Japanese staff:
Director: Manabu Ono
(Horizon in the Middle of Nowhere, Saki, The Asterisk War)
Music: Yuki Kajiura
Original creator: Reki Kawahara
Character Design:
Gou Suzuki
Shingo Adachi
Tomoya Nishiguchi
Art Director:
Yoshito Watanabe
Yukako Ogawa
Art Design:
Kenichi Morioka
Yuuho Taniuchi
Action Animation Director:
Tetsuya Takeuchi
Yoshihiro Kanno
Theme Song Performance:
LiSA is performing the opening theme song "Adamas"
https://youtu.be/MMuAqR_MjS8
Eir Aoi is performing the ending theme song "Iris"
Japanese Cast:
Haruka Tomatsu as Asuna Yūki
Yoshitsugu Matsuoka as Kazuto Kirigaya/Kirito
Ai Kayano as Alice Zuberg
Nobunaga Shimazaki as Eugeo
Japanese companies
Animation Productio
Streaming Info: (will be updated further later)
Time:
Sundays (12:00am JPN):
Services:
Crunchyroll/Funimation(NA/SA/EU)
AnimeLab (Australia and New Zealand)
Wakanim.tv (France)
Mal Link:
https://myanimelist.net/anime/36474/Sword_Art_Online__Alicization
What is Sword Art Online:
Sword Art Online is a Japanese light novel series written by Reki Kawahara and illustrated by abec. The series takes place in the near future and focuses on protagonist Kazuto "Kirito" Kirigaya and Asuna Yuuki as they play through various virtual reality MMORPG worlds. The light novels began publication on ASCII Media Works' Dengeki Bunko imprint from April 10, 2009, with a spin-off series launching in October 2012. The series has spawned eight manga adaptations published by ASCII Media Works and Kadokawa. The novels and four of the manga adaptations have been licensed for release in North America by Yen Press.
An anime television series produced by A-1 Pictures, known simply as Sword Art Online, aired in Japan between July and December 2012, with television film Sword Art Online: Extra Edition airing on December 31, 2013, and a second season, titled Sword Art Online II, airing between July and December 2014. An animated film titled Sword Art Online The Movie: Ordinal Scale featuring an original story by Kawahara premiered in Japan and Southeast Asia on February 18, 2017, and was released in the United States on March 9, 2017. A spin-off anime series titled Sword Art Online Alternative Gun Gale Online premiered in April 2018, while a third season titled Sword Art Online: Alicization will premiere on October 6, 2018. A live-action series will be produced by Netflix. Six video games based on the series have been released for multiple consoles.
Plot so far (anime season 1&2 <obvious spoilers>)
n 2022, a virtual reality massively multiplayer online role-playing game (VRMMORPG) called Sword Art Online (SAO) is released. With the NerveGear, a helmet that stimulates the user's five senses via their brain, players can experience and control their in-game characters with their minds. Both the game and the NerveGear was created by Akihiko Kayaba.
On November 6, 10,000 players log into the SAO's mainframe cyberspace for the first time, only to discover that they are unable to log out. Kayaba appears and tells the players that they must beat all 100 floors of Aincrad, a steel castle which is the setting of SAO, if they wish to be free. Those who suffer in-game deaths or forcibly remove the NerveGear out-of-game will suffer real-life deaths.
One of the players, named Kazuto "Kirito" Kirigaya, is one of 1,000 testers in the game's previous closed beta. With the advantage of previous VR gaming experience and a drive to protect other beta testers from discrimination, he isolates himself from the greater groups and plays the game alone, bearing the mantle of "beater", a portmanteau of "beta tester" and "cheater". As the players progress through the game Kirito eventually befriends a young girl named Asuna Yuuki, forming a relationship with and later marrying her in-game. After the duo discover the identity of Kayaba's secret ID, who was playing as the leader of the guild Asuna joined in, they confront and destroy him, freeing themselves and the other players from the game.
In the real world, Kazuto discovers that 300 SAO players, including Asuna, remain trapped in their NerveGear. As he goes to the hospital to see Asuna, he meets Shouzou Yuuki, Asuna's father, who is asked by an associate of his, Nobuyuki Sugou, to make a decision, which Sugou later reveals to be his marriage with Asuna, angering Kazuto. Several months later, he is informed by Agil, another SAO survivor, that a figure similar to Asuna was spotted on "The World Tree" in another VRMMORPG cyberspace called Alfheim Online (ALO). Assisted in-game by his cousin Suguha "Leafa" Kirigaya and Yui, a navigation pixie (originally an AI from SAO), he quickly learns that the trapped players in ALO are part of a plan conceived by Sugou to perform illegal experiments on their minds. The goal is to create the perfect mind-control for financial gain and to subjugate Asuna, whom he intends to marry in the real world, to assume control of her family's corporation. Kirito eventually stops the experiment and rescues the remaining 300 SAO players, foiling Sugou's plans. Before leaving ALO to see Asuna, Kayaba, who has uploaded his mind to the Internet using an experimental and destructively high-power version of NerveGear at the cost of his life, entrusts Kirito with The Seed – a package program designed to create virtual worlds. Kazuto eventually reunites with Asuna in the real world and The Seed is released onto the Internet, reviving Aincrad as other VRMMORPGs begin to thrive.
