Sword Art Online - Episode 5 Discussion / Poll

[Clarste]

Just based on what he's said and done, I think it's most likely that his goal was simply to create a "real world". The death is just there to make sure that people take what happens in the world seriously. He's probably fascinated by what the players end up doing, but it's not like he's encouraging them to kill each other or anything. He probably doesn't even think any of their deaths are his own fault.

[Rakshasa]

Originally Posted by Anh_Minh

An amazing world where the food doesn't taste that good, where the amenities and entertainment we take for granted are absent, where opportunities are limited, and where the daily grind is not only life-threatening, but at the same time mind-numbingly dull. (Do you want to spend two weeks killing the same monster, waiting for a rare drop?)

I won't say anything about Kayaba's state of mind or character, but seriously - I don't want to be trapped in a world as tiny as Aincrad.

Originally Posted by Anh_Minh

It's big for a video game. It's tiny for a world to live in. Ten thousand people at the start, 8 thousand left. It's a small town.

My favorite past time is reading. Out of those 8 thousand, how many are able to write something I'd consider worth reading? And if the answer's more than zero, won't they be too busy performing the repetitive task of killing monsters to write?

How about all my other hobbies? They don't freaking exist in Aincrad.

And what about those who like to build things? Depending on what they want to do, it may not be possible. The physics of that world are pretty restrictive.

Sounds like you guys couldn't even spend 2 weeks on a camping trip by the sound of it, immediately starting to complain about everything you suddenly can't do instead of the opportunities of a changed environment to provide new experiences.

Originally Posted by Shimapan

Suuure, Aincrad is a pony farm! And they all lived happily ever after

You have a seriously twisted view if you really think that anyone actually wanted to really *live* in that world 24/7, constantly fighting for their lives against all sorts of nasty mosters, living in constant fear of PK thugs, which now became much more threatening with the possibility of sleep PK, living in fear now even in the cities, as people can be killed even there now...

Where did I say anything about happy pony farm? There is no way you can get a good grasp of the whole situation by looking at it from such a simplistic perspective, there's quite profound ethical, philosophical and psychological questions to be asked that go way beyond 'me not want to die, Kayaba bad person'.

First, what did the players want, and what did they agree to?

As has been mentioned, the 10.000 gamers went to quite extreme lengths to be the first ones in, camping for three days or so in queues. It's fairly reasonable to assume that a very large majority of those wanted to live in another world. If not fulltime, at the very least a large part of their free time, and we're dealing with a complete immersion game which is on the hardcore side of gaming. At some level one could say that it is no longer gaming, but alternative reality.

So in many ways Kayaba fulfilled that desire, yet where it becomes an ethical issue is that none of them agreed to the rules of the game.

You could argue that it is categorically unethical for Kayaba to make the decision for the players, based on the right of self-determination and sanctity of life. Yet the world is full of examples of a person or groups of people who make decisions on your behalf, so such actions cannot be categorically unethical rather society has in general decided some are beneficial and some aren't.

Would a sentient being who creates an universe like ours, be twisted and evil for introducing fear, suffering and death?

And if, for each life born, it would take one of its fellow entities and make them the souls of the creatures. These formless entities would exist in a vast emptiness passing time in abject boredom, what then?

I have much more to say on other aspects of this, but long poast.

Originally Posted by Shimapan

"Having such a black and white view of people is a sign of immaturity and indoctrination."

Ever heard of a quote by some dude about what the mark of an educated mind was?

Afterwards he started flapping his arms like a bird yelling Derp Derp Derp Derp...

[Shimapan]

Some thoughts on the fairness of the game, triggered by the current episode.

The gaime is fair on the surface, although not because it was meant to be that way, but only out of sheer neccessity.

If Kabaya had included any overtly unfair stuff in the game, it would've been found by the Beta testers, and only very few would've wanted to play an overtly unfair game - thus Kabaya would've never got his 10.000 "lab rats".

