Forums of the Megaverse®

It just might be easier to go the anime route then movie. I mean, how many new animes get released every year in Japan, 50, 60, 70? So I know they constinely looking for new stuff. And, lets face it, it would be cheeper also to make. We start with a 13 episode "half season", and if its good enough, go from there. I mean, with a good enough villian, they could go all over the Magaverse, and on Rifts Earth just buy its self.

The hard part would be getting them interested. They have tons of new manga, light novels and games coming out all the time to turn into anime. Also got plenty of staff coming up with new idea all the time. I think Rifts would be a perfect fit for anime but it would probably require paying a studio to make it rather then one wanting to license it.

Have to agree with you there. Though it does help to have multi feelers out there.

Try shooting the idea at Funimation, they already have a stable of voice actors, and i heard that they are considering producing some american anime.

I agree that the only way to truly cover the entire megaverse would be via animation. A live action set up would end up being well... "Sliders." If anyone remembers that show.

Was not a bad show.

Does anyone know if they have?

I'd rather not.

Why not?

An anime could be done without focusing on a main character and just jump around the Rifts Earth world. That would be really cool.

I just dont think it would work out.

Funimation would censor all the inherent darkness out of any RIFTS anime project. They'd make it into some "kinder-and-gentler-end-of-the-world" cartoon, thereby homogenizing the entire basis for RIFTS.

and yet they imported or currently sell; Desert Punk, Galaxy railways, Trinity Blood, Hellsing, Hellsing Ultimate, Armitage III, Blue Gender, Claymore, Evangelion, Excell Saga...

seriously, look at what they have before you start typecasting..

also: "homogenizing" .... "you keep using that word. i do not think it means what you think it means"

I totally agree with you.

Yeah, I have to agree with the above, I don't know what funimation you watch but it sounds more like 4Kids from your description.

I actually suggested the Rifts Movie go Anime several years ago. I've thought about this topic extensively. Some of the benefits of going anime have already been laid out. I'll list those and add to it.

1 - It would be cheaper. No special effects budget would be necessary. Let's face it, for a live action Rifts movie the special effects would be pricey at best.

2 - It would be faster. Producing, writing, filming, and editing a movie takes years. Rifts as an animated series could be cranked out in a few months, as a high quality project. How many years have we been waiting on a Rifts movie and there isn't even a script yet?

3 - Rifts would be better as a series.
A) There is no way a movie, even if it were 3 hours long, would do justice to the Rifts world.
B) Being a series, "The Erin Tairn Chronicles" for instance, would also allow a ton of spin offs. There could be a different series for each world book even. Chaos Earth, The Mechanoid Invasion, The Four Horsemen, Coalition Wars, etc, etc. Each one could be it's own series. In all honesty, that would be the only way to do Rifts justice as a show. It would also mean a lot more money in Palladium Books ledger.
C) Hell, you could even expand to other PB titles, Nightbane would make a good series too.

4 - Funimation, Gonzo, Chibi, whichever. There are a number of Japanese anime companies that would look at the project, but why stop with Japan (though giving them the chance to do a season on World Book 8: Japan would only be fair). Pixar and DreamWorks for example. Perhaps PB could find a smaller company that is starting up and looking for scripts.

5 - Control. Animation companies would be more likely to let PB to have creative control over the storylines. Hollywood, especially in live action movies, is notorious for monkeying with scripts.

6 - Voice acting is an acceptable career choice for big name actors. If you try to get a big name for a live action Rifts movie, you can probably forget it. Voice acting is considered the "fun" alternative for big name actors. As a matter of fact there are a number of anime that have been dubbed with popular Hollywood actors. Big name actors could make for a bigger audience draw.

I hope this gets to you Kevin. I've thought long and hard about this. It is a more viable, and in my opinion better, option than a movie.

I actually WAS thinking of 4Kids. Mea culpa.

On another note, I could almost see a RIFTS anime being done in the style of Gungrave, with the flashbacks for exposition and the dark tone that anime has.

Oh, and homogeneous: of the same or a similar kind or nature.

I would watch an animated Rifts series aimed at teens & adults.

And with the way they do seasons in Japan for anime, 12 to 13 episodes, would be perfect, I think, per book. Just a thought on the per book season. And thanks for all the good points!

I really don't watch anime at all but a Rifts one as long as its geared to adults Ill watch.

I'm thinking the best aspect of a RIFTS anime would be the ability to bounce around from one main character to another in a totally different area, country, even continent. With that, there could be entire story arcs devoted to a different country or area... like Japan, for example. Another could follow an officer in the Coalition military, showing how Chi-Town works from the ground up. The possibilities are nearly endless.

Another great aspect of anime is its ability to be spread over hours and hours by splitting it up into episodes. That would grant the script writers the ability to tell a proper story about each different area on RIFTS Earth, instead of compressing a huge wad of information into a relatively small package of two hours, or so. Even a trilogy wouldn't scratch more than the surface of RIFTS.

