Otaku Collection Haul for November 2025

Welcome to the Otaku Collection haul for the month of November 2025. This update features 6 anime releases, 12 physical video games, 8 digital video games and 3 live-action Asian Cinema releases, plus 7 other live-action releases and 1 new product.

For this haul, I had to upgrade my laptop due to age. In the meantime, Black Friday sales began, I secured more anime and a number of video games, including a couple of Limited Run Games releases.

Tales of Xillia Remastered

Starting off the month is another Tales of remaster which I am actually surprised arrived in the same year as the previous remaster (Tales of Graces f). Tales of Xillia Remastered is a remaster of the 2015 PlayStation 3 JRPG that I have played and wasn’t as fond of compared to its second game (which thankfully has been confirmed to receive a remaster as that’s one of my favourite Tales of games), but I did want to revisit the first game to see if my opinion has changed. I remember not liking the ending for whatever reason despite the great story beats it had in parts here and there.

Also worth noting this game features two story paths, you get to choose between playing as spirit girl Maxwell or medical student boy Jude Mathis. In my PlayStation 3 playthrough I went with Maxwell so for this remaster I plan to see Jude’s playthrough as there are some differences here and there. Like Tales of Graces f Remastered, this game features 4K resolution & 60 frames per second support on PlayStation 5 and various adjustments here and there.

Mushoku Tensei II: Jobless Reincarnation

As a fan of the anime I was happy to see Mushoku Tensei II finally get released on home video. Technically Part 1 was released just over a year ago, but because the series received the split-cour treatment, Part 2 had only been released very recently. Since I have the limited edition for the first season, I ordered (last minute) the limited edition for the second season which thankfully didn’t get cancelled considering Anime-on-Line cancelled Solo Leveling which was ordered last minute as well.

HMV 4K Ultra HD Haul

In HMV I picked up four more films for the 4K Ultra HD collection, three of which are from the 3 for £50 deal and another just got released at the end of October which I did try to get but they didn’t have the 4K version in stock.

James Gunn’s Superman is the new release here and I really enjoyed it when I watched it at the cinema last July. It’s the start of the new DC Universe but works really well on its own like an episode of the animated series. The film starred David Corenswet (Pearl), Rachel Brosnahan (The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel), and Nicholas Hoult (Nosferatu).

From the deal we have Ridley Scott’s 2005 film Kingdom of Heaven. This epic historical film I’ve heard about over the years recently saw a 4K release earlier in the year for its director’s cut (which has a runtime of 193 minutes) which is considered the better version of the film. The film starred Orlando Bloom (The Lord of the Rings), Eva Green (Casino Royale), and Jeremy Irons (Die Hard with a Vengeance).

Next we have Darren Aronofsky’s 2000 film Requiem for a Dream. The psychological drama film I’ve heard bits about though I know more about his other film Black Swan which as you know pretty much is a remake of Satoshi Kon’s Perfect Blue. In fact there is a scene in this film that’s a recreation of one of the scenes in the anime. Either way, outside of that stuff, I have heard the film in general is pretty good so I look forward to checking it out. The film starred Ellen Burstyn (The Exorcist), Jared Leto (Tron Ares), and Jennifer Connelly (Phenomena).

And last but not least is David Fincher’s 2007 film Zodiac. This mystery thriller film I do actually own on Blu-ray but I never got around to watching my copy. Sadly this UK version of the 4K release doesn’t have Dolby Vision which is on the US version, but from what I read as the film is also an upscale from the 2K master. The release includes the theatrical on 4K and the director’s cut on Blu-ray. The film starred Jake Gyllenhaal (Nightcrawler), Mark Ruffalo (Dark Waters), and Robert Downey Jr. (Tropic Thunder).

Mass Effect Legendary Edition

Next we have Mass Effect Legendary Edition from CeX. This epic space opera Action RPG is a favourite of mine from the Xbox 360 days and a few years back it got remastered for modern platforms. I saw this was in stock last time I went into York but I decided to hold off, but yesterday I wanted to own it so thankfully they had one available still. This collection includes all three games with quality of life improvements (especially for the first game) and a majority of the original game’s downloadable content on the disc. I won’t be playing this right away but definitely will be before the next instalment is released.

