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Congratulations Congratulation! That’s a LOT they cut out for this episode. It also looks like they’ll be cramming the Red-nosed Reindeer side story into one 20-minute episode for next week.
Here you go, anyway! For those of you who haven’t read the novels, did this episode feel rushed to you?
EDIT: For those of you experiencing lag with the OP/ED karaoke, we highly recommend that you update to xy-VSFilter, which is very simple to install and will drastically improve the efficiency of softsub rendering.
Did they cut anything really important to the story?
Kyaaaa~~~~~ It’s here!!
Didn’t feel rushed to me.
Haven’t watched yet, but I had assumed this would take at least two episodes, so it’s probably going to feel rushed to me; guess they are going to ALO after all.
After watching episode 1 I ended up reading the first volume the same night (then the side stories and the next 2 volumes a few days later), but I didnt remember anything about the first boss fight. I think I might be derping but from what I remember, kirito runs out of the town leaving Klein behind…then it cuts to 2years down the line and they are around then 74th-ish floor or so.
I got a feeling I might of missed a big section of the story =/
Sad that they cut out the shower scene :’c and the Rat, Argo.
It was rushed yea, but it was still a pretty good episode.
Had to watch earlier, rewatching with UTW subs later on. Didn’t feel rushed at all, first half felt even a bit too slow, second half felt just right… maybe the novel goes on a slower pace but I thought this was pretty good (joking, I loved it..!).
@Biribiri, it was a side story named Aria in the Starless Night
(Link: http://www.baka-tsuki.org/project/index.php?title=Sword_Art_Online:Aria_in_the_Starless_Night)
@BIribiri
It’s one of the side stories, check out http://www.baka-tsuki.org/project/index.php?title=Sword_Art_Online:Aria_in_the_Starless_Night
I watched the episode before seeing the post description. Never read the novel, but I did not notice it being rushed or a lot being cut off. Probably anime-only standpoint, the pacing is pretty well. It will probably slow down soon enough.
@Shanticas @Aleithilithos Oh that explains it….it was the 1 side story I skipped inorder to start the next volume lmfao…thx for the info. I’ll have to go back and read it now.
This should have been two episodes. They really cut out all the important character moments in Aria for not only Asuna, but also Diabel.
@Biribiri
I have not watched this episode yet but if you are talking about
[spoiler]the boss of the 1st floor, then this episode should cover the events of the “Aria in the Starless Night” side story. Seeing Asuna in the screenshot confirms my assumption. It looks like the animators are following the story chronological, unlike seen in the novels where you stumble upon side stories here and there.[/spoiler]
it didn’t feel rushed to me who haven’t read the novel
It is rushed but it’s not bad at the same time
So yeah still a good episode
why? Directors never learn!
As always, thanks for the episode.
They sure cut a lot for this side story, Argo didn’t show up, along with the scene where Kirito first met with Asuna, but these aren’t effect so much in the story line so I think is still okay for skipping those.Consider with this story line progress, ALO arc might include in this series too.
Oh and thanks for the release, earlier than last week π
Did it feel rushed? Yes and no. That aside I still think it was a great ep that necessarily staved off the massive time-warp, even if just for another ep or two.
[spoiler]
Even though it sucks they left Argo out of this, I think introducing her would end up being more of a headache than icing on the proverbial storytelling cake. Not having her in the series means depriving the “love story” of some great background detail and initial character development for Asuna and Kirito, but also means having to somehow include or dispose of Argo along the way so as not to make her meaningless later on. Overall they did a great job of incorporating the side story into the main story as much as they could without needlessly warping things and fucking too much with events chronologically. Two episodes would have been nice but a fast pace is necessary if they’re going to cover as much as they seem to want to by the end of the seasons. However, since they didn’t utilize two eps, having Diabel look at Kirito after the meeting like that was pointless if they’re not including the Argo/Anneal Blade components and not have left out so much between the other main characters etc. Oh well![/spoiler]
4/5
Thanks for the release! π
it is as Ricz says, they didn’t put a lot of stuff but the episode is good anyway. No argo, and they omitted a lot of AsunaxKirito moments
If they fucked up Sachi’s Story, i’ll rage a lot, is one of the best parts of SAO, it must be 2 episodes long at least, no one episode bullshit.
Yeah, it was too hasty. “Oh, mighty boss! We should make a raid! Woo! Boo!” and then like 3-4 minutes of action. Dafuq?
They cut out the story because,to those who have read the chapter 3 in manga,Asuna Came in Egil’s shop.It means they already knew each other.Thats why they made the episode 2 like a flashback….Sorry for my wrong grammar……
Seems they cut out character development, build up and went straight to the climax.
maybe this is 12 eps anime??
I’ve already resigned to the fact that they won’t follow the novels page by page. Aria wasn’t THAT great anyways. Hopefully they try to work with Reindeer as best they can.
Oh they skipped First Day and went ahead for the Aria in the Starless Night?
100 pages into one 20 minute episode. Yeah, it felt rushed to me.
And I hope that they’ll make an OVA for First Day afterward………
LOL
Yeah, it did feel rushed a bit. They skipped a lot of stuff about Asuna. Meh =P
It’s still a good episode. xD
UTW: “For those of you who havenβt read the novels, did this episode feel rushed to you?”
Rapidgator: “Enter Captcha: ‘not yet’ ”
Me: LOL
Coming from the perspective of someone who has read all of the main volumes, but apparently missed the side story this episode was based on, it didn’t feel too rushed to me (Not any more so than is to be expected based on the format, anyway. Watching any sort of anime/movie/etc. almost always feels faster-paced than reading it). For all I know though, quite a bit could have been left out, and since I’m going to read it after posting this, I’ll find out soon enough. I’m going to have to look into whether there are any other side stories I missed, though I was somewhat disappointed to see that they skipped “First Day”. I wonder how many of the side stories they’re actually going to include.
I’m also curious as to how well going in more-or-less chronological order is going to work out. I feel like a lot of the side story material actually benefited from coming after the main story. It might ruin some of the mystery (for lack of a better term) from the original story to have all of these things shown ahead of time. Based on the title of the next episode, for example:
[spoiler]I’m not sure if this needs to be in spoiler tags, but I’d rather be safe. The “Red-nosed Reindeer” side-story covers an extremely impactful event for Kirito, and it’s one that isn’t fully understood until later in the original story. I’m not sure if showing it so comparatively early is going to affect the impact it has or not. It might work out well, but it’s definitely going to have a different feel for a newcomer to the series watching the anime compared to reading the original material.[/spoiler]
Yup, it felt somewhat rushed to me, but the way the episode turned out wasn’t too bad — so many scenes I wanted to see animated that weren’t though π
Yeah, super rushed. Big time skip, (what happened? Where are they?), then cuts from the town almost straight to the boss.
