kyojin #31 (66,510 / 542,384)
15. Daiya no Ace Act II #21 (63,792 / 122,920)
16. Kimetsu no Yaiba #19 (61,517 / 2,602,775)
17. Kimetsu no Yaiba #6 (60,944 / 2,815,898)
18. Kimetsu no Yaiba #5 (59,920 / 2,818,917)
19. Kimetsu no Yaiba #10 (59,611 / 2,866,354)
20. Kimetsu no Yaiba #12 (58,586 / 2,862,701)
21. Kimetsu no Yaiba #11 (58,408 / 2,866,976)
22. Kimetsu no Yaiba #13 (58,084 / 2,846,701)
23. Kimetsu no Yaiba #14 (57,438 / 2,837,477)
24. Kimetsu no Yaiba #15 (57,130 / 2,810,081)
25. Kimetsu no Yaiba #16 (56,708 / 2,816,573)
26. Arifureta Shokugyou de Sekai Saikyou #6 (55,951)
27. Kami-tachi ni Hirowareta Otoko #5 (55,812)
28. Kimetsu no Yaiba #18 (54,267 / 2,812,123)
29. One Piece #96 (51,942 / 1,594,700)Those are the most recent figure Kaizou has posted in the Oricon thread. Even if Oricon figure are not completely true, they should not be completely false either
And notice that One Piece is behind despite being released one month later so the difference may not decrease and rather increaseAnd I don't disagree with the fact that the serie is short was a factor of its success. I have said several times that One Piece length has become one of its major drawbacks
Personnally I don't recommend it to my friends who are not manga readers anymore and those who may be interested don't want to invest in such a long serieAlso it is announced that Kimetsu will have the lead color for its final chapter this is something only a handful of series got in Jump history. That surprised me
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You're missing a part of that. KnY is in its final arc and its only a 20 volume pickup. It's at the end and people know it. So people are still wiling to pick up the whole series. That is not just from sales of the new volumes, its the whole series. And it's not going to keep that up.
When just the new 4 volumes on their own are matching just the 4 new volumes of OP, that's when there's a real discussion about surpassing it.
I know that KnY's immense sales this year is because of the entire back catalogue. But that's not outside the scope of the discussion, afterall that was also true last year and Greg acknowledge those sales as beating One Piece once. So now it is twice.
Anyway, KnY is also outselling One Piece in new volumes too. All of the most recent KnY volumes are way above 2.5 million in sales while OP new volumes are struggling to reach 2 million.
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Wait detective conan is still being released?
That is way more interesting than whosits outselling OP a month
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I know that KnY's immense sales this year is because of the entire back catalogue. But that's not outside the scope of the discussion, afterall that was also true last year and Greg acknowledge those sales as beating One Piece once. So now it is twice.
Anyway, KnY is also outselling One Piece in new volumes too. All of the most recent KnY volumes are way above 2.5 million in sales while OP new volumes are struggling to reach 2 million.
And OP at its peak was selling 3.5 million per volume in the first month. ANd its also kept high for decades.
LOTS of manga hit a peak around volume 20 (when their anime adapation hits) and then fall off pretty quickly over the years that follow… KNY is going right into its ending, so its not going to see that falloff to the same degree but its also not going to really be tested for retention either..
I'm not trying to downplay its success, I'm really not, and I like the series, but... it IS doing a different thing under different circumstances.
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@Joy:
What does the internet have to do with this ? Oricon Chart had nothing to do with the internet so no point in bringing up the fans who use the internet to read the series etc.
You're saying that sales reflect Oda's capability to deliver "hype", yet how can the sales reflect it when it doesn't represent every fan's opinion? Isn't that what you mean when you say delivering hype? Is that not an opinion of yours? Unless you see it as fact. That would be borderline delusional because every single reader does not agree with your stance.
