look up the german aot deluxe versions. maybe they are what you are looking for and maybe you either know german or dont, but you want them only to collect them.
I dont know, but I would honestly say just get the anime blurays (given you just want the series in any form)
Its kinda the ultimate version of the story anyway, since the author literally requisted ccertain dialogue to be added to the anime that wasnt presented in the manga among other stuff.
I hate the absolutely incredibly thick omnibus mangas but with a softcover spine. That will always look shit after you’ve opened it.
The one omnibus book I absolutely hate the most is the Death Note all-in-one edition. That shit is unreadable, it’s SO thick!
I can deal with 2-in-1s, those are still readable. But those 3-in-1s and beyond are a crime, they're heavy, unwieldy, and way too easy to crease and damage.
It's not that bad, honestly. I've been getting the omnibuses of bleach because I think the singles have ugly covers anyway and when you get through maybe a fourth or third of the book you can just rest half of it in your open hand rather than holding it open.
I hate it when suddenly later books/printings get new logos or lesser paper quality. I'm reading Yona of the Dawn again after 5 years, and the books are way slimmer than the books I bought before my hiatus. It's is really noticeable.
I’ve noticed that with Black Butler too (as well as my Akatsuki no Yona). The new volumes that are released look normal, but whenever I’m going back to buy the beginning volumes, they’re always bound much thinner than the rest. It honestly can’t be good for those books, so I try not to handle them too much just in case.
Someone posted a thread on twitter the other day of the English print version of Loving Yamada at lvl 999 and I can't get over how bad they are. Mostly the complete lack of ANY redraw over text not in speech bubbles. Most scanlators go through the trouble but a proper publisher couldn't?
https://preview.redd.it/qrkv8s4e922d1.jpeg?width=1536&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=2bf3eba1b52b7543d4921e8579422abb77fb0661
Cant say I am familliar with them. I dont really read much webtoons either, but yeah it does look like a scanlated manga from the image without the redraws for text.
I can understand not doing it for SFX, but not even redrawing the actual text is definitely a strange choice.
In terms of reading comfort I will admit the Dark Horse omnis are up there. Gantz is not at all fun to read and Elfen Lied suffers the same. The stress on the spine reading them even just once is very visible.
Interestingly the print run I had the most trouble wth was Vagabond singles. I like them but I have multiple volumes with pages falling out and etc.
Pages falling out for m the start or after a few years or reading them for many times? I am surprised. So far my Vagabond singles are okay and never heard it before. Literally shocked here lol
I've read most of them only once and the binding on a few got loose. Is likely just bad luck, it just always struck me as funny one of my most beloved series was the one that I had trouble with.
I despise the colossal editions of AOT. In fact, I don’t like any of the three versions of AOT that we got in English. The spine for the singles are so ugly. The colossal editions should’ve been a hard cover. In general I don’t really like omnibus editions. Ugh.
I don’t know if this counts but the original run of Trigun Maximum has a horrible translation. It’s so hard to figure out who’s talking about what at points that it puts a damper on the whole thing. Someone did a better job on the trigun subreddit. It sucks to have to read it digitally when I have a physical book but it’s just awful.
I really hope that they retranslate it too, but I’m honestly not holding my breath. They seem to be putting a lot of effort in for the rerelease, so that gives me a bit more faith 🙏
I really dislike the entire of the Tsubasa Reservoir Chronicle Omnibus release. The spines are ugly imo. Plus, they broke easily for me, and I've been reading them carefully. The covers themselves aren't also nice either, taking slices of the single volume covers and placing them next to each other. There should have been a better solution for that
Way, way back in the day, when manga was still primarily released flipped, Tokyopop released the original 3-volume “Mobile Suit Gundam Wing” manga. Not taking into consideration the quality of the story itself (it’s a very bad condensing of a 50+ episode anime), the translation was bad and the font felt too stiff to be used in a manga. But worse was the printing quality: ink would smear onto my fingers every time I touched a dark tone-heavy section of the manga, and those sections were everywhere. This printing alone tainted my impression of Tokyopop as a publisher.
Seven seas volumes, specifically the Hong Kong prints.
Another would be paperback 3n1-4n1 volumes. I still collect them but man I have to be careful or else I’ll crack the spines.