Blue-haired guy, we hardly knew ye.
@Charkelle
Yeah, I was thinking that arc would work better as a flashback, but maybe it’ll turn out alright…
Also just wanted to note that I’m glad they included the bread scene.
Awesome, thank you subbing people ^^.
So this is the manifestation of my bad feeling when looking at ep 2 title.. “sob” why the director cuts this much. Dont they know the important of character development…. now I’m sure many viewer who dont read the LN will feel less emotion when they watch future ep rather than who read the LN…. “sob”
@PheNoM III
It’s been announced as a 2 season anime. I have no idea if they’re adapting multiple stories/arcs though(this SAO and w/e the other one is, since I didn’t read it)
I’ve only read volume 1 and none of the side stories, but it felt pretty well done to me. There were many subtle hints between Diabel and Kirito that I would have never thought about without looking it up, so it probably fell short of their intentions.
Referencing to this: http://myanimelist.net/forum/?topicid=463839&show=80#msg15888391
From reading the first volume, it doesn’t seem that Argo was a fundamental point to focus on (unless he dies or appears in later side stories or future volumes?), so that’s probably why he was cut in favor of the way they did it for one episode. Scenes with Diabel are the same, because
[spoiler]well… he dies.[/spoiler]
Basically, Kirito got as much character development as he got for this episode with all the hinting. Maybe it was lacking on the Asuna side, but at least they kept the bread scene in, which still shows that side of Kirito.
To those that did read, of course it’s gonna be rushed. If you wanted every detail in, page by page, you’d get the Disappearance of Haruhi Suzumiya in all it’s glory(which would sound nice but isn’t exactly the most realistic expectation budget-wise and time-wise).
Well I’ll read the side story now… From what people said about what I missed like Argo, more scenes with Asuna and Diabel, it sounds nice to have, but for this episode on it’s own, it was nearly? enough to get the point across as to what Kirito has to face up ahead as a “solo player” and a “beater”. It’s not like they completely removed character development or are neglecting it on purpose, but repeating what I said, it was probably as much as they could get realistically, and it seems to have worked… At least for the me that is ignorant of this side-story.
everyone keep mentioning its “a side story” yet they keep complaining how much was cut off, be grateful enough that it has been included in the adaptation
@SGX
there’s a lot of room for character development really, are we just watching a 1-cour show?
Hum… I didn’t read the novels but it was way too much fast. They can always de-rush it in the bds, but oh well…
Judging from this comment thread, they left out some stuff. However, it didn’t feel rushed. Rushed happens when you try to cram too much stuff into a show; if you just leave stuff out, people who don’t know the source material (like me) won’t notice.
On an unrelated note, did the ED’s subtitles lag for anyone? I had to turn off the subtitles for the ED to play smoothly. My hardware is good, is there some config that’s not default that I missed? Using MPC.
@someone:
Either UTW or Gotwoot, or both of them together have recommended people to use xy-vsfilter, which both K-Lite and CCCP appear to have decided against adding. Judging from the reactions people had with only the OP KaraFX, you’ll probably need this. vsfilter appears to be incredibly inefficient for rendering the effects(single threaded?). I have not downloaded ep2 yet from UTWoots to know for myself though.
It didn’t feel too rushed for me. Since episode one had a nice slow pace to set everything, I figured this one would be faster paced and it was. It could have been slowed down, but I chalk the first two episodes to be getting to know everything episodes.
Now we know how they got their and what a fight looks like. I imagine they’ll slow things down a lot in between floors to show more of the game. Basically, I didn’t think it felt rushed, just two into episodes.
@someone:
Following up… This karaFX looks faaaar more complex than the OP. My Core i3 can run it at around 30-40% using xy-vsfilter though. I’d hate to see what the original vsfilter would do to my computer.
I havn’t read the novels but it didn’t feel rushed at all. I do want to see much more of asuna thou. ,This series is amazing.
@TheWingless Have you seen the script? It’s nearly 1 MB in size, with 7,700+ lines. Of course the kfx have to be complex.
@AmberFebruary Maybe many of us will feel this is just a side story as this ep isn’t included in the LN vol 1, which is the “real” SAO. But as this ep contain major and unique char development for the main character, I can’t feel like that. If they decide to do it like this, I prefer they stick close to original just like Charkelle and limabean said.
Note: I’m disappointed in this ep as it can become an amazing ep rather than just good ep, everyone can express their complain or suggestion, just don’t really expect it become real. As TheWingless said that this ep is realistically good but we can always want more, do we? Just don’t dwell on it and move on….
Notice that they cna’t animate the ALO volumes since they are 2 volumes for the ful ALO arc, and already the first volume is pretty huge for a light novel (about 450 pages, while others are about 200-350) and since theey are adding side stories thats a bit more then the normal…
just saying NO ALO but chronological SAO+Volume 2
I thought this episode was amazing and not rushed at all, then I saw every novel reader saying its rushed and now I have mixes feelings…
Like AmberFebruary said, you should not be complaining that a “side story” that got put into the main story is rushed, we’re lucky that they even animated it. I’ll be sure to avoid comments next time so I don’t have this weird mixed feelings again.
shitty script.. SUB PAR
@Crimson The problem is that the anime seems to be animating it chronologically. In the LNs, yes this is a “side story”, but chronologically this is pretty big. Rushing a “pretty big” part of a chronological anime = not the best idea.
@eternalrain Its only rushed to novel readers, I have yet to see anyone who has no knowledge on the novels say its rushed. You should know that this anime is being made to boost the sales and popularity of the light novel like every other adaptation out there. Obviously they won’t animate words to words, they just want to get the important points in, which they did in this episode. I’m sure no one expects them to cram everything in a 2 cour anime…
Thanks for uploading!
that’s not what happened in the novel..
I didn’t read the novel and it still felt rather rushed, jumping quickly between short scenes in the beginning in order to just briefly explain them. The action scene seemed fine, though, it really seems like they should have had the plot exposition be a seperate episode, because I still don’t feel like I have a remote understanding of the rules/systems in SAO.
I don’t like it when things are cut off from the actual novel in the adaptation…
I wanna read the novels now. =/
Well, this is for 1 or 2 season show. So, they need to cut most of the scene to hit their target on time just like movie version of anime. Then, what do you expect ? Something complete with unnecessary filler such as Naruto, Bleach, One Peace and Fairy Tail ?
Our last hope to fill the blanks is BD/DVD version.
yeah. they rushed it too much. you could see it in the animation too. they also changed a little of the sequences and cut off a lot of it. if the did the episode correctly it may end up as 2eps at least
if the next ep really is the Red-nosed Raindeer, damn. that part is a tearjerker and an important factor of the story. I hope they do it properly
i felt like this episode should have been split into two episodes and the battle didn’t really seem all that great; like, not even for a second was i convinced that kirito was going to lose it.
