Sword Art Online - "Real-World" and Legal Implications [Speculation, NO Spoilers]

[Dark Wing]

Or they could separate all the young victims into a specialized school to help them catch up faster.

Also while I'm at it I want to talking about the legal and social ramifications of getting married in SAO.

Now I know after two years of being stuck somewhere one would get really lonely and want to seek out some form of companionship so some people would settle down and choice to marry.

However the question is what happens when or if finally get out of the game?

Do they remain married?

Can the marriage even be considered legal and binding?

Also what if the couple happens to be minors when they marry could their parent or guardian step in and say no?

[Clarste]

I'm very certain a game marriage is not legally binding, nor does it require permission for minors. It's just a form of role-playing. Whether or not they decide to stay together afterward is up to the people involved. For starters, they have to tell each other their real names...

And of course if they decide to stay together for the long run they'd have to get married again in Japan.

[Krono]

Originally Posted by Alucard24

I don't think so : first they are the family who of course didn't forget and since it's not only one family, they would make enough noise to prevent the public to forget too.

And second, the hospital is filled with 8'000 player : I think it would not be easy for the doctors to forget about them since they probably take a lot place and need a lot of care !

They wouldn't be forgotten, but pressure to do something would be significantly less. Especially after the death rate dropped off from the initial 2000 in a month. There'd be a bit of a spike in news coverage on a particularly bad day where a relatively large number of people died, or a group of people that was close IRL died. But overall, coverage would be much lower.

And they wouldn't all be in a single hospital. Most hospitals don't just have 8000 beds lying around empty, and not all players are going to be from Tokyo. The time Kayaba gave them would be enough to transport players to a hospital, but not to transport everyone to the same hospital. So basically a bunch of major hospitals in Japan would have an "SAO ward", but no single hospital would be likely to have them be a majority of the patient population. The doctors wouldn't forget about them, but they'd basically be a bunch of coma patients.

Originally Posted by Dark Wing

Also while I'm at it I want to talking about the legal and social ramifications of getting married in SAO.

Now I know after two years of being stuck somewhere one would get really lonely and want to seek out some form of companionship so some people would settle down and choice to marry.

However the question is what happens when or if finally get out of the game?

Do they remain married?

Can the marriage even be considered legal and binding?

Also what if the couple happens to be minors when they marry could their parent or guardian step in and say no?

Yeah, like Clarste says, marriage in SAO would not be legally binding. It's just a game mechanic. Even if they could find someone that normally performs marriages IRL, marriage in the real world requires a fair bit of legal paperwork, signatures, and so forth that would not be able to be properly completed in the game.

People close enough to get married within the game would likely remain a couple and/or get married for real upon their return, but they'd still have to go through all the hoops a couple looking to get married normally would to have their union legally recognized.

Which could make for some strange conversations upon returning to the real world if you were married in game long enough to become accustom to thinking/referring to someone as your husband or wife, while as far as your family, and the rest of the world was concerned, they'd just be your boyfriend/girlfriend, not your spouse.

[NoemiChan]

Originally Posted by Dark Wing

Do they remain married?

Can the marriage even be considered legal and binding?

NO. Game is a game.... and marriage in SAO is part of it...

Originally Posted by Dark Wing

Also what if the couple happens to be minors when they marry could their parent or guardian step in and say no?

Yes. Minors are minors.

If they really love each other.. they could wait for the proper time then get married legally... that is with the support of your family is better right?

[Wild Goose]

What amuses me about all this discussion, is that the novels do address most of these real world issue. Let's just wait for the end of the anime, and all the questions will be definitively answered.

But the fun will be in seeing what we got right and what we got wrong. ;D

[ronelm2000]

Originally Posted by Wild Goose

What amuses me about all this discussion, is that the novels do address most of these real world issue. Let's just wait for the end of the anime, and all the questions will be definitively answered.

But the fun will be in seeing what we got right and what we got wrong. ;D

There's the slight probability that the anime will intentionally skip over it again.... but who'd wanna entertain that thought?

[Xellos-_^]

they might address it if GGO is animated. As that arc got into the legal ramification more then ALO ever did.

[Adigard]

Originally Posted by Xellos-_^

they might address it if GGO is animated. As that arc got into the legal ramification more then ALO ever did.

SAO S2 ftw!

Could happen, there certainly is enough materials for a second season of 24'ish eps. UW won't be animated, but everything else could be. I guess it all depends on the DVD/BD sales.

[ronelm2000]

Originally Posted by Adigard

SAO S2 ftw!

Could happen, there certainly is enough materials for a second season of 24'ish eps. UW won't be animated, but everything else could be. I guess it all depends on the DVD/BD sales.

UW is presumably the "last" i think...

...wait why are we discussing THAT here?!

[Kyuu]

Just looking at the first page, I see many people focused on legal implications on the players themselves.

How about the game creator?

He should be very much accountable for creating an entertainment product, in which, DEATH is a possibility. Devices exist, that are able to access (or even control) a person's mind. There should be all sorts of regulations pertaining to that, in relation to both privacy and safety. I'm only at eps 9; but by eps 5 or so, thousands of players had already died. Government cannot ignore a death count of that magnitude linked to a single 'cause.

This is the first thing I thought about in the first episode. To think, the devices do not permit users from exiting. This means, a person lost the right to live in the real world. Instead, people are forced to remain in the game world. That is in direct violation to freedom itself.