The internet has so much to do with this. You are using sales that can't quantify the opinions and investment of the fandom as a whole. There are those that can't be counted and your dismissal of their opinion is consistent with your way of using sales to back up your rancor with Oda's execution. That is the very issue. This same Oricon that admittedly doesn't count every retailer that offers the volumes and every platform as well. You are using a chart that is proven not credible and doesn't represent the sample size that you're referring to.
Question still stands and you are really not giving an answer, instead what you are doing is trying to overcomplicate what I said for no reason at all. I'll quote myself and I expect a discussion over my question, not an answer about who uses the internet to read OP or not.
I'm dealing with what you are saying at it's core. That is the chart that you use. I have provided evidence and common sense that says it isn't credible and sales in general don't matter or reflect the execution of the story in the audience's perspective.
What I consider the most hype ? MF, Post skip meeting, Entering the NW, End of PH,first 30 chapters of it and end of Dressrosa and post WCI stuff, Reverie and first 20 chapters of Wano are the most hype moments I've seen personally. All volumes that contain those plot lines nearly have 2,5 million volume sales.
Volume 96 on the other hand is not close to those numbers. Same volume that has Roger, WB etc.
1. This isn't a top 5
2. You're not providing the numbers from the creditless Oricon to compare those moments to othersYou're basically doing everything to dodge the core of your own point. The fact that there are people who even you know wouldn't include some of this in their top 5, defeats your point. Everyone has their fav moments. It doesn't reflect sales.
What it all boils down to is you're making up numbers to backup your disappointment with the arc.
Perfect example. Thousands of people come to AP forums, probably more. If I made a thread with a poll to get a feel on what chapter gained the most activity, would every member on the forum suffice? No. There are people that never signed up. There are people who have been banned. There are people that go years of lurking or just don't engage as much. They can't vote. Do they matter when it comes to activity? Yes. They have engaged at moments or just weren't up for it at points. You are disqualifying those who buy volumes from retailers and platforms that aren't counted by your already creditless Oricon when you try to quantify "hype" for Oda.
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Probably the most impressive thing about all those numbers is how healthy the Manga Industry remains in Japan, despite technology and internet taking over entertainment.
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Probably the most impressive thing about all those numbers is how healthy the Manga Industry remains in Japan, despite technology and internet taking over entertainment.
It just feels THAT MUCH better to have a physical volume in your hands to read. I personally hate reading one piece off of a screen, even though you have the benefit of visualizing a double spread as intended (which you can't properly with a manga volume unless you rip the pages out lol)
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OP is still the best for me but I also have problems with it post ts…
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According to Oricon, within the first months of release, Vol 87 sold more than Vol 90.
Vol 90 is one of Joy Boy's listed "hype" moments in the series and vol 87 isn't. Even the equivocal Oricon doesn't agree with you smh
1 month in
87 - 2.1 m
90 - 1.9 m2 months in
87 - 2.2 m
90 - 2 m -
Dunno… JoyBoy has a point there: what Oda and his editors were hoping for (bring back readers and win new ones) didn't happen. We can conclude this from those dropping sales. I wouldn't go as far as to say that dropping sells = bad quality though.
Anyway, time to give KnY another try. I've read the first 10 chapters some time ago and never went back. Probably because Promised Neverland took my attention and I didn't want to bother with two demon mangas at the same time lol
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Dunno… JoyBoy has a point there: what Oda and his editors were hoping for (bring back readers and win new ones) didn't happen. We can conclude this from those dropping sales. I wouldn't go as far as to say that dropping sells = bad quality though.
Anyway, time to give KnY another try. I've read the first 10 chapters some time ago and never went back. Probably because Promised Neverland took my attention and I didn't want to bother with two demon mangas at the same time lol
What is the number they stated? Or is this just another thing the fans make up to debate who sells more again?
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What is the number they stated? Or is this just another thing the fans make up to debate who sells more again?
Of course we don't know any numbers, but this doesn't sound like "yeah, let's just see how it will turn out": [
E](
)dit: Also that kind of hype isn't done casually, but I may be wrong on this. As far as I remember only the beginning of New World was hyped/promoted that hard.
