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Things look even bleaker in terms of access. I've recently realised there is no distributor within Australia now. Madman sold their anime stuff to Crunchyroll, Hanabee have shut down in Australia and Siren Visual wound down a bit over 5 years ago (feels like a near eternity with them being the only lot worldwide that licensed Monster and Nodame Cantabile in English in anime form, amongst other titles). So Crunchyroll are almost the only place to go now. Their markups on their own store are utterly cringe. At least reasonable prices still appear on Rightstuf (ordered Kodocha, Marmalade Boy, City Hunter OVAs & specials, Mononoke this sale period and secured Gunbuster quickly when it released at a fair price) but that's only because Discotek give that much of a damn about what they do.
Back in 2014 when Crunchyroll was becoming an option, I thought it would improve accessibility. Initially, it did. But in the long run, I think it's harming the industry more. Wonder how much zoomers will cry when they realise their fave titles are gone in 5 years or so and what they will have to resort to.
But it's just dumb. Surely in a digital age, preservation should be relatively easy and an option. But then again, given how Nintendo handles that in games, amongst others...I'm not surprised.
At least we were fans at the right time.
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