Random Thoughts VIII – Why is it so hard to buy h-manga?


So I wanted to buy this porno manga. The first place I checked was Amazon JP but unfortunately they’ve labeled this item as adult and thus will not ship it overseas. Undaunted, I next hit up J-List, knowing that they have a selection of h-manga. Unfortunately, this isn’t one of them. I looked up Sasuga Books but they didn’t have it either. Then I found out about Rakuten, saw that they had it, and was delighted to find out that they ship internationally. Delight turned to dismay as I found out that this isn’t one of the items that they’ll ship internationally, but they did provide a link to Tenso along with a recommendation to use them for items that can’t be shipped outside of Japan.

I went to the Tenso website and signed up and then looked up their policies (sort of the reverse way of doing things, but that’s how I roll) and found that one of their prohibited item categories is anything deemed “obscene.” So what do they define as obscene? Do they have a set list of guidelines, or do they just know it when they see it? I didn’t bother asking, since I’m pretty sure that this book has tentacle rape, gang rape, bondage rape, and probably bestial rape (knowing Subaru’s penchant for pigs), and I suppose most people would define any of those as obscene. Can’t quite figure out why anyone would think that, myself. Finally I wound up just asking a proxy service to buy the book for me, but I’m really disappointed at how difficult it is to buy such things. All I want to do is buy some porn; is that really so unreasonable?

I did notice some nifty things on Amazon JP while looking through their selection of ero stuff and having never bought from them, decided to give it a shot. The first thing I will say about them is that their shipping fees are freaking expensive. They’re also a bit inconsistent with what they label adult, as several of the books I bought are clearly ero in nature. Maybe it’s because those books seem to actually be novels; being Japanese-illiterate, this is somewhat problematic, but it just gives me some additional motivation to learn Japanese someday. I’m not sure what these books are about, exactly, but I figure that officially-produced tentacle rape fiction has to be pretty cool, right?


The main thing I wanted from Amazon JP was the Moe Moe Shin Weapon Collection, mainly because I like the cover illustration. This book purports to be a reference for historic, famous weapons but it curiously eschews realism in favor of depicting the associated warriors as cute, often half-naked girls. Wish it had more pictures, but I guess it’s supposed to be an encyclopedia so it’s pretty dense with text. The book breaks up the selection by region, and here’s an image of a couple of warriors whom I think are supposed to be German:


The chapter intro says this comes from a German folk tale, although I’m not sure which one that could be. I guess German girl fighters wear fur-lined cloaks. And run around half naked. On a glacier. Are there glaciers in Germany? I’ve never been to Germany (or Europe, actually) but I don’t think there are glaciers in Germany.


The book says that this battler comes from Norse mythology, although I’m not sure exactly which exotic part of the world she comes from.

I really need to get a new scanner so I can scan these. Pro tip: you know how scanners have a switch to lock the scanning unit when packing it up? It’s actually a good idea to use that switch while moving.

The end of the month is usually when a bunch of figures ship, but curiously the end of February was pretty quiet as far as figure releases go. Since I’ve got no figure reviews ready and I’m too lazy to properly photograph Miku or gangsta lean Saber yet, here’s some throwaway pictures that I took when I was trying out some new things:


Saber Lily figure


Metatron figure


Miku Hatsune figure


Dizzy figure


Saber Lily figure

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20 Responses to Random Thoughts VIII – Why is it so hard to buy h-manga?

  1. Wolfheinrich says:

    I have a whole selection of ero manga…. in my secret cabinet XDDD. Have you watched the latest Beat Blade Haruka OVA yet? I found it terribly disappointing.

  2. Steve Chen says:

    The Beat Angle Haruka book, it is censored no?

  3. Aka says:

    Tier you maybe interested in this link, while it’s talking about a certain case it does go into obscenity laws in the US, which have a vary vague definition. This is likely why many things wont ship to the US or internationally. It’s impossible for them to know what will be considered obscene as the definition is vague and variable depending on who’s polled. It’s far easier for them to just not ship than to try and figure it out.

    Additionally, much of the content in Japanese hardcore h-manga is illegal in many countries regardless of it’s creation as a drawing.

    I think it’s those reasons that make it nearly impossible to buy it.

    Tenso I believe just uses obscenity as a cover for themselves, because so far as I know, they never open your packages anyway. Then just reship them with an international shipping label on the package. That was my understanding of it anyway.

  4. Tier says:

    >> Wolfheinrich
    You should someday reveal all your secret stuff. It’ll be a great day, like the day the Air Force revealed the F-117. Well, it was a great day to me, I was sort of an airplane buff when I was a kid.