In order to attract enough people, the game must be fair on the surface, and any unfair stuff has to be hidden well enough so that the Beta testers wouldn't find it.
There are several unfair features carefully hidden away by Kabaya:

- People being able to manipulate other people's menus. As it's not something that you would ordinarily try to do, it's quite likely no one tried to do it in the Beta. Even if someone should've noticed it, he wouldn't have realised the implications and be content with a "It's a bug and will be fixed in the final version" lie - whereas it was of course a planned feature and not a bug.

- People who are sleeping can have their menus activated and accept duels. As the Beta testers never slept ingame, they never found this out. Again, this is certainly a planned feature and not a bug.

- Duels are by themselves already somewhat unfair, as they undermine the safety of cities and allow people to be killed in cities. Also here, they could've been more safely programmed in that you can't challenge sleeping people to a duel. Once again, that you *can* challenge sleeping people to a duel is probably fully intentional.

- Going from this episode, there's another possibility how players can be killed in cities besides duels. I think it's most likely that it's done by Kabaya having hidden away weapons that can harm and kill players in cities, and/or he added a skill that allows such weapons to be crafted. Grimlock's weapons likely are such weapons.

- Death traps like the one that killed the Black Cat guild Kirito was in. They probably only start appearing at a level the Beta testers never reached. The sole purpose of those death traps is to kill anyone who triggers the trap and is locked within. The monsters are far too many and far too powerful, so that people who would normally enter the dungeon with the death trap in question don't have the slightest chance to escape certain death. Teleport crystals have been intentionally deactivated, just so no one can escape death.
Anyone except for Kirito didn't have the slightest chance against the monsters. Kirito only survived because he was *extremely* overpowered (a whopping 30 levels over the others). If that had been any less (like 10-15 levels over the others), it most likely wouldn't have been enough against all that powerful monsters.

Most likely, there are still more unfair, intentional features, carefully hidden away by Kabaya.

[Clarste]

You're still ignoring the part where he never asked them to kill each other. It's not even encouraged by the gameplay mechanics. He left the option open, but there's really no good reason for them to. Obviously they're all supposed to be working together to clear the game. So far, basically all the deaths we've seen on screen can be attributed to players trying to trick each other. Did he intend that? It's doubtful. It's a game where everyone can win.

[Shimapan]

Originally Posted by Rakshasa

As has been mentioned, the 10.000 gamers went to quite extreme lengths to be the first ones in, camping for three days or so in queues. It's fairly reasonable to assume that a very large majority of those wanted to live in another world. If not fulltime, at the very least a large part of their free time, and we're dealing with a complete immersion game which is on the hardcore side of gaming. At some level one could say that it is no longer gaming, but alternative reality.

We can safely assume that absolutely *no one* wanted to live full-time in that world, especially not for extend time like years on end. Much less they certainly *didn't* want to have to fight for their lives every single day and live in constant fear of being killed by monsters or wicked PKs, even of being kileld in their sleep, and then have no entertainment whatsoever to take their mind off things.
No even remotely sane person would want to live in such a world which is much more like Hell than anything else.

Originally Posted by Rakshasa

So in many ways Kayaba fulfilled that desire, yet where it becomes an ethical issue is that none of them agreed to the rules of the game.

If you seriously think that anyone would actually have a desire to live in a hellhole where you constantly have to fight for your life, have to live in fear to be killed, even if you sleep, have no means of entertainment as a relief etc., then you've got a gravely warped and messed up set of values.

Originally Posted by Rakshasa

You could argue that it is categorically unethical for Kayaba to make the decision for the players, based on the right of self-determination and sanctity of life.

This is going way beyond Kabaya making decisions for the players (to which he has no right anyway).
Kabaya forces them into an ongoing battle of life and death, every single day from now on.
About their lives, quite obviously Kabaya doesn't have the tiniest regard for their lifes whatsoever, and doesn't give the tiniest damn if a few thousand or however much die - the very most being killed by monsters, making Kabaya directly responsiblle for their death, and only a small percentage being killed by PKs. However, also for the latter deaths Kabaya has some responsibility, as he provided the stage for this, without which it wouldn't have been possible.
In short, Kabaya mass murdered several thousands of players by means of the monsters in his game. To play that down and just call it "categorically unethical", you must have a seriously messed up set of values.