While I was disappointed a bit at them removing some of the Asuna-Kirito interactions and scenes, as well as Argo, it seemed pretty quickly paced. This isnt necessarily bad, to get people who havent read the LNs interested this would be a very good episode, and it goes by without you even noticing it sadly. Now I cant wait to see how this will play out. If the other episodes are shortened like this though, I could see the entire Aincrad arc being finished far under the 24episodes they say it will be, so maybe ALO will get animated as well. Still loved the episode though, and the series itself. π
Master beater
Asuna is cute
Hm. Let’s see. From my memory, I recall them missing a bit of Asuna’s parts, Argo, and Diabel’s relations with Kirito. I recall Argo having like no effect on the rest of the story, so that’s fine to exclude. Diabel’s “beta tester” revelation felt a bit rushed, though I’m comparing it to the original side story, which had the whole bit about “attempting to buy the weapon”.
The parts that were excluded that will probably have the most effect on the rest is the parts with Asuna. Character development and all.
Overall, fine, though perhaps a little rushed. We might miss the character development with Asuna, but the original story was great without it, so it should be fine.
sd,avi version where?
(I didn’t read the novel) My main critic on this episode is that there was not a strong continuity with the previous one:
– Episode 1, the main character is shown with another one which he leaves in the end.
– Episode 2, the main character is shown with yet another one which he seemed to have previously meet. There is a gap there, as if I missed 1 episode somewhere.
OBLIGATORY FASTER-SD-VERSION-RELEASE CHANT
“For those of you who havenβt read the novels, did this episode feel rushed to you?”
YES! Also, did the novels really jump forward one month in the same way? Because it seems like that’s skipping over some of the most interesting stuff (i.e. watching the characters adjust to the situation).
@Vincent if this ep was split to 2 ep, I’m sure u won’t feel like that
@Sven In the novels, the first book went from essentially episode one, to just short of the end of the entire Aincrad arc, where there are only a few floors left before they encounter the final boss.
There were then additional side stories, one of day one, which involved the first day of Kirito, and could have served as a great primer to the combat systems in the anime, though they may do a flashback to it later. Additionally there was this, which was completely rushed, cutting out tons and tons of stuff, like Kirito’s inn, which he and Asuna had a decent about of char. dev. in, as well as Argo and the subplot involving someone trying to buy Kirito’s sword (more powerful than others at that point) for a ridiculous sum of money for that boss fight.
Reindeer isn’t a quick side story either, and I fear they’re gonna cut it short too. This leaves the side stories involving Ai, as well as the one involving Kirito getting a new sword later on.
in the ED part, audio was like go hiccup every 3s, is that encoding problem or my CCCP?
Yeah, I am having the same problem as the anon above. I am not sure what’s wrong…Since I was able to play all of your other releases without any problem up till today. ;O
Kojiro: OK, thanks. Yeah, it really sounds as if using Day One as the second episode would have felt less weird. Essentially skipping to the final boss is unusual, but seems like obviously a literary device rather than just randomly skipping interesting stuff.
“Judging from this comment thread, they left out some stuff. However, it didnβt feel rushed. Rushed happens when you try to cram too much stuff into a show” -someone
Actually, Someone has a point. It didn’t feel so much like they were cramming a lot in, just like they were skimming over a lot of things. Some bits actually felt slightly too slow-paced. They probably could have safely crammed in a bit more information.
Still a fairly good episode in comparison to most shows, but the first episode raised my expectations fairly high, and I’m a bit disappointed.
It didn’t fell rushed for me at all.
Even if you say the scenes were switching a lot. Like the “we gona start a meeting to kill the boss” wents straith from plaza to that coliseum look alike place. But it still made sense.
Well the only thing that felt rushed was the development between Asuna and Kirito.
I heard there were endcards for the episodes. Why aren’t there any for your releases?
Pronounced “You Twoots”
Didn’t feel to rushed to me. I just want moar now!
Also seeing as there’s what 100 floors and this is a 24 episode show? It only seems right that they jump right into things like this. They’ll have plenty of time for slower parts later too.
As a person who has not read the LN, but I admit I am very tempted atm, the story didn’t seem rushed. On that note the development between Asuna and Kirito seems one sided at most. I could see a few things done differently, but that is mostly personal preference. Still am pumped for the next episode!
@anon/Shiki
I’m getting it as well for now.
I’m going to download an updated version of k-lite codec pack (my preferred player) and see if that works
Also, is that 24 episodes 1 season? It really feels like worth 2 or even 3 full seasons. There’s a whole lot of potential for this fictional universe.
That said, watching this episode makes you reminisce about previous MMORPG experience and the want to try it all over again π
aaah, when is RO2 coming???!! π
thanks for the EP as well
Looks like Argo da rat won’t ever appear. Why do they cut out the comedic moments…
Since Aria in the Starless Night is a rewrite of Kirito and Asuna’s meeting, it doesn’t fit the canon of the original novel. I can see that some adaptation is required to make character development pace of the original more believable. Despite skimming a lot of story, I think they handled Aria fairly well.
Shame they didn’t include story ‘First Day’ from eight book though… that story would have been perfect to explain gameplay of Sword Art Online further while illustrating what a deadly game SAO is.
I’d love to see the anime elaborate on the event with the red guild that is often referred in the novels… I’ve felt this is a major point in story that hasn’t been properly told.
UTWoots, good job with the release, thanks!
Why using MX now?
http://utw.me/2012/07/08/sword-art-online-01/#comment-37987
Well, having read the light novel, i know they took a lot out, but personally it doesn’t feel too rushed since they got a lot of the important scenes and the dots kinda joined up pretty smoothly
While it may not be the most original story in the entire world, it has captivated my interest and now I have gotten around to finding the light novel and reading it. The anime does seem to feel rushed. Hopefully it won’t be like that the entire time.
i dont understand, what’s a beater? and why did he turn badass at the end all of a sudden? this anime is starting to feel like crap plot wise
I love the contrast of black and white between the two main characters.
@anon/Shiki
it seems updating fixes it
@huami it’s portmanteau of beta tester + beater, and he took the blame to save the other beta testers from discrimination by separating it to “Beaters” and “Normal” beta testers
my mistake its beta tester + cheater
I got blinking subtitle for the ending. Can anyone help? I’m using K-Lite 9/02 and windows xp
And maybe Beater = Beta tester + Cheater?
Didn’t feel rushed to me, haven’t read the novels. But besides, we’re still in the tutorial really! No point in hanging around on the first floor when we have the basics covered.
Is it just me or does the OP kara blink sometimes?
