Sword Art Online... I mean, c'mon. Really?

[Trippy Turtle]

I liked it for the HUD and cool fights.
If they took out the harem stuff, almost all the dialogue, yui and just focused more on the game and guild interactions I would have liked it more.

It just goes to show, girls truly ruin everything.
[sub]Kidding, kidding.[/sub]

 

[CrystalShadow]

Eh. It's not a great series. Quite bad in fact. But, people hate on it largely because it's inexplicably popular.

You knowwhat though? A lot of the problems stem directly from Kirito.
The last arc, 'mothers Rosario' proves this beyond any doubt, given that firstly it is about an order of magnitude better than anything else in the series, and secondly, Kirito is barely present at all. (next to no screentime whatsoever)

Instead, we get a story about Asuna, her struggles with the dissaproval of her mother, and her getting to know a girl with a kinda messed up secret she's keeping.

Anyway, a lot of anime is like this. A lot of it in fact leans incredibly heavily on some really perverted stuff...
But, there are better things hidden away in amongst all that.
In recent memory I've been watching 'is this a zombie' Which started out as some really crazy extremely perverted dumb comedy, but ironically tones down the perversion in favour of something with a little more... Heart to it. (still pretty perverted though)
The other thing was Death Parade, which is something much more mature. And explores death, and what the point of it all is. Though it refuses to be clear about anything, so it leaves ut all ambiguous. Which is for the best, but also a little frustrating. XD

The contrast though, in tone and quality between those things is extreme.

So while SAO has more in common with the former (though not as openly perverted), it is the latter that makes Anime worthwile to me.
I don't mind the dumb, badly written perverted stuff. It can be an amusing diversion.
But it's telling I'll drop such a thing almost immediately in favour of something better. And if something is truly good, I often fibd myself binge-watching it.

Anyway, getting back to SAO, it's badly written ecen in it's source material. The irony is how such things become so popular.
That Mother's Rosario is better in thus case is perhaps ironically enough, because it's filler.

havinF said that, SAO could pick up from here, because the next story arc was written much later than the early ones, and the author behind it is quite a bit older and wiser. (and less horny. XD)

Popular series always seem to raise awkward questions though.
Why do people like Naruto so much?
Of course, that's different in a sense, given that Naruto's biggest problem is being about 50-60% badly written filler.
Strip out the filler, and pare it back to what the author wrote, and it's actually a decent series. It has moments of brilliance even. Though ultimarely it did fall apart, it could be said to have been a good story for quite a lot of it's run.
The anime though... Pads out the good buts with so much rubbish, you need the patience of a saint to wade through it all to find the good stuff.

Anime is weird.

 

[MDSnowman]

The show had a lot of promise, and was at its best when it was at its darkest. However, they ended the first story arc WAY too abruptly and started a second one that, by design, couldn't be long enough to really stand on its own.

 

[BeerTent]

Welcome to about 80% of anime I've watched. "I'M going to use my rainbow-wind slash!" Kind of reminds me of schoolyard battles, where we're pretending we're heroes or something. Kids, fucking retarded, aren't they?

On the SAO thing? I actually kind of liked it. It had it's faults, it was a little weird here and there, and the concepts was amazing.

Aaand then the marriage thing happened. Okay, new direction. This is still okay. Kind of works with the setting, it's probably been a while.

Aaand then Kirito gets involved back in going up the floors. We're missing something here, it's the old stuff, yeah, but the writing's getting pretty damn lazy. and it's starting to feel like a really shitty anime instead of just a funky one.

Aaaand then Kirito beats the game. Okay. That came fucking fast. I knew that they were going with an emotional sort of thing but that was a pretty bad ending. Seriously. His "Feelings" beat the code? Maybe that's just me, but damn that came pretty abrupt.

After the end of the game, yeah, we can explore some pretty interesting ideas here. Crippling fear of online games, severely atrophied body, trying to find his "wife." There's a lot of really cool shit we can explore here! We're going back to a pretty interesting setting here!