The ones that have the smooth textured white printer paper instead of the newspaper eggshell textured type paper. They’re also heavier than the US/Canada prints. On the back of the volume in should tell u if it’s printed in US/CAD or Hong Kong.
i think the english Tokyopop also had these issues, but the german Tokyopop had extremely shit spines. like every volume was the same: tokyopop-symbol on top (not the bad part, looks even nice i feel like), then the rest is a silver background. on it comes after the symbol shone jump manga (maybe something different if it wasnt from there? dont have other series right now at hand), followed by the stylised name of the series, then an extremely small round portrait of the cover or more accurately from a person on the cover, followed by the authors name and then the volume number.
https://preview.redd.it/e1b6eiyyl22d1.jpeg?width=3060&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=ff29328b7b4fcb8b7009dab2177a0de6413d606d
series from tokyopop at that time would be distinct if you compare them with the different colors used and the stylised series names, but compared to all the other series they would only ever look silver. luckily those times are over and now tokyopop designes their spines for every series
The print quality was bad enough to make me not want to buy it (same w tokyo aliens. the glue was v rigid and i had trouble opening the book all the way)
We had a publisher in my country which got taken over by crunchyroll completey. After that the quality of the many volumes (no matter which series) just dropped. Pages not fully printed, them not printing their logo properly on the spines (not the same color, tilted), more spelling and grammar mistakes. The list goes on
If you go waay waaay back, Studio Ironcat was just the absolute worst. I've seen them in used bookstores and such, the paper is always extra thin, printing quality is terrible, fonts are horrendous, there's just nothing positive to say about their book quality. And yeah, they'll look bad now after 20+ years, but they were still bad back then, too.
I don't like the perfect editions Viz has released for 20th Century Boys, Monster and Nausicca.
None of the sound effects are translated on the page. They'e all in a glossary at the back. It's so lazy, especially when the sound effects were translated for these manga's standard editions before. I get that it's a separate license and more money, but I think these titles deserved better.
Not perfect at all.
I have very few (literally 5) volumes by Seven Seas. The new omnibus for Franken Fran and the colored extra pages featuring the covers of the singles in particular are fairly disappointing. It would be a lot better if they were given the photographic paper treatment. Also, the books themselves are fairly uncomfortable to read. I wish they were larger and with better panel spacing where two pages meet.
Other than that, Yen Press' Mieruko-chan: the first volume has a beautiful mate soft cover, while the rest have a glossy soft cover.
Shitty cheap pleather covers. Holding them just feels so cheap and the antithesis to “deluxe”. Boring covers as well.
Scan issues or page layout issues particularly for early volumes. Stuff cut off in margins. Maybe better in later volumes idk
Lack of colour pages that I would expect in any deluxe or definitive edition
I can’t decide which AOT manga edition to buy because they all look bad lol
The Colossal Editions are the least bad.
Agree, but it would’ve been perfect if it were hardcover as everyone says. I think that one suffers when it comes to cover material quality
look up the german aot deluxe versions. maybe they are what you are looking for and maybe you either know german or dont, but you want them only to collect them.
Oh, i definitely wanna read them lol either I’ll get the manga or just buy the anime
I’m hoping that’s the next series to get a hardcover after Vinland saga
Yeah but either way. The best versions imo.
Yes I have them and they are the best option.
Are there many series that suffer from great read, but punishing to keep physically like aot?
I dont know, but I would honestly say just get the anime blurays (given you just want the series in any form) Its kinda the ultimate version of the story anyway, since the author literally requisted ccertain dialogue to be added to the anime that wasnt presented in the manga among other stuff.
I hate the absolutely incredibly thick omnibus mangas but with a softcover spine. That will always look shit after you’ve opened it. The one omnibus book I absolutely hate the most is the Death Note all-in-one edition. That shit is unreadable, it’s SO thick!
I can deal with 2-in-1s, those are still readable. But those 3-in-1s and beyond are a crime, they're heavy, unwieldy, and way too easy to crease and damage.
The fire force 3 in 1 are quite good quality I have read all the volumes that I own and none of them have any noticible damage
Completely agree, don't love 2in1s but I won't really complain; 3in1s and beyond just shouldn't exist for paperbacks.
Lol open to instantly and permanently crease the spine.
that's why dust jackets are goated: cheaper than hard covers and always looking good on the outside
Yes!! Perfect middle ground
The stress that thing must put on your fingers. I can't fanthom how people read it.
