Comments on: Buying Cardcaptor Sakura

By: Mitchell

Mitchell — Wed, 22 Feb 2012 13:47:30 +0000

Hey man, thanks for your help. I’m pretty sure I have the Media Link release, but don’t see a “Media Link” logo or copyright. Below is a transcript of all of the English text on the box and discs.

Front Box:
Video Star Japanese Animation
Cardcaptor Sakura
TV Animation Cardcaptor Sakura
12 Disc VCD Box Collection
Animation International
Super Golden Box Set

Back Box:
Cardcaptor Sakura
TV Animation Cardcaptor Sakura
12 Disc VCD Box Collection
Video Star Holding Inc.
Animation International Inc.

Discs:
All rights of the manufacturer and of the owner of the recorded work reserved. Unauthorized public performance, broadcasting and copying of this disc prohibited. Man Bone Film. Ch Isin G Ltd.

If it helps, I will take some pictures of the discs. I’m not sure if what I have is worth 100 dollars, or 100 cents! lol

By: Chris

Chris — Wed, 22 Feb 2012 05:22:42 +0000

I haven't heard of Video Star Japanese Animation. "Animation International" is the name of a known bootleg company, but there is a Hong Kong "Animation International Ltd." which may be the same or a different company. They don't like Cardcaptor Sakura in their properties, though. Does the logo on the box look the same as the one on Animation International Ltd.'s web site? The only VCDs I can find are a Hong Kong release with Cantonese dubbing and no subtitles, from a Hong Kong company called Wide Sight. (These are at YesAsia, under the name "百變小櫻Magic", as seen on their CCS list.) Looks like this and this are from the same set as your purchase. While on the topic of VCDs, it looks like there was a VCD release in Singapore with Japanese dialogue and English subtitles. Interesting. It seems there was also a VCD release in a yellow box with Chinese text, and 12 VCDs, licensed by a company called Media Link.

By: Mitchell

Mitchell — Wed, 22 Feb 2012 03:11:11 +0000

Sorry, my mistake. These disks actually contain episodes 1 to 35, which means it holds the entire 1st Season, with 3 episodes per disk on disks 1 to 11, and 2 episodes on disk 12.

By: Mitchell

Mitchell — Wed, 22 Feb 2012 02:30:44 +0000

Hey there. You seem very knowledgeable about Cardcaptor Sakura and the available media sets. I have one HELL of a puzzler for you though! I bought a VCD set of Cardcaptor Sakura at a thrift store for $3. It’s the original Japanese production, with Chinese subtitles. In total, there are 12 disks, containing Episodes 1 to 24 of the series. Initially, I thought it was a bootleg, but the quality is far too high, and the disks are professionally labelled. It says it was produced under licence by Video Star Japanese Animation and Animation International, and it is known as the “Super Golden Box Set.” If you have any information on what in the Hell it is I have here, that would be great! lol

By: Chris

Chris — Mon, 26 Dec 2011 02:17:02 +0000

I hope so, too. CCS really is a magical series, and deserves a chance to have its remastered form reach American, European, etc. shores. I don’t know what kind of licensing costs would be involved, but if the owners of the series (animation studio, etc.) licensed it at a reasonable price, it seems like the kind of thing that would be profit all around. Maybe in another five years, the time will be right for Nozomi or another to introduce the series to a new generation of CLAMP/anime/mahou shoujo fans.

By: Pokelucelop

Pokelucelop — Mon, 26 Dec 2011 00:56:21 +0000

Thank you for the insight! Hopefully there will be a company (maybe Funimation or Nozomi) that will be able to acquire the licenses and re-release the series. I honestly don’t care if they produce it with the cheapest materials that they can find; so long as it gets a complete release, I’ll be satisfied. Who knows; maybe it will turn out like Nozomi recently re-releasing Utena into 3 parts for affordable prices (and throwing in special goodies). I just really, REALLY hope that CCS gets some sort of re-release. :)

By: Chris

Chris — Mon, 07 Nov 2011 11:05:39 +0000

The remaster does not have any subtitles. It’s pure Japanese, without any English.