Originally Posted by Rakshasa

Would a sentient being who creates an universe like ours, be twisted and evil for introducing fear, suffering and death?

Moot argument, as that premise is utter bs. The universe wasn't created by a sentient being (unless you want to believe in some ridiculous fairy tales which say so).

"The sky is empty, comrades. There is no god." (Yuri Gagarin, first human in space)

Originally Posted by Rakshasa

Afterwards he started flapping his arms like a bird yelling Derp Derp Derp Derp...

Why do you refer to yourself in the third person? Do you think that's cute?

Originally Posted by Clarste

You're still ignoring the part where he never asked them to kill each other. It's not even encouraged by the gameplay mechanics. He left the option open, but there's really no good reason for them to.

No. There actually is a good reason for them to go PKing - boredom. Huge, mindnumbing boredom. There are no forms of entertainment whatsoever in the game - which is just natural. Of course the game wouldn't have any entertainment, as it was only meant to be used as entertainment itself, for just parts of the day. If however the game becomes full-time, that's a problem. If people aren't busy fighting for their lives, there's no enterrtainment, nothing to pass their time. To escape that mind-numbing boredom, some players decided to hunt down other players and PK them as a form of entertainment, and to escape boredom.

Originally Posted by Clarste

Obviously they're all supposed to be working together to clear the game. So far, basically all the deaths we've seen on screen can be attributed to players trying to trick each other.

Now that is very, *very* wrong. The very most deaths are certainly not due to PKing, but instead due to Kabaya's monsters. Deaths by PKing only make up for a small part of it.

[jpwong]

Originally Posted by Shimapan

The gaime is fair on the surface, although not because it was meant to be that way, but only out of sheer neccessity.

I think you're over-thinking things here. If we step back and look at SAO as a normal MMORPG instead of a death game, a lot of the mechanics are actually quite normal.

You're pointing to a lot of things as being intentional, but I find it's unlikely that Kayaba was the sole programmer for the whole game. Therefore unless he co-opted the entire development team into going along with his plan, which seems unlikely in the extreme, it would point more to the fact that they are either issues that were unknown at the time of the beta, technical limitations due to how the NerveGear works or limitations within the game engine itself, or were identified issues that were considered of exceptionally low priority.

If we take a step back and look at a lot of these "issues" under the light that SAO was not a death game and players would not be trapped in game perpetually a lot of these problems would rank exceptionally low on fix priority scales.

For example we don't know what the death penalty in the game amounted to before everyone became trapped. Assuming it wasn't something completely ridiculous, the whole issue with the dualing mechanics would have at worst been annoying. Given that the specific conditions to cause it to occur would undoubtedly be exceptionally rare, a development team would more than likely prioritize the addition of new features over correcting something that takes exceptional circumstances to create and would otherwise only be a minor inconvenience to the player if it somehow did happen. Normally the player would be awake to accept a dual, so if they accept a dual to the death inside a city, why not let them? In fact that may even have been intentional as that way players could dual for show or something and not have to worry about monsters or PKers crashing their dual.

It's the same thing with trap rooms, normally you'd just suck it up and play more carefully if the same type situation came at you in the future.

Kabaya certainly could have added in some intentional features which break specific aspects of how the game normally operates, but unless he's able to manipulate the game code live while the players are playing, the amount of things he personally could have added without tripping off the rest of the programming team can't be exceptionally large.

