Sword Art Online Review

Overall rating: 6.5 / 10

Sword Art Online anime, based on Reki Kawahara's light novel series of the same name, is one of the most hyped shows of the year 2012. Ranked third in the Blu-Ray sales in Japan (right after Nisemonogatari and the second season of Fate/Zero), and climbing to top50 in the MyAnimeList popularity rating - when SAO anime was airing, it was difficult to read /a/ without accidentally getting spoilers, because the Sword Art Online Threads were everywhere (most of those were full of haters). The main character Kazuto Kirigaya won the ISML 2012 exhibition tournament (I'm glad that at least Japan and Russia voted for Lelouch, lol). My expectations of SAO were particularly high, because of the another anime adaptation of Reki Kawahara's series - Accel World, which aired before SAO. AW anime impressed me very much and most people who read both series were saying that SAO is the better one (as of today, after reading the first four volumes of both series, I partially agree with that statement). Unfortunately, the SAO anime turned out to be much weaker. I surely liked it, but its flaws were obvious even without reading the original and overall impressions were not near as good as those of Accel World. I just didn't know at first who was at fault: Kawahara-san or A-1 Pictures. It turned out to be A-1 Pictures.

The floating castle Aincrad - the stage for the "Sword Art Online" Virtual Reality MMO RPG

Basically, they tried to squeeze too much material into 26 episodes. SAO anime covers the first four volumes of the light novel series, also it includes one side story from the 8th volume and the first chapter from the Sword Art Online Progressive as far as I know. While Accel World anime also covers the first four volumes of the novels and includes two side stories, it should be noted that the first volume of the Sword Art Online series are much longer and contains much more material than the Accel World's first volume. But what's more important, the two series differs entirely in both style and content. The pace which perfectly suits AW is too fast for SAO. Messed up composition aggravated it: the second volume of SAO, which solely consists of non-chronological side stories, was cut and inserted in the story in chronological order. As a result, the mood fluctuates widely and that ruins the impressions of the darker parts of the story. Of course, you can just assume that A-1 Pictures simply lacks the skills and competence being compared to Sunrise, and that SAO could have been much better even with all the content left intact.

The title "Sword Art Online" comes from the name of a virtual reality massive multiplayer online RPG, where the story takes place. The first volume of Sword Art Online ranobe series was written by Reki Kawahara in the year 2002. As far as I know, it was his first major work. To understand the very essence of SAO, let's look at Reki Kawahara's words, taken from the Author's Notes for "Fairy Dance", the 4th volume of the Sword Art Online series (thank Baka-Tsuki for the translation).

When I wrote the first volume of SAO, I found out that a RPG novel can't work without some kind of setting. Because, no matter how much of a life or death pinch the hero has in the game, the hero in the real world is not hurt the least.

An example of YGGR situation: 3 enemies, HP in the red zone, no tp - Hey, you're playing HC, not SC!

And so, Kawahara-san came up with a setting where death in game means death in real life. The author himself thought, that the story wouldn't be interesting and/or touching enough without that kind of plot device. Personally, I totally agree with that. The setting of "Death Game" is what makes SAO good. One hundred percent of story's emotional impact and atmosphere comes from that. To be precise, the way in which those setting was implemented is also important. I'm not sure if even Kawahara-san himself wholly understands all the nuances, that make his setting so strong (I explain why in the second part). But he definitely put the emphases in a right way. And unfortunately, that emphases were completely lost in the anime adaptation. When I was watching SAO for the first time, several ideas crossed my mind about what were left off screen. Some thoughts and scenes, which I imagined myself, impressed me far more than what was happening on the screen. When I started reading the novels, I was astonished, because many of those thoughts of mine had actually been listed by Kawahara Reki in his books. A-1 Pictures cut several meaningful scenes and even more character's unspoken thoughts in their anime adaptation, thus losing focus on what's important for the emotional perception. I would argue that even the original doesn't have enough focus on things and emotions that usually accompany someone's death (while death itself happens in the story pretty often). I suppose that Kawahara-san just didn't want to make his story too depressing. But if the original somehow lacks the touch, anime is just plain unrealistic in how "Death Game" is represented.

There is no blood in SAO: when you die, you just shatter into polygons and then get your brain fried

A few words about music. Please note, that at the moment only the first part of the Sword Art Online OST is released. The composer is famous Yuki Kajiura, whose previous work was Fate/Zero. Strangely enough, three of the four SAO OP & ED singers (namely Haruna Luna, Aoi Eir and LiSA) also previously worked on the Fate/Zero's glorious opening and ending songs. This time, however, I liked only Haruna Luna's song ("Overfly"). But the similarities don't end here. The main similarity is the soundtrack itself. Kajiura's last two works are practically indistinguishable in style. Take, for example, the song "Rule the Battlefield" from the Fate/Zero OST and "Survive the Swordland" from the Sword Art Online OST. Even the melodies are the same. Personally, I like both the F/Z's and SAO's soundtracks. However, I must also say that those two soundtracks are among the weakest of Kajiura's works. That's why I am particularly disappointed by their similarity. It's definitely not the style I would like her to continue working in. Still, SAO gave a nice addition to my Yuki Kajiura's music selection.

