Sword Art Online - Episode 2 Discussion / Poll

[OpenDoors]

Regarding the potion issue: in episode one when we see the boar and wolf kill, we see the hit, then the hp bar turns to red and drains. This is similar to some fighting games that I've played like Virtual Fighter 5 where after each hit the amount of life that would be lost is first turned to red and "drains".

As for the episode itself, as an anime-only viewer, I don't really see much wrong-doing except the sudden formation of teams to fight boss and the stills. Though in all honesty, the stills didn't feel that long and is typical of unnamed characters in anime. The main duo's attack animation picked up pretty fast after and is enjoyable to watch.

I do wish I live long enough to see such game developed lol.

[Polarpew]

Spoiler for Comparison to the novels:

And here I was complimenting Episode 1 last week about how closely it followed the novel. Now they completely butchered it in episode 2, leaving out The First Day, and more than 2 thirds of Aira of the Starless Night. Felt completely rushed, lots of things got cut like how Kirito was supposed to know Asuna before the boss meeting, and how he saved her from her suicidal mission in the dungeon. I'm seriously not looking forward to next week's Red Nosed Reindeer seeing how they butchered this episode. Wouldnt be surprised it starts halfway or more into the chapter.

It just occurred to me that it would have been fine if they followed Volume 1 exactly and use First Day, Aria of the Starless Night and all those chapters in volume 2 as flashback material or insert it when necessary into the main story. This way we get set up with vital information such as what kind of personality Kirito has and the characters around him. Still would have been perfect to start episode 2 with First Day, and then followed up with Aria and then continue volume 1

[Hypernova]

Originally Posted by Utsuro no Hako

It's not. But using that knowledge to your advantage in the real game -- getting to the good quests ahead of everyone and taking the best monster hunting zones while not using your knowledge to help n00bs -- is, especially when lives are on the line. Cactus Head does have a point -- the way Kirito (and apparently the other beta testers) ran off on the first day really killed the chance of organizing a single army to clear the game.

While I agree that the betas as a whole acted selfishly I would not go as far as to call it cheating, as the current logic is akin to calling someone a cheater at an exam because he studied all the past exams. And remember what that orange turd (as someone puts it so succinctly) said at the end of the first rant , he's sentiments IMO is largely from jealousy.

[Eratas123]

I'm calling him that because he's overgeneralizing ridiculously. "Any Beater is to immediately hand over all their item's and kiss our asses."

So if someone "played fair" so to say, but they were a beta tester, then they hand over all their items? Wow, great logic there.

[OceanBlue]

From all of the reactions, I was expecting an awful episode, but it wasn't that bad at all . It wasn't as amazing as the first episode but it was definitely entertaining. Maybe it's because I'm an anime-only watcher .

The potion thing was a bit dumb, but other than that I didn't really see a big issue. SAO is still among the top of the anime that I'll look forward to every week.

[novalysis]

It's not terrible from an Anime viewer perspective- certainly, a step down from the excellent Episode 1, but you've got to be terribly naive to believe that every episode of an anime would be top notch stuff- even Gurren Laagan and Madoka Magica, and Fate Zero never managed that.

From a LN viewer perspective, I do bemoan the fast pacing, and believe that this episode would have been told better as two episodes.

Spoiler for Missing Scenes in Aria:

- Asuna's Suicidal state of mind. Very huge characterization axed out here, though the Bred conversation did hint at that.

- The whole affair of Kirito's sword would have explained the BEATER issue better. And they should have shown us Kirito's internal thought processes on it at least - just mentioning Beta player "executions" would make Kirito's proclamation at the end a major character defining scene

That's the two biggest missing elements, and unfortunately, it made Beater a much more simplistic and less interesting than it could have been.

[Flere821]

My issues with the episode was basically how they didn't explain what a Beater (Beta Cheater) is, and you wouldn't have known unless you read the LNs. Or explain Kirito took it on himself to lessen the hate for Beta people and making himself into a scapegoat, a symbol of beta people that actually uses their info for selfish gains versus Beta players that apart from some more experience is just the same as the rest of them.

Asuna, well as a introduction to the main heroine (as evident from the OP and ED), it was kind of lack-lustre. From the episode we knows she's skilled with a sword, but knows nearly nothing about Virtual MMORPG games (eg, 'switch' and names under HP bar scenes). Hopefully future episodes will flesh out her character a bit more, for example like her background or her motivations.

[OceanBlue]

Originally Posted by Flere821

Or explain Kirito took it on himself to lessen the hate for Beta people and making himself into a scapegoat, a symbol of beta people that actually uses their info for selfish gains versus Beta players that apart from some more experience is just the same as the rest of them.

Everything else makes sense to me (although I think it's stuff that can be explained later as well, maybe aside from the Beater thing), but I kinda thought this was obvious. I didn't read the LN and it was really obvious to me why he did what he did. After all, why else would someone, after thinking about how everyone will start mistrusting each other, act completely out of character to garner the hate of everyone there?

