Sword Art Online - Episode 2 Discussion / Poll

[HandofFate]

Spoiler for comparison to the novels; reply to Adigard:

Originally Posted by Adigard

B) By tightening the storyline so tight, and removing so many stray details we don't know why Diabel decided to suicide, rather than taking the healing potion. LN reader's of course know that he's not as 'good' of a person as he sounds, and again... reading between the lines it should be apparent something is up.

I feel a lot of people ended up misinterpreting that gesture. I'm sure many realize it now after reading a few posts.

But it seems many's first impression was Diabel refusing the healing potion.
Rather than refusal it was a Don't bother, its too late gesture.

He knew he was already dead, so it was just a "don't bother" scene.
Like how when some warrior gets a fatal wound, and his princess runs up to him and rips off her clothes to try to dress his wound, he starts talking and stops the princess, and the princess is like "Stop talking, you be okay"

and the warrior is like "Its too late" Then says a few parting lines, and finally dies.
Then Princess is like "NOOOOOOOO!!" Then rain starts pouring onto the field when just moments before it was sunny and not a cloud in the sky.

Originally Posted by Adigard

As for the advantage beta testers have? Considering how difficult Kline found the first mob he fought in the field... imagine how poorly most fights went for new players in the starter fields? The death rates would have been horrendous as the first few non-beta brave souls took to the fields.

The angry mob mentality was pretty dangerous. Especially when everyone is more or less depending on eachother try to get out of this game alive.
While the beta testers seem to have an advantage, its not as big as many were rallying on.

The 1000 beta testers were all picked by lottery, meaning not all of them were gaming otaku like Kirito. Most like many in the game were just casual gamers and didn't get far as all which Kirito mentioned.

I believe in the LN, Kirito mentioned he mentioned to dig up the Beta Players death. And it was revealed that the death rate for beta testers was an alarming 40% while the non-beta death rate was @ 10-15%. Granted many were still holding up in Starting City, and that non-beta far out populate the beta. Almost half the beta players are already dead by episode 2.

Diabel showed by example that being a beta example could be a liability as well as a strength. He was overconfidence in his 'inside' knowledge as a beta tester and he charged in without considering changes in the game and paid for it.

[Adigard]

Spoiler for comparison to the novels; reply to HandofFate:

Originally Posted by HandofFate

I feel a lot of people ended up misinterpreting that gesture. I'm sure many realize it now after reading a few posts.

I think there are a LOT of subtle nuances that could easily be missed by non-observant viewers, or non-LN readers. Show, don't tell, and all of that to a really surprising degree. Simply seeing the DoT tick of damage on his health bar after being hit by the boss could explain some of it, as well as knowing that the first floor's health pots are rather crappy.

Skipping the entire PK issue though really brings up some issues, and I don't believe it's been mentioned at all by the anime.

As to the beta tester advantage I'm talking less about knowing the good hunting sites and quests to grind... and more simple familiarity with the game's controls. If hitting 0 HP kills you, you really need to be extra cautious with every single fight... doubly so with the first few fights when you don't even have a firm grasp on Sword Skill usage. As I pointed out before, Klein considered that first mob a mid-floor boss, and he's an experienced MMO gamer with probably years of experience under his belt. Imagine how the noobs like Asuna fared.

[james0246]

Originally Posted by Klashikari

But as you said, the whole "cheater" point is stupid as hell. In fact, this kind of information should probably be avaiable to anyone having a brain and checking bulletin board or anything reporting info from a beta (considering SAO fame in the setup, you would definitely expect players raving about the exposed content from the beta etc).

While I agree with your sentiment (I also found the whole "cheater" idea very flawed), I expect many players (whether in this series or in real life) use an online guide or forum separate from an in-universe tutorial in order to gain an idea of how a game works or the stats for characters (etc). In other words, I would expect many players would be looking for cheat-codes, wikis, and other similar non-game based informational tools, and since they are cut-off from such tools some could blame those that already have the tools at hand.

That being said, the idea of information brokers has been brought up, and I hope this is expanded on in the future.

Additionally, and this is a side question for all, where are the NPCs? Are do MMOs not have NPCs?

Also, I know there were 1000 beta-testers and 10,000 copies of the game when the game started, but I am unsure how many total players there were. Specifically, were their 10,000 total players including the bet testers (so 9,000 regular gamers and 1,000 beta testers), or were their 11,000 players including the beta-testers?