Continue to the second part (spoilers)

So, about the story's shortcomings (with spoilers). Basically, story's weaknesses are mostly continuations of its strengths. As I noted in the previous part, the setting of "Death Game" is what makes SAO good. What elements of this setting were especially strong (in emotional sense)? First, the existence of the resurrection artifact and its "10 second rule", of course. When I first seen it in the third episode of the anime, it instantly became clear for me, that every player should have at least ten second lag between "death" in the game and the Nerve Gear frying his brain. I didn't like how most players died on the screen. It's way too unrealistic. They never shown any traces of the strongest fear and the deepest despair. They never screamed in agony. They didn't curse, they didn't swear. Some of them even said their last words with peaceful face. It would be OK, if those players were some kind of samurai or members of the French Foreign Legion. But they were just the usual Japanese boys and girls, mostly teenagers. I just remembered how people were acting in the Accel World, written by the same Reki Kawahara, when they were on the verge of losing the Brain Burst program. And losing your one and only life is beyond compare with losing just an extraordinary "acceleration" ability. Of course, most causalities in SAO happened in the heat of battle. Probably, those who died just didn't have time to comprehend what were happening. Or so I thought until the third episode. Then, it suddenly turned out that after speaking those beautiful words or silently shattering into polygons, they had the whole ten seconds to completely comprehend what had happened and what were going to happen. So, there were screams. But not inside the game. Screams were either in hospitals, or in some "after death" location in the virtual reality. They just weren't shown to viewers/readers. But the difference between the anime and the novel is that in the novel Kirito did understand what "10 second rule" means. He did imagined the consequences. And that's what made the last chapter of the second volume much stronger than the third episode of the anime.

One of the most depressive scenes in SAO if you understand the hidden meaning behind those words

The second thing which I like about the setting, is the killing method and circumstances. For me there is a huge difference between the setting of SAO and the setting of The Matrix, for example. In both shows people who died in Virtual Reality dies in the real world. There is one crucial difference. In The Matrix, connection between death in Matrix and death in the real world was some kind of technical phenomenon. In some sense it could be called "natural". In SAO, strictly speaking, there was no such connection at all. Instead, there was an act of conditional murder. Or rather an execution. And very intimate one. A person lying helplessly on the hospital bed with the Nerve Gear on his head, which prevents him from feeling and controlling his own body, and then it suddenly sends the killing charge into his brain. This scene could be happening in front of the hospital's personnel, or even the person's family, who came to visit him in the hospital. Nobody can do a thing about it. What should have been done with those setting? At least one actual death should have been shown. The Aincrad story arc was concluded in the first volume of the light novels. Probably, it was Kawahara's intention to left it dubious till the end if the players, who died in game, did actually die in the real world. But that was confirmed by Kayaba Akihiko at the end of the first volume. There should have been at least a scene in the end of the second volume of how Sachi actually died IRL. Things like news articles about SAO victims or some kind of memorial for those who've died in SAO also should have been mentioned to show the incident's impact on the society. The story's emotional impact would have skyrocketed.

Sad fanart image which should been included as an illustration for "Red-nosed Reindeer" story from the second volume

Finally, you should note, that the whole killing system was artificial and were intentionally implemented in accordance with the ideology of Kayaba Akihiko. And so we come to the third thing. Those whole killing system was by no means necessary even for the sick Kayaba Akihiko's plans. Instead of killing the players IRL he could just transfer their consciousness to some other virtual reality with no access from Aincrad. People in the game had no means to confirm whether the person who died in game did actually die in the real world. For them it looked the same as if dead person's consciousness were moved to somewhere else. On the other hand, the rule that the person is killed if someone from the outside tries to remove his Nerve Gear could be left intact. Like this Kayaba Akihiko could have achieved exactly the same results, but with very little casualties. He consciously preferred to kill several thousands people including girls and children instead. What he did is one of the most terrible acts of terrorism in history. And that makes him a very interesting character. IRL mass murderers, dictators and top terrorists always invoke tons of sick curiosity. That's how people are. Yet, Kayaba Akihiko's character were left completely unexposed both in the anime and in the novels. That's surely a big failure of Reki Kawahara.