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Of course we don't know any numbers, but this doesn't sound like "yeah, let's just see how it will turn out": [
E](
)dit: Also that kind of hype isn't done casually, but I may be wrong on this. As far as I remember only the beginning of New World was hyped/promoted that hard.
Wait, this is what this whole convo is about?
Wano arc will be the most amazing arc ever since Marineford War arc
You're telling me that saying "this will be the best arc ever" entails that every volume will sell more than ever? The same arc that isn't even over yet? Again, sales will never equate to quality. Joy Boy just proved that with his list.We can have everyone list their fav volume right now. Everyone won't post the same volume. Not only that, everyone's volume won't be when volumes were selling the highest and you know why? Sales and the exact chart being relied upon isn't reliable.
Show me where in Oricon is my purchase of 3 box sets in 2015 represented. It doesn't account for everyone. It's also not reliable for those they do account for, yet people take it serious enough to normalize it in conversation. It's by definition, ignorant to do so.
Edit
"The company i'm using to measure sales activity has admitted that they don't count everyone, yet I still think they're reliable"
"Oricon was accused of manipulating numbers, pressed charges against that individual, then dropped the case. They are credible tho"
"Oricon doesn't account for everyone, but i'm performing mental gymnastics to make it fit my stance because i'm not satisfied with the arc"
"Oricon says vol. 87 sold better than vol. 90, but vol 90 has 1 of the most "hype" moments still"This is literally what i'm seeing here. It's far from logical.
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What I get is that they were trying to increase sales with the beginning of Wano more than on their daily economic/publishing-business basis. They had little success with it. I never made a connection between sales and quality. Actually I 'm with kdom and robby and some others on this… It's just impossible for a 100volume manga that already is the most popular manga for such a long time to drag in new fans.
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And OP at its peak was selling 3.5 million per volume in the first month. ANd its also kept high for decades.
LOTS of manga hit a peak around volume 20 (when their anime adapation hits) and then fall off pretty quickly over the years that follow… KNY is going right into its ending, so its not going to see that falloff to the same degree but its also not going to really be tested for retention either..
I'm not trying to downplay its success, I'm really not, and I like the series, but... it IS doing a different thing under different circumstances.
I'm aware that OP in general is way more successful than KnY will ever be.
All I said was that KnY was beating OP two years in a roll in response to Greg's comment that, is his words, "I'll be impressed only when a series does that twice in a roll".
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I'm aware that OP in general is way more successful than KnY will ever be.
All I said was that KnY was beating OP two years in a roll in response to Greg's comment that, is his words, "I'll be impressed only when a series does that twice in a roll".
You got me hungry.
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Didn't they said publicly that the beginning of Wano was designed to be easy to jump into in order to get new readers/get back new readers? Probably the reason for the anime overhaul as well, and maybe even Oda's comments about ending in five years (the subtext being ''just a little more, guys, now is the time to jump in or you'll miss it'').
I do think they were trying, and it doesn't seem to have worked.
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If they were trying to sell more, Oda showing his face on certain platforms would be a great strategy. While his mystique helps, we are in an engaging period. The best marketing is engaging and interacting with your fans outside of the magazine, volumes, comments and interviews. I just don't get that from the translated comments. I see comments like this where they are excited for the coming events a lot
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If they were trying to sell more, Oda showing his face on certain platforms would be a great strategy. While his mystique helps, we are in an engaging period. The best marketing is engaging and interacting with your fans outside of the magazine, volumes, comments and interviews. I just don't get that from the translated comments. I see comments like this where they are excited for the coming events a lot
Nah. I don't think that would help at all.
Oda has a "pretend I don't exist" policy, wanting his story to be at the forefront for the readers (confirmed by a SBS). And it has never really hurt him before.
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Nah. I don't think that would help at all.
