Sword Art Online - Episode 11 Discussion / Poll

[relentlessflame]

Originally Posted by Dr. Casey

Kirito, stop being such a stereotypical male and stop getting bored your first month in a relationship.

Well, I'm not sure if it's just that. I know that when I go on vacation, the last thing I want to do is be run ragged doing this and that. My idea of a great vacation is just go somewhere far away and not have to do anything, at least for the first week or so. Meanwhile, Asuna's a bit more of an extrovert, and she wants to spend her time doing all the things she's always wanted to do but never had time for, and to him that's probably just as tiring as what he was doing before the vacation. So to me this is just a basic personality conflict they'll eventually have to come to terms with. I'm sure he enjoys the company, but his idea of "the perfect vacation" might just be a quiet cottage with just the two of them. It does go to show how little they really know each other outside of the usual context... but getting to know each other (and learning to cope with how much you're annoyed by the other person's quirks) is half the fun of a relationship.

[Rakshasa]

Originally Posted by Metaneo

Good episode if u ask me, though I have to say mentally, does Yui appear to be younger then her appearance would imply?

She's traumatized beyond anything we can imagine, even if we knew the details of what happened.

Basically she's probably spent 2 years in sensory deprivation.

[Endless Soul]

Originally Posted by Metaneo

On the topic of Yui, does it seem odd to anyone else that Heathcliff said that Kirito & Asuna that the two would soon return to battle, then suddenly they find a reason in Yui, to free her from this world as soon as possible?

I think that's it's highly improbable that Healthcliff knows about Yui, however, I think that's a very interesting thought. Thanks to Yui, they're encouraged to finish the game as quickly as possible.

Endless "Suffering from nickname laziness" Soul

[Kamui04]

Originally Posted by Dr. Casey

And damn, these are the slowest RPG players ever. I fancy myself an RPG expert, and I can't think of any RPG where I couldn't easily grind to the max level in two years and curbstomp the boss.

Young you're my little padawan, your profile it reveals. uhmm.

Well for starters theres a little write up about how different would SAO be if it were written now than in the early 2000's. http://randomc.net/2012/09/12/specia...written-today/

Back in the late 90's, early 00's games like Everquest, RO and FFXI were designed for the more hardcore gamers and to be a Big time sink, to keep player subscriptions over the months. Thus they had a very steep exp curve.

I remember that back then it took me almost a year to reach the lvl 75 cap of FFXI and I was playing 6-8 hours daily. And also take into account that dying in those games although it bore a penalty it wasn't as bad as death in SAO . From statistics provided to each player on a yearly basis, I think I had died over a thousand times. SAO being real death you'd expect people to be more cautious in their approach after the first month where maybe a lot of beta testers or those not cautious enough were weeded out.

[Somnus]

Originally Posted by Kamui04

Young you're my little padawan, your profile it reveals. uhmm.

Well for starters theres a little write up about how different would SAO be if it were written now than in the early 2000's. http://randomc.net/2012/09/12/specia...written-today/

Back in the late 90's, early 00's games like Everquest, RO and FFXI were designed for the more hardcore gamers and to be a Big time sink, to keep player subscriptions over the months. Thus they had a very steep exp curve.

I remember that back then it took me almost a year to reach the lvl 75 cap of FFXI and I was playing 6-8 hours daily. And also take into account that dying in those games although it bore a penalty it wasn't as bad as death in SAO . From statistics provided to each player on a yearly basis, I think I had died over a thousand times. SAO being real death you'd expect people to be more cautious in their approach after the first month where maybe a lot of beta testers or those not cautious enough were weeded out.

Thanks for posting that, Kamui. I agree completely.

SAO is definitely reminiscent of the old model of MMO's. As I've said several times throughout the threads, I was an avid player of RO back in my high school days (when it had only been in North America for about a year). Playing on the official server for the first six months was unbelievably fun, but even after all that I hadn't even reached level 25 (I think the cap was 90?).

It was only when it went pay, and I switched to a private server (with much higher exp rates, but still exponentially slower than today's models) for the several years to follow that I was able to cap out after some considerable time. Also, don't get me started on the bosses, or simply some of the monsters. One wrong move/click and you were toast. Add a perma-death element to all of that, and there's no question as to why it's taken them this long.

On a more positive note, I did also foster a bunch of fantastic friendships due to the long journey, and joined some pretty tight-knit guilds. Which SAO is capturing very well, in my opinion.

The only issue I do have with your post though, is the fact that I'm younger than that poster and I have knowledge of "the good old days", haha.

Fun Fact: Don't get me started on finding rare items in those days. I was looking for a card (upgrade item in RO) once, and it took me 3 weeks of killing the same enemy to get it. This was on said private server, which already had a multiplier on the drop rates.

[Rising Dragon]

Originally Posted by Metaneo

For all we know there could be an incredibally high exp curve, exponentially so. I dont think Kayaba intended anyone to be able to clear this "game" of his very quickly or easily.

