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Gooey

Member
Oct 27, 2017
137
So...any impressions from this release?

Seems like a pretty solid release! Haven't had a chance to fully dive in but it looks really good. Not a lot in terms of bonus features but what's there is interesting.

Minor note, the steelbook packaging is a little weird. You can't get two the second disc without removing the first
 
Ok, I finally got around to picking this up.

Here are impressions from someone who doesn't have much experience with standard definition anime to Blu-ray transfers:

Overall, the video quality is blurrier than I expected. Widescreen looks ok. The sound is really great, super crisp and clear.

4:3 mode (manually set through my Blu-ray player): Looks better than widescreen, which shouldn't be a surprise.

Compared to my original DVD release, the Blu-ray actually looks slightly softer in 4:3, which is a major disappointment. This could be due to how my Blu-ray player up scales standard DVD definition content, too.

The only advantage of the Blu-ray that I could see over the DVD is that the color/font of the subtitles is majorly improved. On my DVD, the subtitles are a hideous yellow, chunky font.
The Blu-ray has a typical subtitle font, works well enough.

The Blu-ray menu is also less appealing to me compared to the somewhat unsettling original DVD menu.

On the Blu-ray Disc 1, it's just a still image with some quirky music playing in the background. Haven't checked disc 2 yet.

The packaging is alright. As mentioned by Gooey above, it has an odd layout where disc 2 is permanently behind a small nub for disc 1. Maybe this is usual for steel case?

Overall, if you plan on watching Paranoia Agent in 4:3 and you own the DVDs, in my experience, you should still hold on to them. That may depend on your Blu-ray player's upscaling ability, though.

I mostly bought it to support Satoshi Kon's works and because it's in my personal top 3 favorite anime series. Haven't checked out the special content yet!
 

Lord Fanny

Member
Apr 25, 2020
26,068
Ok, I finally got around to picking this up.

Here are impressions from someone who doesn't have much experience with standard definition anime to Blu-ray transfers:

Overall, the video quality is blurrier than I expected. Widescreen looks ok. The sound is really great, super crisp and clear.

4:3 mode (manually set through my Blu-ray player): Looks better than widescreen, which shouldn't be a surprise.

Compared to my original DVD release, the Blu-ray actually looks slightly softer in 4:3, which is a major disappointment. This could be due to how my Blu-ray player up scales standard DVD definition content, too.

The only advantage of the Blu-ray that I could see over the DVD is that the color/font of the subtitles is majorly improved. On my DVD, the subtitles are a hideous yellow, chunky font.
The Blu-ray has a typical subtitle font, works well enough.

The Blu-ray menu is also less appealing to me compared to the somewhat unsettling original DVD menu.

On the Blu-ray Disc 1, it's just a still image with some quirky music playing in the background. Haven't checked disc 2 yet.

The packaging is alright. As mentioned by Gooey above, it has an odd layout where disc 2 is permanently behind a small nub for disc 1. Maybe this is usual for steel case?

Overall, if you plan on watching Paranoia Agent in 4:3 and you own the DVDs, in my experience, you should still hold on to them. That may depend on your Blu-ray player's upscaling ability, though.

I mostly bought it to support Satoshi Kon's works and because it's in my personal top 3 favorite anime series. Haven't checked out the special content yet!

Yeah, that is just weird. I don't know why they designed it that way.

Anyway, I don't have the DVDs, so can't give any kind of real technical analysis, but I just got to watching the first few episodes and man, this show is just so good lol. I'd forgotten all about the opening, too, just great stuff all around.