    Yeah, I saw it, and I’d agree, it really wasn’t nearly as good as I hoped that it would be. I did like the extended Haruka/Narika scene in the second episode a lot, though; the voice acting was really hot. But the high contrast look and the low animation and drawing quality really sucked, and Escalayer was way, way better than this show. (Also, where was Subaru? I mean, she got one little scene in the first show and then they replayed that clip in the second episode and just showed her eyes at the end; are they going to make a third episode? As disappointing as the OVAs are, I’d still really like a third episode so we can finally see Subaru … hopefully with some pigs, cuz she digs that sort of thing.)

    >> Steve Chen
    Yeah, virtually all stuff is censored, although the one BBH book that I bought has very basic censoring (pointless censoring it would be tagged, if it were on Danbooru).

    >> Aka
    A most interesting article, thanks for the link. After doing a bit more research, it seems that some sort of sexuality needs to present in order to be classified as obscene, which is good for me since I’ve got an item preordered that I was really hesitant to put a review up for, but I think it’ll be okay. It’s a good thing I’m not into loli stuff, since it seems like a good deal of porn will slide in the US, but child pornography and pedophilia are two things that will bring the smack down. (We will conveniently disregard the fact that my next figure review is going to feature a character who does not look very old <.<) That's good to know about Tenso, maybe I'll give them a try sometime. In the meantime, my Subaru book (and a couple other books) are on the way to the United States ^____^ <---- I don't often use this sort of smiley but Subaru makes me disregard my personal inhibitions on internet conduct. (Not enough to ever make me use "lol" or "rofl," though.)

  5. Ashlotte says:

    Aye because I mostly read Loli manga theres no way in hell I’d ever try buying the real physical copy…Love to support the artists, but I’d rather avoid being arrested by overzealous idiots that can’t tell the difference between reality and fiction…

    Ah anyway that Miku shot is lovely! You should do a full review! *nudge nudge* How far away are those lights in the background btw? Was curious when I saw them in the Mio ones and forgot to ask…

    Also yes the Beats blade OVAs have been distinctly meh so far…Game was 100x hotter…

  6. Marcucho says:

    Hi!!!,, well i´ve never bought hentai mangas, but i really want to buy one.. i´ve seen many Hmangas that are really wonderful (harimax)so good material porn jajajajjaja but in fact i don´t know where buy one of those.I started my hentai collection with my ero-singular-especial-figures jak and H-mangas will the next yea!!

    So bad you couldn´t got that manga about rapes with tentacles (i don´t like it very much, i prefer something more common). I think may buy some Comic Aun´s mangas(i hope to can find the manga where lala poplip pipiruno was introduced) i love this figure and i want see her in action!!!! …you know what action .. uf!! jak

    Well, saludos tier!!

  7. Tier says:

    >> Ashlotte
    Yeah, I think I’m going to try to stay clear of the thought police. Fortunately Subaru is all woman.

    I should! That is a good idea. Maybe I’ll have time soon, I was playing Beat Blades Haruka this week but then my character got forced into proposing marriage to Haruka. I spent all this time macking on Subaru and I even basically threw Haruka to the monster bosses (literally) at every opportunity, but still Haruka was my only marriage choice. I find that annoying. I guess it’ll make me feel better about having Subaru submit to Lao, though. (If they do make a third episode, the series can redeem itself by putting in that scene XD )

    Lights were about, hmm, maybe two feet behind the figure; they weren’t that far back since I don’t have a lot of space.

    >> Marcucho
    You should go for it! If you can figure out a good place to buy them, anyway … I’m still looking for a store with a good selection but that isn’t insanely expensive <.< Hmm, yeah, I'm not sure which issue of Comic Aun had Lala on the cover. I do know that I really like what Orchid Seed showed off at Wonder Festival last month, though.

  8. Steve Chen says:

    Btw did you try and contact Yasu Nieda of jlist? He’s helped me a lot on special type order hentai. For example I’ve taken a liking to Souryu’s works http://www.jlist.com/PRODUCT/HMG695 , http://www.jlist.com/PRODUCT/EMN491 and http://www.jlist.com/PRODUCT/EMN823 (this for example which they ordered for me)

  9. Tier says:

    I did not, I didn’t even know that they’d special order stuff. That probably would’ve been a better option if they do that.

    Funny that you mention Souryu, I was looking through Tokyo Archive a few weeks back and came across some of his books there. I bookmarked the page even though their prices are pretty steep, but now I see that J-List’s prices are quite a bit cheaper. Thanks for the heads up, that saves me some money 😀

  10. Marcucho says:

    You re right!! ,orochiseed is good making H- material jakjakjak

    keep collecting H-stuff jejeje

  11. Steve Chen says:

    Just look for the option in the site Contact us and click this

    https://help.jlist.com/index.php?_m=tickets&_a=submit&step=1&departmentid=5

    Btw, Yasu Nieda hasn’t failed me yet will all my special requests….got ALL of Souryu’s works.

