Vertical Panel was an industry/Publisher panel ran by Ed Chavez (@vertical_ed), who has been dangling the announcement of three new titles prior to the convention via twitter. He had a similar presentation to last year’s industry panel at AnimeNEXT. Here are some of my notes:
- Chi’s Sweet Home with vol 8 has caught up with Japanese releases. Releases shall be slower, but vol 9 will be out in May and English version looking for an August release.
- Drops of God is only going to be 5 volumes. Not enough in sales to justify bringing out the entire 40+ volume series. Dropsofgod.net has retail prices of individual wine from manga if you want to taste.
- Dororo is to be released soon. Meant as a value release in only paperback. Going to be keeping the same cover as previous volumes, and paper quality would be like Drops of God.
- Vertical catalog is going exclusively on ebook format.
- Flowers of Evil from Shuzo Oshimi is releasing in May. This was run in the same magazine as Attack on Titan, may appeal to Love Hina fans.
- Five Centimeters per Second from Makoto Shinkai’s noted movie. This is an omnibus trade paperback out in June. Take a look at the cover here.
- Heroman from Stan Lee and Tamon Ohta is a new property. Looks to be a September release. Great way to get into manga from not necessarily a Japanese property.
- Message to Adolf part 1 out August in Hardcover format with 614 pages.
- Sakuran from Moyoco Anno is releasing in July.
- Limit from Keiko Suenobu is a new title. Her previous work Life was released from Tokyopop.
- Queen’s Blade Perfect Visual Collection is releasing in November with hard cover treatment. Vertical will get into artbooks, so “why not go in fists flying?”
Some issues brought up from audience on potential for more Usamaru Furuya works. Sales have been limited, favored title for Academic, so it is up to mangaka on willingness for more English releases.