Why do most anime adaptations have 12 episodes?

[thirdlc]

Originally Posted by Cheezy

But in the case with VN adaptions, most are either 12 or 26 episodes, which are _always_ too few.

11 eyes, umineko and basically almost every VN adaption have way too few episodes, and thus are horribly rushed and bad. Whyyy must this always happen?

Because almost every VN adaptation is just like a promotional video for a port of the game that it is based on to another platform released within a few months after it is finished. You are not satisfied and want to get more of it when you watch a VN adaptation? If so, the anime did its share.

[Kazuta00lord]

May I ask something. With all that things that everybody is saying, that is why good anime adaptions like 11eyes get 12 or 13 episodes? So why made it make it in the 1st place? Would it be better to do a movie out of it than as anime?

[Ithekro]

Well then you'd have 2 to 3 hours to tell the story rather than 4 to 5 hours with a 13 episode series.

[Jan-Poo]

Originally Posted by Kazuta00lord

May I ask something. With all that things that everybody is saying, that is why good anime adaptions like 11eyes get 12 or 13 episodes? So why made it make it in the 1st place? Would it be better to do a movie out of it than as anime?

Well...

People expect animated movies to have a better quality than TV shows. If you make a feature film with the same quality of a regular anime series you are bound to get trashed by the critics. You may think that it costs less to make a 1 and a half hour of animation for a movie than about 4-5 hours of a 12 episode anime, but the opposite is true (generally).

[IceHism]

Anime these days have less cours mostly because the funding is just not there compared to before. It's not really a secret that books like manga and light novels make A LOT more money than anime does. You can check Oricon to see this in effect.

[speedyexpress48]

Back in the day there were some long series and lots of OVAs.

Now there's a lot of short series that have taken the place of the OVAs of the past.

[ArabianLuffy]

Most animes that end in 12 episodes are weak plotted.

[RichardFromMarple]

One problem with adapting a Manga was the Anime would eventually catch up, & then need a lot of filler episodes to pad out a series, weakening the quality.

With 12 episodes per year it's a lot easier to keep pace.

[DragoonKain3]

Uhh... what? Anime have '12' episodes because that's the equivalent of 1 cour, and most anime have some multiple of that or close to it (24 for 2 cours, or around 50 for year long anime since anime takes up to 2 separate weeks break).

http://forums.animesuki.com/showthre...232#post508232

Some exceptions do occur. Noitamina shows generally run 11, some other shows run 13 because sometimes there are 13 weeks in 3 months, or they generally start early. Some others (like Nisekoi) intentionally cut a few episodes because that's where they want to end.

But why do shows only run 1 cour? Because sometimes its all the anime can be greenlit for. Money is still what makes the world go round, and the anime world is of no exception. And as other people can attest, a 2 cour anime is a much MUCH bigger investment risk than 2 anime with 1 cour each (hence why some shows go split cour format).

For the record, it's not only anime that follows this cour format, but J-dramas as well. It's simply a function of the way Japanese broadcasting works.

[Jan-Poo]

Originally Posted by DragoonKain3

But why do shows only run 1 cour? Because sometimes its all the anime can be greenlit for. Money is still what makes the world go round, and the anime world is of no exception. And as other people can attest, a 2 cour anime is a much MUCH bigger investment risk than 2 anime with 1 cour each (hence why some shows go split cour format).

I think risk is the important keyword here.
I expect two 1 cour anime to actually cost more than a single 2 cours anime.

There's a lot of stuff that you can reuse in a single anime (especially backgrounds) but you must start from zero if you begin another one.

The main reason, I think, is that in case the anime fails they can contain the losses better.
Another possible reason is that costumers are more likely to spend their money to buy BD-DVD of a short series than a long one, but I'm not 100% positive on that.


There's the fact that in the past 4 cours series were the standard while now they are mostly 2 cours and 1 cours.
But this shouldn't be seen as a decrease in the amount of animated productions, in fact the opposite is true and the money used to finance the anime industry isn't less than before by any mean.

[DonQuigleone]

Originally Posted by Jan-Poo

I think risk is the important keyword here.
I expect two 1 cour anime to actually cost more than a single 2 cours anime.

There's a lot of stuff that you can reuse in a single anime (especially backgrounds) but you must start from zero if you begin another one.

The main reason, I think, is that in case the anime fails they can contain the losses better.
Another possible reason is that costumers are more likely to spend their money to buy BD-DVD of a short series than a long one, but I'm not 100% positive on that.

I'd say to an extent you're right, however as 1 cour shows that get "sequels" is becoming common, I'd say the animators are setting aside the resources to make continuations easier then starting fresh on a new property. You'd have been dead on though 5 years ago, when most 1 cour shows were one offs that, even if they did get a sequel, it would be years after the fact with a fresh animation team.

My own speculation is that the system now is that that they begin full production of a show maybe half a cour before the show starts. By halfway through the run, they know if their show is successful or not, and they'll know whether they've gotten a second cour, in which case they just continue production after their season "ends".

For instance, with Knights of Sidonia, it was officially announced with the last episode (I believe) that they were getting a second season, but it's fairly likely that the animation studio and production committee would have greenlighted the continuation a few weeks before that announcement, in which case they can easily prepare for continuing that show with minimal loss of resources, unlike how it would have been a few years ago, where production of a show was disjointed. My speculation is that animation team for Knights of Sidonia S1 probably leaped straight onto producing S2 immediately after they finished S1.