It wasnt like this before, can I get some help?
i havent read the LNs but i have read some of the manga adaptations, i think that it does feel rushed but its still enjoyable, i just hope they end arcs in the anime version i would love to get 52 eps on one go but i doubt that will happen
@animeweaver its the ED thats problematic for me. I’m getting a sizable fps drop at some points of it.
I read the novel and yes they cut out a lot but I kinda understand their decision …
I just missed the “Of Course … I’ll get the LA on the boss” from Kirito …
how do you install xy-VSFilter ?
@animeweaver @zaz122 You guys are lucky, I got blink in BOTH OP and ED TT.TT
Thanks for the episode! I have not read the novels either, and I think it was pretty good. Sure, they skipped a whole month, so it would be interesting to know a bit more of what happened before that (a whole 2K people were put down so… simply…). But I think it was great over all. I would like to know what people who have never played an MMO think though… There are a lot of MMO established mechanics that are not explained much in the series.
i think 2ep split woudve been cooler, to thoroughly and properly introduce Asuna and Argo.
im having a problem at the ED too D:
Just found the solution for ED and OP, guys:
http://code.google.com/p/xy-vsfilter/
dl the file and follow the instructions
well still waiting for the avi ^_
@animeweaver @zaz122
You’re gonna get blinking if you have subpictures set to buffer. I’ll provide a solution for the set up you probably already have though…
In MPC>View>Options>Subtitles on the left>Look for “subpictures to buffer”>Set it to “0”
This may actually cause a performance issue though, as you will get fully animated soft subbed karaoke.
The better solution: You’re better off installing xy-vsfilter, which castor212 has linked to on the second page. I’ve actually tested it and the ED was too much for my CPU(a measly first generation Core i3) to handle without using xy-filter, which is far more efficient.
lol! people say they are surprised at the 1 month timeskip but was it not already shown at the end of episode 1 when already 2k died?
in the novel v1 skipped 2 freaking whole years! and from the looks of it next would be red nosed, can you guess when that’ll take place?
For those whom are experiencing lag. Get a fooking new computer you povo
Thanks! π
i didn’t install it but the opening works fine it started to lag when i used vlc player for the opening for the new imouto anime but worked fine for the rest of the episode and the ending and the opening and the whole episode worked fine when i used potplayer. So I don’t have any problems.
@copy i have i5-2400 and a 9400 GT i dont think watching a video will make my pc crawl
I see what you did there raze. I lol’d.
So I went and read this side story last night, and I have to say that while I’m not sure “rushed” would be an appropriate term (The pacing was fairly good for the amount of material covered), there was a lot left out. I can understand leaving Argo and the part about trying to buy Kirito’s sword out, as while interesting, they don’t have as much of an impact on the rest of the story. On the other hand, there was a lot of character development for Asuna which was left out (And Kirito to a lesser extent, though they covered most of the major points for him).
One thing to keep in mind for everyone who has read the original material, though, is the difficulty of converting everything into anime format. A ton of exposition and character development is done by introspection on Kirito’s part in the light novels, which is something that isn’t easy to do well in anime. I was honestly surprised Kirito wasn’t “narrating” things at times, as that might have been the simplest way to do it.
@Kal: Since you bring up people who don’t play MMOs, there was actually something in this side story that could have helped explain these things, though it was mostly left out. Asuna is a first-time MMO player, and Kirito ends up explaining a few terms and concepts to her throughout the side story. In this episode I believe the only thing he actually explains to her is the concept of Switching, which is more or less something specific to SAO.
Also, the fact that they skipped a month is hardly so jarring when you consider the fact that in the original story it skipped nearly two years. That was because Volume 1 was originally written as a stand-alone story (and even with the skip a fairly long one by light novel standards), and the important events of those two years were alluded to or otherwise explained as they became relevant. A number of side stories were later written to fill in more of the time between the beginning and most of the story in volume 1, as well as to further flesh out the past events that were mentioned but not fully explained.
Sorry about the big clump of text there, I keep forgetting that you can’t leave blank lines in comments to split it up.
@Huami
Seriously, do you actually think when watching animes?
He basically pulled a Lelouch here. If you never had the chance to watch Code Geass, here’s a rough explanation. He basically took on all the hate and frustration the players had onto himself, who started to focus their anger on all those beta testers. By making himself “the bad guy” he precludes a conflict between beta- and non-beta-players that would have unfolded if he hadn’t intervened.
Once again I’m astonished. Most animes have tons of small details like fleeting facial expressions, certain reactions to specific keywords among other a lot more subtle stuff than Kirito’s reaction which are vital to fully understanding each character and his decisions. A necessary stylistic device since visual media usually lacks a narrator and that is especially prominent in animes.
guess this means I’m moving my sched for anticipating sd release as I’ve been refreshing the whole day xD oh well, at least i know it’s coming.. thanks in advance π
@Nayu Although it is a stupid explanation, Nervegear is unable to simulate subtle expressions.
Thanks for the new episode!
On main topic:
I did not read the novels so I can not say how much plot loss the omissions cause, but I liked this episode overall (that scene with Diabel at the end felt a bit forced but not too bad).
somewhat off topic:
I am actually amazed at how much I am enjoying this show since I usually try to avoid titles with a setting that overglorifies or forces sword combat and little or nothing else, but this show I’ll probably stick with. I guess I am an oddity among anime fans since I still believe that sword < gun < plasma cannon on a starship…
Also… this is bugging me now…. if there is no thought process acceleration here…. what do they do about food and stuff? Put the players on IV drips? Force feed them in the real world? I do realize this is set in the future so the tech probably exists, but the fact that they mentioned it with the pizza thing in the first episode and then just left it at that bugs me… I mean cmon… even a 1 sentence explanation would have been enough…
Why is it stupid? Please elaborate
It’s a natural development followed by his monologue after Diabel’s death. He is a loner while he actually doesnt want to be one and admired Diabel for being able to help others without only thinking about his own benefit. Statistically ever 9th or so player is a beta-player (the 2k+ deaths most likely changed the 1:10 rate to something like 1:9).
From a rational point of view, you cant blame the beta-testers. But in a situation like this humans tend to search for an entity they can blame for their misery. You think it would’ve been smarter to stay idle and risk a conflict among players to erupt, further diminishing the chance for survival?
And if you had paid attention, you should have been able to realize that I never put stress on “subtle facial expressions” in SAO. I merely stated that is is part of the bigger picture that is composed of various elements.
Also, I don’t see how Nervgear isn’t able to simulate these expressions. It basically reads and interprets the brain’s data traffic (essentially a digital code). And man, scientifically a mere “subtle expression” is composed of an unbelievable amount of data volume. Compared to what the device is capable of aside from that, simulating “subtle expressions” should be child’s play.
-sigh- guess i wont be seeing hi-10 mkv quality video on any tablet/smartphone, since none seems strong enough to read them.
gotta download both mkv and avi…
LOL they showed the typical types of players in mmorpg.