    His artworks are detailed, nasty and……….well you got my drift.

    His rendition of women is like well a cross between Leina from QB (plump yet sexy) + a bit of Akira Toriyama. That’s why I couldn’t resist ordering them, all those tentacles……..

  12. Persocom says:

    I’m afraid to buy much more than ecchi books to be honest with all the loose laws regarding pornographic materials these days. The worst things I’ve ordered came from J-List and that was nothing more than some eroge, which I actually got in download form so I wouldn’t have to deal with possible conflict with the post office. Perhaps I’m a bit more paranoid than need be, but it’s not cool when you hear about people getting jail time over something stupid like porn. I know the only real cases involved loli but who’s to say random Customs guy won’t think a moe character is loli, and well you get the point.

  13. Blowfish says:

    Hmmm German Folk Tale?
    I guess this has to be the Nibelungen Saga then.
    You probably heard of Siegfried the Dragon Slayer and stuff before no?
    Well heres a link:
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nibelung

    Talking about Customs Problems…
    My long delayed and thought lost package with some QB goodness turned out to be withheld by customs for ond and a half month for thorough investigation for forbidden content.

    In the end they seem to approve of QueensBlade but holy hell they even checked the Drama Cd that came with one of the books

  14. Tier says:

    >> Marcucho
    That’s the plan!

    >> Steve Chen
    Hmm, that sounds very promising then, thanks again for the link. I don’t really dig Amazon JP’s per-item shipping cost; shipping lots of inexpensive things like books doesn’t seem worth it.

    Souryu’s books sound like something that I will like a lot XD I’ll definitely have to check those out. I guess I ought to preorder Lightning Warrior Raidy II, too, I think they’re supposed to be releasing that soon.

    >> Persocom
    Yeah, that sort of thing kinda freaks me out too. It seems perfectly normal to me, but I guess all it takes is one inspector with an excessively puritanical streak to get you in a ton of trouble.

    >> Blowfish
    Hmm, nope, never heard of that. I know almost nothing of ancient Norse or Germanic mythology (or Greek or Roman mythology, too). The geneology section of the Wikipedia article is, uhh, kinda convoluted XD

    Man, that’s lame. My Amazon JP didn’t seem to be touched; everything was still sealed in the plastic shrink wrap Amazon uses to hold books secure against a piece of cardboard so that they don’t have to pad the box interior.

  15. Steve Chen says:

    @ Blowfish……that SUCKS! Where the hell are you from anyway? Are the customs authorities that puritanical that they’ll even open a sealed Drama CD? Heck, they’re that strict and still allow the “underwear” bomber to get in (if you live in the USA that is)

    @ Tier enjoy them bro, be prepared to wait and also follow up from time to time with Mr. Yasu Nieda.

    Btw I also got this from them http://otakai.ipbfree.com/index.php?showtopic=4882

  16. Katsura-chan says:

    Mmm lol i don’t know why it’s so difficult. It never comes to my mind to buy such mangas :p
    But i guess if sometimes they don’t want to ship internationally that’s because they had troubles with previous orders or that’s because specific country rules all around the globe are too different and cause too much paperwork ^^

  17. Tier says:

    >> Steve Chen
    Irma’s closer to Aldra on the cover of that book than she ever got in the TV show XD

    Rin-sin drew the first example of hentai art I ever saw … I think it was fifteen years ago that I had this big catalog from a movie store, I flipped to the anime section and there was a grainy black-and-white picture of the cover to the La Blue Girl video tape. That was the day I became a hentai fan.

    >> Katsura-chan
    Yeah, that’s probably the case. Still makes me sad that I have to go through so much trouble (and expense!) just to get some porno books >.<

  18. Steve Chen says:

    @ Tier……….don’t call them porno books, how about erotica. Porno makes it sound dirty hehehe

  19. Blowfish says:

    @Tier
    Well,I dont think you missed anything important.Its just another one of the epics sagas where dragons are slayed,brothers betrayed and all those kinda stuff.

    Its lame indeed but hey atleast they handled it with care.I wonder what they thought about the Siggy Visual combat Book tough.

    @Steve Chen
    I am from Germany and this is just an educated guess but I believe that they were checking for porn.For some stupid reason you arent allowed to import porn in Germany as a private person.If you are a business and want to resell it its a different story though…

    Another thing possible is that they were looking for loli stuff. Well never know….

  20. Tier says:

    >> Steve Chen
    Okay, erotica it is … I don’t mind porn at all, though.

    >> Blowfish
    Sounds like a good fantasy series! That reminds me that I need to find some new books to read one of these days … I’ve been re-reading all my old stuff for like the last year.

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