Most Japanese publishers offer up their rights for overseas distribution. Your problem here is almost certainly that no one bothered to buy the rights and localise the game. A problem that is generally based on companies in your market determining that X game won't sell, regardless of whether it actually will.

In fact several games do even go so far as to get a localisation (a few even at the expense of the Japanese company paying for it) only for it to then never see the light of day - GiFTPiA is one such example, its English localised version was showcased at E3 or the like, but it never got an overseas release due to US companies deeming it's content unsuitable for their market (guess they didn't like the homosexual characters).

Again, it's not anywhere near as simple as just "waiting for a western company to do it".

You may want to research how the industry works. But needless to say, with the exception of VN companies*, most anime/game publishers offer up their content to other markets. It is up to the companies in those markets to determine which content they consider (a) suitable, and (b) marketable. To expect the local companies (and by that, I mean companies that unlike SEGA, etc., do not have an international presence) to localise all their content and sell ROW is, simply put, unreasonable for a multitude of reasons.

* VN companies have basically taken the stance not to make their majority of their content available ROW due to the continued harassment they received from western media.

Free speech is not relevant to privately owned forums, that's a silly argument. My core point is that I wish people didn't spam the forum with constant threads about the same issue. That's all. It's no different to me than having 1,000 threads on Skyrim or something like that.

That's what happens when you openly admit to liking the movie. ;)

To come back to an earlier point: I download TV series as well for the simple reason that Belgian TV is far too unreliable.

Example: Channel X buys the rights to TV series A. It airs the first two series and it turns out to be hugely popular in the US and they're already at series 4 so 2 series behind. Besides running the risk that things get spoiled on forums (à la Lost), they also often cancel a series because it becomes too expensive to buy! So instead of getting all the seasons, they air the first three and then suddenly stop with no other channel picking it up. Makes no sense? Well it does if the series isn't that popular here - like the Big Bang Theory. They did it to Sliders as well and quite a few other series.

On top of that, they'll often show episodes at random - even series that are connected with eachother! I remember a lot of double episodes of sitcoms only getting the first part or only the second part.

So now I simply download the TV series - I get to watch them when I want to, no commercials, always get to watch them in order and always the latest episodes.

Yes, they've played enough shows across both borders simultaneously that they are walking on well threaded ground.

If they have having inspiration blocks on how to get it done, they can look at how countless other channels pulled it off.

Maybe it was rocket science the first time, but not anymore.

Speak for yourself. I find it very educational.

Right you are.

And why did they need the consent of a U.S company?

You see plenty of Japanese companies selling their wares overseas.

Right.

1) You create a website to distribute your things digitally

2) You set up a Paypal/credit card interface

3) You sell your things.

And you only have to do that if you can't get the myriad of pre-established digital distributors to sell your stuff.

Very affordable, yet I'm not seeing them doing it much.

However, I see your point that international distribution was an expensive proposition in the pre-internet era for a smaller company.

That being said, many of those companies were big and did not do it (ex: the pushers for Final Fantasy were not small players).

I think there was some complacency at work here. They didn't really care about oversea markets that much (at least, as long as they were reasonably successful at home) and didn't want to bother if someone oversea wasn't volunteering to do the heavy lifting for them.

It has nothing to do with consent of a US company. It is far more down to the fact that (a) US companies "know" what will be profitable in their own region, (b) US companies know the applicable laws for their region, and (c) US companies do not have to deal with the language barrier.

Those other Japanese companies you speak of? They spend a fortune hiring people like me to help with translation, as well as lawyers, etc., while working with relevant distribution businesses within the US market to aid in selling to that market. This is the way international business works.

Right off the bat, there will be severe issues with offering Paypal due to local banking regulations, so the Japanese company would have difficulties with transferring that money to their bank account. FYI, Paypal is provided to Japanese customers by PayPal Singapore, and is heavily restricted as a result. Not to mention all the other legal issues that prevent them from just offering up (non-rated) content to all and sundry.

I worked in a company that had less than 20 people who could afford a lawyer to do their legalities and their legalities are complicated (they do middleware for gaming companies internationally).

A translator (and voice actor) are 2 employees.

A mid-sized company can have over a 100.

Again, not that huge of an overhead.

So, credit cards then.

For being non-rated... rate it. This is the sort of thing a lawyer will assist you with.

Basically, I'll just take it that you have little understanding of the anime industry and leave it at that. Else this is just going around in circles. But I will say, I sure wouldn't want to watch an anime that has been dubbed by only ONE voice actor ;)

Fair enough, you need a cast so maybe 8-10 temps instead of 1, but it seems like a worthwhile thing to have done for the English language at the very least.

As for the anime scene, I don't see why it should be different from other cartoons, TV programs or movies.

The most worthwhile argument I could see is the cultural barrier, but anime has been successful enough to indicate that viewers welcome the change.

The universe has an underlying complexity that needs to be grasped, but let's not make things needlessly complicated either.