Manga Bookshelf

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iPad

Going Digital: March 2012

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Welcome to the latest Going Digital, Manga Bookshelf’s monthly feature focusing on manga available for digital viewing or download. Each month, the Manga Bookshelf bloggers review a selection of comics we’ve read on our computers, phones, or tablet devices, to give readers a taste of what’s out there, old and new, and how well it works in digital form.

This month, MJchecks in on the iPad manga scene, while Sean takes a look a a recent JManga release for your web browser. Device, OS, and browser information is included with each review as appropriate, to let you know exactly how we accessed what we read.


iOS

Manga on the iPad: 18 month check-in

It’s been a year and a half since New York Comic Con 2010, where Yen Press announced the launch of their new iPad app. Viz followed soon after, and quickly rose to the head of the class thanks to their quickly growing catalogue and significantly lower pricing. Fast forward to NYCC 2011, where Kodansha USA finally joined the game, followed by Digital Manga Publishing a few months later.

For me, the success (or failure) of any manga app can be boiled down to three basic components: functionality, selection, and price. So now, 18 months after manga first began trickling onto the iPad, how are publishers faring on these three key issues?

Functionality

All four of the major manga apps began with strong functionality right out of the gate. Their (very similar) layouts are all fairly intuitive, with easy access to each publisher’s catalogue as well as the user’s own library of purchased manga. Each app offers high-quality images, and the ability to read in single or double page-view, as well as the ability to zoom in on (and out from) any single panel with ease. Of these apps, only Kodansha Comics’ displayed any functionality issues at launch time, with its progressive images that stall readability from page to page. Unfortunately, this issue appears to remain unresolved at the time of this writing, making Kodansha Comics’ app the least visually attractive of the manga apps to-date.

It’s worth noting here, too, that while both Viz and DMP both have browser-based stores as well, so far only Viz’s app allows for cross-platform purchases, while eManga customers must buy again to read their purchased volumes on the iPad.

Selection

Viz far outshines its mainstream competitors in this category, with over fifty titles available to-date (and more being added all the time), including super-popular titles like Naruto and One Piece, as well as more eclectic fare like House of Five Leaves and Saturn Apartments. Though I’m still hoping to see some of Viz’s out-of-print shoujo licenses show up here one day (e.g. Please Save My Earth, Banana Fish, Basara) there’s no denying that Viz is blowing everyone else away when it comes to selection on this platform. Recent additions like Hikaru no Go suggest that Viz indeed views its various digital platforms as a means for introducing long-running, completed series to new readers, and I certainly hope to see that continue.

DMP started out with a very strong catalogue, particularly for fans of its Juné and Digital Manga Guild imprints, but new additions have stalled since their recent issues with Apple censors, and it’s difficult to know at this point what the future of their app might be. BL fans can still pick up over fifty different titles (several with multiple volumes) at the time of this writing, ranging from newer releases like An Even More Beautiful Lie, Seven Days, and Blue Sheep Reverie, to older titles like Maiden Rose and Il Gatto Sul G. Though many more DMP/DMG titles are currently available to iPad readers by way of Amazon’s Kindle app (which has had its rocky moments, too), issues like image quality and reading direction make this option less than ideal.

While Yen Press’ catalogue is relatively small (25 titles as of this writing), it does have the advantage of being the only real source for Korean manhwa among these publishers to-date. Manga Bookshelf favorites like Time and Again and 13th Boy are both being released by Yen Press on this platform, and I certainly hope this will be a continuing trend. Though Yen’s manhwa licensing seems to have come to a halt over the past year or so, it would be a real treat to see series like Forest of Gray City or Very! Very! Sweet make a reappearance on the iPad so that they can be discovered by new readers. OEL series are another highlight of Yen’s app, including critical successes like Nightschool and Soulless: The Manga. Yen’s manga selection is less impressive, with titles Yotsuba&! and The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya standing as its heaviest hitters.

Bringing up the rear in this category again is Kodansha Comics, whose catalogue has still not expanded beyond the four series it launched with (Arisa, Fairy Tail, Sayonara, Zetsubou-Sensei, and Until the Full Moon) even after six months.