Elfhiem. Nope, I'm fucking done. Rock bottom is like, Can't even see it anymore it's so far above us now.

I can kind of take the protagonist is good at everything. The harem thing, okay it's anime. I've yet to find one where at least one of these is not the case. I can't say SAO didn't have a good idea, that it didn't have it's moments. (Black Cats Clan come to mind.) But fck me after a while that went downhill, didn't it?

As others have said, this is pretty late on the bandwagon. I haven't watched anything beyond Elfhiem, because, Jesus, no thanks.

 

[Katherine Kerensky]

I enjoyed the series up until the pointy-eared bastards arrived.
I hate elves. And that hatred extends to the other humanoids with pointy ears. Like faeries.
So, the actual SAO part of the series was entertaining for me. The rest wasn't bad, but still, not as good in my eyes.

 

[Smooth Operator]

Ya that is the vast majority of anime writing. Which is why I am still very convinced anime characters are written by an alien who got all his information on humans from reality TV, so he makes very odd caricature persona's who resemble people only in the broadest sense.
But hey as long as they got that over the top style and fighting I will be there to enjoy all it's glory.

 

[VanQ]

We have this thread nearly every week and we are getting exceptionally efficient at it. Is SAO the new Anita Sarkeesian?

 

[CrystalShadow]

My friend, have you consi-

I'm more of a fan of LOG HORIZON

Well it looks like my work here is done. Log Horizon was written by someone who has actually played an MMO before

You know what's ironic here? Both series were apparently based on the work of the same person...
Yeah. Just let that sink in for a moment... >_>

 

[VanQ]

My friend, have you consi-

I'm more of a fan of LOG HORIZON

Well it looks like my work here is done. Log Horizon was written by someone who has actually played an MMO before

You know what's ironic here? Both series were apparently based on the work of the same person...
Yeah. Just let that sink in for a moment... >_>

You're thinking of Accel World, Reki Kawahara's second series which got popular before SAO. Log Horizon was written by Mamare Touno. All three shows have their ups and downs but are different enough that I don't get why they keep being compared to one another.

 

[CrystalShadow]

My friend, have you consi-

I'm more of a fan of LOG HORIZON

Well it looks like my work here is done. Log Horizon was written by someone who has actually played an MMO before

You know what's ironic here? Both series were apparently based on the work of the same person...
Yeah. Just let that sink in for a moment... >_>

You're thinking of Accel World, Reki Kawahara's second series which got popular before SAO. Log Horizon was written by Mamare Touno. All three shows have their ups and downs but are different enough that I don't get why they keep being compared to one another.

Ah right my bad.

And if they get compared, it's because of superficial resemblance and vague similarities in concept.
It's a bit like comparing the terminator with bicentennial man because both involve cyborgs...
But that's as far as some people ever get. Especially if they've not really watched what they are comparing.

 

[bluegate]

My friend, have you consi-

I'm more of a fan of LOG HORIZON

Well it looks like my work here is done. Log Horizon was written by someone who has actually played an MMO before

Haven't watched more than the first season of Log Horizon, and that first season was little more than every character jerking off to how amazing four eyes was and four eyes' inner dialogue spelling out how fucking awesome he was, almost every episode. Sure, they might have gotten the MMO details right more than SAO did, but they are both pretty much on the same level of crappy writing in my book.

As for SAO... just nope, nope nope nope.

 

[Scars Unseen]

Welcome to anime. No subtlety allowed, please check your willing suspension of disbelief at the door.

That's pretty unfair to anime, there's tons and tons of it out there that exist as superior properties compared to SAO.

But I guess that doesn't really say much considering SAO is basically the nadir of entertainment. The most that can be said about SAO is that it looks pretty and flashy, but look at it from any other angle and you'll see how painfully 2 dimensional it is.

I actually like a lot of anime series, but as a whole it tends to be formulaic, badly written and incredibly poorly paced.