Oda has a "pretend I don't exist" policy, wanting his story to be at the forefront for the readers (confirmed by a SBS). And it has never really hurt him before.
Yet some in this thread say that him and his editors are making statements to help with sales
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I love Joy Boy's post.
Like he seems to understand how irrelevant and utterly pointless his "sales = quality" point is but instead of taking a moment to step back and reflect, he just delves deeper and deeper into the rabbit hole while proving nothing. Not sure why people are entertaining him though.
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DS's success in sales lies in its freshness and ease of accessibility .
Make no mistake.
Any 4th-6th grade elementary school classroom you walk into now in Japan will present you with roughly half those kids being dedicated DS fans.
Due to the internet of things, a normally fad-driven culture like Japan is now seeing the acceptance of popular culture like never before.
But…by definition, the very nature of fads is that in two years time, although not forgotten, they are almost universally accepted as 'old' unless they create an industry unto themselves.
Hikakin did this. Johnny's has multiple arms like this. Comedians who become variety MCs do this. AoT did this for a respectable length. OP obviously is. MHA was on the verge of doing it and with insider info I do know the push is most certainly being made but I'm not sure where things are going now.
DS seems poised to do so. But...can it maintain it? That's my point.
It's hard as hell to accomplish it but it's even harder to maintain it. As things stand, esp. with the series ending, it's not hard to see it slipping into regular fad rotation unless Shueisha has a baller plan for continuing the series that doesn't feel tacked on. Because mark my words, Japan's cruelest critics, are elementary school students. I have seen wildly popular series be dropped dead just because new content wasn't avcilable or something more distracting was released.
Yokai Watch
Splatoon
Minecraft
Pokemon GO!
Attack on Titan
Osomatsu-kun
Assassination ClassroomI've watched each of these be dropped hard by elementary schoolers.
Yes they're still around and still profitable. But they're not the bleeding edge of ubiquitousness they once were.As things stand, with the impending end, DS is on track to be the next Assassination Classroom in terms of poofing out at the height of popularity.
It will be interesting to see if MHA picks up steam but that'll be tough considering how well DS outshined it.
As for monthlies or even quarterlies beating OP, that has long proven to never be a safe bet. When I say I'll be impressed if it accomplishes it twice, it's for the year. If it manages to do so, that's better than AoT and I didn't expect to see a series accomplish that during OP's running life. If it does, that's impressive!!!
Also, just curious, those figures posted a few pages back, am I reading that right? Are older tanks of DS selling more copies than newer ones?
(Hi, matamune :) )
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What's your take on the theory that Mihawk might be the son of Shakky and Rayleigh? Don't think there's anything in the manga that would make it impossible and perhaps by the time of the recent Oden flashback, Oda realised he could make it work i.e drawing Rayleigh wearing flower patterned clothes, talking about old memories of holding a baby when he held Momo.
It would add a whole other dimension to Mihawk's rivalry with Shanks (Rayleigh's student)
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^…....What?
How the hell do people even come to that conclusion? Is it from Joyboy The Youtuber?
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Re: JB's question on hype, it's a fair question and deserves an equally fair answer but one I need to be at a computer for. If my atrocious spelling hasn't given it away, these past few posts have been from my phone.
Also, I was lucky enough to be interviewed on the Shonen Jump Podcast and I was able to be a bit more candid than I usually am in public about discussing Oda-san. Check it out if you have time and interest
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Anyway, time to give KnY another try. I've read the first 10 chapters some time ago and never went back.
Watch the anime. It doing well is entirely on the adaptation elevating it. Same plot and story, but gorgeous animation and backgrounds add a lot.
Manga didn't do much for me when I looked at it. Pretty typical shonen though with almost seinin levels of blood. It starts out strongish but becomes pretty typical as soon as the roster expands.
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Scratch that. Go read/watch D.Gray Man. It does the similar premise with much much better characters and plot.
Kaiba got animation but the source-material is as weak and typical modern shonen as a modern shonen can get.
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^…....What?