[Clarste]

Originally Posted by Shimapan

No. There actually is a good reason for them to go PKing - boredom. Huge, mindnumbing boredom. There are no forms of entertainment whatsoever in the game - which is just natural. Of course the game wouldn't have any entertainment, as it was only meant to be used as entertainment itself, for just parts of the day. If however the game becomes full-time, that's a problem. If people aren't busy fighting for their lives, there's no enterrtainment, nothing to pass their time. To escape that mind-numbing boredom, some players decided to hunt down other players and PK them as a form of entertainment, and to escape boredom.

Not to self: never get near a bored Shimapan. Apparently you think killing people is an acceptable way to kill time? It's only been 2 years. Yes, I can imagine getting pretty bored of the game by that point, but it's nowhere near enough to make people go insane or anything. Maybe in 20 years.

Now that is very, *very* wrong. The very most deaths are certainly not due to PKing, but instead due to Kabaya's monsters. Deaths by PKing only make up for a small part of it.

I didn't say PKing. I said "tricking". Doing sly things. Diabel wanted to get the last hit on the boss so he charged in front. Kirito hid his level from the guild and made them overconfident. The whole "beater" thing in the first place. None of this would have happened if people had just trusted each other and worked together, just like the game encourages you do to.

MMOs are fundamentally cooperative.

Originally Posted by Shimapan

If you seriously think that anyone would actually have a desire to live in a hellhole where you constantly have to fight for your life, have to live in fear to be killed, even if you sleep, have no means of entertainment as a relief etc., then you've got a gravely warped and messed up set of values.

You mean just like real life? It's only safe because we've created safety in the form of government and police. We only have entertainment because we made it. Now, I doubt the physics simulator in-game is detailed enough for them to make microchips and invent computer games, but what's stopping them from playing baseball? Gambling? Going on long walks on the beach?

Edit: Honestly, it's safer in the game than it is in reality. Reality doesn't make you immortal in towns by default.

[zaz122]

Originally Posted by Clarste

You mean just like real life? It's only safe because we've created safety in the form of government and police. We only have entertainment because we made it. Now, I doubt the physics simulator in-game is detailed enough for them to make microchips and invent computer games, but what's stopping them from playing baseball? Gambling? Going on long walks on the beach?

^This exactly. Real life is as much as a grind as any game would be. Heck, I go to work everyday, do the same thing everyday. Anything can be a grind if you do it more than enough times for long enough.

People have come up with ways to enjoy themselves long, long before computers, television and games. People will adjust and always find ways to slack (that's what we're good at.)

[Dengar]

Besides, obviously the current murder case has nothing to do with boredom.

Shimapan, pardon me for addressing you personally, but I do believe your posts would be a lot more credible if you threw some "I think"'s and "In my opinion"'s in there. As it is, it kind of looks like you're making stuff up and calling them facts, rather theorizing.

[Shimapan]

Originally Posted by Clarste

Not to self: never get near a bored Shimapan. Apparently you think killing people is an acceptable way to kill time? It's only been 2 years. Yes, I can imagine getting pretty bored of the game by that point, but it's nowhere near enough to make people go insane or anything. Maybe in 20 years.

Don't put words into my mouth I never said
I wouldn't do that, but there's apparently a good amount of people in the game who do think it's a good form of entertainment. There's even enough of them that they bandtogether and form PK guilds, one of which Kirito busted - but there are probably still many more.

Originally Posted by Clarste

You mean just like real life? It's only safe because we've created safety in the form of government and police.

Seriously, are you living under a rock in real life?
Having raving hordes of vicious mosters behind every rock outside the cities is "just like real life"?
And no, it's certainly not police and government that are keeping any imaginary monster hordes in check so we don't see them.

Originally Posted by Clarste

Edit: Honestly, it's safer in the game than it is in reality. Reality doesn't make you immortal in towns by default.

Yet more bs. You're anything but immortal in the cities ingame. There's the duel, where people can be killed in cities - another thing that's "just like real life", huh? I guess you get challenged to duels to the death on a regular base.
Then there's the sleep PKing - yes, that's also soo much safer than in real life, because in real life vagabonding murderers who kill people in their sleep are a much bigger problem than in the game. Suuure.
Then there's still the other possibility to kill people in cities, which has to be revealed yet. Quite possibly it's a special type of weapon which can be crafted. Once that crafting skill becomes more common and those weapons are crafted en masse, what little safety was left in the cities is completely *gone*.