Person giving orders from the back-end while sheep rushes. Then goes in final kill for greed.
Laughed when he died thinking it was safe to move in.
Whiners just gota whine about anything no matter what. Noobs cant expect much from them.
Newbies are portrayed correct, nothing against them or for them.
Beta-testers are portrayed correctly also. Solo type nothing new, they just wander alone and will only party for a bit. They have yet to show the hardcore type. Information and info brokers too cliche. Information changes all the time and one doesn’t even know how accurate or helpful it can even be until tried. The foolish most often dies with no wisdom. Seeing how they can die(irl) once they are dead(in SAO), it isn’t shown the players fully understand their predicament. Don’t think Kirito can solo much longer as the pve on upper levels will get more deadly.
Yeah, really think the director is making bad moves all around here. Skipping ‘First Day’, showing ‘Aria’ -before- the 2 year skip…showing ‘reindeer’ as -anything- but a flashback episode -way later- in the series…I’ll still call it as lame as putting the kiritsugu alimango episodes as episode 2 and 3 of fate/zero.
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Most of the character development you get for kirito and asuna in these side stories isn’t meant to, and wasn’t really written, as ‘okay, here’s development as they go’. Since they were written -after- the main story, they were written with more of a ‘see, this is what they were like! And how they became what you know and are used to!’. See the difference? The latter made the side stories interesting to read, since the mystery of the characters had been sufficiently built up, while the former…makes it just seem like any other story, not really as interesting.
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More than anything, to skip around from side story to side story like this will be nothing more than annoying. A two year skip from the beginning is something you -must- get used to, and would get used to, but now they will be doing a few small skips to the point where viewers will get kind of annoyed. Curiosity is better massaged by that one massive skip with -some- things gradually filled in later.
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As for cutting Argo, that’s fair enough actually.
[spoiler]Is she even alive at the end? She might be as I vaguely remember an offhand comment about kirito at least contacting her in the real world, but she never shows up outside of aria, aria pt 2 (which was p. much all argo and kirito), and maybe a few other side stories I’m forgetting, at least with small cameos. Like the investigation one…it’s been a while since I’ve read SAO, but she might have had a small scene there. [/spoiler]
And then the pacing in general…I don’t think they did too bad with this episode, but if there are going to be 24 episodes of volume 1 + volume 2 + side-stories the pacing might become kind of jarring. More than anything, pacing is guaranteed to become jarring when you compare side-story writing to main story writing as well as the time jumps that come with hopping from one to another.
in one of the side stories, i believe, its mentioned that from the 2k that died 200-300 were beta testers, and from the 1k beta testers around 700-800 logged in on the first day and got trapped.
The pacing seems a bit fast for me too, I felt a lot of stuff was left out and was a bit disappointed. I wouldn’t whine too much though since they animated my favorite light novel so who cares. LOL
Thx for the awesome link!!! It totally solve the laggy problem with the op/ed.
But who cares so much about the light novel short missing plot if the anime is good.
Even with that xy-vsfilter thingy, I get massive lag during the ED. What do?
The pacing did feel a bit too fast to me, but I didn’t have the feeling they were leaving stuff out.
About the only thing that pissed me off was that guy refusing the potion without any reason.
“Yeah sure, I’ll die IRL if that guy doesn’t use it on me, but hey, it’s no big thing, right?”
Idk if that was executed better in the novel, when is it safe to start reading it to not get ahead of the anime? Warning: I eat books for breakfast.
Just awesome. I haven’t read the LN, so I can’t judge about the “rushed” thing, but I’m able to say that this show is awesome. I’m so excited to see the next episodes.. can’t wait anymore!
@Shawn263241
Buy a new computer?
Either that, or you can try to increase your frame buffer, so your CPU can try and decode frames in advance while it hasn’t anything else to do, instead of having to wait until the previously decoded frame is displayed.
It’s easy to do with MPC-HC, just go to Options -> Output -> EVR buffers.
If you’re NOT using MPC-HC, then maybe increasing the cache size of xy-vsfilter might help.
Keep an eye on your RAM though, because you don’t want xy-vsfilter to overload your RAM, or performances WILL dramatically backfire.
If your PC has 4 – 8 GB RAM, you should be relatively safe (as long as you don’t have any RAM intensive programs running in the background).
PS:
With 8 GB RAM, I can easily max out xy-vsfilter’s cache and buffer up to 20 frames on MPC-HC.
I don’t recommend buffering more than 20 frames, though; but you should try out for yourself, what works best for you.
yeah even with the instructions, I don’t know how to install the filter…I’m such a noob.
The OP is fine, it’s just the ED…
I use MPC-HC
Thank you that xy-VSFilter solved the problem for me! ^^
It felt a little rushed, I suppose, but without having read the LNs, it’s hard to imagine that anything of great substance was left out. They could have spent 1-2 episodes on the noobs dying or whatever, but…why?
@Soukyuu: The scene happened somewhat differently in the side story this episode was based on. Kirito never offered him a potion, or even reached him before he died. The reason for this seems to be that they needed to do the reveal about him having been a beta tester as well, which in the original Kirito figured out for himself before the boss fight (He figured it out based on information that came from events that were cut from this episode, though).
Also, if you wanted to read and not get ahead of the anime… there’s really not much you can do. The original story skips nearly two years ahead after the events in the first episode, but it seems like the anime will be including many of the side stories that were published afterwards which took place in that two-year period. You could read those side stories, but many of them are written in a way that will leave a lot of “holes” if you read them before the main story, since they tend to assume you’ve read it already. I’d suggest just reading it all if you want to read it, since the direction the anime is taking may end up losing a lot of what made the original interesting. The side stories often flesh out things that were mentioned in the original, but you lose a lot of the mystery that was present there when you learn about all of this ahead of time.
Personally, I think certain side stories could be worked in chronologically (As they are doing with the anime) without ruining the effect, but others really should have been saved for flashbacks or such. For example, “First Day” from volume 8 (Which was skipped over in the anime) could have easily been episode 2 without messing up the flow of the story at all. Even “Aria in the Starless Night” (The one in this episode) doesn’t cover any events that would spoil things.
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On the other hand, “Red-nosed Reindeer”, which seems to be the next episode, is something that really should have been saved for later (Though I suppose flashback-within-a-flashback would have been silly). I can’t help but feel that showing it so early may ruin the effect. If you read the story in the original order, you see the start, then how the characters are near the end, and then you find out why they became that way over the course of the remaining time leading up to the end. Then, after the end, there are more short stories giving more details about what happened back then and why. It was an unusual way of doing things, but that was part of its charm, and it worked well. Going the route they seem to be going, they’re turning it to more of a standard sequence of events, and they may lose a lot of what kept the original interesting in doing so.
