I was ready to hate Daisuki months before it even launched.
On April 15, I got a press inquiry from the anime streaming site’s agent. Although I’m not writing professionally for any anime sites right now, the blog title “Otaku Journalist” usually ensures I still get interview queries about new products in the anime industry.
The email header was just too good: “Japan’s FIRST legal Japanese anime distribution website.”
Who are they kidding? Any otaku who’s been on the Internet more than a day knows there are plenty of legal places to get Japanese anime, at least one of them based in Japan. There’s niconico, Netflix, Funimation, Hulu, Crunchyroll, and more.
I emailed several questions over to Daisuki PR. Chiefly of which was this:
“There are already four legal, streaming anime providers in the United States. How is Daisuki different or better than CrunchyRoll, Hulu, Netflix, or Funimation’s streaming anime services?”
This week, I finally got my reply:
“DAISUKI does not aim to compete with other existing sites, since our main purpose is to provide Anime legally. So, as long fans are watching Anime on legal sites, we are happy with that.”
All right, that sort of makes it sound like the original email title never happened. But it’s a good sentiment, so go on…
“What is special at DAISUKI: the Anime companies are our shareholders, so we receive long lists with Anime titles which are ready to be streamed!”
This is great, too! Some of the titles include Madoka Magica, Gundam Seed, and Sword Art Online. However, as Anime News Network has already pointed out, these titles all have something in common—they’re all available and streaming on other sites already!
Could there be more to this?
“Also, there will be a DAISUKI online store where fans can purchase limited official items. Thanks to our direct connections to the Anime studios we are able to provide exclusive footage, too, that can be only viewed on DAISUKI. For example, making-of material, video messages from the creators, etc.”
All right, so a store, same as Funimation and Crunchyroll. It doesn’t look like the store is available yet, but there is a giveaway with merchandise prizes going on.
I signed up for Daisuki over the weekend. Daisuki TV is a dead link, so I clicked on Anime Studios and was led to a video player. However, every time I tried to watch something, I kept getting a notice that “This player is unable to play this protected content at this time.” (This may be my unique problem, since Crunchyroll reviewer Humberto Saabedra was able to watch.)
At least I’m not paying for the privilege to not be able to watch shows. Daisuki told me “Watching most of the Anime content will be for free,” though they will eventually offer fee-based content. I just wish I could tell if there were commercials or not—if there aren’t, that gives it a huge edge over sites like Crunchyroll and Funimation where you have to pay if you don’t want ads.
For now, I don’t see Daisuki as a game changer or a “first” in any way. However, it is yet another way to watch anime cheaply and legally, and that makes it worth supporting. I’m just glad that Daisuki said “as long fans are watching Anime on legal sites, we are happy.” Because as supportive I am of legal anime streaming, it’s physically impossible for me to do it here.
Have you signed up for Daisuki yet? What are your first impressions?
28 Comments.
In my end here in Manila, I can only watch the two Gundam series from Sunrise – the rest is either region-locked or something else, which is a sad thing, but I’m letting it pass since the site is in its first steps.
It might as well be the same problem in other countries though, as with my experience with other legal streaming sites.
@Jay, glad to hear you can at least watch some! In the US, I’m used to being able to watch most stuff. I agree though, they’re just getting started so it’s easy to give them the benefit of the doubt now.
Which has a better layout? Daisuki, or CrunchyRoll?
Are they both equally easy to browse and find what you want to watch?
@John, it’s hard to tell so far since I can’t watch any shows yet and Daisuki TV isn’t live.
Since I had some time I signed up.
Portland, OR US here and I had access to a small selection of shows — Madoka, SOA, Mobile Suit Gundam, Mobile Suit Z Gundam, Lupin the Third Part 2 and The Prince of Tennis OVA.
I find the site design and interface that Crunchyroll uses to be clearer and easier to use. On Daisuki I have to click the pause button, but on CR I can just hit space. I know it’s a nitpick… :)
So, I can access everything Daisuki shows me as available titles. No region locks. Though the list of available titles (at this time at least) is extremely limited.
@Zoe, upon reading your comment I tried watching a few more things. No luck over here in the nation’s capital!
Are you seeing commercials? Because if not, that’s a HUGE plus for Daisuki.
No, I didn’t see any commercials. When I clicked play it went right into the episode. This held true for all the titles I listed. Additionally, the resolution was definitely above 480. I’d say 720 or 1080. Everything looked nice when played full screen.
It’s the little things like having the Space Bar pause that I appreciate too. I’m alwasy suprised when that doesn’t work.
Also being in HD is a plus.
“Any otaku who’s been on the Internet more than a day knows there are plenty of legal places to get Japanese anime”
I would counter by saying there’s still not enough (especially since you count the number of not so legal streams out there) — and most certainly not enough in other countries, which is one of the reasons why I hope Daisuki does well, especially for those not in the US ;)
There are too many streaming sites like anime3000and more they are providing anime, we can collect our favorite anime….
Hi Lauren, I would like some advice. I’ve never really watched anime before, but I’ve recently gotten really into it at the urging of a friend. He gave the site for chia anime and I have watched many episodes of Fairy Tail on it. Is this website legal? What websites are FOR SURE 100% legal? I feel guilty watching illegal streams of anime if there are legal options. I know Funimation, Crunchyroll, and Hulu are definitely legal, correct? However, none of those sites have multiple seasons of Fairy Tail. They only have the first 60 or so episodes. I just want to make sure that I am supporting the producers of the anime when I watch the videos, not some scam website.
More sites that I’ve used that I’m now also questioning the legality of – gogoanime, fairytail.tv, animefreak…Oh, and also I was wondering – if there are so many illegal sites out there, why don’t the Japanese companies take action? Surely they have the right to sue, or at least shut down the sites?