[Adigard]

Originally Posted by james0246

Additionally, and this is a side question for all, where are the NPCs? Are do MMOs not have NPCs?

We saw NPC's in ep1 as Kirito ran out of town. We definitely should see more as the story progresses, but I'm guessing the bazaar's we saw in ep2 were player-run. The NPC's are an interesting subplot in the SAO LN storyline (IMO).

Originally Posted by james0246

Also, I know there were 1000 beta-testers and 10,000 copies of the game when the game started, but I am unsure how many total players there were. Specifically, were their 10,000 total players including the bet testers (so 9,000 regular gamers and 1,000 beta testers), or were their 11,000 players including the beta-testers?

There were 1,000 beta testers... however many of the beta testers probably did not spend as much time in-game as Kirito did. he mentioned in EP1 that he was on break (IIRC?) and basically did nothing but eat/sleep/SAO. There were 10,000 players logged into SAO before the 'tutorial', there were probably some very happy beta testers who didn't log in before the tutorial, figuring they'd log in a little later on, once the day one bugs were ironed out. SAO at the credit roll in EP1 should have had a population of 10,000 - 213.

[Swordstriker21]

Originally Posted by james0246

While I agree with your sentiment (I also found the whole "cheater" idea very flawed), I expect many players (whether in this series or in real life) use an online guide or forum separate from an in-universe tutorial in order to gain an idea of how a game works or the stats for characters (etc). In other words, I would expect many players would be looking for cheat-codes, wikis, and other similar non-game based informational tools, and since they are cut-off from such tools some could blame those that already have the tools at hand.

That being said, the idea of information brokers has been brought up, and I hope this is expanded on in the future.

Additionally, and this is a side question for all, where are the NPCs? Are do MMOs not have NPCs?

Also, I know there were 1000 beta-testers and 10,000 copies of the game when the game started, but I am unsure how many total players there were. Specifically, were their 10,000 total players including the bet testers (so 9,000 regular gamers and 1,000 beta testers), or were their 11,000 players including the beta-testers?

1000 beta testers and 9000 new players. As for the info broker...

Spoiler for Information broker...:

She was axed in the anime but a character called Argo the Rat was supposed to appear. Kirito described her as "someone who would even sell her own stats." She's Aincrads number 1 info broker and also acts as go between for special transactions. She was also the one who compiled the eponymous guidebook and personally tested out a majority of the info written there. In fact she was one of the major reasons why Kirito acted out being the bad guy since the guidebook was being blamed for inaccuracy after the boss fight. Once she was found out to be a beta tester as well things would go downhill pretty fast. The fact that PK is enabled outside of towns and cities didn't help matters much.

[Xaturas]

Originally Posted by james0246

Additionally, and this is a side question for all, where are the NPCs? Are do MMOs not have NPCs?

You didn't watch carefully did you. There was a scene in town where mother was walking with her child. I was like WOOOT why you bring such npc's interaction.


As for the dead dude, dunno if you people don't watch carefully or just my subs were better.
But the dude said clearly "you know why I attacked last", you can easily deduce that he was after last hit bonus items, and heck I'm anime only viewer [cut]

[Triple_R]

Just so people know, I'm posting this without having read through the rest of the thread yet, and I'm also an anime-only viewer.

Ok, what I liked about this episode:

1. The artwork, animation, and directing (including character designs).

2. The voice-acting.

3. The BGM.

4. The action scenes.

These four in particular reminded me a lot of Fate/Zero, and that's a definite plus for me. Moving on...

5. The way Kirito and Asuna met each other. It felt naturalistic to me, especially since...

6. Asuna is trying to avoid much contact with others, probably due to her gender. I like how SAO is brutally honest about the sort of grief that female players can sometimes face in MMOs.

7. The overall chemistry between Kirito and Asuna.

8. Diabel's character. Good, tragic hero. I liked how he tried to do the common sense thing here, and get everybody working as a well-structured team.


What I didn't like:

1. I think that I get what they're going for with Beaters/Beta-Testers vs. Newbies, but it kind of fell flat to me. I know they need some drama/dissension within the ranks so everything doesn't feel too smooth, but I found the overall execution of this aspect of it a bit clunky and hard to swallow. In fairness, I've definitely seen worse.

