Saturday, December 26, 2009

Anime Stores Around Vancouver II

Been in Vancouver for a while? Can't find your anime & anime goods fix? Let me help you by showing you the anime stores around Vancouver and its surrounding areas. This is a continuation of part I. I've only found fewer than before, so I also moved one of the entries to this post to reduce the loading time of the first one. After this post I think I've covered all the stores that sell a majority of anime-related products in-store around Vancouver.

Once again, not all the stores sell anime, but anime goods and other merchandise. I will specify what they sell under each store. Also not all the stores are actually IN Vancouver, but cities surrounding Vancouver. If there are local people who've seen both posts and I'm missing a store, do let me know and I'll add them in.

Before I start: These are my general impression of the stores and I haven't been paid by any of them to advertise their store on this blog. I do tend to visit some of them a lot and may have some bias, but I try to be as neutral as possible and be informative as possible about the product that each store sell. You may have to judge to your standards accordingly. I only wish to inform anyone looking for anime products around Vancouver and I hope you find what you're looking for.

Located at 100-3731 North Fraser Way, Burnaby


From the outside it doesn't look like much, but once you're inside this warehouse, you'll be in awe as well. Shelves and shelves of manga and anime DVDs (amongst normal DVDs). They have the biggest anime DVDs/Blu-Ray collection for sale. The prices are quite low compared to retail and they tend to have discount during every statutory holidays. You'll find DVDs from Aa! Megami-sama to Zenki! The only drawback is you have to be a member and have to buy a lot from them to get the best prices.

Located in Admiralty Center at 8700 McKim Way, Richmond


Sorry for the bad angle of the picture. I tried to be as incognito as possible. This place has a lot of Gundams. Some are pretty good priced, but a lot of them are quite high. They don't charge tax, if I read it correctly though. There are a lot of shokugan (trading figures) and completed sales for sale as well. Of course there are the modeling kit tools as well. One of the employees here can actually fix figures as well. I got one of my figures fixed here when Lacus' ponytail ripped off.

Located at 852 Granville Street, Vancouver


Another mixed store of manga & American comic books. However the manga collection is almost as big as the comics! About 1/3 of the store is manga/anime related. The person who's in charge of the manga insisted on the needed shelves. She also knows a lot of series and knows how many volumes are in a manga. There are also a few anime figures, but the prices are bit high, but you can order figures from this store as well. I found a hard-to-find Hatsune Miku Figma from here. They don't regularly order figures though, so you'll have to take what you can get. The focus of the store may still be American comics, but very up to date with the manga section.

Located at 519 Southwest Marine Drive, Vancouver


Lastly is this second hand book store, but unlike Book-Off, there are a lot more older books here. They sell all sorts of old Japanese VHS, DVDs, books, games, etc. It was really hard for me to take an impression of this store. For one thing there are a lot of authentic Japanese products here, but some of them are decades old... If you like your old school stuff then this is your place to be.

That concludes this post and maybe this series, unless I find other anime-related stores that I haven't seen yet.

Before I go, you may notice the "shopping" pictures of Mahoro at the top and Nodame above... I planned out the last 5 posts to spell out the first (or last) name of one of my favourite voice actresses, Ayako Kawasumi. She is the reason for a lot of my anime/anime-related purchases ^^;

Check what's highlighted in red ^^

Anyhow... that's it for me! I've been up for almost 36 hours now from Boxing Day shopping. Started up early so I thought it's easier to not just sleep... but I'll leave that story for another post... tomorrow.

37 comments:

  1. Ever consider becoming a bootlegger? =P.

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  2. There's an option for 25 cents for three minutes >.>? I take it Vancouver's a pretty 'getchershit and getout' place?

    Can you do like one toronto(richmond hill) based store? That's a city near vancouver :DDDD! Though you'll probably knock yourself out before you find one...

    AYAKOKIEMOOO...
    You just made me spend like two minutes looking at the first letters of everyone's last twenty posts or so :/

    Who do you think would notice you moved penguin village if you hadn't given the heads-up :p? and I wouldn't advise becoming a bootlegger unless you enjoy thrills and have special ops-like reaction time - you need to be able to become one with the wind the moment you hear those sirens.