Quantic Dream Games

As I’ve been picking up more PlayStation 4 games as of late, I wanted to grab a couple more that I felt were missing in my collection and among those were the adventure games developed by Quantic Dream. Of course the developer has had some controversy over the past decade but the games they have released were pretty intriguing.

Starting off with The Heavy Rain & Beyond: Two Souls Collection, this covers two games that were originally released for the PlayStation 3; 2010’s Heavy Rain and 2013’s Beyond: Two Souls, and I have in fact played the latter as it was included in a bundle with The Last of Us for my console. While the collection includes both games, it was the former that I wanted to play the most in this collection.

Also picked up was their latest game Detroit: Become Human, which I’ve been intrigued to check out ever since the trailers were released at the expos. I’ll save this until I have finished Heavy Rain though.

Fear Effect & Gex Trilogy

Next we have some more PlayStation classics in the collection and they’re both remasters for the PlayStation 5. In an interesting move, publisher Square Enix decided to let two of their owned IPs (via Edios from back in the day) be published by Limited Run Games with the help of two groups.

Fear Effect, originally released in 2000 by developer Kronos Digital Entertainment, was brought over to modern platforms by Implicit Conversions, the same company known for bringing classic PlayStation games onto PlayStation Plus Premium over the past few years. The game has been on my radar but I never understood what sort of game it was though its visual style did get my interest. As much as I liked the anime-esque design of the cover art, I did go for the more accurate represented version that Limited Run used as a cover variant.

Gex Trilogy features three games in the franchise; 1995’s Gex, 1998’s Gex: Enter the Gecko and 1999’s Gex 3: Deep Cover Gecko, all developed by Crystal Dynamics (Legacy of Kain: Soul Reaver), and one is not like the other. The original Gex started out for the 3DO and is a 2D platformer, while the next two games are 3D action/adventure platformers like many of the others that came out during that generation. The remaster was done by Limited Run’s own Carbon Engine co-developed by YouTuber ModernVintageGamer who not long ago joined Digital Eclipse with their projects. Gex is also known for having unique voice acting for each region, with a British dub for the PAL releases and an American dub for the NTSC release. This remaster initially only had the latter but the British dub did come back with a patch later down the line. The cover variant for this release is rather using as they managed to get Final Fantasy artist Yoshitaka Amano to make the cover art which was so bizarre that I wanted it.

Cyberpunk 2077

A few years ago I downloaded the digital version for Cyberpunk 2077 and I held off due to my backlog but also to make sure the patches were pretty much sorted so that I can get the best experience. Eventually they released a physical version which for the PlayStation 5 release has a digital code for the Phantom Liberty expansion (whilst Xbox owners have the expansion on the disc), so I picked it up during Amazon’s Black Friday sale.

88 Films Terracotta Pre-Order Haul

88 Films have been releasing more Asian Cinema titles each month and here is another batch from Terracotta Store. Two of these were released during the month of October whilst one was released for November.

Starting off with Heart of Dragon (龍的心), Sammo Hung & Fruit Chan’s 1985 film starring Jackie Chan (Police Story), Sammo Hung (Eastern Condors), Emily Chu Bo-Yee (A Better Tomorrow), Lam Ching-Ying (Mr. Vampire) and more. This was one of the first Jackie Chan titles that 88 Films released on Blu-ray in their nicer packaging format and now it returns for the 4K Ultra HD format. The same on-disc content from before is here with the Hong Kong theatrical cut and extended Japanese cut available to choose from.

Next we have two films that 88 Films released as part of their new line of deluxe collector’s editions that come with slipcases, booklets and a double-sided card. Both are also for the Blu-ray format.

First is Peacock King (孔雀王子), Lam Nai-Choi’s 1988 film starring Yuen Biao (Righting Wrongs), Hiroshi Mikami (Parasite Eve), Gloria Yip Wan-Yee (The Cat), Pauline Wong (Her Vengeance), Gordon Liu Chia-Hui (Kill Bill) and more. Lam Nai-Choi is a mad director as his films are filled with insane body horror fantasy action and what’s interesting about this film is that it’s also based on the manga series of the same name by Makoto Ogino. A sequel film was also made which 88 Films will be releasing very soon.