2. After Kirito put on the whole "I'm going to act like a smug villain" display, I was kind of hoping he'd go full-Lelouch Lamperouge and try to make himself a charismatic and powerful leader. Instead, the way that whole display was handled made it feel a bit pointless to me... unless the whole point was simply turning people off from him. And if that's it, it's not exactly the most likeable characterization to be giving our male lead protagonist. What exacerbates this for me is the example that Diabel had just finished giving Kirito. So Kirito admires Diabel for caring about others, and then... he decides to act like Light Yagami? That all seemed a bit odd to me.


Overall, what I liked significantly outweighed what I disliked, and so I rate this episode a 8/10.

[Meltyred]

Originally Posted by Triple_R

Just so people know, I'm posting this without having read through the rest of the thread yet, and I'm also an anime-only viewer.

Ok, what I liked about this episode:

1. The artwork, animation, and directing (including character designs).

2. The voice-acting.

3. The BGM.

4. The action scenes.

These four in particular reminded me a lot of Fate/Zero, and that's a definite plus for me. Moving on...

5. The way Kirito and Asuna met each other. It felt naturalistic to me, especially since...

6. Asuna is trying to avoid much contact with others, probably due to her gender. I like how SAO is brutally honest about the sort of grief that female players can sometimes face in MMOs.

7. The overall chemistry between Kirito and Asuna.

8. Diabel's character. Good, tragic hero. I liked how he tried to do the common sense thing here, and get everybody working as a well-structured team.


What I didn't like:

1. I think that I get what they're going for with Beaters/Beta-Testers vs. Newbies, but it kind of fell flat to me. I know they need some drama/dissension within the ranks so everything doesn't feel too smooth, but I found the overall execution of this aspect of it a bit clunky and hard to swallow. In fairness, I've definitely seen worse.

2. After Kirito put on the whole "I'm going to act like a smug villain" display, I was kind of hoping he'd go full-Lelouch Lamperouge and try to make himself a charismatic and powerful leader. Instead, the way that whole display was handled made it feel a bit pointless to me... unless the whole point was simply turning people off from him. And if that's it, it's not exactly the most likeable characterization to be giving our male lead protagonist. What exacerbates this for me is the example that Diabel had just finished giving Kirito. So Kirito admires Diabel for caring about others, and then... he decides to act like Light Yagami? That all seemed a bit odd to me.


Overall, what I liked significantly outweighed what I disliked, and so I rate this episode a 8/10.

Spoiler for comparison to the novels:

Well in the light novels, Diabel was person who was using the group raid for his own agendas, including trying to get Kirito to sell away his sword by using another player as his proxy to not give away his identity as well as weaken Kirito. And also trying to get the last hit on the boss.
Kirito decides to put himself as the most hated person to ease the tension between Beta testers and normal players, and also out of his guilt that he left his first friend Cline behind at the start.
Few people see through this facade, and are the rare few Kirito actually opens up his heart to. (Asuna is one of them, another is shown in this episode, and others will pop up soon enough)

The hate against Beta Testers are heavily emphasized but no clear case of Beta Testers doing something to deliberately harm the normal players was ever given, it's more of a one-sided grudge then anything.

In one sense, the Anime made the plot brighter in general, which is why Kirito's actions seem awkward at times.
The most important thing they missed out on was also Asuna's suicidal mindset. (In the anime, this was only implied, and she suddenly changes right at the end of the episode....)

[ThereminVox]

Busy weekends mean I haven't had the chance to dig into the LNs yet, so for the time being, I'm anime-only. Having read through much of this thread, here are some of the things that didn't come through very clearly to me:

- As plenty AO viewer questions suggest, the handling of Diabel's death made his actions pretty incomprehensible. Remember, this is the first time we've seen a health potion, and we haven't been told how they work. Also, his HP appeared to still be depleting. With this information, all I could conclude was that after bravely and competently leading a multi group raid, he got greedy and tried to KS the boss. Immediately wracked by guilt, he chose to die rather than live with his e-crime. In short: What an idiot. Thanks for clearing that up.

- The interaction with Asuna did indeed feel like it had been compressed. However, it hardly seemed like anything major had been cut. There's lots of time to dig into her story, and quite frankly, because of this thread, I know more than I want to already.