Price

Here, again, Viz leads the pack, with prices starting at $4.99 a volume for Shonen Jump and Shojo Beat series, $5.99 for IKKI and Signature series, and between $6.99-$8.99 for oversized or omnibus releases. Though I still think that $5 a volume is too high to encourage real bulk purchases, it remains the best price out there for manga on the iPad. Kodansha Comics’ volumes sell for $4.99 apiece as well, though it’s worth mentioning that they ran a $2.99 special for Fairy Tail when the app first launched—a price I absolutely would pay for bulk purchases of a series I had interest in reading.

Both Yen Press and DMP lag in this category, with single volumes going for $6.99-$8.99 apiece—sometimes significantly more than print prices online—and $12.99 for larger volumes. Though BL readers, in particular, are accustomed to paying more for their habit, thrifty shoppers who are willing to put up with the downsides of the Kindle app can pretty much always get the same books for less by going that route—and have their purchase available on their other compatible devices as well, including their computers. I will admit that though I was fairly depressed not to be able to purchase Keiko Kinoshita’s You & Tonight through DMP’s far superior iPad app, it’s awfully nice to have it available on both my iPad and my laptop via Amazon’s Kindle app.

Bottom Line

Viz is the clear winner on the iPad overall, performing well in all three categories of functionality, selection, and price. DMP’s app is promising, and should they manage to resolve their issues with Apple and find a way to better serve cross-platform customers, they could become a digital powerhouse for BL fans, despite a significantly less attractive price point. Yen Press’s app lags in both selection and price, though it does hold a particular allure for manhwa fans. (Will we ever see NETCOMICS in the iPad app game?) And though Kodansha Comics does well when it comes to pricing, its dinky selection and less-than-optimum readability diminish its worth significantly.

What do you suppose this year’s New York Comic Con will bring? – MJ


Web Browser

Anesthesiologist Hana Vol. 2 | By Nakao Hakua and Kappei Matsumoto | Futabasha, Manga Action | JManga.com | Windows XP, Firefox 11.0
Volume Two of this medical series continues to pummel our heroine with exhausting daily living. I’d say crises, but she’s an anesthesiologist, so to a certain degree this is what she does. She has professors teaching a class putting her on the spot to embarrass her, the hospital changing to more of a trauma unit center (meaning longer hours), and most of all a new doctor in the unit, Hiura, who is a complete and utter jerk to her He’s constantly yelling at her and forcing her to step up her game, and is rude to her other colleagues… especially Dr. Kobayakawa, the troubled young doctor Hana hit it off with last volume. Of course, those familiar with this type of manga will know immediately that he is the sort of person that doesn’t suffer fools gladly. He dislikes Kobayakawa for his fear and wasted potential, and is so hard on Hana because of her increasing skills and pluck – he teaches by rudeness, basically.

He also, in yelling at Hana, basically notes that her breasts are big, something this manga never really allows us to forget. There’s no gratuitous shower scene here, but instead we get a new trauma doctor, Kenshi, who simply walks up, marvels at her breasts, and starts to fondle them. My jaw dropped briefly, and I am once again reminded of the huge sexual harassment gulf between here and Japan, in that Hana didn’t slug him. Yes, this is supposed to take place in the mid-90s rather than the time it was written, but sheesh. This doctor later gets a nice moment where he tries to teach Hana a basic truth – patients die, and that doctors simply have to accept this and try to save the next one just as hard – but he can’t read her as well as Hiura, so it doesn’t really take. In any case, if his schtick of groping Hana becomes his running gag, I can’t say I’ll be too fond of him.

There’s a lot of medical stuff going on here, and like the first volume if the reader doesn’t want to wade through some jargon they may be in trouble..That said, it’s not too difficult, and the basic premise remains the same – a doctor’s life is very hard, and every day is a struggle to wonder if it’s worth it. Especially given that these are anesthesiologists, so they don’t have the ‘these are my life-saving hands!’ aspect that, say, heart surgeons would. Hana, like the heroine of Nao Go Straight, can be too empathic at times – something contrasted with the new trauma doctors introduced towards the end. The best chapters were the two-parters, one dealing with the patient who loses his life, as I’d mentioned, and the other with how anesthesiologists have immense trouble with morbidly obese people. Hiura wants to harness Hana’s passion, and avoid having her become like Kobayakawa. Can he do it? To be continued! -Sean Gaffney

Disclosure: MJ is currently under contract with Digital Manga Publishing’s Digital Manga Guild, as necessitated for her ongoing report Inside the DMG. Any compensation earned by MJin her role as an editor with the DMG will be donated to the Comic Book Legal Defense Fund.