Falsename's OP summed up one of my major complaints with anime: The badly written and repetitive dialogue (or, more often, internal monologue) where the characters go on and fucking on about shit that was painfully obvious to begin with. And it's all just the same fucking thing anyway. In fact, here. Let me show you how easy it is to write a climactic anime fight.

[snip]

The moral of the story is, anime is kinda bad.

Allow me to introduce you to something called Sturgeon's Law. [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sturgeon%27s_law] Anime isn't any more bad than anything else is when looked at as a whole.

Anyway... yeah, SAO had an interesting start followed by bucket loads of meh. In similar premises, DanMachi does basically the same thing without being crap(though there is a lot of fan service, so if that's a hang up then...), and the currently airing Overlord tackles the premise from another angle, as the main character is more of an antihero in a Dungeon Keeper type of setup.

Spoiler: No seriously, the MC of Overlord is basically Skeletor

 

[Fox12]

Son, you may wish to sit down for the massive bombshell imma bout to drop on you...

People. Can. Like. Different. Things. Than. You.

Holy shit balls I almost blew my own mind with that amazing logic. It's almost like people can like different things than you, with zero need to defend why they like it. This thread has no point, other than you to say "I think SAO is bad and everyone should know about it. Cause it's not like I'm the thousandth person on the internet to do so."

That doesn't make his criticism invalid. And he never said people couldn't like it. He simply stated the issues with the show. There's nothing wrong with valid criticism.

Also, he can't be that much younger then you that you get to call him "son." : P

Anyway, this is old news. SAO is bad. Most shonen/harem are bad. Do yourself a favor and skip them.

 

[Elfgore]

Son, you may wish to sit down for the massive bombshell imma bout to drop on you...

People. Can. Like. Different. Things. Than. You.

Holy shit balls I almost blew my own mind with that amazing logic. It's almost like people can like different things than you, with zero need to defend why they like it. This thread has no point, other than you to say "I think SAO is bad and everyone should know about it. Cause it's not like I'm the thousandth person on the internet to do so."

That doesn't make his criticism invalid. And he never said people couldn't like it. He simply stated the issues with the show. There's nothing wrong with valid criticism.

Also, he can't be that much younger then you that you get to call him "son." : P

Anyway, this is old news. SAO is bad. Most shonen/harem are bad. Do yourself a favor and skip them.

Except here's the thing, we've all heard pretty much this exact criticism again and again oh, and again. Each time it feels like the person saying is thinking they just dropped a bombshell of ungodly proportions on us. No, we know. We still like it with all its faults, most of which are valid. We just get sick of hearing it all constantly.

 

[Dalrien]

Welcome to anime. No subtlety allowed, please check your willing suspension of disbelief at the door.

That's pretty unfair to anime, there's tons and tons of it out there that exist as superior properties compared to SAO.

But I guess that doesn't really say much considering SAO is basically the nadir of entertainment. The most that can be said about SAO is that it looks pretty and flashy, but look at it from any other angle and you'll see how painfully 2 dimensional it is.

I actually like a lot of anime series, but as a whole it tends to be formulaic, badly written and incredibly poorly paced.

Falsename's OP summed up one of my major complaints with anime: The badly written and repetitive dialogue (or, more often, internal monologue) where the characters go on and fucking on about shit that was painfully obvious to begin with. And it's all just the same fucking thing anyway. In fact, here. Let me show you how easy it is to write a climactic anime fight.

1. Put the protagonist in a room with an antagonist. The antagonist is too strong for the protagonist to beat ohhh noooo!

2. Show at least ten minutes of flashbacks explaining the antagonist's backstory and motivations, because you literally just pulled this character out of your ass and haven't had time to develop him/her but have to at least pretend you want the audience to relate to him/her.

3. Have the protagonist monologue internally about his own motivations that you've already established a hundred times. You can do this either while the protagonist and antagonist glare at each other, or while you're recycling a three frame loop of them trying to hit each other. If you're feeling REALLY ballsy, play the monologue over actual new footage of the fight!

