Until a few years ago, Right Stuf Anime was a neutral territory where fans of anime from around the world could log in and enjoy access to a range of physical media – whether it was the new releases or, as I always found, the older gems that had been bundled together for seasonal sales. Especially in the late 2010s, when Australia was serviced by only three anime publishers (Madman Entertainment, Siren Visual, and Hanabee) and we missed out on many titles North America saw licensed, this was a godsend. This all came to an end on 10 October 2023 when, following an acquisition by CrunchyRoll, they discontinued the online store and instead merged it into the CrunchyRoll Store. Boasting “over 30,000 items, from home video and figures to manga and apparel”, you could tell that some brands had pivoted away, but it was still a source for a wide variety of goods.
This has all recently changed, however, as it was recently noticed that the store has undergone a major overhaul. Gone are the manga and light novels entirely; the number of home video releases now numbers in the hundreds and is primarily Sony titles from CrunchyRoll (Eg., CrunchyRoll, Aniplex of America); and there appears to be a greater focus on collectibles and apparel, with an upcoming ‘Chainsaw Man’ drop due in six days. Furthermore, the ability to purchase items appears to be limited to Mega and Ultimate subscribers to CrunchyRoll, and there is no option to pick up a single Blu-ray you may be interested in watching.
For Australian fans, this also appears to be the long-promised “relaunch” of our local store, which went offline on 30 September 2025 after replacing the Madman Entertainment Online Store as the main destination for anime purchases a couple of years earlier. They said it would come back “better than ever”, and this is what came back.
Ultimately, times change, and this is another shift we are seeing as entertainment media goes all-digital faster, with a focus on storefronts for apparel and pop culture merch. What goes with it is the thing Right Stuf was actually good at: being the place where someone on the other side of the world could turn up an older, stranger, less obviously profitable title and give it a home. It’s hard not to miss the thriving physical market we had years ago.