[Meltyred]

Well for LN viewers we go mad due to the potential left out, but in as a Anime, it's going smoothly.
Hopefully we can get a much better RNR adaptation.
It better not be downplaying the emotional struggles Kirito goes through....

[zeniselv]

this thread reafirmed my belief that is something its getting an anime, dont read the original unless you already started, if so all you can do is pray.

[Qilin]

I'm pretty sure that this is where the flaws of the two mediums arise. This show has to strike the perfect balance between action and characterization, which might be hard given the each medium is better suited for different aspects of the story. Fate/Zero suffered from the exact same problems, I believe.

Originally Posted by novalysis

Spoiler for Missing Scenes in Aria:

- Asuna's Suicidal state of mind. Very huge characterization axed out here, though the Bred conversation did hint at that.

Spoiler for novel comparison:

I can see what you mean, but I don't see why it had to be tackled in this episode specifically. This episode did fairly well when it came to Kirito's characterization, and it helped that the entire episode was told from his point of view.

I'm pretty sure the show can find time to include Asuna's back story much later once her character becomes more relevant to the bigger picture. So yeah. I wouldn't be so quick to assume that the relevant characterization was "axed".

[The Green One]

Originally Posted by Meltyred

Well for LN viewers we go mad due to the potential left out, but in as a Anime, it's going smoothly.
Hopefully we can get a much better RNR adaptation.
It better not be downplaying the emotional struggles Kirito goes through....

Spoiler for Next Episode Spoiler:

Considering the storyline that's going to start in the next episode you'll have no worries about that. This is going to be the story that defines Kirito for quite some time to come....

Originally Posted by Qilin

I'm pretty sure that this is where the flaws of the two mediums arise. This show has to strike the perfect balance between action and characterization, which might be hard given the each medium is better suited for different aspects of the story. Fate/Zero suffered from the exact same problems, I believe.

Spoiler for novel comparison:

I can see what you mean, but I don't see why it had to be tackled in this episode specifically. This episode did fairly well when it came to Kirito's characterization, and it helped that the entire episode was told from his point of view.

I'm pretty sure the show can find time to include Asuna's back story much later once her character becomes more relevant to the bigger picture. So yeah. I wouldn't be so quick to assume that the relevant characterization was "axed".

Very true, this was going to be an inevitable problem.

Spoiler for Light novel comparison:

Though with only the first two episodes done so far it's unavoidable that we get paranoid about details, if certain stuff, some important and some not so important, are missing we can't help but start to fret about what else might be removed. I don't think the changes so far are so much upsetting as they are disappointing, I'm sure we'll all be back for more next week. We'll just have to give it a chance and see how well the medium translates, either way it should be a fun ride as we should have enough time to get the most important details.

[tomtkp]

I did not have high expectation when I saw the episode list indicating that Aria will only have one episode in the anime. But nonetheless, I enjoyed this second episode because of good action scenes.

So, this episode I give a 8/10. Weaker than the first episode but okay as well.

Next episode, the anime will head into the side stories of Volume 2 with the first story being "Red-Nosed Reindeer". I am really looking forward to this episode as a LN fans.

[MrTerrorist]

-sigh-

Why is it that novels readers complained about everything on an episode that adapted a scene when the episode was very good? (eg. The Blackwater episode in Game of Thrones. Best episode of the season yet still complained by a few Songs of Fire and Ice novel fans over certain things.) Just view the various media as something different and not the same juts the Hellboy movies and comics; very different yet very good.

Well, anyway, as an anime viewer, I love this episode. A very action pack and character development episode. I love how it portrays Kirito who was only thinking himself and realize how selfish he was compared to Diabel who cared about the other players. When there was distrust and possibly infighting between the beta players and new players, Kirito placed the blame on himself as a no good cheater who didn't care about others so everyone focus their hatred on him.

Asuna's introduction was great. I admired her quick swordplay while possibly seeing Kirito was no bad guy.

Also, Yuki Kajura's music is till lovely. 10 out of 10.

[Kafriel]

As an AO viewer, I felt the rush in the first few minutes and honestly expected Kirito to take his sweet time in towns and fields before braving the tower floors. Still, the pace got better afterwards, they practically formed an expedition of many parties to beat the boss and we got some exposure on the few introduced characters so far.

Two things I don't get: 1) why didn't Diabel take Kirito's potion? He definitely knew he'd die and there's nothing to gain from his death, sooo...yeah. 2) Why did people call Kirito a cheater? Cheaters in MMOs are hackers and scammers, what he did was conceal information about the game, which could have changed since beta anyway.

I also don't get the general hate and fear towards beta testers, if Kirito really was the best of them and only got up to 8F, they probably know nothing about the actual game, since they always take 20 levels or so before entering a meta state.

Anyways, I actually found the episode very good; love the OP/ED, controlled use of stills to cut some slack without ruining the battles, nice tracks to boost the tension and enough plot to give the viewers something to look forward to. Asuna is a rapier user, so she's got my attention :P

[Archon_Wing]

Ah, people were too noob and died already. >.>

Let's hope there's no bugs/lag, for that will be fatal. Solid episode again, and the pacing is very neat.

