As many of you heard Steam has started to cooperate with Crunchyroll to bring Anime TV series and movies to Steam. Seeing that Steam wasnt able to bring Hollywood to the point to sell Movies on their platform, they chose to go the easy way and started their TV/Video distribution now with Japanese Anime probably with the future aim to expand the Anime selling to a point that the Hollywood Studios would be inclined to allow Steam to sell their Movies as well.

This is therefore a good time to start for GoG to research on how to expand their DRM-Free Distribution the same way.

The Problem with Steam's Anime TV Shows are the following and GoG can be a better Alternative:

1. Steam's Anime is streamed instead of getting a file. Making it impossible to watch it on the train for example.
2. Steam's Anime is in some cases the censored TV Version (not the uncensored Blu-Ray or DVD Version)
3. Steam's Anime is not the highest possible encoding quality (because of streaming bandwith the quality is lower than DVD or Blurays.
4. Steam's Anime is not in all Regions available. (Many anime are only available in the US and cant be bought from Europe.

GoG could be a better Alternative:

1. GoG's Anime should provide a video file in mkv format. The benefit is that Subtitles are softcoded and not hardcoded into the video so you could correct the subtitle or disable it for taking screenshots for example. You can add multiple different language subtitles with mkv as well. Having files enable you to play them on almost every playback device or tablet and on the move without worrying about internet connection (especially if you dont have one available in the train for example)
2. GoG's Anime should in those rare cases where censored TV Versions are available, get the Uncensored Version which are released on DVD and Blu-Ray.
3. GoG's Anime should have the highest possible encoding quality (Blu-Ray, DVD Quality and not bandwith optimized lower quality Streaming encodes)
4. GoG's Anime should try to be available in all Regions. Although that would be a bit harder because those Licence givers want to have contracts stupidly for every region separately instead of making it available for the entire World but with different prices for different regions (like pc games are doing it now)

GoG could perhaps start to contact Crunchyroll as well or if they dont cooperate, try to contact Japanese Anime Producers directly. Even a small testing of 2-3 small and old series on GoG (Good Old Anime) would give sales feedback and statistics to GoG and to the cooperating Japanese distributor or (Crunchyroll). If they see that they can have good profit selling Anime on GoG they probably will extend their cooperation with GoG as well.

Now is the time for GoG to act, so to be not left behind by Steam in the race for providing more than Games to your customers.

Please add your opinions to this discussion! (^_^) and make Suggestions for (old- Good old Anime) TV Shows you would want to add to GoG.

Steam has anime now? That's very convenient. Now I can avoid two things I hate at the same time! :D

cant see it happening. We all seen how japanese studios love their drm; you have the big distributors/publishers selling the dvd/blu rays to contend with (Madhouse etc) - the same regional issues affecting movies (and games to lesser extent) will be prevalent for anime.....

Licensing and regional deals says no...

What exactly is the difference between looking at Anime on the page and watching Anime.

I've done both and near as I can tell there is like 2 frames per second difference between the two.

Some old ( 80s/90s ) animated series could be nice to have, and I think they might be quite popular with the audience here. I'm generally in favor of more video content here on GOG, if they haven't entirely given up on that business branch. But as others have said, currently the chances for DRM-free movies and series seem rather slim.

For what it's worth, that Witcher 3 concert video sold quite well, so there may be hope yet.

No.

If GOG has the interest in selling Anime or TV Shows, they would need to have a mix of heavy-hitters and exclusives.

Perhaps a Witcher mini-series exclusive to GOG? :P

Imo, I would love to be able to purchase a library of DRM free Anime on GOG. But being DRM free alone wouldn't be enough, the whole system would have to be better than what Steam is offering.

I would suggest GoG could start with famous old TV Anime Shows. Would be GoA then = Good old Anime. (^_^)

One very nice, epic and not published in US and EU show with about 110 Episodes:

Legend of the Galactic Heroes

A Space Opera like Star Trek.

If only.. sadly, unless some heroic brave company shows up and tries DRM-free (and then sells well), nothing will change.

I don't think that one finds success in a market dominated by the 800-pound Gaberilla by copying the 800-pound Gaberilla.

But, sure, more non-interactive video content wouldn't hurt my feelings. I've enjoyed the movies purchased here.

Well with the movies section being such a great success...

Cough, cough.... We would have to define "classic content that no one else sees profits in it" then....

My generation (influenced by the French television) grew up on old anime series and is still interested in this old-school style (back when we didn't care about shonen, shojo, etc.) and the publishers know it so they keep releasing related stuff after all those years.

I was gonna take "Space Adventure Cobra" as an example but instead I searched for Blu-Ray (which I'm gonna buy because this series rocked).

It thus lead to show that their are still rights contracts going on on the series people remember. An alternative would be to get the old series that no one remembers but I'm afraid that in such a case, it really would be because of their poor initial quality (thus leading to a potential loss for GOG).

BTW, I'm not even including the question of the restoration and remastering of the original print...

I am not sure if this is a model that will really catch on. As you said yourself, the model on Steam is flawed with it's streaming, and streaming in low quality to the boot.

When I get movies/tv shows/anime I prefer the physical format, merely because of the comparison of price to digital/physical and how easy it is to simply watch any anime/tv show online.

Crunchyroll, kissanime etc.

Only things that could GOG do that could sway me to purchase my favorite anime from them would be enough goodies to do along with it and more favorable price as opposed to buying physical media.