And the second is Rosa (神勇雙響炮續集), Joe Cheung’s 1986 film starring Yuen Biao (On the Run), Lowell Lo Koon-Ting (Pedicab Driver), Lu Hsiao-Fen (Song of the Exile), Kara Wai Ying-Hung (Rouge), Paul Chun Pui (Peking Opera Blues), James Tien Chun (Fist of Fury), Charlie Cho Cha-Lee (Hong Kong, Hong Kong) and more. Another action film with Yuen Biao in the main lead once again but this film’s cover has a bright style to it that reminded me of Police Story so I’m also intrigued here.

Lenovo Legion Pro 5 Gen 10 Laptop

So yes we have a rather big purchase here but for good reason. It’s been seven years since I last received a new laptop which was the HP Omen 15 back in October 2018. That laptop had been solid for the majority of its journey but the signs started to become clear when last year the battery went funny at one point and also the Q key stopped functioning.

Then fast-forward to the past month, more keys also started to stop functioning as well, like the M key, L key, O key, 9 key and even the Down key. It was getting ridiculous, combined with a couple random freezes here and there which prevented me from multi-tasking a lot. The keys issue was escalating further these past couple of weeks so I made the decision to invest in a new laptop right away. It took a while to decide which one I wanted to go for but the reviews from various sources pointed me towards Lenovo.

Lenovo’s Legion Pro model offered enough intrigue and the price range was enough for me to pick one up. So what are the differences in specs between my previous laptop and the current one? For starters the specs have all received a big upgrade, especially considering the technology has changed a lot since 2018.

HP OMEN 15 (2018)	Lenovo Legion Pro 5 (2025)
Intel Core i7-8750H CPU @ 2.20GHz, 2208 Mhz, 6 Core(s) & 12 Logical Processors	AMD Ryzen 7 8745HX with Radeon Graphics, 3601 Mhz, 8 Core(s) & 16 Logical Processors
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1050 Ti	NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5060 GDDR7
8GB RAM	32GB (2 x 16GB) RAM
128GB SSD C: Drive + 1TB HDD D: Drive	1TB SSD C: Drive + 1TB SSD D: Drive
1080p HD LCD Screen	2.5K OLED HDR Screen

There were two major motivators for what I wanted for a new laptop; tons of RAM to make sure it can maintain strong speed and power even with browser and programs using up more memory over time, and two drives of storage so I can have one focused on the programs and performance, and the other for the files and other stuff I could store on there if needed as that was what I liked about my previous laptop.

Everything else was essentially an added bonus. These specs ensured that I would also be able to play a lot of the newer games on PC as well. Because the GPU was capped to 8GB there wasn’t any need to go for bigger processors or GPUs for the laptop (and the processor above the current one doesn’t support OLED which was interesting). Outside of the Bluetooth randomly disappearing at one point which I was able to fix by redownloading it directly from Lenovo’s website, I’ve not had any major issues so far and hopefully it maintains that way for the next decade.

Let me make it clear. This is not a cheap product and even though it was on an early Black Friday sale, I purchased the laptop directly from Lenovo’s website which was originally slated to be delivered in mid-December but ended up arriving in about a week with a pretty fast speed thanks to UPS (Lenovo is also from China so it travelled around the world before reaching the UK).

The other benefits for this new laptop is I can now watch YouTube videos in 4K 60fps, multi-task without any struggles, optimise the photos for the blog at a faster rate and I can also install GOG Galaxy and combine various accounts to it which is handy. I also downloaded the File Pilot beta due to issues with the File Explorer caused by Microsoft.

Crunchyroll UK Black Friday Haul

I’ve been waiting for a moment like this for the Crunchyroll UK catalogue and finally we had prices that were lowered for a number of their newer releases! I had planned to watch these on the streaming site itself but I prefer Blu-rays whenever possible due to using the home video versions and no hassle with resolution dips.

We have two isekai shows with Chillin’ in Another World with Level 2 Super Cheat Powers, aired in Spring 2024 by studio J.C.Staff (DanMachi) and No Longer Allowed in Another World, aired in Summer 2024 by studio Atelier Pontdarc (Uncle from Another World).