Ack, sorry final question :) When encountering anime sites, do you have any advice for what I can do to check to see whether or not they are legal? Also…is there anywhere to listen to openings, endings, and soundtracks of animes LEGALLY? I know there’s youtube… is that legal? Thanks SO much.
I know this comment is 3 years old but better late then never, but all those sites listed are illegal, and the reason they cant find them is because they run through encrypted streaming servers, and every couple of months or so the move locations, so kissanime.me recently became kissanime.to because the law came after them, if you want to use legal streaming networks for free uust use Crunchyroll or Hulu (both completely free of charge for anime), crunchyroll puts a premium cap for at least a week before it becomes free, which is a big turn off and i think they should make simulcast free like daisuki and hulu, and also, hulu doesnt simulcast most anime, they have most anime but they dont simulcast alot of it (unless its popular like one piece) which is also a big turnoff on hulu, so i’d say keep daisuki bookmarked but not as your primary anime source, if an anime isnt available on any of these legal streaming services then you should feel free to use kissanime.to because its the creators fault for not licensing to those services.
well, here in Arlington, VA i can watch it fine and free and HD :p
Glad to hear it! I wrote this blog post back in June after Daisuki had just launched, and I guess it was having issues. Maybe I’ll need to give it another go!
even if you use other browsers, most likely the problem is google chrome’s built in flash player.
this is just to archive, but download adobe flash directly to your computer, reset content permissions and disable it in chrome.
follow the steps under “how to run alternate versions” in chrome.
http://helpx.adobe.com/flash-player/kb/flash-player-google-chrome.html
[…] Anti Social Geniuses narrows down the 5 legal anime and manga streaming sites to watch. I admit I wasn’t so hot on Daisuki once upon a time, but now that they have Kuroko’s Basketball as an exclusive, of course […]
I only wish they had more content like Fairy Tail, Naruto, Dragonball (original, Z, GT, and Super), and others. Also it looks like since they started both sao2 and one piece were taken down.
They do surveys sometimes, so gotta wait to suggest what they should bring in.
[…] Is Anime Streaming Site Daisuki Worth It? – Otaku Journalist […]
So far I haven’t been able to watch a single video on Daisuki.net. The player always gives a spinning circle as if it was buffering.. but nothing ever happens. In addition to that, the store page is RIDICULOUSLY slow to scroll. It turns out that it’s fine though, since all they have for sale are little plastic figurines that they bought from China for $1 and are selling for almost $50 after the shipping cost is included.
Daisuki’s player does even wirk all on android, it oplays videos for almist NOBODY its fucking stupid how a corporation is still supported and surviving when their service doesnt even work.
It’s working properly for me with no commercials and no need to create an account, which is great. I’ve watched a few episodes of One Punch Man and can’t speak to any of their other offerings. I did experience an issue on Chrome where I was unable to navigate forward or backward in the video – attempting to do so would just restart the video. The problem cleared up when I moved to Firefox – it may be an incompatibility issue with Chrome, but likely I just need to clear my cache and cookies. The available quality options were only 360p and 480p – not great, but given the convenience, not a dealbreaker.
The ads didnt load, either your using adblock of they failed entirely, it has video ads, im telling you.
I try daisuki to day and unlike the other streaming sites their anime is for free I hope this stays
( will they change that ?)
Well, I’ve never faced any problems with it. The website is very
simple and works well, unlike Crunchyroll which gets flash player errors
every other month. The app is PERFECT. No sort of lag. It runs smooth
and the player is responsive. In terms of quality, I’d actually rate it
higher than Crunchyroll. The ads are much shorter and less annoying plus
most ads are related to anime.
Content is the downside. They
don’t have many anime listed. But it’s new and it has stuff like One
Punch Man, Kuroko no Basket, Black Butler, Blood Blockade Battlefront,
Durarara!!x2, Gundam, ERASED, Gangsta and many other popular new anime.
I expect One Piece, Naruto, Dragon Ball Super to be included soon seeing that their developers are a part of Daisuki themselves.
I’ll
give it 1-2 years to become one of the most practical anime sites.
Mostly because it’s COMPLETELY FREE WITH LESS ANNOYING ADS!
(But it has around 1-2 15 second ads per episode)
And it also links to your Myanimelist.net account so you don’t have to bother updating it every time.
I’m looking forward to see Daisuki become popular worldwide. Especially in countries where access to Funimation, Netflix, Hulu, Crunchyroll are limited..
Crunchyroll, Funimation, Netflix, and Hulu aren’t based in Japan. So obviously they wouldn’t be covered under “Japan’s FIRST legal Japanese anime distribution website.” I mean, really.
Daisuki has worked better for me than any other anime streaming site, sans Youtube. Crunchyroll and Funimation have horrible playback (Funi in particular is just awful; I was prompted to switch to Daisuki when I realized I could watch the same videos there as I did on Funi, with much less frustration). Hulu and Netflix aren’t bad but they do get kind of laggy sometimes. I’ve gotten a few error messages from Daisuki videos (out of dozens of viewings) but these were easily solved by going back to the show page. It does seem that many people (you included) had problems with Daisuki when it first came out. I hope it’s better now.
I haven’t done much research on it, but it also seems that animation companies receive more revenue from having their shows on Daisuki than western streaming sites. So that’s another reason I support them.
My only current problem with Daisuki is that they seem to have charged me $5 for my supposedly free premium trial; I’m about to contact them and try to get a refund. Still, $5 isn’t bad for what seems like a pretty good premium service.
tl;dr Daisuki is my favorite anime streaming site right now.