[Pocari_Sweat]

Once again LN readers are complaining. Really guys, this is an ANIME. Changes must be made. Do we really need 2-3 episodes for the FIRST boss. This might be a 2cour series but there's a shit-ton of material to cover so I'm congratulating A-1 and its production staff for choosing to do this one episode. It was a bit brisk yeah, but it covered everything it needed pretty well.

A side character dies, moe girl Asuna takes off her hoodie and goes badass mode and Kirito also does a badass speech of his own when someone accuses him of being a beta tester. I seriously lold and applauded when he was like "I'm a beta tester. So what? U MAD?" Also I was amused at all the RPG terminologies. Having played Ultima Online, Everquest, World of Warcraft and a bunch of other MMOs in the past, it makes feel right at home

Badass, strong and generally non-wimpy males are pretty rare in anime these days so it's very refreshing to see someone like Kirito. This was one of the primary reasons I couldn't enjoy Accel World (let alone the MC being fat) and any character with Yuki Kaiji as VA is assumed default bad unless proven in my books. Kirito is also not "lawful good" or a "play by the books" kinda person too, which is awesome to see. I love characters who take initiative and make their own decisions.

Asuna was pretty badass too (on top of being pretty moe), and I'm sure we'll be seeing a lot of further development from her in the future.

Excellent followup to the first ep.

[creb]

I thought it was pretty good, and did a decent job of capturing the MMO feel. If it seems more positive than the typical western MMO "pug", I'll attribute that to what I've been told is a far greater willingness to group up with others in asian MMOs played in asia.

It did bring back fond memories, a decade past, when strangers in western MMOs overwhelmingly helped each other, rather than ignore each other.

I'm a little unclear as to whether he put on an act there at the end or not. I feel like he did, though I'm not sure what the point was, other than possibly defusing the ugly situation by sheer blunt force of personality (and also serving as cover for any other beta testers that may have been afraid to speak up).

[FlareKnight]

Originally Posted by OceanBlue

From all of the reactions, I was expecting an awful episode, but it wasn't that bad at all . It wasn't as amazing as the first episode but it was definitely entertaining. Maybe it's because I'm an anime-only watcher .

The potion thing was a bit dumb, but other than that I didn't really see a big issue. SAO is still among the top of the anime that I'll look forward to every week.

Yeah, kind of weird coming out of that episode pretty satisfied to find the reactions here . I thought it did a fine job following up on the first episode and starting to show how the people in that world are adapting to their situation. Some seem to be hiding in the first town afraid to take action and some are charging on ahead, though clearly with more caution than they would in a normal game.

I didn't expect the Beta testers to get so much hate. Figured that most would be focusing their anger at the guy who has trapped them in this death game. Though maybe I shouldn't be too surprised since hating on people who they can see is easier than someone they can't reach.

Kirito really did a good job playing the villain there. Just had to enjoy him shutting up Kibaou. God that idiot really annoyed me in this one. Pretty much forced Kirito to act like that so the hate would shift from Beta Testers in general towards him. Though of course Kirito knows that doing this is going to be hurting his chances to survive since (presumably) few are going to be eager to team up with a Beater. Doing a good thing for others just added to his personal suffering. In a sense he probably just told the truth with a negative attitude. Like he told Klein he made it up a few several floors so he certainly would have seen different enemy types and have greater experience than the average beta player. Just taking in all that hatred so people can focus on what really matters which is cooperating in order to get out of the game alive.

Definitely curious about Asuna's character. While I could understand some preferring to take action than sitting and losing themselves, seems to be more to it with her. Preferring to die in a fight than hanging around in that first town. Definitely has plenty of skill despite the fact that she doesn't apparently know much about these games.

I thought the fight was alright. Didn't even think much of the still shots since when Kirito and Asuna were in the action they stole the show.

Have to say this series will be interesting to watch. Just think the idea of real death along side health bars and in an MMO environment will be interesting. Can literally see someone's life draining away in this series.

Anyways I thought it was a solid episode.

[com_gwp]

Originally Posted by Pocari_Sweat

Once again LN readers are complaining. Really guys, this is an ANIME. Changes must be made. Do we really need 2-3 episodes for the FIRST boss. This might be a 2cour series but there's a shit-ton of material to cover so I'm congratulating A-1 and its production staff for choosing to do this one episode. It was a bit brisk yeah, but it covered everything it needed pretty well.

We get that things have to be changed, but with little tweaks in the writing here and there, they could've included things that would've made

1)The characterization of Asuna a hell lot more interesting then just a badass heroine
2)The concept of beaters much more significant, and Diabel not-so-noble final act a lot more understandable. The guy came off far too much like a white knight by the end, which made Kirito seem like he was carrying on his will, when really in the original story Kirito made a extremely huge personal sacrifice at that point.

Otherwise, from anime-only view, it's a perfectly fine episode, not quite as good as the first, but decent in it's own right. It's because we read the novels that we see wasted potential, what could've been left out and what should've been prioritised to make the episode even better.