Originally Posted by zaz122

^This exactly. Real life is as much as a grind as any game would be. Heck, I go to work everyday, do the same thing everyday. Anything can be a grind if you do it more than enough times for long enough.

And you also fight vicious monsters which want to kill you every day, right? Or, at the very least, you're in a constant struggle every day to ward off other people which want to kill you, right?
If not, then it's retarded to say that the game has even the least thing to do with real life.

[Triple_R]

I think that both sides of the Kayaba/SAO argument are probably taking their respective positions a bit too far.

Here's my take, but with the added note that I am an anime-only viewer, so take this with a huge grain of salt...

This is something of a social experiment for Kayaba. I think that a couple key things are motivating him here:

1. The desire to use VR/MMO technology to create, as seamlessly as possible, a truly new world. But for a new world to work, you have to have people to populate it with. People who stay there for more than just a few hours a day. People who can truly die in that world so they take things as seriously as we would in the real world - Otherwise it's not truly a new world, but merely Disneyland.

2. What motivates MMO and JRPG players? The desire to play a hero in a high fantasy world. The longing for adventure. The relief that comes with putting aside the real world to fully engage in a fantasy world where the rules are different and the modern ways of doing things are less applicable. And all of this is particularly true for somebody who would play a VR MMO. Kayaba says to the gamers "Very well. I will give you all of that, to its logical end!". There's a definite element of "Be careful what you wish for, you might just get it." to SAO, imo.

Now, none of this excuses Kayaba's actions. His actions resulted in the deaths of thousands of people, the vast majority of whom would still be alive if not for him. That obviously makes him a criminal that should be brought to justice. But that doesn't mean his motivations are pure sadism or complete cruelty. There is a definite element of scientific curiosity to his actions, imo. He's more Dr. Doom than The Joker; more mad scientist than destructive serial killer.

[Clarste]

Originally Posted by Shimapan

Seriously, are you living under a rock in real life?
Having raving hordes of vicious mosters behind every rock outside the cities is "just like real life"?
And no, it's certainly not police and government that are keeping any imaginary monster hordes in check so we don't see them.

Go try fighting a wild boar. Or a tiger. It's not impossible, sure, but you have to risk your life. The only reason the real world tends to have less "monsters" is that they don't respawn very fast. The modern equivalent might be driving a car.

Yet more bs. You're anything but immortal in the cities ingame. There's the duel, where people can be killed in cities - another thing that's "just like real life", huh? I guess you get challenged to duels to the death on a regular base.
Then there's the sleep PKing - yes, that's also soo much safer than in real life, because in real life vagabonding murderers who kill people in their sleep are a much bigger problem than in the game. Suuure.
Then there's still the other possibility to kill people in cities, which has to be revealed yet. Quite possibly it's a special type of weapon which can be crafted. Once that crafting skill becomes more common and those weapons are crafted en masse, what little safety was left in the cities is completely *gone*.

Car accidents. Violent crimes. They happen. A burglar could "sleep PK" you in real life, even if you lock your doors. I'm not saying the game is perfectly safe, but the real world is hardly safe either. And the game has at least some mechanics designed to keep safe. Reality has absolutely nothing stopping anyone from killing you at any point in time. The only reason they don't is because they don't feel like it. Maybe they're afraid of the police, maybe they're just nice people, or maybe you're a really scary person they don't want to mess with. And all those reasons can apply in the game too.

Edit: Homeless people get murdered in real life all the time.

And you also fight vicious monsters which want to kill you every day, right? Or, at the very least, you're in a constant struggle every day to ward off other people which want to kill you, right?
If not, then it's retarded to say that the game has even the least thing to do with real life.