We also have two fantasy (non-isekai) shows with The Ossan Newbie Adventurer, Trained to Death by the Most Powerful Party, Became Invincible, aired in Summer 2024 by studio Yumeta Company (Record of Ragnarok II & III), and The Unwanted Undead Adventurer, aired in Winter 2024 by studio Connect (Ayakashi Triangle).

J-Stars Victory Vs.+

In April 2014 I bought the Japanese version of J-Stars Victory Vs. on the PlayStation 3 and loved it. It’s not a complicated fighting game but fun enough to get people on-board and the people at my anime society had a great time with it as well, which is a big deal because this wasn’t released outside Japan back then.

Then a few years later, Bandai Namco in a surprise move, brought the over to the west for PlayStation 4 and Vita (skipping the PS3 version) as J-Stars Victory Vs.+ and I didn’t bother because I already had the PS3 version. As time went by, the English release eventually delisted from digital storefronts because of licensing (which happens because there’s a lot of IPs in this game). Fast-forward to 2024 and it caught be by surprise to find a copy of the PlayStation 4 in CeX for £10 and in really solid condition. Even though I said that I had the PS3 version, I figured it was long enough that I would get the English version and re-experience the game sometime especially with having more knowledge of the characters and IPs featured in the game.

If you didn’t like JUMP FORCE, I think you’ll enjoy this game a lot more as there’s tons of characters and fun supporting characters in the roster. It’s a great game and celebration of the Shonen Jump magazine to which even if a character can’t fight they can at least show up in some form, hence why you have Haikyuu!!, Kuroko’s Basketball, Nisekoi, SKET Dance (from Witch Watch creator) and To Love-Ru featured alongside Assassination Classroom, Bleach, Hunter x Hunter, JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure, One Piece and many more.

I believe the main difference between the Japanese PS3 version and English PS4 releases is that this release includes gameplay adjustments and an Arcade mode.

Another HMV 4K Ultra HD Haul

After watching Wake Up Dead Man: A Knives Out Mystery there was enough time in the day to take a quick trip to HMV before the store would close for the day, and I will admit their 4K selection was pretty limited in what I want to get and I also checked the anime section which had titles like Boochi the Rock and Ningen Fushin but neither were on offer even though they should (the HMV York store is weird with this).

Anywho for the 4K section I picked up three films that were part of the 3 for £50 offer. The first is Ridley Scott’s 1982 film Blade Runner: The Final Cut starring Harrison Ford (Indiana Jones), Rutger Hauer (The Hitcher), Sean Young (Dune) and Edward James Olmos (Battlestar Galactica). This cyberpunk sci-fi noir classic I first watched a decade ago when I picked up the Blu-ray version, but after watching The Running Man I was reminded of this film and wanted to pick up the 4K Ultra HD version. I know there was a special edition that included all of the different cuts to the film but that’s long out of print.

Next we have Andrzej Bartkowiak’s 2005 film DOOM, based on id Software’s classic first-person shooter. This is an interesting film because it’s mainly taking inspiration from DOOM 3 whilst also being its own thing and I figured I’ll give it another watch sometime especially with the cast involved like Karl Urban (The Boys), Dwayne Johnson (The Smashing Machine) and Rosamund Pike (Gone Girl).

And going back to the club we have Francis Ford Coppola’s 2024 film Megalopolis, a film that has baffled many for what it is. It’s been in development hell for a long time and we have an ensemble cast including Adam Driver (BlacKkKlansman), Giancarlo Esposito (Breaking Bad), Shia LaBeouf (Transformers), Laurence Fishburne (The Matrix) and many more. The 4K release does not include HDR which is a surprise but at least it’s in 4K.

Atelier Ryza Secret Trilogy Deluxe Pack

I finally add Atelier to my collection which I’m surprised has taken this long. With various instalments released over the years, this trilogy seemed to be the most newcomer trilogy of the bunch. Atelier Ryza Secret Trilogy Deluxe Pack features three games that developer Gust worked on between 2019 to 2023 and as I had predicted they eventually released a deluxe version which is what this edition offers.

DX versions have been pretty common with the Atelier franchise. They were mainly for moving the games onto the Vita back in the seventh generation but have since been brought over to other platforms namely the Switch. For this trilogy we have extra playable characters, more costumes and since they’re on PlayStation 5 better performance for the gameplay. I know lots of people went with the Nintendo Switch version but I just couldn’t accept the performance and graphic issues it had and portability isn’t a strong argument when I don’t play on the go.