Soon after, at the prompting of a government official investigating strange occurrences in VR, Kazuto takes on a job to investigate a series of murders involving another VRMMORPG called Gun Gale Online (GGO), the AmuSphere (the successor of the NerveGear), and a player called Death Gun. Aided by a female player named Shino "Sinon" Asada, he participates in a gunfight tournament called the Bullet of Bullets (BoB) and discovers the truth behind the murders, which originated with a player who participated in a player-killing guild in SAO. Through his and Sinon's efforts, two suspects are captured, though the third suspect, Johnny Black, escapes
Season 1&2 can be watched here:
http://www.crunchyroll.com/sword-art-online?utm_source=android&utm_campaign=socialshare
Story Synopsis (Alicization Arc):
Where…am I…?" Before he knows it, Kirito has made a full-dive into an epic, fantasy-like virtual world. With only a murky recollection of what happened right before he logged in, he starts to wander around, searching for clues. He comes upon an enormous, pitch dark tree (the Gigas Cedar), where he encounters a boy. "My name is Eugeo. Nice to meet you, Kirito." Although he is supposedly a resident of the virtual world - an NPC - the boy shows the same array of emotions as any human being. As Kirito bonds with Eugeo, he continues to search for a way to log out of this world. Meanwhile, he remembers a certain memory deep down within him. He remembers racing through the mountains with Eugeo as a child… A memory that he should not have in the first place... And in this memory, he sees someone other than Eugeo, a young blond girl. Her name is Alice. And it is a name that must never be forgotten…
- The anime will cover the entirety of the novels' "Alicization Arc." The Alicization arc is in volumes 9 through 18 of the original novel series
Main Character Info:
Kazuto Kirigaya "Kirito" a.k.a "The Master Gary Stu"
SAO History:
Kirito is the protagonist of Sword Art Online. He is a "solo" player, a player who hasn't joined a guild and usually works alone. He is also one of the very few people to have had the privilege to play in the beta testing period of Sword Art Online. His game alias, Kirito, is created by taking the syllables of the first and last Kanji of his real last and first names respectively: (Kirigaya Kazuto). In the real world, he lives with his aunt and younger cousin in a family of 3.
When Kayaba announced the start of the death game, he is surprised, but unlike everyone else, he quickly gets over it and accepts it to an extent. He invited his friend Klein to go with him but Klein had to find his friends in the game. He was invited to join them but he declined as he couldn't take the pressure of protecting them even with his beta testing knowledge of the game.
Kirito tends to use a single handed straight sword. The blade that he uses most often is the Elucidator. Later on, he acquires a second blade called Dark Repulser that was made by his blacksmith friend, Lisbeth.
He was the first one to be called a Beater, a combination of beta testing and cheater, as he had great knowledge of the game through the beta test period and showing great skills in floor clearing but chose not to help other players. He had it imposed on himself so as to differentiate the beta testers who were just picked in the testing and the serious gamers who use the knowledge efficiently like a cheat.
He has a unique skill called "Dual Blades" which allows him to dual wield two swords and use Swords Skills. It's the special skill designed for the Hero that defeats the Demon Lord at the last floor. He found it in his skills list after a year in the game. After nearly mastering it, he only uses it in emergencies to avoid attention for being one of the few people to have a unique skill.
He befriends a girl by the name of Yuuki Asuna who later becomes his lover.
Asuna Yuuki
SAO History:
Asuna is a friend of Kirito and is a sub-leader of the guild Knights of the Blood (KoB), a medium-sized guild of about thirty players, also called the strongest guild in Aincrad. Being one of the few girls that are in SAO, and even more so that she's extremely pretty, she receives many invitations and proposals. She is a skilled player earning the title "Flash" for her extraordinary sword skill that is lightning fast. Her game alias is the same as her real world name.
She is married to Kirito in SAO. They decide to live a peaceful life and to buy a house on the lower part of Aincrad and take a break from the guild Knights of the Blood Oath. But later they need to return to the front lines, abandoning their peaceful life.
After the SAO incident, all the players that survived should have awoken, but Asuna is still trapped within her NerveGear. She is actually abducted by her betrothed, Sugou Naboyuki, who transfers her to Alfheim Online (ALO).
In ALO, She is known as Queen Titania, yet she is only a character who is trapped within a cage that is programmed to be a unbreakable object. She was rescued by Kirito who became a Game Master by accessing Heathcliff's account, and defeated Sugou. Kirito logged Asuna off from ALO and rejoins her in the hospital after he ended his fight with Sugou in the real world.
Alice Zuberg
The heroine of the fourth arc, "Project Alicization." Alice is a childhood friend of Kirito and Eugeo, and is also from Rulid Village. The rest is spoilers, so….
Eugeo:
Eugeo is a wood cutter of Rulid Village and Kirito's best friend in the beginning. Kirito was then unheard of when their friend Alice was taken away; however, upon Kirito's return to Underworld, in which he has no memory, Eugeo is the first person Kirito (as Kazuto), encountered upon awakening.
Media:
Premier Video:
PV#2:
Thread Rules and Notes:
#1) If your sole purpose is to come into the thread and $hit-post, please do not:
Put it away for the MAL or Reddit anime boards where that is encouraged
#2) Like it or hate it, feel free to react any way you want, just don't get flagged and tagged for the favorite tag line here "Disingenuous Posting." If you have any questions, please refer to rule #1
#3) There is no need to spoiler tag events from the first two seasons of SAO, or anything currently airing on the show. If you have read the Light Novels past what is airing that week, please post in spoilers, or just do not post it outside of PMs to avoid any issues.
#4) Be respectful, not everyone hates Kirito as much as you. (refer to #1)
#5) Hopefully this is good! Either way, let's have FUN with it!
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