A part of it is likely fear--it's getting tougher and tougher as they progress up the game, and many would get afraid of being killed by higher-level monsters, so they leave the front lines as they grow more accustomed to living in Aincrad.

Originally Posted by Metaneo

On the topic of Yui, does it seem odd to anyone else that Heathcliff said that Kirito & Asuna that the two would soon return to battle, then suddenly they find a reason in Yui, to free her from this world as soon as possible?

Originally Posted by Endless Soul

I think that's it's highly improbable that Healthcliff knows about Yui, however, I think that's a very interesting thought. Thanks to Yui, they're encouraged to finish the game as quickly as possible.

Endless "Suffering from nickname laziness" Soul

Well, Asuna seemed to think Heathcliff knew something they didn't. Remember when Kirito brought it up, she immediately thought back to Heathcliff and what he said?

[Rakshasa]

Originally Posted by Rising Dragon

Well, Asuna seemed to think Heathcliff knew something they didn't. Remember when Kirito brought it up, she immediately thought back to Heathcliff and what he said?

He knew they would pretty soon get restless and feel the need to do something, as Kirito seemed to be at the beginning before getting distracted by the Yui case.

[Anh_Minh]

Asuna in particular would feel guilty about not only leaving the frontlines, but taking Kirito away from them.

[GundamZZ]

Originally Posted by Rakshasa

He knew they would pretty soon get restless and feel the need to do something, as Kirito seemed to be at the beginning before getting distracted by the Yui case.

Yeah, and that El Shaddai Enoch guy becomes one of Kirito's secret admirers. After reviewing all clues from past days, Asuna claims "In the name of my grandfather, I will solves this case!"

[Dengar]

I really don't see how people think this Heathcliff guy's so suspicious.


He just knows people. His guess that they'd be back before long isn't that strange if you know about their personality alone.


He's the leader of THE frontline guild. You don't get to be THAT badass by having a high level alone.

[larethian]

Originally Posted by Wild Goose

No, because the specifics of what I'm discussing with novel information were all monologues from Kirito and Didn't occur during this episode. The harrassment window was monologued during the kiss - that's a past episode. The novels never explore the question of attacking players going to jail, and the information I used came up during Kirito's duel with Kuradeel, another past episode.

Question is asked and I attempt to answer, and mark that I am using LN information that more often than not comes from monologues that are not animated, and that this is my speculation/best guess given what I know.

I can't say for other people, but I do my best to leave spoilers for future episodes out of it. But the fact that pretty much everything is considered a spoiler is just... I have no more words.

Even if what you posted is from a past event or cut out monologue, if it provides supplementary information of a nature that aids in speculation of a future event, it is still considered an offending spoiler as far as I know. Anime-only viewers are supposed to speculate with what they have from the show itself, even if they are not as complete as that of the novel. Of course, in this post I quoted regarding harassment, it isn't of such a nature at this stage of the show as far as I can remember so I guess this particular piece of information is fine. But not necessarily so for other 'cut out' events and information. Just because the author wants to give 'hints' to the readers doesn't mean that the anime team wants to do the same, nor do all anime-only viewers appreciate the 'extra' clues which a reader think should have been adapted into an episode.

[grey_moon]

Originally Posted by Dr. Casey

And damn, these are the slowest RPG players ever. I fancy myself an RPG expert, and I can't think of any RPG where I couldn't easily grind to the max level in two years and curbstomp the boss.

I keep mentioning it, but check out Shin Megami Tensei Imagine... The Japanese server is much worse then Int as gears cost much much more. Japanese MMO with eq damage, and limited high end resources. Even if you were willing to splash real case some items just don't exist, or at least their owners won't part with them.

People been playing this game for years (beta in 2008), and only a few are on the max level.

[Gearhead]

Originally Posted by Somnus

SAO is definitely reminiscent of the old model of MMO's.

The writer's gamer pedigree starts with Ultima Online, this should tell you something about how Aincrad operates.

[Netto Azure]

Originally Posted by Gearhead

The writer's gamer pedigree starts with Ultima Online, this should tell you something about how Aincrad operates.

I've recently started playing MMO's again (Dragon Nest ans STO) and was quite surprised at how easy it was to reach the level cap and access some good gear. It's certainly a contrast to my old pRO days. I remember grinding for weeks just to get first job o.o

So yeah based on that article and how Ultima and RO influenced the author, SAO is definitely designed to be a lot harder than today's more casual leaning MMO's. Certainly back then when SAO and .Hack were concieved nobody could have forseen how much influence WoW would have to the industry and how the F2P model would necessitate a more "easier" gameplay.

[Wild Goose]

Originally Posted by larethian

Even if what you posted is from a past event or cut out monologue, if it provides supplementary information of a nature that aids in speculation of a future event, it is still considered an offending spoiler as far as I know. Anime-only viewers are supposed to speculate with what they have from the show itself, even if they are not as complete as that of the novel. Of course, in this post I quoted regarding harassment, it isn't of such a nature at this stage of the show as far as I can remember so I guess this particular piece of information is fine. But not necessarily so for other 'cut out' events and information. Just because the author wants to give 'hints' to the readers doesn't mean that the anime team wants to do the same, nor do all anime-only viewers appreciate the 'extra' clues which a reader think should have been adapted into an episode.