Anyway, this release comes from Koei Tecmo Taiwan because they aren’t releasing these in physical editions outside Asia. Of the three games released in this trilogy; Atelier Ryza: Ever Darkness & the Secret Hideout, Atelier Ryza 2: Lost Legends & the Secret Fairy and Atelier Ryza 3: Alchemist of the End & the Secret Key, the first game was only released on PlayStation 4 & Switch while the second game added PlayStation 4 but only for digital formats, then the third game included PlayStation 5 for physical with the rest. So this deluxe release (which the games are also available to pickup separately) is the best way to own all three games physically on the PlayStation 5 format.

The Great Ace Attorney Chronicles & Tomba! Special Edition

A while back Canadian retailer Video Games Plus revealed another batch of products they have in stock from Limited Run Games and that included Tomba! Special Edition. I had been debating on whether to go for either the PlayStation 5 version or the Nintendo Switch version, but after seeing the performance reviews and looking at the history of the franchise I decided it would be more fitting to go for the former instead, much like what I had done with Fear Effect and the Gex Trilogy as well as non-limited releases like Klonoa and Pac-Man World.

Tomba! is an action-adventure game developed by Whoopee Camp from Japan and director Tokuro Fujiwara (Ghosts ‘n Goblins) which was one of the many popular games released for the original PlayStation. The special edition release used the Carbon Engine so it’s more-so an emulated experience than a full-on remaster. I have the second game pre-ordered to complete the series.

Also picked up thanks to the Black Friday sale is the English version for The Great Ace Attorney Chronicles collection for the Nintendo Switch. A few years back I picked up the Japanese PlayStation 4 version but I decided the franchise was better suited on a Nintendo platform especially due to its gameplay style and how the franchise began on the Game Boy Advance. This collection features two previously Japan only Nintendo 3DS games The Great Ace Attorney: Adventures from 2015 and The Great Ace Attorney 2: Resolve from 2017. These are both spin-offs of the main Ace Attorney franchise by featuring a different cast and the setting taking place during the end of the 19th century into the 20th century which in British terms is around the end of the Victorian era.

Vanity Fair: The Pursuit

And the final arrival of the month was a surprisingly early addition because it was initially estimated to appear at the start of December but instead Evri decided to deliver on a weekend without notice. I actually thought this package was lost but apparently my relative received it without telling me.

Anyway, what we have is a Chinese full-motion video interactive game called Vanity Fair: The Pursuit (名利游戏) by developer MuYan Studio and publisher NIU Games. This looked pretty intriguing and it’s not common to have a Chinese title receive a physical release especially for this particular genre so I wanted to support it, especially considering it was also a limited print run because Limited Run Games handled the distribution. It’s cheaper digitally but to have a physical version is pretty neat. There’s also another live-action interactive game that was also given the same treatment called Love is All Around but I may get around to it if Video Games Plus manages to receive any stock.

Bonus: GOG Games

This past month I’ve also picked up a number of games for PC thanks to the GOG marketplace. For those unfamiliar with them, GOG is handled by CD Projekt RED (the developers of Cyberpunk 2077 and The Witcher) which offers DRM-free versions of various games. Originally started with niche old titles eventually grew to a mixture of classics and newer titles, some of which were even blocked by Steam.

I made two batches of purchases here. The first is for Capcom’s 2002 survival horror remake Resident Evil HD Remaster, which made its debut appearance on GOG with a sale for only £4. It’s been available on Steam for ages but figured for that time it’s pretty good. I also added EA Los Angeles’ 2001 first-person horror shooter Clive Barker’s Undying for £1.19 since I was recently watching the Hellraiser films and noticed the creator had other adaptations. And Irrational Games’ 2005 first-person tactical shooter SWAT 4 was also picked up for £3.99 because I heard it’s one cult classic title that had a lot of praise which is surprising considering I hadn’t heard of it before, but knowing it was made by the developers of System Shock 2 and BioShock definitely caught my interest further.