I don't, because I don't routinely wander off into the wilderness with the intent of wrestling bears to raise my level. I spend most of my life in town. Most people do.

[Rakshasa]

Originally Posted by Shimapan

Seriously, are you living under a rock in real life?
Having raving hordes of vicious mosters behind every rock outside the cities is "just like real life"?
And no, it's certainly not police and government that are keeping any imaginary monster hordes in check so we don't see them.

There used to be a time back... uhm... from 200 years ago to pretty much the beginning of life that mortality was comparable.

And it wasn't so much just monsters behind evert rock as more of an issue of hunger and disease. A 20% mortality rate on first year of life? That's a rather recognisable number.

[Clarste]

You know, I should probably leave this conservation before I start sympathizing with the PKers. It seems like there'd be something incredibly satisfying about showing someone who acts like they're invincible the fear of true death. Movies do this a lot with smug villains.

[Triple_R]

Originally Posted by Clarste

Edit: Honestly, it's safer in the game than it is in reality. Reality doesn't make you immortal in towns by default.

I have to say - You're really out to lunch on this.

Shima is also taking some of his arguments a bit too far, but nothing like this. To argue that SAO is safer than the real world is pure BS. Sorry, but it is.

How many people were playing SAO on Day 1? How many are left? That's a pretty huge drop in the population in a pretty short period of time, don't you think? It goes far beyond anything you'd see in a real world city or town outside of a massive natural disaster hitting.

SAO is more dangerous than the real world. SAO basically requires you to fight monsters on a regular basis simply to earn cash in order to live. That's obviously a more dangerous "job" than most of the jobs in the real world. What's more dangerous - Going to the office everyday, or fighting monsters all the time?

[Clarste]

Originally Posted by Triple_R

I have to say - You're really out to lunch on this.

Shima is also taking some of his arguments a bit too far, but nothing like this. To argue that SAO is safer than the real world is pure BS. Sorry, but it is.

How many people were playing SAO on Day 1? How many are left? That's a pretty huge drop in the population in a pretty short period of time, don't you think? It goes far beyond anything you'd see in a real world city or town outside of a massive natural disaster hitting.

SAO is more dangerous than the real world. SAO basically requires you to fight monsters on a regular basis simply to earn cash in order to live. That's obviously a more dangerous "job" than most of the jobs in the real world. What's more dangerous - Going to the office everyday, or fighting monsters all the time?

I meant the rules are safer. Not that it's statistically safer or whatever. Real life does not make you invincible, ever. If people are being killed in towns, that requires criminals (who are treated by the other players as criminals) to put in even more effort to not only kill you but to work around game mechanics that prevent them from killing you in normal ways. Can you imagine what real life would be like if people were invincible in towns? You could run across a busy street, get hit by a car, and suffer no damage or pain. Walk around in back alleys at night knowing that nothing could hurt you unless you agreed to a duel, which they can't force you to do unless you're sleeping. That would be weird.

Simply put, life doesn't have rules. If people in the game can figure out how to break the rules, all that does is put it on the same level as real life. Now, real life doesn't involve swordfighting against monsters very often, but the primary thing they're concerned with in this episode is the safety of towns. And I'd bet dollars to donuts that the number of players who were killed in town (not in the field, not by monsters) is way less than the average murder rate per capita of a reasonably sized town.

Edit: If you don't want to die to monsters then don't go outside. Apparently being inside towns isn't perfectly safe either, but it's also not an extreme deathtrap like some people are trying to make it sound. Yes, they can kill you with sleep-PKs and/or whatever new exploit will turn out the be the solution to this mystery, but it's not likely. Fearing it is exactly as reasonable as fearing burglars killing you in your sleep. Which is to say, it's a reasonable fear and by all means lock your doors, but it's just not very likely.