How the hell do people even come to that conclusion? Is it from Joyboy The Youtuber?
It's not an obvious theory with loads of hints but it's plausible. Consider the below:
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Shakky told Luffy and co, she retired as a pirate 42 years ago, before the God Valley incident, and importantly 1 year after Mihawk was born.
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In the recent Oden flashback, when Rayleigh is holding baby Momo, he says: "Reminds me of the old days", so it's possible Rayleigh was with baby Mihawk for at least a year.
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We know Shakky and Rayleigh are romantic partners.
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In the Oden flashback, Rayleigh is wearing a coat with the flower type patterns similar to what Mihawk wears, and Shakky's real name, Shakuyaku, means Peony a flower. They could be subtle hints from Oda.
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Mihawk has pointy sideburns similar to Shakky's hair and loves wine, perhaps the influence of growing up in Shakky's Rip-off Bar.
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By the time Rayleigh retired and reunited with Shakky, Mihawk was old enough to go his separate ways as a pirate.
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Mihawk's rivalry with Shanks - if it's true Mihawk is the son of Rayleigh, this could explain his fierce rivalry with Shanks. Since Shanks served under Roger's ship, he spent quality time as Rayleigh's student, learning his sword-fighting from him. It could have made Mihawk envious towards Shanks and strive to prove his swordsmanship was better than Rayleigh's (which he taught Shanks).
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I assumed Shakky was part of the rox pirates after she said 40 years ago she was a pirate and that Garp chased her relentlessly
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Some years ago I used to check on every new manga from Weekly Shonen Jump. Kimetsu no Yaiba was much above average and did a pretty good job with the atmosphere of its universe.
I only read the first 20 chapters or something, because I don't really have patience anymore to follow weekly chapters other than One Piece, but I'm really excited to binge-read it once it is finished. I don't see much reason to belittle its beginning (even though it's very simple) and I vehemently disagree with any comparison to trash like Black Clover.
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It's funny that you mention Black Clover because it is exactly like it. The level of tropes, cliches, mediocre execution, lack of author-voice etc… are basically on-par with Black Cover.
There is a reason why the series, for most of its publication, was unknown. Nobody really gave a crap about it until the flashy anime showed up. It's a success for the author but let's not sit here and pretend that there is even an ouch of creative-input and some fresh approach that the series offers. It's as cliched and as soulless as a series can get right down to the design and personality of its main baddie.
It sort of reminds me of Fairytail with its lack of any author-voice and Gantz with its bleakness.
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Some years ago I used to check on every new manga from Weekly Shonen Jump. Kimetsu no Yaiba was much above average and did a pretty good job with the atmosphere of its universe.
I only read the first 20 chapters or something, because I don't really have patience anymore to follow weekly chapters other than One Piece, but I'm really excited to binge-read it once it is finished. I don't see much reason to belittle its beginning (even though it's very simple) and I vehemently disagree with any comparison to trash like Black Clover.
I much prefer Black Clover and how earnestly it just goes with the Shonen flow. So the buck goes both ways.
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but let's not sit here and pretend that there is even an ouch of creative-input and some fresh approach that the series offers.
I dunno, making the demons sympathetic and showing their backstories, generally right as they're killed, and having the lead be predisposed to feeling bad for them, was an interesting touch… if not explored as much as it could be.
It gets rough when Zenitsu shows up though because of sheer obnoxiousness.
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I dunno, making the demons sympathetic and showing their backstories, generally right as they're killed, and having the lead be predisposed to feeling bad for them, was an interesting touch… if not explored as much as it could be.
It gets rough when Zenitsu shows up though because of sheer obnoxiousness.
Yeah, that guy is obnoxious. For my taste, the author went too far in making that guy obnoxious. He comes off as more cowardly than Usopp, yet his heroics are accidental so while they're badass, they don't feel earned. At least by the end of the first season they don't. I liked the pig guy, though, but he was the only character I really liked and I wasn't invested in him.
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