In the second batch we have five more games. The first is for Capcom’s 2000 JRPG turn-based game Breath of Fire IV which was previously stuck on PlayStation for the most part, though a PC version was made back in the day which GOG has managed to bring back. I do own this on PlayStation 3 via the PS1 Classics, but having another option to play this classic especially for £3.99 is welcoming. Since I downloaded the original Deus Ex earlier in the year, I also bought Eidos-Montréal’s 2011 Action RPG cyberpunk game Deus Ex: Human Revolution Director’s Cut for £2.49 which is a steal for what’s considered one of the best games of that generation.

Another cult-like game I picked up were IO Interactive’s 2007 & 2009 third-person shooter games Kane & Lynch: Dead Men and Kane & Lynch 2: Dog Days. I played the second game on Xbox 360 back in the day but I’ve wanted to revisit this franchise for a while and since both were super cheap (99p and £1.59 respectively) it was a good opportunity to get them. I suppose if I wanted to I could always track down physical copies of the PlayStation 3 versions but only if they run well or so. And last but not least we have Nihon Falcom’s 2005 Action RPG game Xanadu Next for £3.95. Whilst the developers are more known for The Legend of Heroes and Ys, Xanadu is among one of their oldest IPs and even though I have Tokyo Xanadu eX+, Xanadu Next has caught my intrigue for as long as I first got into Ys a decade ago.

Unboxing Links

You can view more photos & specs for the titles below:

• Mushoku Tensei: Jobless Reincarnation Season 2 Parts 1 & 2 (Blu-ray / Limited Edition Blu-ray)

Unboxings for the recent 88 Films pickups will be arriving in the coming weeks.

What’s to Come for the Hauls

December 2025

We’re ending the year on a high note, assuming things go according to plan given the holiday rush creating issues with the shipping speeds. I have a number of potential arrivals for December so here’s what we can expect to make an appearance:

• Amagi Brilliant Park (Blu-ray)
• Bleach Part 9 (Limited Edition Blu-ray)
• Blue Comet SPT Layzner (Blu-ray)
• Call of the Night Season 1 (Collector’s Edition Blu-ray)
• City on Fire (Limited Edition 4K Ultra HD)
• Cyberpunk: Edgerunners (Collector’s Edition Blu-ray)
• DAN DA DAN Season 1 (Collector’s Edition Blu-ray)
• Devilman Crybaby (Deluxe Edition Blu-ray)
• Diebuster (Collector’s Edition Blu-ray)
• Giant Gorg (Blu-ray)
• Level 1 Demon Lord and One Room Hero (Blu-ray)
• The Most Heretical Last Boss Queen: From Villainess to Savior (Blu-ray)
• Over Your Dead Body (Limited Edition Blu-ray)
• Perfect Blue (Deluxe Edition 4K Ultra HD & Blu-ray)
• Playful White Fingers (Limited Edition Blu-ray)
• Radical Japan: Cinema and State – Nine Films by Nagisa Oshima (Limited Edition Blu-ray)
• Saga of the Phoenix (Deluxe Collector’s Edition Blu-ray)
• Shawscope Volume Four (Limited Edition Blu-ray)
• Towanoquon (Blu-ray)
• Triple Threat: Three Films with Sammo Hung (Limited Edition Blu-ray)
• Urusei Yatsura Collections 1, 2, 3 & 4 (Blu-rays)
• Urusei Yatsura OVA Collection (Blu-ray)
• Vermeil in Gold: The Failing Student and the Strongest Scourge Plunge Into the World of Magic (Steelbook Edition Blu-ray)

January 2026

Looking into the year, a couple of these could in fact arrive before the end of this year.

• Bleach Part 5 (Limited Edition Blu-ray)
• The Dangers in My Heart Season 1 (Collector’s Edition Blu-ray)
• I’m Standing on a Million-Lives (Collector’s Edition Blu-ray)
• Keep Your Hands Off Eizouken! (Collector’s Edition Blu-ray)
• Macross II: Lovers Again (Premium Edition 4K Ultra HD & Blu-ray)
• Naruto Shippuden Set 1 (Collector’s Edition Blu-ray)
• System Shock 2: 25th Anniversary Edition (PlayStation 5)

Also Arriving in 2026

A couple more pre-orders are also on the way and the timings can change at my point.