- I still don't get how "switching" works, and I suspect I would if I read the novels. Here's my guess: It's basically someone blowing their specials, and jousting out while someone whose cooldowns are ready takes their place in order to chain attacks, and protect players who are vulnerable during their own cooldowns. If I'm even close, I should say the only reason for that is that I've dabbled in MMOs since EQ1. Otherwise I'd be completely lost on this tactic.

- I worked out what Kirito's whole beater schtick was about, but only after the credits started to roll. I had to work backwards to figure it out. They could have made it clearer that there was some tension between beta testers and newbies besides that one loud, obnoxious dude. Have some testers been lynched or something? That didn't come across at all.

Having said all that, the pacing didn't seem off to me, having not read the LNs. Honestly, if we were going into episode 3 and still on the first floor, I think I'd rage pretty hard. Asuna's story can wait. Not everything has to be animated in exact chronological order.

[Ferp]

I went into this show imagining it would be just awesome. The show is based around my favourite genres, yet I think it's pretty bad. This episode felt rushed, although the boss battle animation was pretty good and rather exciting. The main character has no depth at all and is just some lonely kid who wont admit it with a superiority complex.

[kyp275]

Originally Posted by Ferp

The main character has no depth at all and is just some lonely kid who wont admit it with a superiority complex.

Someone missed a few clues I think

[justsomeguy]

Spoiler for information about current episode from the novels; reply to ThereminVox:

Originally Posted by ThereminVox

- I still don't get how "switching" works, and I suspect I would if I read the novels. Here's my guess: It's basically someone blowing their specials, and jousting out while someone whose cooldowns are ready takes their place in order to chain attacks, and protect players who are vulnerable during their own cooldowns. If I'm even close, I should say the only reason for that is that I've dabbled in MMOs since EQ1. Otherwise I'd be completely lost on this tactic.

The AI has trouble adapting to quick changes in tactics. Switching basically consists of two players "juggling" an enemy by having one stagger it or block its attack while the other one deals damage.

- I worked out what Kirito's whole beater schtick was about, but only after the credits started to roll. I had to work backwards to figure it out. They could have made it clearer that there was some tension between beta testers and newbies besides that one loud, obnoxious dude. Have some testers been lynched or something? That didn't come across at all.

If the anime had included the "First Day" short story, it would have been more obvious. As a beta tester, Kirito had better equipment and a easier and safer time grinding because he knew where to farm and quest. His sword in fact was one of the best quest rewards on the first floor.

Asuna's story can wait. Not everything has to be animated in exact chronological order.

You'll be waiting a very long time, considering that Reki Kawahara has not even written most of it yet.

[Adigard]

Originally Posted by ThereminVox

- I still don't get how "switching" works, and I suspect I would if I read the novels. Here's my guess: It's basically someone blowing their specials, and jousting out while someone whose cooldowns are ready takes their place in order to chain attacks, and protect players who are vulnerable during their own cooldowns. If I'm even close, I should say the only reason for that is that I've dabbled in MMOs since EQ1. Otherwise I'd be completely lost on this tactic.

Spoiler for Information from the novels:

It's... actually a LOT more interesting than that, and the biggest reason SAO frowns heavily on solo players... and one reason why solo'ers are so rare.

justsomeguy touched on one reason.

There are three other reasons player's switch. In the context of this episode... it gives you time to heal with a healing pot. In a boss fight you would fight until you took a pot's worth of damage, then switch to the back lines to allow the heal over time pot to take effect.

Also, with multiple people fighting a monster at the same time, you run the risk of hitting one another. Very bad in a death game type scenario.

More importantly... and one of the vital bits that got cut out in this episode (le'sigh), the SAO monster AI delays when a player's attack pattern suddenly changes. If you're fighting a monster with a sword, then suddenly switch to a polearm... the monster will be delayed for a short time while it adjusts to the new attack style.

A solo player would have to drastically change his fighting style to do this... a party could simply switch players. I think it's addressed in Vol1 somewhere, but should also be mentioned somewhat in Kirito and Asuna's cut discussion on tactics and overkill.