Well, the Aincrad arc ended out of the blue in the 14th episode of the anime. And then goes Alfheim... For starters, let's look at the continuation of Reki Kawahara's words, cited by me in the first part of the review.

Since that is «just a game», you can «reset it to end», to remove these two options, the first volume was a Death Game, that is dying in game means death in a real kind of setting.
But, always inside me, there's the question 'does it really have to be like that'. If a RPG novel can't be made without this kind of setting, then that would mean my feelings of excitement and passion as a MMO player would be fake. Making a party with friends, stepping gingerly into a dungeon for the first time, the joy from that, I want to see if I can make a story out of it. This is a huge theme in these two volumes of "Fairy Dance".

The question Kawahara-san asked himself is "does in really have to be like that". No, it doesn't. Actually, Kawahara-san proved it himself with the Accel World, which is totally fine even without the "Death Game" setting. Unfortunately, the Alfheim arc of SAO is just bad in nearly every aspect. For starters, it is not about people playing a RPG. It's mostly about Kirito searching for Asuna, without giving a fuck to the game itself. The plot device, which created the situation where rescuing Asuna was tied to some in-game activity, is totally dumb. The game itself was poorly covered and just boring. The only good scenes were those, where Kirito pwned random guys with his imba stats and m4d ski11z. At least it was funny. The love story of Suguha/Lyfa and Kirito... well, in my opinion it wasn't that bad. The only problem is that it was completely obvious for the viewer/reader from the very beginning that Sugu stands no chance. There was no intrigue at all. Still, I somehow appreciated watching the development of their relationship. But I didn't like the denouement. In my opinion, Sugu forgave him too quickly. Or rather she surrendered too quickly. It's just that she cope with her emotions unrealistically fast. After seeing Sugu's feelings being the primary content for the two-thirds of the Alfheim arc, I expected way more drama in the conclusion. What's next? The antagonist... oh, I liked him! I've seen tons of hatred towards Oberon in SAO threads. The same story were with the antagonist of the third and the fourth volumes of Accel World. Both Oberon and Dusk Taker were disgusting. And in both stories there were some NTR motive regarding those guys. That's what caused the most butthurt, probably. My logic is simple. If an antagonist is truly disgusting and he invokes strong negative feeling towards him - that's what makes him good as antagonist. Not all the bad guys are charismatic, you know. Still, the ending was crappy. Kirito didn't defeat Oberon with his own strength. He won only because of Heathcliff's interests. The whole grandiose struggle was for nothing. And once again it was obvious from the beginning, that Kirito as a player wouldn't be able to do anything against an administrator, but I still expected some plan or trick from him, not just the plain confirmation of the trivial predictions.

This is how Kirito defeated Heathcliff

Finally, one more big problem of SAO is its lack of realism. There are minor and major flaws in technical aspects. And then, there is a complete bullshit. The minor flaws are numerous, I'm not going to list them all. I would name just two of them. First, there is no way for such technology as Nerve Gear, operating directly with human brain, to be allowed for common use. Not in 2023 at least. It absolutely requires decades of testing before going to the mass market. And surely, such incidents would be predicted and prevented beforehand. Second, it was definitely possible to save people trapped in SAO from the outside with modern technologies. For example, using some kind of strong EMP could have helped. The major flaw is the existence of Yui. From Kawahara's point of view, who lacks any technical background, there is probably not much difference between the Nerve Gear and true artificial intelligence in terms of levels of technologies. But I would say that true AI is much more unrealistic. And how Kirito copied Yui into his Nerve Gear in one minute using unfamiliar interface, that's a bullshit. Even complete lamer like Kawahara should understand that. How Kirito "defeated" Heathcliff, that's an epic bullshit. How Asuna overcame paralysis with her willpower, that's a fucking terrible bullshit, which enraged me the most. If Kirito at least was some kind of a "chosen one", Asuna was just a usual player. Quod licet Jovi, non licet Bovi. The most ridiculous bullshit however is those virtual "laboratory" where the tentacle-guys were researching brains and where "material" ID cards were needed to operate the console. Since all of those bullshit was used as key plot-devices, it ruined my impression of SAO pretty much.

Kawahara Reki

Kawahara Reki

If there is a man in the anime related industry for whom the year 2012 was especially lucky, that would be Reki Kawahara. He is the author of the Sword Art Online and Accel World ranobe series, both of which were animated in 2012. The rule of thumb is while only the most popular ranobe series get animated, sales of the light novels rocket when the anime adaptation is announced. You can also guess that one successful series would naturally draw attention to the other series from the same author. Yet, to think that a single person as a writer could simultaneously occupy both the first and the second place in the list of top-selling light novels in Japan with two different series - that's an extremely scarce situation. That's Reki Kawahara for you.