The only concern I have about an anime is the cost. With the need to pay an animation studio, voice actors, and advertising, among other things, a long-running series could be quite expensive. Even with income from royalties and merchandising, PB would probably need a huge Kickstarter program to get everything started.

Yeah, I know fans would end up donating more than enough to see a RIFTS anime or movie get made. We just rock like that.

I totally agree.

Rifts version: Glitterboy
Funimation translation: Glitterpony

Rifts version: Lord Alistair Dunscon of the Federation of Magic
Funimation translation: Lord Apple Dumpling of the Federation of Mojo

Etc.

Wrong. He got it wrong and he said so:



You are getting things mixed up Little Snuzzles.

Something is telling me that they won't be really interested in this. They have a lot of own material to work with. Unless you pay them a loooooot of money!

That would work really well, I think.
Also, it would avoid any weird copyright infringement things (Psylocke used a "psi-sword" in X-Men: Apocalypse, after all...).
People are too law-suit happy.
Then again, I remember a thing with Palladium and Wizards of the Coast when all the latter really had was Talislanta, and had just started the whole deck-master thing...

Unlikely as Anime is usually character driven, extolling the virtues of Japanese philosophy. (Not uncommon for the Japanese hero to die saving the nation/people and not ending in the West's happily ever after)

They could try to do it like some of the anthology anime but those usually have a different artist for each show.

Do you assume because it is "Fun"imation that they don't have hard titles?

009 Re:Cyborg
Afro Samurai
Air Gear
Akira (Come on if you think Akira is a kinder... world your screwed up)
Appleseed
Armitage
Attack on Titan
Basilisk
Bayonetta
Berserk (if Akira wasn't dark enough...)
Black Lagoon
Blassreiter
Blood Blockade Battlefront
Blood-C
Bubblegum Crisis
C3
Claymore
Code Geass
Darling in the Franxx
Deadman Wonderland
Ergo Proxy
Evangelion
Fist of the North Star
Full Metal Panic
Fullmetal Alchemist
Gantz
Guyver
Ghost in the Shell (the anime of course not the crappy American movie... just as bad as the crappy American Guyver movie)

Too many gonna stop now.

That is a list of some of the most violent, dark, gritty and dystopian titles I've seen and I didn't even finish the alphabet, and all of them are owned by Funimation. In comparison to some of those Rifts is a "kinder-and-gentler-end-of-the-world".

HOWEVER. I doubt they'd turn Rifts aside because it isn't edgy enough seeing as how they've got Gonna be the twin tail and .hack and FLCL.

I'm gonna chock this up to prejudice as in a preconceived opinion that is not based on reason or actual experience

oops ya beat me... really really got to read more before I post. Even some of the same titles. I did learn that they own most of my favorites and took up the mantle for others (BGC) but they have a ridiculously large collection of the definitive Anime under their belt.

I haven't seen a Pixar or Dreamworks title that would compare to the depth of most Anime. Their list of releases is also pretty dry of serious titles, Dreamworks live action... that is a different story but a moot point in this conversation.

But Rifts is a homogenization of Palladium. It isn't like each area is a different flavor. It is Rifts and as it is all Rifts it is homogeneous.

An anime seems wildly unlikely. The odds of PB being willing to part with Rifts animation rights for anything close to their actual worth are nil. Hiring an animation studio to produce a show where rights are retained is somewhere in the market of $150-200K/30 minute episode. If PB had the kind of money for that, then they had the kind of money for RTT refunds, and that's a Pandora's box best left shut.

A crowd-sourced web production, however, allows some possibilities. Licenses for Toonz, Toon Boom, or Animate CC range from free to affordable, and putting together a few assets to release publicly as part of a call for volunteer submissions is something that could actually happen.

I think the only way to get a real successful anime into production would be to start with a solid manga series by a big production studio, with A-list artists, great story writers, etc.

That is the standard flow: Manga or light novel > Anime

And there is a massive amount of new manga and light novels/novellas every season. Like thousands every year. Most just live in print form for a couple of seasons and then stop production. Maybe a hundred get licensed per season for a research and planning, and only 25-ish get picked up for anime production.

Also, Funimation and 4Kids are really just distribution companies in the U.S. They don't make most of their anime, they just licence the anime for translation and distribution in the U.S. or hire an animation studio to do the work. You'd need an actual anime company like T.V. Toyko, Gonzo, J.C. Staff, Aniplex, Kadokawa Shoten, etc. (Here is a non-comprehensive list on Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_anime_companies)

I think if Kevin wanted to make it happen, then they could contact an agent to find a company, and pitch the idea of licencing rifts for a limited run on a single series (think 8 episodes to feel out the reaction). Even if they had to focus on Rifts: Japan it would be pretty amazing. Content could be slightly flexible to allow for some new content that could be turned into another world book...