[Chiibi]

Ah....if there's one cliche I'll never tire of, it's the badass long cloak

I liked this episode much more than the first. My favorite parts were Kirito and Asuna's interactions. There were both cute how quickly they scooted around on the benches. Kirito's nervousness about being in a party was cute too. XD
His fake "I'm a jerk" display was pretty cool as well. While characters doing this to protect others hardly ever works, I still find it noble...even if it's a bit stupid. But in this case I think it worked on everyone but Asuna....and if it had worked on her, I'd be disappointed in her perception. The two already seem to understand each other, if only a tiny bit.
*waves a shipper flag*

That loud, mean guy was kinda unfair to him, I thought, saying things like that. Kirito DID try to warn the other player-he just didn't make it in time! Duh, that should have been obvious!

A bit of advice. Try to read between the lines to see why he acted the way he acted

THIS.

[Triple_R]

Originally Posted by Chiibi

His fake "I'm a jerk" display was pretty cool as well. While characters doing this to protect others hardly ever works, I still find it noble...even if it's a bit stupid.

If Kirito truly wants to protect others, he should share his knowledge of the game with others.

Kirito could have also just calmly explained that the game had been changed since it was beta tested. That this 1st Boss had been given a different weapon than what it had in the beta testing. It's not an unreasonable explanation, and in fact, it's the truth.

If people accepted that truth then they'd realize that beta-testers don't necessarily have it all that much better than the newbies, because some of what the beta-testers went through has been changed. This would bring the two sides (beta-testers and newbies) closer together as the differences between them would be lessened.

[Xellos-_^]

Originally Posted by Ferp

I went into this show imagining it would be just awesome. The show is based around my favourite genres, yet I think it's pretty bad. This episode felt rushed, although the boss battle animation was pretty good and rather exciting. The main character has no depth at all and is just some lonely kid who wont admit it with a superiority complex.

Originally Posted by Swordstriker21

A bit of advice. Try to read between the lines to see why he acted the way he acted

Do not feed the trolls

[Swordstriker21]

Originally Posted by Xellos-_^

Do not feed the trolls

Ahahahaha Nice pic

I do agree that an explanation does work to solve the problem more concretely if it's effective but when a stupid jerk (*KibaOu Actually translates to "Fang King" BTW) agitates an already agitated crowd who knows what would happen? Ohers would undoubtedly see reason but what about the rest who're already not thinking clearly? Mass hysteria isn't easily diffused by calm explanations. Granted that the written SS does portray things in a darker, more drastic light w/ people actually hinting PK executions.

[relentlessflame]

Okay, just stop. I am locking this thread temporarily until we deal with this spoiler issue.

If any anime-only viewer posts their thoughts and speculation about what happened in the episode, this is not a invitation for all the novel readers to jump in and tell them what they missed, or why they're wrong, or what the proper interpretation is, or to hint "oh you may need to pay more attention here". Your job is not to "correct" anime viewers to make sure they know everything you know as a novel reader. To be blunt: go away. Let people have the privilege of discovering the story on their own. If people want to read the novel, let them read the novel. If people don't want to read the novel, you don't need to fill them in on every little damn thing they missed. You may think you're doing them a favour, but you're not. If people want to ask spoiler questions, they know where to go.

So for now, this thread is locked because I'm sick and tired of adding spoiler tags to posts when the spoilers and comparisons are totally uncalled for anyway. The thread will be re-opened once a clarification of the spoiler policy has been posted.

[relentlessflame]

As I alluded to above, we have now put together a post that clarifies the Spoiler Policy and we are looking for any comments about areas that are still confusing or unclear. Please review the thread and provide any questions you have. After a time when everyone has had the chance to review the policy, it will take effect (with strict enforcement) and we will re-open this thread for further conversation.

[relentlessflame]

Okay, thanks to everyone who reviewed and commented on the policy clarification. This is to let everyone know that the stricter punishments based on the clarified rules will take effect now, as I re-open this Episode 2 thread, and these rules will apply throughout this sub-forum (and growing to the entire forum progressively).

If you haven't read it yet -- even anime-only viewers -- I recommend you read it to make sure you know what is and isn't allowed. If you encounter any post that breaks the rules, please let us know by reporting the post. Please don't be concerned about "getting someone else in trouble" because the staff will review each report, and make their own determination. In addition, we will be browsing the threads regularly to spot issues on our own. Your cooperation will just help things go more quickly and result in less of a Forum mess to clean-up. And as a reminder, please don't reply to spoiler posts in the open either; if you want to give someone a warning, consider VM or PM.


Anyway, now back to the regularly-scheduled discussion of Episode 2.