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  3. Sweet! I actually know the guy that owns Half-Moon. Dunno if he still owns it though. ^^

    And yeah, Book-Off is awesome, as well as C&L if you're looking for hard to find stuff and really niche stuff, they can get it for you.

    I think you mentioned Penguin Village the last time.

    I HATE parking downtown. It's so expensive. I usually end up parking at Pacific Center Mall for $4 all-day if I'm there during the weekend, and then just walk everywhere.
    Considering how far I've walked in Singapore, downtown is "a walk in the park" lol.

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  4. I saw a white shadow at Half-Moon's window... :)

    Parking in downtown will be longer in the new year, until 10pm you'll still have to pay.

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  5. Thank you so much for Part 2. I'm really looking forward to going there now :D

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  6. @Ningyo: It's not a cheap city to park in, that's for sure. I pretty much paid for 10 cents for 2.5 minutes to get one picture of the store up there. LoL you'd think a place that's called Richmond HIll would be close to Richmond, BC, eh? :P

    Yup I actually did that too when I posted mine and see if anyone's spelled out anything, lol! Oh and look below your comment about Penguin Village. Someone noticed XD Yeah, and I have no intention of being a bootlegger. They tend to just come in without warning ^^;

    @radiantdreamer: Oooh cool You know a lot of people in the business, don'tcha? :D I know 1-2 managers at the Sakura Media because I come there SO often, lol. I did mention Penguin Village last time, but I also mentioned that I did move it from the previous one to this one ^^; I suppose I should do that when I wanna walk around downtown... but I'm VERY lazy to walk around downtown XD Good to know how much it costs to park there though.

    @mh: GASP! You found out that I didn't park properly in front of the store! It was closed anyway :P Book-Off closes at 8 anyway... so I don't have the need to park past 10... at least I don't think so ^^;

    @Mr.CupNoodle: You're welcome! Enjoy your stay and shopping in Vancouver ^_^

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  7. Dude, I live in boring-ass animeless Michigan. So fucking boring here it's not even funny....-_-'' I wish I could just do my anime thing like I want :(

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  8. it isn't that expensive to park in downtown vancouver. plenty of other cities (for example, toronto) is much more expensive.

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  9. @FaS: Ah sorry to hear about that... Perhaps start your own store? ^^

    @Anonymous: Well for us, whose parking fee is about to get increased again, it is expensive. So we can't help but whine about it for the moment ^^;

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  10. Hello.
    I 'm surprised that Vancouver has a Book-off store. What kind of books or software do you bought?
    I like Mahoro so much.
    I went to Golden Age when I live in Vancouver and bought works of Rumiko Takahashi (English edition).

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  11. @kirara3500: Hey. I was just as surprised as you were when I found out about it. I bought a book on Kamen Rider 555 and a wrestling game. Mahoro was one of my favourites too, a weird ending though. Ah so you must've lived around downtown Vancouver then? Golden Age is one place I usually buy my manga too.

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  12. I know your blog at your comment of Koi Aichaku. I went to Book-off stores at Sendai, I bought anime CDs, books about train (rail) and business.

    I am happy to seen new Mahoromatic story on Autumn 2009, it was so interesting. It will sale DVD or BD in Japan.
    (www.mahoro-matic.com)

    I used to live in Vancouver in 5 months of 1999, my home located near of Commercial–Broadway Station. Also I bought comic books at Virgin Megastore.
    I read mangas on several languages at library.

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  13. Wow I'm glad I found this!
    I've walked by Book-Off before but didn't bother walking inside.

    I think I'll check out Half-Moon this morning first since I'm going to my Agency that is around that location. :)

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  14. @kirara3500: Ah a more sensible kind of purchases than mine. My Japanese isn't that good, so I can't really read a lot of the kanji books... Otherwise I would love to read many of the light novels available.

    Hmm... I forgot to watch those new Mahoromatic stories... Thanks for reminding me! That was quite a short time for only 5 months in Vancouver. It's only recently that I found out my local library actually has manga. It has been that long since I've been to the library ^^;

    @CG: Oh yeah, take a look in Book-Off. I'm surprised at its size! Good luck in finding what you're looking for ;)

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  15. Ugh, been to a lot of the places you scouted out in your two posts, but to be honest they are all pretty damn extortion-level priced stores, well with the exception of book-off or iwasae which are just epic :'D Honestly, if you buy a lot of figures, you could buy a ton, and ship them back over directly from Japan in a mass order through a deputy service. I mean, the markups on them over the original Japanese prices averages probably 100%. Really depressing eh?