Apple censors still targeting LGBTQ content?

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In June of 2010, Apple’s policies for adult content in the iOS App Store received a lot of attention in the comics press after Tom Bouden’s all-male graphic novel adaptation of Oscar Wilde’s The Importance of Being Earnest was rejected from the store for its very mild sexual content, while similarly non-explicit heterosexual content seemed to be flying through just fine. Though Apple eventually agreed to accept a censored version of Bouden’s comic, Prism Comics founder Charles “Zan” Christensen gave voice to the thought on everyone’s mind at the time in his article, “iPad Publishing No Savior for Small Press, LGBT Comics Creators” at the company’s website. And though, just a year later, Apple seemed to throw its arms open wide to Christensen’s LGBT imprint Northwest Press by accepting several of Northwest’s comics into its iBooks store, publishers and fans have remained skeptical.

American manga publishers learned their lessons early on. In 2008, Yaoi Press founder Yamila Abraham—an early proponent of digital distribution—worked with a company called Fika Publishing to create apps for their comics, which feature male-male relationships. “They knew Apple had tight policies so we first attempted to get our tamest title accepted, Zesty,” Abraham told me in an e-mail this week. “There is no gay sex in Zesty. The gayest thing is two guys kissing. The School Library Journal even rated it grades 10 and up,” she said. “Apple flat out rejected it and refused to tell us why so we could modify it for a resubmission. To me it said they aren’t anti-porn, they’re anti-gay. I was extremely bitter over this.”

Given Apple’s track record, most manga publishers haven’t even tried. Of yuri publisher ALC Publishing, founder Erica Friedman says, “… we have not ever considered releasing any ALC Publishing books by iTunes. When we last published a book, Apple wasn’t the monster distributor it is now—print was still the favored distribution. Right now, I am so enraged and disgusted by Apple’s censorship—especially of LGBTQ material—that I do not consider them a viable distributor of our material.”

Jennifer LeBlanc, editor of VIZ Media‘s new BL imprint SuBLime Manga (whose titles are largely digital-only), when asked why they had not followed their parent company to the iOS platform replied simply, “Because of Apple’s strict content policy, we have no plans for developing an iOS app at this time.”

Then came Digital Manga Publishing. Most well-known for their extensive line of BL manga—ranging anywhere from sweet, chaste romances to racy adult fare—DMP announced their launch on the iPad just last November. When I reviewed their app in January, DMP’s iPad catalogue was fairly robust, populated mostly by titles from their various BL imprints, DokiDoki, Juné, 801 Media, and the fan-localized Digital Manga Guild.

On February 2nd, DMP broadcast the following message to their followers on Twitter, “Sad day, yaoi fans. Unfortunately we’ve been asked to remove our yaoi titles from our iPad app soon. Get them while you still can!”

Further inquiry revealed that the removal was, indeed, for mature content, though whether the mandate applies to all of DMP’s BL titles (and if not, which ones?) remains vague. DMP representative Kelly Orita told me that she hasn’t “been given the OK to mention which specific titles caused problems.” She said that they’d been contacted previously about removing certain pages from their titles, “… but I don’t know how far along we were in that process before they asked us to remove entire books. Internally we’ve been working in batches to take down books with explicit content—we have to take down the content, get Apple to OK the removal, then hear back from them in regards to further developments.”

When asked about the app’s rating, Orita replied, “We did provide a 17+ rating for the app, and while I can’t double check to confirm at the moment I am fairly positive all explicit books had warnings as well.”

Though at the time of this writing, BL titles still remain in DMP’s iPad store, it is unclear how many may be removed before this process is over, when the removal will be complete, or what which titles may still be available by the end. Without that information, of course, it’s difficult to determine whether Apple’s policies are being applied unfairly towards DMP’s same-sex content. Still, I did a little poking around in some popular comics apps to see what kind of content Apple apparently deems appropriate.

My first stop was DC Comics, whose mainstream, non-adult-rated app offered me volume one of Catwoman from their New 52 lineup. Here are a few screencaps taken on my iPad of the final scene in issue #1, where Catwoman meets up with Batman for a passionate sexual encounter.