4. Show at least 50 fucking reaction shots of the side characters whenever the protagonist or antagonist do a thing.

5. Have the protagonist and antagonist run at each other screaming and hit each other at the same time, and then do the thing where they're standing facing away from each other for a couple of minutes and then one of them falls. Then more reaction shots.

6. The protagonist wins because of the power of his/her determination to do the thing! Hooray!

There. You now know the formula behind every anime fight. Variables include the protagonist losing but then coming back stronger, the antagonist joining the protagonist's side, and the protagonist being sad the antognist died/lost because of whatever backstory you pulled out of your ass.

The moral of the story is, anime is kinda bad.

I see your anime experience consist of Naruto, Bleach, SAO, Tokyo Ghoul and Fairy tail amongs others.

Worry not, the plebs will believe your dastardly words.

 

[NiPah]

There are very few things in this world I don't enjoy, pretty much every anime I watch is better then the last, yet when I rewatch older shows they're just as good if not better then previous viewings. Sword Art Online was an amazing show, beautiful artwork, characters that I really enjoyed, an engrossing story that kept me on the edge of my seat, it's great. Honestly I was initially turned off of log horizon just because the number of annoying people saying SAO is horrid LH is great, ended up watching LH and really enjoyed it as well, life is good (also .Hack was great, still have the old bandai DVDs).

 

[Fox12]

Son, you may wish to sit down for the massive bombshell imma bout to drop on you...

People. Can. Like. Different. Things. Than. You.

Holy shit balls I almost blew my own mind with that amazing logic. It's almost like people can like different things than you, with zero need to defend why they like it. This thread has no point, other than you to say "I think SAO is bad and everyone should know about it. Cause it's not like I'm the thousandth person on the internet to do so."

That doesn't make his criticism invalid. And he never said people couldn't like it. He simply stated the issues with the show. There's nothing wrong with valid criticism.

Also, he can't be that much younger then you that you get to call him "son." : P

Anyway, this is old news. SAO is bad. Most shonen/harem are bad. Do yourself a favor and skip them.

Except here's the thing, we've all heard pretty much this exact criticism again and again oh, and again. Each time it feels like the person saying is thinking they just dropped a bombshell of ungodly proportions on us. No, we know. We still like it with all its faults, most of which are valid. We just get sick of hearing it all constantly.

There's nothing wrong with liking an objectively bad show. I loved Mirai Nikki, despite its numerous flaws and laps in logic. Sometimes even because of it. I could pick that series apart all the live long day, and still enjoy it. SAO is like McDonald's. It's not good for you, but it can be fun all the same. The only time I would get offended is if the OP is deliberately belligerent.

 

[FPLOON]

...And I thought people were complaining about the dub alongside people forgetting about the lore-filled .Hack series when it comes to comparisons... Turns out the latter still exist and the formal's more of a "criticism may vary" depending who's complaining talking about it this time...

Anyway, the first part in SAO should have been longer, the second part dropped the ball, SAO II actually had a good arc, and everyone who's seen SAO should check out the abridged series of SAO... Other than that, when can we start having threads about Accel World?

 

[Kaimax]

Other than that, when can we start having threads about Accel World?

When we can finally get a 2nd season I guess?

OT: It's way too late to start complaining about SAO now... Even the ones who hate it is sick of these kind of threads.

 

[Maphysto]

I see your anime experience consist of Naruto, Bleach, SAO, Tokyo Ghoul and Fairy tail amongs others.

Worry not, the plebs will believe your dastardly words.

Just change that list to "Everything Shonen Jump has ever made." It'll save time.

And like I said, there are a lot of series I really enjoy. Moribito, Ghost in the Shell, Mushi-shi, Madoka Magica and Cowboy Bebop to name a few.

Allow me to introduce you to something called Sturgeon's Law. [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sturgeon%27s_law] Anime isn't any more bad than anything else is when looked at as a whole.

...That doesn't really change anything though? A thing doesn't stop being bad just because other things are equally bad. And, yes, I realize I'm lumping Anime together because that's the thing I'm trying to criticize. Criticisms leveled at the cliches and flaws of a form of media as a whole are perfectly valid.