[Triple_R]

Originally Posted by Clarste

I meant the rules are safer. Not that it's statistically safer or whatever. Real life does not make you invincible. If people are being killed in towns, that requires criminals (who are treated by the other players as criminals) to put in even more effort to not only kill you but to work around game mechanics that prevent them from killing you in normal ways. Can you imagine what life you be like if people were invincible in towns? You could run across a busy street, get hit by a car, and suffer no damage or pain. Walk around in back alleys at night knowing that nothing could hurt you unless you agreed to a duel, which they can't force you to do unless you're sleeping. That would be weird.

Simply put, life doesn't have rules. If people in the game can figure out how to break the rules, all that does is put it on the same level as real life. Now, real life doesn't involve swordfighting against monsters very often, but the primary thing they're concerned with in this episode is the safety of towns. And I'd bet dollars to donuts that the number of players who were killed in town (not in the field, not by monsters) is way less than the average murder rate per capita of a reasonably sized town.

Edit: If you don't want to die to monsters then don't go outside. Apparently being inside towns isn't perfectly safe either, but it's also not an extreme deathtrap like some people are trying to make it sound. Yes, they can kill you with sleep-PKs and/or whatever new exploit will turn out the be the solution to this mystery, but it's not likely. Fearing it is exactly as reasonable as fearing burglars killing you in your sleep. Which is to say, it's a reasonable fear and by all means lock your doors, but it's just not very likely.

A town in SAO is safer than a real world city. Yes, that alone is true. But the world of SAO is more dangerous than the real world.

If your argument is just that the existence of Sleep-Pk is no worse than what you'd have to deal with in real life, then yes, I can agree with that. Actually, Sleep-PK just lines up SAO with real life, imo.

[Clarste]

Originally Posted by Triple_R

A town in SAO is safer than a real world city. Yes, that alone is true. But the world of SAO is more dangerous than the real world.

If your argument is just that the existence of Sleep-Pk is no worse than what you'd have to deal with in real life, then yes, I can agree with that. Actually, Sleep-PK just lines up SAO with real life, imo.

The world is safe because we make it safe. Law, trade, medicine, civilization is designed to keep us safer than we were before. We've got 10,000 years of history in taming the natural world that's otherwise trying to kill us. So yes, it's safer, because we made it that way.

Anyway, Kayaba definitely wasn't doing these guys a favor. It's hard to imagine how having a bomb strapped to your head could do that. At best, you could say he declared war on them. Note the similarities between their behavior and a country at war (a foreign-type war, not a civil war or an invasion). They even call the highest floor "the front lines".

[zaz122]

Originally Posted by Shimapan

And you also fight vicious monsters which want to kill you every day, right? Or, at the very least, you're in a constant struggle every day to ward off other people which want to kill you, right?
If not, then it's retarded to say that the game has even the least thing to do with real life.

I don't, and I never said I did. I didn't argue that SAO wasn't dangerous.

You said that It was an incredibly boring grind in order to survive; I say it's just like in real life, a long monotonous grind with hobbies or leisure time as our only reprieve. And really.. how boring of a grind is it when you have a chance of dying?
It's like being in a hostile battlefield and saying, "Well, I'm bored."

You said, they have a legitimate excuse for killing: boredom, mind numbing boredom; I say people get very bored in real life as well and they make do. Sure there are the statistical out-liners that will snap and kill someone, not going to deny that. But there are very different forms of entertainment or leisure that you can get into in SAO. People have been getting bored before electricity was invented and people made do.

If there's one thing I can count on it's man's ability to distract himself.

[Flower]

Annddd ... caught up on SAO as well.

Must admit that I enjoyed ep 4. Seems eps 3 and 4 were contrasting a "happy possible mini-arc ending" and a "sad possible mini-arc ending" with the SAO "world". Almost as if sketching the possibilities before heading into the main story.

Ep 5, though, seems to finally be moving into the main focus and character dynamic of the series, and I for one am glad to see it. (Not that I was impatient or what not with previous eps, mind you.)

Must admit that I was abit puzzled by the PK technique being employed here.... Hmm. I hope it is "explainable" and not just a code/re-write hack type of thing.