new mu 09

Well, it's properly April now, so that means a lot of new anime stuff has started in Japan.

April seems to represent the main big season, which I'd guess is tied into the new financial year and the refreshing of yearly budgets. The second season starts in six-months at around the beginning of October. There are also the half-season points in July and January, but those normally only see a handful of new shows come out.

I have to admit that, having perused some of the show descriptions there's not much that stands out as being my cup of tea so far. Of course, one of the reasons I watch fansubs is to sample all of the shows and find out for sure. There are often things that turn up that I'm pleasantly surprised by, and I've therefore learned not to make too many assumptions.

A big difference this year, though is that crunchyroll is picking up a good few shows.

I've mentioned crunchyroll before of course and my feelings are generally unchanged. I'm seriously unimpressed with the site itself. It's horribly laid out, horrible to navigate and pitifully slow to load most of the time.

It also relies predominantly on streaming, which I'm not the biggest fan of. Downloads are much better, I find, and that brings me to the main point - I think I'm going to have to become a member of crunchyroll in order to make the most out of it and download these new shows they've got.

It seems like relatively reasonable value from that point of view and I've said before I'm very much in favour of sites offering legal anime content, despite being a DVD man at heart.

The only thing I'm left worrying about is how practical it's goign to be. One of the biggest advantages to fansubs is the use of bittorrent, which I can just leave going while I'm at work and when I come home it's sorted its own life out. Direst downloads tend to need a bit more in the way of active management, especially on my connection, which can be a bit flaky.

Still, I'm going to take the plunge, I think. I can always cancel the subscription if it's not working out, after all.

New anime magazines turned up yesterday, which I wasn't expecting - I thought they'd not be here until next week, actually, so that was a nice surprise.