[Anh_Minh]

That's only relevant if you catch him.

[Andrewthelord]

he would be threated for kidnapping and mass murder.

[Kyuu]

Originally Posted by Anh_Minh

That's only relevant if you catch him.

Hey, it took 10 years or so to finally nail bin Laden. Thing about individuals who do these kinds of things -- they're not going to last long undetected. They'll be found eventually.

[Vmem]

Originally Posted by Kyuu

Hey, it took 10 years or so to finally nail bin Laden. Thing about individuals who do these kinds of things -- they're not going to last long undetected. They'll be found eventually.

It's a difficult question to answer without spoilers, finish watching the available anime :P

now I've been having this weird thought. so after a few weeks pass after SAO started, thousands of people have already died, that's thousands of NERVEGEAR helmets freed up for research in fully gov't funded (probably heavily privately funded as well) research to figure out how to get the rest of the trapped people out without killing them. now you mean to tell me the entire nation of Japan can't figure out this one puzzle over YEARS? I would've just put maybe 10 or 20 on manequins, turn them on and shoot parts with a gun or hit it with a hammer lol, eventually I'd find the right place to hit to disable the "microwave emitting" chip

[Oroboro]

Originally Posted by Vmem

It's a difficult question to answer without spoilers, finish watching the available anime :P

now I've been having this weird thought. so after a few weeks pass after SAO started, thousands of people have already died, that's thousands of NERVEGEAR helmets freed up for research in fully gov't funded (probably heavily privately funded as well) research to figure out how to get the rest of the trapped people out without killing them. now you mean to tell me the entire nation of Japan can't figure out this one puzzle over YEARS? I would've just put maybe 10 or 20 on manequins, turn them on and shoot parts with a gun or hit it with a hammer lol, eventually I'd find the right place to hit to disable the "microwave emitting" chip

If I had to hazard a guess, the microwave pulse probably fries the rest of the systems, as well as the booby traps that are likely in places, making used NervGears worthless hunks of junk.

For the gunshot option... too dangerous, maybe? Danger of a shockwave trauma / shrapnel to the brain, whatever.

[kyp275]

Originally Posted by Vmem

mow you mean to tell me the entire nation of Japan can't figure out this one puzzle over YEARS? I would've just put maybe 10 or 20 on manequins, turn them on and shoot parts with a gun or hit it with a hammer lol, eventually I'd find the right place to hit to disable the "microwave emitting" chip

Guess you're not really familiar with ballistics. Bullets don't behave like lasers, they don't keep going straight through when they hit stuff, least of all metals. When a round impacts a hard surface, it mushrooms/deforms (depending on the type of rounds), and then tumbles and/or bounces around. In other words, it's not something you want to use near anyone's head, much less on something they're wearing ON their head.

[Vmem]

Originally Posted by kyp275

Guess you're not really familiar with ballistics. Bullets don't behave like lasers, they don't keep going straight through when they hit stuff, least of all metals. When a round impacts a hard surface, it mushrooms/deforms (depending on the type of rounds), and then tumbles and/or bounces around. In other words, it's not something you want to use near anyone's head, much less on something they're wearing ON their head.

very true, I just raised that as an example as a possible solution. my main point is they essentially obtained 2000+ helmets to research on after only a few short weeks. advanced as nervegear maybe, it's still circuit boards wired to some sensors and emitters of electrical signal. Thus, even without going into the source program to shut it down internally, there should be some way to shut the units down directly.

anyway, I know it sorts ruins the story and I love SAO. but just wanted to point out how helpless the people in the real world seems in SAO

[Oroboro]

I think the human element has a lot to do with it too. If you do nothing and leave them alone, there's a decent chance they'll survive. But if you try to save them, there's a pretty good chance something goes wrong and you kill them, and this time their death is on your hands.

Suppose they get a decent idea on how to disarm the device from used copies. A couple families volunteer their loved ones, hoping for a miracle, but the first couple attempts are failures. There's a huge public backlash, and even if they feel like they might be getting close, nobody is willing, and they can't just go experimenting on people without friends or family.

This is all just speculation, but I think that's ultimately why the NervGear was never cracked. Because nobody wants the death of an innocent on their hands if they should fail.

[kyp275]

Originally Posted by Vmem

very true, I just raised that as an example as a possible solution. my main point is they essentially obtained 2000+ helmets to research on after only a few short weeks. advanced as nervegear maybe, it's still circuit boards wired to some sensors and emitters of electrical signal. Thus, even without going into the source program to shut it down internally, there should be some way to shut the units down directly.

anyway, I know it sorts ruins the story and I love SAO. but just wanted to point out how helpless the people in the real world seems in SAO

I know what you mean, it requires a degree of suspense of disbelief, mostly because the scenario relies on the super genius trope (Kayaba), which doesn't really pan out IRL.

That's just the way things go in fictional stories though :P

[Anh_Minh]

Originally Posted by Vmem

very true, I just raised that as an example as a possible solution. my main point is they essentially obtained 2000+ helmets to research on after only a few short weeks. advanced as nervegear maybe, it's still circuit boards wired to some sensors and emitters of electrical signal. Thus, even without going into the source program to shut it down internally, there should be some way to shut the units down directly.

anyway, I know it sorts ruins the story and I love SAO. but just wanted to point out how helpless the people in the real world seems in SAO

It's been talked to death already. All I'll say is that disarming bombs isn't a blue wire/red wire affair like in the movies.