@Nayu
They can’t show subtle expression not because they can’t read them but more because reproducing them would take too much on the “video” simply because of the amount of information, the resolution would have to be too high for the hardware to process while processing all others visual. Because of that same reason (as i remember from the novel) it will also magnify some expressions like blushing and such.
So far i can’t say it really feels rushed but i does feel forced because of a lack in narration from Kirito’s point of view which is the core of the novel, on that same aspect, putting side stories before the main story (even though it is in the right order temporarily speaking) might feel quite strange for those who have read the novel since we don’t have a ‘that’s how they are’ -> ‘that’s how they were’ kind of development but more of a ‘that’s how they became like this’ development. Can’t say it’s wrong but can’t say it’s good either, will just have to wait and see how it turns out.
@Drano: Thanks for the information. As a poor college student, I can’t buy a new computer or even upgrade my current one further. I only have 3GB of RAM, but I do make sure that MPC-HC is the only program running (besides Explorer and some other basic background stuff) when I watch anime.
Wow, that was rushed. Thanks, UTW!
@castor212 @TheWingless Thanks a bunch for the info you too. I got rid of the blinking txt issues with that
O yea, I haven’t read the novel and I didn’t feel like it was rushed at all. Then I read the manga which skipped 2 years into the future. I feel that the anime should take the same path if its only going to be 12 episodes.
@ninja
anidb shows it as being a 25 episode series, so they have a bit of room, not to mention they can always do 2 seasons….
@S27 12 for season one and I guess 13 for a season 2. I looked at ANN. In that case, they do have room for more. I don’t see this anime having any fillers (I could be wrong).
Anyone who needs help, can get help from me… lol!
All you need to do is have CCCP and MPC, and a really good PC (like me I have a AMD quad core), you just need to download the xy-vsfilter (newest one) and extract it (keep the file in case), then you put the VSfilter.dll in the Program Files 86x, and into the CCCP (Community whatever), and put in the VSfilter (the one you just downloaded), in there, remember to copy it, don’t cut it… Make sure your using MPC-HC with LAV, and Directvobsub (auto-loading), there a way to find out if your using it by, playing back a video and right clicking on MPC and going to filters then directvobsub, then “misc” you should see a drop down box, for the first one pick PC, for the second one pick bt.709 (supports 720p)…
Well thats it I hope this works for all of you guys!! π
PS. Any questions just ask me…
Can someone tell me where to extract VsFilter.dll please??
@ballstothefloor
You copy VSfilter.dll into the CCCP folder which is located in the program files 86x, then replace the one in there…
@S27 About the food thing, it was never mention in the first episode but Kayaba Akihiko said in the novel, “…dislocation from an outside source of electricity for ten minutes, being cut off from the system for more than two hours, or any attempt to unlock, dismantle, or destroy the Nerve Gear. If any of these conditions are met, the brain destruction sequence will start.”
Since the government knew about what was happening, they found every person who was in SAO and brought them to a hospital. So IV drips is your answer.
I don’t use CCCP. I only have MPC-HC + LAV + madvr.
I tried the guide on xy-vsfilter but “regsvr32 VSFilter.dll” doesn’t work for me, it doesn’t recognize regsvr32 blah blah blah. Any help?
@Daniel @ballstothefloor Just replacing wont work if you alredy got another vsfilter installed in your pc. You need to run : regsvr32 “C:\Program Files (86x)\VSFilter.dll” or wherever you place the Vsfilter you just download
Tried extracting the xy-VSFilter_3.0.0.53_Stable.7z using WinRAR. It failed…and when I double click on it, there is nothing inside the 7z zipped file. What program do you recommend unpacking it? Or would someone just upload an unpacked version please? That would make things easier for the community. Thanks in advance.
Try again. maybe you fail to download it
@Fliu, and everyone who has trouble extracting the xy-vsfilter zip from google code :
Download 7zip program and extract the files using it.
I met that problem as well when using winrar (maybe because it’s an outdated version), and 7zip solves it.
I uninstalled everything and restarted from scratch. Got the latest MPC-HC v1.6 32 bit, latest LAV 51.2, vsfilter 3.9, xy-filter, haali, and madVR. Got everything set up without a hitch and the OP started to flash, which it didn’t before, and the ED does too. The only to stop it is turn off animation buffering and set the buffer to 0 but that causes massive frame drops on the ED. Don’t know what else I can do but live with the frame drops.
Hmm how about flashing subtitles? anyway to fix that? P.S. if MPC does not work, use VLC! Works beautifully on my com.
The xy-vsfilter worked. There are some minor bugs (if you skip to the middle of the OP the current line it’s on doesn’t render correctly sometimes, but the next line onwards is fine) but its functional.
To whoever said get a better computer… Phenom II X4@3.6GHz with dual HD4870s reporting in. Processing power has absolutely nothing to do with it. I always suspected there was some setting I was missing because this had happened before but I guess now I know.
I only got flashing subtitles on the old/default VSFilter that came with CCCP if I turned the buffered frames above 0, otherwise it just lagged. With xy-vsfilter no problems, although if your computer is just too slow it might flash. Dunno.
@cosmos Look if I manage to bloody unzip it, I will share it in my stupid dropbox for the sake of everyone posting 100 same post with the same notion of “unable” to extract the thing. Will post back later.
Here’s what I’ve done so far with CCCP. If you go the settings and select “VSFilter Subpicture Pre-Buffering” under VSFilter, it stops the FPS drop but the subtitles are now flashing instead. For me at least. I’m talking about the OP/ED karaoke of course, though it only happens with the ED for me.
(This also fixed the slight lag at a certain point I experienced with the previous Accel World OP and Mazui’s Hyouka’s previous OP, so I’m satisfied for now.)
I haven’t been able to figure out how to install the xy-vsfilter since I don’t exactly understand what all the terms in the instructions mean (I’m bad with this…). I can stand flashing subtitles for now, but I would like to make that stop too π
sd,avi version where???