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  16. @Taku: Oh yeah, the markups are hideous. I only buy figures when they're discounted, otherwise it's much cheaper to buy them online. But really adding shipping prices to the figures in the store, they might add up to about the same. So gotta shop around a little and see if they're worth the same or not.

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  17. :O Cool Anime shops, D: Been looking for this certain Anime but most dont have them D:< If anyone knows about the Anime- Katekyo Hitman Reborn, Reborn!, kateikyoushi hitman reborn (All 3 same) *Please Email me :D <333 Thanks (Vancouver please >.<)lilliumput@hotmail.com

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  18. You have NO IDEA how much this guide helped me!

    In Vancouver for a conference, and have absolutely no idea where to go. Now I have way too many places to visit.

    - Otaku from Australia

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  19. @randompeoplegaming: Ah that's good to hear that it was some help ^^ Too bad some of them seem to be closed now and I haven't had much time to update them ^^;;; Enjoy your visit :D

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  20. I am amazed by the number bookstores are based in Vancouver. We just recently got sponsored by HalfMoon Bookstore :P

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    1. Ah oops, I forgot to update this post ^^; Some of these stores closed but yea, there are still a few around :D I really hope to find more someday ^_^ Congratulations on the sponsorship :D

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  21. Do you know which ones sell akatsuki rings?

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    1. I don't know for sure since I don't look for them, but you can try Soul of Anime in Richmond Centre or Gacha Hobbies in Aberdeen Centre. Both of these are in Richmond.

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  22. Do you know where can I find any Vocaloid merchandises in Vancouver/B.C? I want to buy some so bad! I want anything about Vocaloid.

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    1. So far the most Vocaloid merchandise I've seen are Gacha Hobbies at Aberdeen Centre and Soul of Anime at Richmond Centre. I haven't visited the other ones for a while to gauge their items.

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    2. Oh, thank-you! Is there any more other places? And do you know what's the average prices for their/Vocaloid merchandises?

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    3. You can try one more place called J-Hobby. Other than these three I mentioned, I have no other idea unfortunately ^^; I haven't gotten around to looking at other places in lower mainland lately...

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  23. Went to Soul of Anime and bought the full set of fate/stay night petit nendoroid. When I opened them at home, I saw that they were all fake. Bought them in final sale so I can't even refund them, and they were supposed to be a gift but I can't give some shitty and bad painting figures, oh my I'm so mas at the store ._.

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    1. Oh no :< Sorry to hear that. I wonder what happened to them because they used to be better than that. That's really too bad >_< Hope you can find another gift. I'll put up a warning about bootlegs in their section.

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  24. Would you be able to help me and my friends?
    ( ̄O ̄)A

    We're looking for the best locations for Nendoroids (Haruhi figures specifically). We have been to Gacha Hobbies, which offered some Nendoroids as you said, but we will have to look elsewhere for what we want.

    I would like to thank you for revealing just how many stores we have around us locally~! We would have never visited some of these without your expertise~
    Thank you for your help~ (シ_ _)シ

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  25. is character box closed already?

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    1. Sorry, I haven't been there for a long time, so I cannot confirm whether it's still open or not.

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    2. can you find out? i live in white rock and i love gundam. if you could help me find some stores who sells them.. i went to sakura and jhobby already and there ok jhobby now is mainly pre order on basis sakura files they have a collection but to steep for some of the models kits..so can you please help me out. thanks ghee

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    3. Hello. Sorry for the late reply. I had to find the time to actually go there. Unfortunately it has closed already. There is a store for Gundam kits that I recently found (again). They used to be in Metrotown but now they are in Lougheed Mall. Check it out if you're in that area.

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  26. is it ages3 and up? they have a small gundam sale but way to expensive and also pre order basis... they are mainly transformers store and hot toys and enterbay dolls or toys.. anyway thank you...

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    1. Yeah, that's them. That's too bad that they're lacking with the GunPla.

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