(click images to enlarge – read left-to-right)

Here’s the most explicit scene from Rihito Takarai and Venio Tachibana’s two-volume Seven Days (Monday-Thursday & Friday-Sunday) series, currently available from the DMP app.

(click images to enlarge – read right-to-left)

Certainly, many of DMP’s BL titles do contain more explicit scenes, including various stages of nudity. To see if this kind of content was being censored in comics with heterosexual couples, I popped over to the 17+ Comixology app, where I was able to download issue #57 of Y: The Last Man by Brian K. Vaughan and Pia Guerra, published by DC’s grown-up imprint, Vertigo. Here are a few iPad screencaps from an early scene in that issue:

(click images to enlarge – warning: full nudity)

Given the content allowed here, it’s difficult to imagine where DMP has gone wrong, or what kind of content they could be offering that would be inappropriate in a 17+ app.

Meanwhile, fans of DMP’s BL comics looking to read them on their iPads have at an alternative in Amazon’s Kindle app, though the difference in quality is fairly brutal.

The downsides of reading DMP manga on the Kindle app are, as I understand it, pretty much the same as reading on the Kindle itself. First, though Japanese comics read from right-to-left, the Kindle app only allows page-turning from left-to-right, making for a somewhat unintuitive experience for manga readers, who must still read pages and panels in the Japanese configuration. This issue is minor, however, compared to the disparity in image quality.

Here is a page from Keiko Kinoshita’s Kiss Blue, as viewed in DMP’s iPad app (full size):

Here is the same page from the Kindle version (full size):

The iPad version is crisp, clear, and easy to read, while smaller (and especially hand-written) text requires a lot of squinting when reading from the Kindle app. This issue becomes even more pronounced when taking advantage of the apps’ two-page spreads. Two page spreads accentuate the issue with page-order as well, as you’ll note that the Kindle’s two-page spread requires that the pages be followed from left-to-right, while the content still reads right-to-left.

DMP App version (click image to enlarge to full-size):

Kindle App version (click image to enlarge to full-size):

Both apps offer the ability to zoom in on any portion of the page, but not only is the DMP app’s interface far more intuitive (zooming in and out on the DMP app is accomplished with a double-click, while the Kindle app requires the two-finger pinch-and-spread, after which the reader must tap an “X” to close out of the enlarged section), its image quality blows the Kindle app out of the water.

DMP App version (click image to enlarge to full-size):

Kindle App version (click image to enlarge to full-size):

As you can see, while the Kindle app serves as a semi-tolerable stop-gap for iPad users, the prospect of losing access to these comics in the DMP app’s superior format is a significant blow for the publisher’s fans.

Manga Bookshelf will report further information as it’s available, including names of specific titles that have been targeted for removal, and any response from Apple who, at the time of this writing, have yet to respond to a request for comment.

Disclosure: MJ is currently under contract with DMP’s Digital Manga Guild, as necessitated for her ongoing report Inside the DMG. All compensation earned by MJin her capacity as subcontractor will be donated to the Comic Book Legal Defense Fund. MJ is also a long-time Apple customer.

Seven Days: Friday-Sunday © Venio Tachibana/Rihito Takari. All rights reserved. English translation © 2011 by DIGITAL MANGA, Inc./TAIYO TOSHO CO., LTD. KISS BLUE © KEIKO KINOSHITA. All rights reserved. English translation © 2008 by DIGITAL MANGA, Inc./TAIYO TOSHO CO., LTD.

Platform review: Viz on the iPad

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People made fun of the iPad when it was first announced, from its seemingly limited functionality to its unfortunate name, but over the last year it has proven to be probably the most exciting new device to enter the (as Steve Jobs likes to call it) “post-PC” market.

Besides offering much of the same day-to-day functionality we require of our desktop computers (web browsing, e-mail, and so on), it’s also a terrific tablet reader and possibly the best personal gaming device I’ve ever seen. Now with Apple’s recent announcement of the upcoming iPad 2, complete with new video cameras and (frankly amazing) new versions of iMovie and Garageband written especially for the iPad, it’s definitely the device every forward-thinking company wants a piece of.