By: jem

jem — Mon, 07 Nov 2011 07:01:15 +0000

was wondering if there are any english subtitles on the japanese remasters… saw some in yahoo japan auctions and was thinking of buying them if they have subtitles…

By: Chris

Chris — Sun, 17 Jul 2011 06:02:00 +0000

Currently, it’ll be difficult to find a legit subtitled Cardcaptor Sakura release for any DVD region. It seems the only option for region two Cardcaptor fans is (as far as I know) to get a bootleg copy.

By: Tsubasa lover

Tsubasa lover — Tue, 12 Jul 2011 18:38:16 +0000

I know its a long shot, but any infomation would be helpful. Thank you.

By: Tsubasa lover

Tsubasa lover — Tue, 12 Jul 2011 18:36:44 +0000

I have been trying to find Cardcaptor, region 2, with subs. For years now. With little success. I just kick myself when I think of the fact that, about 10 years ago I saw the complete box-set in HMV and didn’t get it!!…:(…because I thought the price was to high….well compared to the prices now…Anyway I was wondering if anyone knew anything or had herd anything about region 2, subbed Cardcaptor DVD’s?

By: Chris

Chris — Sat, 20 Nov 2010 16:28:30 +0000

It’s especially hard for a poor college student to justify a high price for a series whose English release is long out of production.

You bring up a good point to consider about the flow of the animation. Another item to consider is the audio, and whether it has any issue. You’ll be glad to hear that I never mentioned these because I didn’t consider them because there are no issues with them.

The video will have lower quality/more compression artifacts, but the video plays smoothly. I didn’t see any issues with the animation flow. I also don’t recall any issues with audio. Granted, I haven’t watched every episode on every bootleg, only random samplings.

I hope to extract the subtitles from the Pioneer release (to use when watching the episodes with the Japanese remastered release), and if I’m able to successfully do that, I may do the same for the non-Pioneer subtitles, and do a post comparing the two. However, there’s no telling if I’ll ever get something like that completed, so I’d say if the clarity of the translation is a top issue above accuracy of colors, the Pioneer bootleg would be the way to go.

Good luck on your purchases. This is such a cute series with a well thought out storyline, and the company that made it probably has earned back more than the money they put into it, so it’s a shame there isn’t a release in production and at a reasonable price including Pioneer’s English subtitles. It’s a lost market right there.

By: Blik

Blik — Sat, 20 Nov 2010 09:48:54 +0000

I’ve been researching this series to purchase it, and at the beginning of November I could have bought all 18 DVDs (used) individually on Amazon for about $400 all told. Though at the low end of the prices discussed on this page, this is not really a viable option for a poor college student. So, I’ve been reluctantly researching the bootlegs (as you say, they’re not legal), and your series of articles has been the most helpful resource I’ve found. But I do have a question that you haven’t addressed.

What does compression do to the video quality as far as smoothness of animation? Are the versions that are compressed onto fewer discs jumpier? I can handle poor picture quality and some color anomalies, but my sticking points are smooth animation and intelligible subtitles. (I discovered this pet peeve after watching an episode of Yu-Gi-Oh! in Japanese, where the subtitling was particularly horrendous.)

I’m leaning towards the Pioneer release because of what you say about the subtitles, but how is the animation flow?

By: Miu

Miu — Thu, 11 Nov 2010 04:51:01 +0000

Okay thank you~! That was really helpful~ ^^

By: Chris

Chris — Sun, 07 Nov 2010 21:18:31 +0000

Bootlegs are illegal in every country that is part of the Berne Convention. I don't expect to see a new CCS release. A lot of US anime (and manga) companies seem to be having hard times right now (but I don't know about in the UK or Australia). CCS might still be licensed to the company that released it on DVD before, so another company might not be able to release the remastered yet (I don't know). Also, if a company wanted to release the remaster, they have to either translate everything on their own, or pay to reuse the existing subtitles. If you decide buying a bootleg is your better option, the bootleg of Pioneer's DVDs are copied from the region one DVDs. It also has the cropping and bad coloring of the region one release. The AnimeCartoon release has the better colors and less cropping, but it also has worse compression than the region one, a less-good translation, an AnimeCartoon logo that shows now and then, and sometimes really bad compression. If you cannot get the region one DVDs, I recommend the bootleg of the Pioneer region one DVDs if you want a better translation, or the AnimeCartoon if you want better colors and no cropping (but don't mind things like a random logo on the screen). Both will have bad compression to fit on only eight DVDs.