My policy is to never read anything (implying manga and ranobe) that has a good chance to be animated in the foreseeable future. Basically, I prefer to watch anime adaptation first and then read the original. It's just that anime as an art form currently has a higher priority for me than manga and ranobe. Even though, originals often left better overall impression than anime adaptations. Speaking of Reki Kawahara, I've read the first four volumes of both SAO and AW barely managing to resist temptation to continue, due to a hope for the second seasons of both shows. I think that I grasp the general idea of what that man is doing.

Kawahara Reki is actually a man who sold the same thing twice. Both of his series revolve around single phenomenon scientifically called brain–computer interface (BCI). And also, both of his series are about games. Virtual reality massive multiplayer online games to be precise. The genres would be VRMMO RPG for Sword Art Online and VRMMO fighting game for Accel World. A peek into the distant future of the current computer gaming. There are ongoing debates on imageboards and anime forums on whether SAO and AW set in the alternative worlds or just in the different timelines (events of SAO begins in the year 2023 while AW describes the year 2046). But the technologies involved are clearly the same. I must note that Kawahara-san obviously have neither even the slightest technical background in neurobiology, nor the knowledge of the computer science. He does have experience in the MMO gaming, though. He understands and appeals to gamer's psychology to the degree only insiders could do. If that's the case, one could guess that gamers are Kawahara's natural and most faithful audience. I have an impression that it's actually quite the opposite. Gamers are people who understand better than anyone else how roughly and incompetently Kawahara's virtual worlds are made. The real Kawahara's audience is much wider and way less meticulous, fortunately. And his strength lies in his ability to depict humans, not computer games.

Sword Art Online Volume 1 cover

If there is a single main idea or better said message in both Kawahara's works, from my point of view that would be "there is no such thing as the other side". It's hard to imagine VR-related series not having the contrast between the virtual reality and the real world as one of its primary themes. And then, there can generally be one of the following conclusions or morals: either that real world is always better than any VR simply because it is real, or that good enough virtual reality may be actually better than the real world. What I really appreciate about Reki Kawahara is that he states neither of those. He instead underlines that VR (namely games) is basically a part of the real world and you always stay yourself whether you're acting in VR or IRL. So any experience one can receive while being in VR and any relations one can build there are by no means "virtual". As a former hardcore gamer, I'm absolutely sure that Kawahara-san does actually believe in what he writes. Also he uses completely different plot devices in SAO and AW to expose those ideas. And because of it, the series have completely different touch and atmosphere. Also, I should note that while AW is smooth and solid, SAO actually consists of very distinct story arcs, which have pretty different touch and atmosphere themselves. From what I've seen, most people find the second arc pretty disappointing compared to the first one (which is especially bad because the SAO anime stops at the end of the second arc), but praise more recent volumes. As for me, I'm more disappointed by the fact that the first arc isn't nearly as strong as it could have been; from my point of view it had nearly endless potential in terms of atmosphere and emotional drama, but Kawahara-san decided that the mood of the story shouldn't be too dark.

Accel World Volume 1 cover

Looking at the year 2012 ranobe sales, SAO does nearly three times better than AW both in cumulative sales and sales per volume. When in comes to Blu-ray anime sales, SAO did more than four times better for the first volume and I have a strong feeling that this gap will increase for the volumes yet to come. That's the situation in Japan and as for the international anime community, judging from MyAnimeList popularity rating and average scores, SAO are clearly far above AW. Naturally, you can consider that between the two Kawahara Reki's series Sword Art Online is definitely the primary one. As for me, I can't really say that I like SAO more than AW or that I see Accel World as a "secondary product". And neither do Kawahara-san, judging from the fact that he steadily refuse to drop AW (volume 13 scheduled to be released on February 2013) in favor of SAO, despite immense difficulties of running two popular series at the same time.

As for the recent anime adaptations, I'm going to review both of them in the near future. Right now, I would say that Sunrise did a great job, making the Accel World anime an example of what can be called "perfect adaptation". Staying 95% faithful to the original, omitting only the most insignificant details and reworking a couple of scenes into those with the same meaning but even stronger touch. Unfortunately, I can't say that A-1 Pictures did a good job as well animating SAO. They didn't cut any scenes (for the first story arc at least), but they lose tons of important information, especially regarding character's thoughts, emotions and motivation. They also simplified the composition, inserting side stories from the second volume into main plot in  chronological order. As a result, the SAO anime turned out to be extremely messy and spasmodic, leaving very confusing impression. So, if you have interest in Reki Kawahara's stories, I strongly recommend to go with the anime for Accel World, but as for Sword Art Online reading the books is the only choice.