FUNimation has kicked off their Fall Survey and there’s definitely some interesting things in there. As we’ve seen with past surveys, results from it definitely have an impact (to varying degrees of course) with what the company does. Shifts in packaging, combo releases and limited edition material have definitely come from fan input with what people are looking for. The latest survey has a number of questions, thirty or so going by the initial page (thankfully they include a progress bar) but the main takeaway people are having from it is that there is now the potential for subtitle-only releases. With FUNimation being the only company that does bilingual for all the titles they do, they’re in a difficult place. To change it brings the potential to upset fans if their favorite show gets picked up from them and now it may not get subtitles. And going by other companies, subtitled Blu-ray releases are slim indeed with generally only import sets and high priced limited editions warranting it. So that could have problems as well.
But there are many shows that simply can’t support a dub that the company may want to tackle, including some prestige titles that float around out there as well. We’re seeing some of those getting acquired elsewhere and you can imagine that FUNimation might feel like they’re missing out on adding some of these titles to their catalog as well as their streaming service. Which, in turn, could drive more eyeballs and consumers to their bilingual products and potentially raise the whole boat.
As we’ve said every time that FUNimation slides out a new survey, take the time to fill it out if you buy your anime on DVD and Blu-ray, streaming from the company or get your simulcasts elsewhere. They take a lot of data and work it to improve their products overall and we’ve all benefited from those improvements over the last few years.