• Nobody Wants to Die (PlayStation 5)
• Tomba! 2: The Evil Swine Returns Special Edition (PlayStation 5)
• Ys vs. Trails in the Sky: Alternative Saga (PlayStation 5)

Other Tidbits

Managed to take more time off work but there’s still a lot that needs to be done. Going to need to work another weekend event before the year is over, and January is going to be a nightmare as far as things stand. Either way, it is what it is.

Weight loss progress has been good this past month though the past few days felt like I lost months of progress all at once and it is that time of year where you can easily gain weight due to the holiday food.

As mentioned earlier, the biggest change to the collection has been a brand new laptop. It had to be done as it was becoming more and more tedious as the days went by and was interfering with my daily routine and blog work also. It’s out of the way so I can move forward to other things.

Anime Limited

Their Christmas sale has begun with a technical issue caused by Shopify but I don’t expect to pick up anything worthwhile due to already owning everything I would have wanted from the early birds and toning down the collector’s editions. I may grab a couple standard edition Blu-rays but there’s no rush.

In terms of new license announcements, the only major one that was leaked beforehand thanks to the BBFC was Otaku Elf which conveniently I imported the Sentai Filmworks release a couple months prior but I can live without the collector’s edition. Other than that they also revealed more information for their new UK Blu-ray releases of Naruto Shippuden which will not only receive the Bleach model for their release formats (20 volumes with 4 collector’s edition sets to house a quarter of them at a time) but also be re-authored which is a surprise as I didn’t expect they would go that far considering this series is 500 episodes long. Viz Media’s volumes are shorter but Anime Limited are aiming for monthly releases so the series will be fully completed by the end of 2027.

There was also an update on what was going on with I’m Standing on a Million-Lives, the isekai series that Anime Limited managed to license from the Crunchyroll license bundle a while back. Apparently it came down to an “admin issue” that couldn’t be resolved until recently so if things go to plan with the production schedule, the series may actually be released before the year is over which is nice to see.

AnimEigo & Discotek Media

AnimEigo ran a Black Friday sale on their webstore and they ran out of slipcovers for Looking for the Full Moon Volume 1, though Justin Sevakis has implied more will be printed but won’t be available for a few weeks. Glad to hear the sale has been a success for them, since they mentioned it’s supporting their future projects.

Meanwhile, Discotek Media have revealed their January 2026 slate already which is a surprise but that’s more backlog out of the way for them. Project A-Ko Perfect Collection (which consists of the first film in 4K HDR and the second to fourth films in 1080p SDR presentation on a 4K Ultra HD disc), Shin Aim for the Ace! and Space Adventure Cobra the Movie: Yello Edition are now scheduled. For their live-action line-up, they’re also releasing Shark Skin Man and Peach Hip Girl and Tomorrow’s Joe the Movie from the Nihon Nights label and Kikaider Ultimate Human Machine from the Toku Time label.

That just leaves Higurashi: When They Cry Kai & Rei, Monster, Sgt. Frog the Movies Collection, Zegapain Collection and Zone of the Enders Perfect Collection left in the anime backlog, as well as Bangkok Dangerous, Hana Yori Dango Final, both Nana films, Sars Wars: Bangkok Zombie Crisis, and Kamen Rider Stronger on the live-action backlog. We know there’s another Discotek Day event planned for January so I suspect that will reveal more license announcements and what’s to come for the next half-year.

On a different note, Justin did respond to the concerns folks had about what is considered out of print and what’s not really over on Reddit. It’s understandable what they were trying to convey considering they’re a smaller business than others, but it’s baffling that I’ll have to spend hundreds of dollars just to get a copy of Lupin the Third: Swallowtail Tattoo when it should have been in stock for like $25. I do wonder if the correct way to handle these situations is basically say “hey we’re releasing this but get it within the first 18 months otherwise it’ll be very hard to find” and that would make planning easier for everyone, which is why I think Dear Brother worked so well because everyone got a heads up in advance.

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That’s all for the month of November for the latest collection update. You can expect another yearly collection update blog post as well as the games that I finished this year at the end of the month. There’ll also be a Christmas haul which probably won’t have any unboxings related to them. Either way, I plan to try and get some more unboxings of older pickups like I did a few months back so stay tuned for those!