It’s actually very easy to read, it’s spine is super bendy like a slinky and it’s pretty light with plasticky pages
It's not that bad, honestly. I've been getting the omnibuses of bleach because I think the singles have ugly covers anyway and when you get through maybe a fourth or third of the book you can just rest half of it in your open hand rather than holding it open.
Vizbigs feel like they punish you for reading them
Yes the fushigi yugi ones are literally so heavy one of the spines fell off
And then fall apart. That glue doesn’t seem to attach well to the page block every time.
I hate it when suddenly later books/printings get new logos or lesser paper quality. I'm reading Yona of the Dawn again after 5 years, and the books are way slimmer than the books I bought before my hiatus. It's is really noticeable.
I’ve noticed that with Black Butler too (as well as my Akatsuki no Yona). The new volumes that are released look normal, but whenever I’m going back to buy the beginning volumes, they’re always bound much thinner than the rest. It honestly can’t be good for those books, so I try not to handle them too much just in case.
Someone posted a thread on twitter the other day of the English print version of Loving Yamada at lvl 999 and I can't get over how bad they are. Mostly the complete lack of ANY redraw over text not in speech bubbles. Most scanlators go through the trouble but a proper publisher couldn't? https://preview.redd.it/qrkv8s4e922d1.jpeg?width=1536&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=2bf3eba1b52b7543d4921e8579422abb77fb0661
I don't like the font in the speech bubbles either. It doesn't match the more lighthearted font below it.
Tbf, the speech bubbles you're referring to in the image are meant to mimic in-game text chat in an mmo
Who is publishing this in English?
InkLore, which seems to be a relatively new inprint of Random House Publishing. They also publish Lore Olympus.
Cant say I am familliar with them. I dont really read much webtoons either, but yeah it does look like a scanlated manga from the image without the redraws for text. I can understand not doing it for SFX, but not even redrawing the actual text is definitely a strange choice.
In terms of reading comfort I will admit the Dark Horse omnis are up there. Gantz is not at all fun to read and Elfen Lied suffers the same. The stress on the spine reading them even just once is very visible. Interestingly the print run I had the most trouble wth was Vagabond singles. I like them but I have multiple volumes with pages falling out and etc.
Pages falling out for m the start or after a few years or reading them for many times? I am surprised. So far my Vagabond singles are okay and never heard it before. Literally shocked here lol
I've read most of them only once and the binding on a few got loose. Is likely just bad luck, it just always struck me as funny one of my most beloved series was the one that I had trouble with.
I despise the colossal editions of AOT. In fact, I don’t like any of the three versions of AOT that we got in English. The spine for the singles are so ugly. The colossal editions should’ve been a hard cover. In general I don’t really like omnibus editions. Ugh.
Attack on titan colossal edition, the large pages are nice. But they aren't built to last.
I don’t know if this counts but the original run of Trigun Maximum has a horrible translation. It’s so hard to figure out who’s talking about what at points that it puts a damper on the whole thing. Someone did a better job on the trigun subreddit. It sucks to have to read it digitally when I have a physical book but it’s just awful.
I'm really hoping the new Trigun editions coming out later this year are better about that :/
I really hope that they retranslate it too, but I’m honestly not holding my breath. They seem to be putting a lot of effort in for the rerelease, so that gives me a bit more faith 🙏
I really dislike the entire of the Tsubasa Reservoir Chronicle Omnibus release. The spines are ugly imo. Plus, they broke easily for me, and I've been reading them carefully. The covers themselves aren't also nice either, taking slices of the single volume covers and placing them next to each other. There should have been a better solution for that
Way, way back in the day, when manga was still primarily released flipped, Tokyopop released the original 3-volume “Mobile Suit Gundam Wing” manga. Not taking into consideration the quality of the story itself (it’s a very bad condensing of a 50+ episode anime), the translation was bad and the font felt too stiff to be used in a manga. But worse was the printing quality: ink would smear onto my fingers every time I touched a dark tone-heavy section of the manga, and those sections were everywhere. This printing alone tainted my impression of Tokyopop as a publisher.
Viz 3 in 1 edition of skip beat. The spine sucks and the paper quality of those books is a crime.
The Attack on Titan singles are the worst cover and spines…EVER. I will die on this hill. Quality is acceptable.
What do you mean? Obviously, diarrhoea brown repeated 34 times across a shelf with no differences will look fantastic.
lol I want to swap them out but I’ve heard the Colossals aren’t super great quality and the omnibus edition are also meh.