Hence the spoiler tags, that I use. If you click on them, the choice is yours - I am not holding a gun to your head, forcing you to read the spoilers.

At the same time anime viewers don't appreciate additional information, novel readers don't appreciate being treated like pariahs just because they have a different perspective on things.

I'm sure this would make any discussion of, say, Black Hawk Down or Band of Brothers difficult, what with how much was cut out and changed to adapt both books.

[Znail]

Yeah, old MMO's was quite different. Old EverQuest was deffinitly a typical one there as the name was quite telling about how long everything took. Things were quite intentionally made to be as hard as possible. Get a new spell, what does it do? It's not like newer games with tooltips etc, you were just told a name and got an icon as only clue about what it did. The most informative was actually the color of the icon as it told you if it was ment to be cast on friends or enemies and if it was an area spell etc.

Got a quest to talk to some guy, you know that means that there is some dude in the entire game that will want to talk to you, but it's not like you will see a '?' above the head or something. You just have to run around and try every single person around. In some cases so did you have to check the entire world, including toiwns where you were attacked on sight.

Did you miss the boat? It's ok, there will be another one in 30 mins or so

[chaos_alfa]

Originally Posted by Dr. Casey

Ah, young love. This was a very warm and relaxing episode, and Yui's damn adorable. I was glad whenever Asuna chided Kirito whenever he asked if their relationship was real just because it takes place in virtual reality, that was a dumb thing to say and reminiscent of the "You can't make friends on the internet, what if the person you're speaking to is secretly an overweight 95 year old serial killer rapist??????" attitude that's always annoyed me (though thankfully it's much less pervasive during the 2010s than the 2000s). Kirito doesn't exactly seem Asuna's equal when it comes to romance in general, though...

Asuna: Ne~ Kirito-kun~ Let's play~
Kirito: Damn bitch you clingy, we played the last two days in a row, get off my nuts already

Kirito, stop being such a stereotypical male and stop getting bored your first month in a relationship.

And damn, these are the slowest RPG players ever. I fancy myself an RPG expert, and I can't think of any RPG where I couldn't easily grind to the max level in two years and curbstomp the boss.

The question would then be, can you also do the same thing without dying once?

[ronelm2000]

Originally Posted by chaos_alfa

The question would then be, can you also do the same thing without dying once?

Here's a nice little comparison for food of thought:

I have played an open source game called Transcedence, which is a pass through several solar systems to get to the epilogue of the story. Sounds similar? Anyway, on first walkthrough (Not knowing anything) I finished the entire thing in around 2 weeks. Deaths? Over 300. Second walkthrough, I installed a mod that changes the number of solar systems ro...Around 50. And it's non-linear as well. It took me around 2 months to finish... requiring the shortcuts I already knew from the 1st walkthrough. (Btw i had 1000+ Deaths)

Okay, come permadeath policy on the entire thing. You know what? I've played it for 6 months and I still couldnt finish it (Being careful and all)

That's probably what's happening in SAO right now.

[Tempest35]

Episode was nice. It's okay Kirito - it's what happens when you get a hyper-active girlfriend. She wants to do everything that couples do within the first month. That aside, they'll make it. Their personalities aren't that far off and they compliment each other: Asuna being hyper-active and Kirito being largely reactive among other things.

That said, Asuna's 'Mama Bear' moment was sweeet~ Poking the guy so hard he collapses. XD Do not threaten kids around Asuna - period. I'm sure that Kirito had a, "I'm glad I married her," moment.

[larethian]

Originally Posted by Wild Goose

Hence the spoiler tags, that I use. If you click on them, the choice is yours - I am not holding a gun to your head, forcing you to read the spoilers.

At the same time anime viewers don't appreciate additional information, novel readers don't appreciate being treated like pariahs just because they have a different perspective on things.

I'm sure this would make any discussion of, say, Black Hawk Down or Band of Brothers difficult, what with how much was cut out and changed to adapt both books.

I'm not even sure what you are asserting makes any sense since the spoiler tag of your post just before my previous post was not even labeled properly to protect audience who don't want to be spoiled on certain things. You just mentioned it was a 'cut out' info from a past adapted chapter but any anime-only watcher who opened it while thinking it will not spoil something future will get a critical hint on a future piece of information not originally provided by the anime. It is almost like bait for me to open it, say if I'm a person who wants to know what was cut out from the 'murder case' chapter as implied by the label, but when in actual fact don't want to get hints that might spoil my enjoyment on a future revelation. And come to think of it, the author wasn't even hinting to the novel readers in that chapter since it was actually published later... But you providing that piece of information actually made it a hint to anime-only viewers since the order of presentation is different.

Hence separate thread(s) were created for the novel readers to discuss what they want to discuss about the episode, and anime-only viewers who want to know more without minding spoilers will actually visit those threads.