If this is beginning to sound like a paid iPad commercial, that’s only because I have to pretty much fight my husband to get just a couple minutes of time on his iPad, that’s how much use he gets out of the thing. It has become the centerpiece of our gadget-geek household (which is saying quite a bit), so not much could make me happier than to see my own personal geek obsession making inroads in the iPad market. Comics publishers, including a few manga publishers, have been putting out apps left and right, and we’ve got ’em all.

Viz’s iPad app has an immediate edge over its current competitors in the manga market, simply because Viz has actually managed to acquire digital rights for titles from Japan, something that companies like Yen Press and Dark Horse have had some pretty obvious difficulty with.

Most of the titles offered are popular ones too, like Bleach, Naruto, and Vampire Knight, with a few surprising treats like older series Rurouni Kenshin and some quirky shoujo picks like Natsume’s Book of Friends and Otomen. Shounen series dominate the app by far at this point, with no sign at all of older-aimed titles from Viz’s IKKI and Signature catalogues, and just the barest sprinkling of shoujo.

Navigation is simple and pretty intuitive. The app’s landing page features three simple tabs in the middle of the screen for checking out new arrivals, as well as “featured” volumes and a small selection of free previews.

A button on the top right provides access to a list of all available series, though there doesn’t seem to be any way to flip through all available volumes, the way one might in the bookstore aisle. Not that browsing between series is a hardship at all, as the “All Series” button remains on every page of the app.

Purchasing or previewing a volume is pretty easy (though full volume downloads can take some time), and everything is purchased in-app. But the app does require that you create a Viz account before you can make purchases using iTunes. And since signing into your account moves you away from the screen where your purchase was initiated, you have to manually navigate back to the original page in order to complete the purchase. Fortunately, once you’ve signed in, you’re not required to do so again during the same session.

Getting to the important stuff: Viz’s manga looks great on the iPad, especially when viewed as single pages, portrait-style. Images are crisp and clear, and text is easy to read.

In wide-screen, double-page mode, artists with heavy inking and contrast fare the best (like Bakuman and Death Note‘s Obata), while those with a lighter, sketchier style suffer somewhat with the smaller page size, though nothing is genuinely difficult to see.

Enlargement of a single panel is incredibly easy. Double-tap on any panel for a close up, and then double-tap to return. The iOS two-finger pinching works on all pages as well, both in single and double-page mode.

Overall, the iPad makes a great comics reader, and Viz’s app takes full advantage of its capabilities.

Purchases are downloaded directly to the iPad, so they can be saved in your library forever–a much nicer deal than most of the online “rental” models we’ve seen from manga publishers up to now–and first volumes of all series are currently offered for just $.99 apiece, which is a pretty unbeatable deal.

The $4.99 price tag on subsequent volumes is a bit too high to encourage buying in bulk, especially when brand new physical volumes of most of these series can be found for just a few dollars more on Amazon (and for at least a couple of dollars less used). While it’s easy to imagine buying volumes of newer, currently running series (like Bakuman or Toriko, both available now) for that price, the idea of trying to catch up with long-running series (like Bleach or One Piece) at $5 a pop is much less enticing. Lowering the price of later volumes by even just a dollar would make these longer, older series more attractive, especially as bulk buys.

Accessing all your downloaded manga is very easy–just a single click on the “My Manga” button found at the bottom of every screen, and preferences can be set for maximum storage size. Any overflow can be deleted from the device as needed, then re-downloaded whenever you’re ready to read. The app’s storage settings allow you to see or hide titles not currently stored on your device, whichever you prefer. You can also choose to be notified (or not) when new volumes of your downloaded series are available for purchase.

With such a relatively small percentage of Viz’s catalogue (just sixteen series at this time) currently available in their iPad store, it would be a stretch to describe it as a great source for manga, but it’s not difficult to imagine the possibilities.

Many have already pointed out its potential as a platform for long, out-of-print series, particularly the scads of fantastic 80s and 90s shoujo Viz put out on their now-defunct shôjo imprint. Packaged “omnibus” editions with several volumes for a reduced price could be very exciting as well, making it truly feasible for both old and new fans to catch up on longer series they might have missed during their original print runs. Whether Viz is willing or able to make any significant volume of its back catalogue available remains to be seen, as is whether or not any of their more sophisticated titles will ever hit these digital shelves.

Still, Viz is adding new manga to their store at a pretty brisk pace, as Kate recently reported in her coverage of their new “March Madness” campaign. Let’s hope we’ll see much more to come!