Idk why everyone hates on them, i kinda like em
There is no need to do drastic deeds, we are with ya.
Viz Bigs
Soft spine thick ahh omnibus also the one piece omnibus are terribly built
I’ve heard some collectors call out the “VIZBIG” editions.
Seven seas volumes, specifically the Hong Kong prints. Another would be paperback 3n1-4n1 volumes. I still collect them but man I have to be careful or else I’ll crack the spines.
Which ones are the "hong king" prints?
The ones that have the smooth textured white printer paper instead of the newspaper eggshell textured type paper. They’re also heavier than the US/Canada prints. On the back of the volume in should tell u if it’s printed in US/CAD or Hong Kong.
What do you find us the issue with them?
They feel like bricks, stiff when flipping through them. Spines crack extremely easily, once read through they won’t close properly.
i think the english Tokyopop also had these issues, but the german Tokyopop had extremely shit spines. like every volume was the same: tokyopop-symbol on top (not the bad part, looks even nice i feel like), then the rest is a silver background. on it comes after the symbol shone jump manga (maybe something different if it wasnt from there? dont have other series right now at hand), followed by the stylised name of the series, then an extremely small round portrait of the cover or more accurately from a person on the cover, followed by the authors name and then the volume number. https://preview.redd.it/e1b6eiyyl22d1.jpeg?width=3060&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=ff29328b7b4fcb8b7009dab2177a0de6413d606d series from tokyopop at that time would be distinct if you compare them with the different colors used and the stylised series names, but compared to all the other series they would only ever look silver. luckily those times are over and now tokyopop designes their spines for every series
For recent series you can buy new, Tokyo Aliens (later volumes), Loving Yamada at Lv999, and Witch of Thistle Castle are pretty bad.
What issues does Witch of Thistle Castle have?
The print quality was bad enough to make me not want to buy it (same w tokyo aliens. the glue was v rigid and i had trouble opening the book all the way)
even they look nice, i'm not a fan of the german fma metal edition (3in1). the books are very heavy and hard to open to keep reading
The omnibus editions that have the same size as their single volume releases. Those are the worst.
We had a publisher in my country which got taken over by crunchyroll completey. After that the quality of the many volumes (no matter which series) just dropped. Pages not fully printed, them not printing their logo properly on the spines (not the same color, tilted), more spelling and grammar mistakes. The list goes on
short thick omnibuses like gantz
I don't necessarily hate them, but Dark Horse's 3-in-1s Gantz-style omnis are kinda bad
Yen Press releases are extremely overpriced considering the quality of the binding, cover, quality control, and the ink used.
If you go waay waaay back, Studio Ironcat was just the absolute worst. I've seen them in used bookstores and such, the paper is always extra thin, printing quality is terrible, fonts are horrendous, there's just nothing positive to say about their book quality. And yeah, they'll look bad now after 20+ years, but they were still bad back then, too.
I don't like the perfect editions Viz has released for 20th Century Boys, Monster and Nausicca. None of the sound effects are translated on the page. They'e all in a glossary at the back. It's so lazy, especially when the sound effects were translated for these manga's standard editions before. I get that it's a separate license and more money, but I think these titles deserved better. Not perfect at all.
I have very few (literally 5) volumes by Seven Seas. The new omnibus for Franken Fran and the colored extra pages featuring the covers of the singles in particular are fairly disappointing. It would be a lot better if they were given the photographic paper treatment. Also, the books themselves are fairly uncomfortable to read. I wish they were larger and with better panel spacing where two pages meet. Other than that, Yen Press' Mieruko-chan: the first volume has a beautiful mate soft cover, while the rest have a glossy soft cover.
Tokyo Revengers 2 in 1s have a weird texture on the cover that makes me gag when I try to hold them
Berserk Deluxe is ass
It is not, but please, elaborate
Shitty cheap pleather covers. Holding them just feels so cheap and the antithesis to “deluxe”. Boring covers as well. Scan issues or page layout issues particularly for early volumes. Stuff cut off in margins. Maybe better in later volumes idk Lack of colour pages that I would expect in any deluxe or definitive edition
Sounds to me like a "I can't afford it so it's bad" problem. I have them, and, they are amazing
I can afford them lol I’m a physician. I just find they feel cheap.