Gun Gale Online!
Time for some loli sniping!
Peace.
A 13 years old author can come up with jolly good ideas the same as anybody, assuming a gifted imagination, but writing a wholesome, well thought-out story with three-dimensional characters, in an appropriate manner (since this is still manga/anime), takes a bit of maturity and perspective. So, let's not judge SAO too harshly. Besides, SAO was well-received among its intended audience of other 13 years olds.
He was 13 in 2002.He isn't now. The later novels appear to have an even lower reception, even among its fans here, and the first novel(s) got re-edited in 2008-2009.
edit:
Actually, he's 39 (b. 1974), so I have no idea where the myth perpetuates from that he was young when volume 1 (Aincrad Arc) was officially published.
Last edited by Ryllharu; Sat, 01-04-2014 at 05:01 PM.
Looking at Ryll's post, it apparently wasn't. For some reason I was living under an impression the author was really young when he wrote this, though to be honest, I wasn't sure of the exact number, so 13 was a guess, more or less. But apparently he's fricking older than I am, which leaves me speechless. I used to write fiction as a hobby back in my earlier days (all the way up to high school), and although a publisher wanted to see the rest when I sent in the first part, it didn't get published and that was the end of it. But I assure you it was much more mature and better than SAO despite being written by a brat (not trying to claim it was objectively nearly good enough to be published, now judging it in hindsight)... But then again, we are talking about Japan, where this unique thing called a light novel exists and flourishes. I reckon one of its requirements is not to be too high literature.
Well, even Kirino could become an author in Japan, so that says it all .... :>
"She's the only non-loli girl in the show, your honor!" will be my defense in court
And I find it silly to compare the two.
Log Horizon isnt really one of those MMORPG-Matrix-esque stories. Thatīs maybe how it started, but the way itīs handled, itīs a generic fantasy-story with a unique origin.
Whereas SAO plays fully to the strengths of the popular "this is how videogames could become one day"-theme.
If I had to compare general enjoyment, though, Iīd say that SAO had a fantastic first few episodes and then started sucking hard. Full of moe-crap, harem-crap and illogical unexplained actions. And the whole second story was ruined, as there was never a chance for a Kirito-Sugu couple, since Asuna had already been introduced as some sort of hotness-goddess before, who occupies Kirito like a succubus.
Meanwhile, Log Horizon starts out slowly, is still kinda slow, but it gives me the feeling that something is coming together the more it proceeds.
If only Log Horizon had the quality animation of SAO, itīd be so much better.
"She's the only non-loli girl in the show, your honor!" will be my defense in court
Anime of late has been plagued by an endless supply of little sisters falling in love with the big brothers, or vice versa, creating the whole imouto craze (or curse) that's going on, so I'm thankful Sugu never had a chance. Siblings falling in love with each other, unknowingly, is an ancient element in drama and it's used for tragedy. Leave it to the Japanese to make serious romance and romantic comedy out of it. As much as I blame SAO's author for being immature and inexperienced, at the very least I give him props for making Kirito clearly reject his sister as well as Sugu not actively chasing after him.
I wasnt complaining about the lack of incest. Rather that all the romance-teasing in part 2, and likely 3 as well, is wasted time since Kirito already chose Asuna to be his eternal girl. Having scenes where a girl ponders about her love for Kirito, then further showing how she goes about it, is extremely annoying for me as the audience, since I know that itll never lead to anything of substance. At least, Im rather sure that Kirito would never cheat on Asuna, itīs not that kind of show.
"She's the only non-loli girl in the show, your honor!" will be my defense in court
Kirito's official answer to Sugu was "I don't know yet, I'll have to wait for Asuna to wake up" but I don't think we got any follow-up after that. The answer's obvious, but he still got away without properly concluding his answer with Sugu.
If it's not Isuzu-chan Mii~
I concur with MFauli. It was revolting how saintly and untouchable the other girls treated Asuna in the OVA. "Oh my, I could never compete with Asuna over Kirito. ╥﹏╥ She's simply too perfect."
Asuna doesn't really seem to have much of a personality on her own anymore either. She's just this overly mature, motherly, graceful, holy virgin (though she most definitely isn't that last one, at least virtually). All the personality she used to have when they first met, during the 1st floor boss, and when she was a commander before they got romantically involved disappeared. She became this demure, dull, motherly saint.
Hinting that the other girls even had a chance to begin with was kind of pointless. At least Sugu didn't know before she fell for him, unlike the other two.
I absolutely agree about Asuna. I find her "perfection" way too bland. The sudden jump from her dark initial persona to the perfect team leader with amazing household skills was also too abrupt because not a lot of time was used to show the transition.
I also find the entire Yui daughter thing extremely annoying. SAO would have been much better without her. She kind of represents everything that is making suspension of disbelief harder to achieve.
That said, I am still looking forward to the next arc. I believe people who hate SAO will still hate that because it has more of the same stuff (it is a light novel after all, which is almost trademark formulaic for each novel, with very few exceptions), but the people who liked the good parts of SAO will probably like it. For those who might get interested because of this fact, it has guns.
Peace.
Yui would be fine if she wasn't treated as a daughter by both of them instantly. That whole arc in Aincrad is retarded. There's no lead-up, no development, nothing. It's just, "Nice to meet you. We'll treat you as a daughter, done." It wouldn't be as bad if they built up to it across 3-5 episodes, instead of 1.5 episodes.
Her parts in Alfhiem Online are some of the better parts. She's a digital fairy after all. There, she acts like it, and is and treated as such. Correspondingly, her scenes and dialog are good. It would legitimately be better if she was not treated as a child, but more like an "overly clingy friend" or "sister". Basically what Suguha sees her as before she learns the truth from Kirito off-screen in the real world.
Last edited by Ryllharu; Sun, 01-05-2014 at 10:03 AM. Reason: added substantial elaboration
The whole AI thing is just a bit too unbelievable for me. That, and the fact that she was downloaded into the nerv gear headgear. I also simply dislike cutesy shallow characters like her. I know she is AI and that cannot allow for much development, but weren't they selling her character as something more, almost human perhaps? Her role in the fairy arc was even more of a stretch. All of a sudden, she is recognized by the system as tinkerbell, and can get all sorts of information despite being a foreign object. All we get are one liner explanations, and really, she does nothing for the plot.
It's like they wanted to add a constant loli that won't attract Asuna's wrath, so Yui suddenly got inserted into the story.
Almost insignificant spoiler for the coming Gun Gale Online arc:
Almost no Asuna or Yui.
Peace.