I bought these. Are they real??

[USSJ Roshi]

Hello. Editted.

[linkdude20002001]

I think those are all bootlegs EXCEPT for the black one with the Toei logo. I think that's an official Chinese release. It says it's by T.A.E. (Toei Animation Enterprises). I think they're the ones (along with Animation International) who made that horrible English dub that was sold in Malaysia by Speedy. Sad that that English dub isn't on here... Those VCDs are rare and expensive nowadays.

[USSJ Roshi]

These are DVDs. I had the VCDs.

[Dbzfan94]

Seem like bootlegs to me.

[superrayman3]

The blue boxsets are bootleg for sure (I have the first volume and it's severely gimped), the black box on the other hand seems to be an official R3 release, could you post some screen caps from the black boxset as I've been curious to see how the quality of the R3 DVDs compare to the other DBZ releases (primarily the DBOX release, if I'm right these DVD's might be better than the DBOX's in terms of visual quality of the footage, at least that's what happened with Saint Seiya so I'm hopeful that DB-GT got the same kind of treatment).

[USSJ Roshi]

The blue boxsets are bootleg for sure (I have the first volume and it's severely gimped), the black box on the other hand seems to be an official R3 release, could you post some screen caps from the black boxset as I've been curious to see how the quality of the R3 DVDs compare to the other DBZ releases (primarily the DBOX release, if I'm right these DVD's might be better than the DBOX's in terms of visual quality of the footage, at least that's what happened with Saint Seiya so I'm hopeful that DB-GT got the same kind of treatment).

The first 2 are from this black box and the last 2 are from the Funimation orange box.

https://ibb.co/b7Z1Py
https://ibb.co/kNGRrd
https://ibb.co/iiP1Py
https://ibb.co/emkmrd

This black box does not have English subtitles. So it may be an Asia only release.

[superrayman3]

The blue boxsets are bootleg for sure (I have the first volume and it's severely gimped), the black box on the other hand seems to be an official R3 release, could you post some screen caps from the black boxset as I've been curious to see how the quality of the R3 DVDs compare to the other DBZ releases (primarily the DBOX release, if I'm right these DVD's might be better than the DBOX's in terms of visual quality of the footage, at least that's what happened with Saint Seiya so I'm hopeful that DB-GT got the same kind of treatment).

The first 2 are from this black box and the last 2 are from the Funimation orange box.

https://ibb.co/b7Z1Py
https://ibb.co/kNGRrd
https://ibb.co/iiP1Py
https://ibb.co/emkmrd

This black box does not have English subtitles. So it may be an Asia only release.

Okay based on those shots here's what I noticed, the black R3 DVD Box retains the original 4:3 AR of the series so it's already got one positive working in its favor, and the black box footage might be a little sharper compared to the DBOX just like with what happened with Saint Seiya (I'm pretty sure this release uses some form of DBOX footage) but those photos of the screen make it hard to tell for sure (I usually use VLC's take snapshot option to get my screen caps which is a much easier option in the long run for this very reason).

[TheGreatness25]

Why wouldn't it have a 4:3 aspect ratio, though? I was under the impression that the Funimation releases were the only ones to be butchered in 16:9.

[USSJ Roshi]

The blue boxsets are bootleg for sure (I have the first volume and it's severely gimped), the black box on the other hand seems to be an official R3 release, could you post some screen caps from the black boxset as I've been curious to see how the quality of the R3 DVDs compare to the other DBZ releases (primarily the DBOX release, if I'm right these DVD's might be better than the DBOX's in terms of visual quality of the footage, at least that's what happened with Saint Seiya so I'm hopeful that DB-GT got the same kind of treatment).

The first 2 are from this black box and the last 2 are from the Funimation orange box.

https://ibb.co/b7Z1Py
https://ibb.co/kNGRrd
https://ibb.co/iiP1Py
https://ibb.co/emkmrd

This black box does not have English subtitles. So it may be an Asia only release.

Okay based on those shots here's what I noticed, the black R3 DVD Box retains the original 4:3 AR of the series so it's already got one positive working in its favor, and the black box footage might be a little sharper compared to the DBOX just like with what happened with Saint Seiya (I'm pretty sure this release uses some form of DBOX footage) but those photos of the screen make it hard to tell for sure (I usually use VLC's take snapshot option to get my screen caps which is a much easier option in the long run for this very reason).

Here are some screenshots
https://ibb.co/fgdQZy
https://ibb.co/kBtESJ
https://ibb.co/nAisEy
https://ibb.co/k0AiMd
https://ibb.co/ejc8nJ
https://ibb.co/dqOg7J
https://ibb.co/djCKuy
https://ibb.co/i1L5Zy
https://ibb.co/cbJESJ
https://ibb.co/h9sxgd
https://ibb.co/k76OMd
https://ibb.co/eivTnJ
https://ibb.co/mg83Md
https://ibb.co/iFJ3Md
https://ibb.co/bCgOMd
https://ibb.co/e4XkZy
https://ibb.co/ngPonJ
https://ibb.co/dyFuSJ
https://ibb.co/nsCxgd
https://ibb.co/bytg7J
https://ibb.co/f8DaZy
https://ibb.co/k9tL1d
https://ibb.co/dNFB7J
https://ibb.co/n3Apuy
https://ibb.co/f3dL1d

These are the menus. They move around a bit. It's pretty cool.
https://ibb.co/gGaEBd
https://ibb.co/nF9KcJ
https://ibb.co/cQxGPy
https://ibb.co/bZ2i4y

[TheGreatness25]

Aw man, they don't even list the episode name in the selection screen?

I would say they all look not real (I don't want to use a harsher word lol) except maybe the Cantonese one with the black box. That one certainly looks more legitimate than the majority of fakes out there. My thing is always this: Why would a foreign product use English? I understand using English alongside the native language, but why would the copyright warning be exclusively in English? What if the person living in China who picks this up, doesn't speak English? To them, there would be one side of the box in complete gibberish.

I also don't know why they'd be in MPEG 2 and not VOB. Now, I'm not a technical expert by any means, so I might just not have the knowledge, but what I do know is every time I open up a DVD -- whether it be a Funimation one or even bootlegs -- the files are VOB and need to be converted to another format to be playable on a PlayStation, for example.

But then I look at the various production numbers on them and bar codes, and think to myself, "Why would a bootleg release need those things?" but then I realize that some of them actually do have those.

So for me, I'm always going to lean toward, "they're not real," but I don't have knowledge of the various international (to me at least) releases, so I wouldn't know. I'll tell you that it looks pretty good.

Again, I'm talking about the black one with Goku and Kaio on the cover -- the rest are definitely not real in my opinion. The blue ones for sure are not real, as it's been stated various times before. I'm always wary of releases that use Funimation's single covers but are obviously not Funimation. I understand that Toei gave Funimation a lot of the art to use on their covers for the orange bricks and whatnot, but the particular covers that I'm talking about are just screenshots from the anime put on a cover. The GT ones pretty much look like Funimation's, but obviously are not either. So, I'm pretty sure they're all not real, except maybe the black one with Goku and Kaio just because a lot more care was put into that one. But everything that makes it look official -- from bar codes to production numbers to the Toei logo -- has appeared on other not real releases, so I'm not sure.