Ok here is the file I uploaded on my sendspace for those who cbb to extract it. If you want UTW you can make it to the front page EDIT
http://www.sendspace.com/file/e86gbd
IF YOU ARE USING A 64 BIT OS, THESE PATHS ARE DIFFERENT. Namely, “Program Files” is “Program Files (x86)”
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If you’ve got CCCP:
1. Download xy-vsfilter (convenient links for people that can’t into archives)
2. Navigate to the CCCP folder, this is probably C:Program FilesCombined Community Codec PackFilters)
3. Replace (Cut and paste) the VSFilter.dll in the CCCP directory with the one you downloaded
4. Open the CCCP Settings (it’s in the Start Menu, go to Combined Community Codec Pack or just type CCCP Settings)
5. Click “Next”
6. Check the box that says “Re-Register Filters”
7. Go to the end of this post
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If you just have Media Player Classic
1. Download xy-vsfilter (from either of the links above)
2. Navigate to the Media Player Classic directory (C:Program FilesMedia Player Classic – Home Cinema)
3. Replace (Cut, paste) the VSFilter.dll in the MPC directory with the one you downloaded
4. Open a command prompt as administrator (Start menu, accessories, command prompt (right click, run as administrator for Vista and 7)
5. Type: regsvr32 “C:Program FilesMedia Player Classic – Home CinemaVSFilter.dll” (WITH QUOTES, REMEMBER IF YOU HAVE A 64 BIT OS THE PATH IS DIFFERENT)
6. Hit enter, you should get a lovely little screen saying that you have just turned your computer into a bomb (it’s a joke oh god stop freaking out)
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AFTER FOR BOTH
1. Open MPC
2. Go to View->Options
3. Go to “Playback” in the Options dialogue that just opened
4. UNcheck Auto-load subtitles (It may already be unchecked)
5. Go to “External Filters”
6. Click “Add Filter”
7. Find the one that says DirectVobSub (auto-loading version)
8. Select “Prefer” (Under remove)
9. Hit Ok
10. Try some video
11. Holy fuck
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If these don’t work I don’t know, just try hitting it or jiggling the cord.
You already know that the fancy subs are going to lag a default CCCP/K-Lite install. Just go easy on the encode next time.
Honestly, all this talk about MPC-HC, xy-vsfilter, LAV and CCCP is making me chuckle. Most of you guys have it wrong, and using VLC is not a worthy option. You lose video quality, and its libass doesn’t work as well as mplayer does, which uses true libass.
Shit, even Pantsu wrote directions, and they’re still way more involved and detailed than how they need to be.
There is no such thing as “going light” on an encode, nor would it even make a difference.
Bottom line is, if you can’t make the effort to figure out how to setup and run a proper chain for playback, then you shouldn’t complain that something doesn’t work, or you should just go wait for the .avi and be happy with your xvid.
Yeah I know, it’s not actually the encode, it’s the .ass being inefficiently rendered by vsfilter. But I don’t see how blaming the user for using an off the shelf codec pack is helpful.
Will the SD version be released “soon” or should I just look for another fansub group? I really want to watch this..
@giitaaa: Just wait. They never skipped SD releases. If they will, they’ll announce it.
It’s kinda like Guilty Crown (in good and bad ways) but MC has some balls.
@Pantsu
Thanks for the step by step ^_^
now its working fine for me
@Asdfjuma
http://gotwoot-subs.net/?p=3560#comments
No, it didn’t really seem rushed to me. I kinda would like to know what they skipped over now that you say that, because I didn’t really get a sense for what was missing.
No, it was not rushed, it’s just that LN readers are the worst kind of fans.
@zhou
the thing is that there are two possible outcomes to this season:
1) the whole 24 episodes dedicate to Aincrad (a new season for post-Aincrad! π )
2) split between Aincrad and after in one season (boooo!!! )
this is the reason why we’re worried about it being “rushed”
we want to experience Aincrad as long as possible.
it’s like the Lord of The Rings being made in one movie only instead of the three (even then, it still was compressed)
@zhou
as a fan, is it wrong for us to want more? Furthermore, we’re free to express our opinion, right?
btw, as most of u had seen this ep, let me tell u guys what this ep missed….
1. Kirito meeting Asuna in the dungeon
2. Witnessing Asuna’s potential as 1st time gamer
3. How Asuna and Asuna relationship truly start
4. How Kirito worries his actions will affect the beta testers who played normally and how significance Kirito, Diabel, and Kibaou action
5. Information on the item the boss dropped and the concept of the last attack bonus
6. How Kirito warns about the irregular attack patterns
7. How Kirito realises Asuna’s talent and the importance of it
8. How and why Kirito bears the infamy
9. How Asuna and Agil spot Kirito’s true intentions
10. One of few fan-service in SAO
@zhou
LN readers are not the worst possible fans, we’re just the ones that expect the anime adaptions to live up to all the important, albeit sometimes minute, details that were in the LN. Judging from your comment, it would seem that you have not read the LN, and since you have not read the LN how could you possibly know how we feel at the ep being rushed?
I’ve followed this post for too long. I also doubt Zhou will come back to reply lululul. I’ve already made my point about the episode being rushed(I think I accept the definition of cramming too much stuff in as rushing) as well as realistic expectations of adaptations (“weβre just the ones that expect the anime adaptions to live up to all the important, albeit sometimes minute, details that were in the LN” is NOT).
@zhou
You must be stupid or are deliberately inciting the wrath of LN readers considering the number of responses to you lululul.
After reading the side story shown in this episode (Aria in the starless night) here is what i can say about this episode : it’s excessivly rushed ! Not knowing the side story i could still find it acceptable as an anime episode but once you have read the origina story i find it impossible to not feel it’s extremly lacking, we lose almost all scenes that could have shown Asuna’s personnality, Kibaou is pictured in a way too different from how he was in the original story (knowing what he will accomplish it is quite important) and the boss fight’s end (after Diabel’s death) seem like a simple “Kirito is the hero so he goes in and just finish him while others act on their own”. I’m not sure if i’m really making sense but well, in my opinion this episode’s events should have been split in at least 2 episodes and developped further.
@zhou
you say that LN readers are the worst kind of fans but fact is that this anime’s original story is in LN format which means that it’s thanks to those fans that you can now watch it as an anime. Also when you understand that all those readers are talking about it like this simply because we hope for the best show possible based on how good the LN is, you can’t seriously say they are bad fans.
@zhou, nice one.
I installed the updated filter and that fixed the OP/ED problems with this episode but now Commie’s releases don’t display subs. I imagine if I reinstall the CCCP I’ll be able to watch those releases again but I would have problems with this series… is there some way to have my cake and eat it too?
I don’t know how to delete posts here so I’ll just add this post. After I posted, I read the rest of the thread and I found a post by SGX not too far from this post which explained how to get subs working again. I just wanted to say that my issue is resolved and I should have read the thread before asking.
I didn’t think it was horrible, but it did seem pretty bland.
Without Argo and Kirito’s narration there isn’t anything that forces Kirito from his “I don’t give a fuck” posture to the “I’m a beater!”.
I also think a lot could be better. There was no enphasis on him actually knowing the patterns. He could’ve dodged that just from reflex. In the novel he actually tutored the tanking party in where would the attack come from.
And it misses the best part of the short story, the metaphor with Asuna’s Flash and a shooting star.
One of the objectives of this story was to make both of them realize the other is great, but while the animation was great, it didn’t give that kind of feeling. Asuna’s flash wasn’t even hitting the neck of the mobs flawlessly.
The reveal of her face was also pretty meh. It was better in the novel, where Kirito was constantly trying to take a peak at her face, muttering things like “pretty”.
Diabel was dumb. Attacking like that was just stupid. In the novel he was plenty respectful. He wanted the last hit, but still helped everyone, despite taking hindering Kirito.
Oh, and Kibaou was just stupid in the episode, while in the novel he ends it with a more understanding tone, but too prideful to really admit it.
And the ending just isn’t complete without the:
“……The next time we meet, tell me just how you carried me out of that labyrinth section.”
“I understand.”
And the drama with the ink whiskers. They wasted an amazing gag. T_T
hmm, now that i think about it sao wasnt that hard right? its just theres too many retarded and jealous user with zero cooperation on their own that makes this game too hard to finish, not to mention the number of people suicide probably higher than killed in battle.
man, it kinda reminds me of mmorpg nowdays. they mostly died not BECAUSE theyre weak or underleveled, or even lack of information.
its because too much retard people acting idiotly like selfish brat that makes it so hard. no wonder kirito start soloing hahaha.
inside a death survival game, only those which keeps trying to survive can live, that holds true even for the weakest player.
if we all trapped too within mmorpg, i wonder how much people actually trying to survive and wanting to kick kayaba ass? ..i wouldnt even want to think about it, its probably hell of backstabbing.
For those who haven’t checked, there is a new version of LAV filters and MPC. If you are still having problems I would suggest uninstalling everything and get it setup from scratch without CCCP or codec packs.
@someone – I didn’t install the xy filter and my my subs on flash once then go back to normal.
I’m pretty sure hardware plays a part in this. I’m running old hardware, but still better then your phenom. i7 870 here, with subs flashing once before they play with no lag.
I just read SAO Volume 1 Chapter 16.5 side story online. All I can say is…what the fuck did I just read?
@o.o
From what I heard that wasn’t in the published version. That was from waaaay back when he released it on his site or something. I could be wrong.
where is SD? i don’t wanna mess around with filters and stuff
@o.o That’s why I considered SAO as a real virtual game, where u don’t just fight and die, but even eat, sleep, and u-know-what… I really hope them to animate it even if it’s scene just like what western movies do to scene lika that, but there’s no chance right?
Oh god please animate that even as an OVA…. kinda like Princess Lover OVA for those who know what I’m talking about
lolling in the deep….
http://www.baka-tsuki.org/project/index.php?title=Sword_Art_Online:ME7
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The continuation of ‘Aria’. Won’t make sense unless you’ve read the original, given it’s all argo and whisker explanation, but a funny read that’s easy to miss so I’m posting the link here.
who care all those LN shit!
sd,avi version where ???????????????????????????
ikr, wish they’d at least post a notice when it’ll be up. been refreshing like mad since mkv was released xD
@31785813uhfkqhf without the LN there won’t SAO anime, u retard… and don’t waste u’r time post where are the SD version, it’ll be done before the next ep… u don’t want to wait, make it urself, bitch
See this is what I was afraid of when I watched the first episode. It’s not really a matter of rushing, since time and budget constraints usually constrict anime adaptations. The problem comes up when the wrong parts of the original are cut for their sake.
In the LNs, you get a feel for the stigma involved in being a beta-tester even when the “game” started, which is later topped by Kirito’s “beater”, as well as his burden in deciding to bear that title. The anime scrapped that by removing Argo and Kirito’s efforts in keeping the betas a secret, and suddenly the impact feels like it popped up only when Kibao started bitching about it.
Cutting down Diabel’s ploy was alright, since his being a beta tester impacted little in the grand scheme of things. Cutting out Agil’s message to Kirito at the end limits his characterisation as an open and understanding fellow. Heck, even Kibao feels like a normal player, and that will impact on his role if “Morning Dew Girl” ever comes about.
But the character who SERIOUSLY got shortchanged is Asuna. Most of her defining scenes are cut off, and even the line she makes about refusing to lose to the game feels bland because there’s no comparison to make of. She was a talented swordswoman despite playing an MMO for the first time; she was willing to befriend Kirito even though it may mean she will earn the ire of other players; She’s an emotionally strong girl, able to rise from fear of rotting away to challenge her own fate; the events which sparked her interest in Kirito Seriously, her characterisation came in spurts during Aincrad, and a huge part is already cut off, to say nothing of those characterisations that comes in the later novels.
Putting “Red-Nosed Reindeer” into the storyline chronogically is a bad move. It would’ve made a bigger impact if they placed it later on during Asuna and Kirito’s heart-to-heart.
Are we LN readers being picky? We might be. But that’s because we already have some expectations of this anime. We don’t find this anime terrible, otherwise we wouldn’t be watching it anymore. We’re just hoping things will pick up.
@ Solitud
“Continuation of Aria” would be from the material editions right? I doubt they’d animate those. For one, those feel like drafts to the main story. Two, quite a bit of those storylines aren’t completed yet. You know which ones I’m talking about.
@Pantsu thx, it got laggy for me on the ED and the tips worked like a charm, I just need the SD version coz it’s readily viewable on my fone. No need to convert anymore so I can watch this awesome show anytime, anywhere xD
@ o.o
16.5 made it a non-interactible eroge hahaha
To be fair, it was rather well written. It’s hard to… well, come to though. I was half crying and half laughing that all erotic sensations were entirely in the backburner
that said, having just read Volume 2 a while ago, I’m REALLY looking forward to the next episode or two.
Red nosed reindeer made my throat ache and eyes foggy, I want to to experience it all over again
Here isn’t someone by any chance that knows the name of the epic song, which is playing while they fight the boss? Or does know if it’s released or at least will be..
@Kirito well, lest hope the next ep can make us all emotional just like the novel intended to…
Thanks for the SD release!
Thanks for the AVI I hope the next one is not this late but I understand people have lives.
Anyone has noticed that the date in 10:20 is wrong? .-.
@Arukami:
Wait for the OST to come out… It usually does.
Didn’t read the novel, but I felt that something was missing. Also, I don’t understand why Kirito acts this way at the end. It’s as if the author only did that to make him look cool, except it didn’t work, at all(for me anyway). I just thought it was lame. Am i the only one who thinks so ?
Anyway, good job UTWoots, thank you.
I don’t think it felt rushed at all…except for that knight dude dying so fast. Theeeen, was there supposed to be a dungeon thing before the boss, or does the game work to where the enemies stay dead?
@Enam:
Did you watch the same episode as everyone else? it’s clear why Kirito did what he did and it certainly wasn’t to look cool. I suggest you play the video again specifically the part where everyone starts turning on eachother
Thank you for this episode.
I liked it quite a bit. I even finished first 2 volumes of LNs, they are great.
Thank you for the hard work.
It felt rushed. Yeah I’m a LN reader as well. There are just too many important things missing, especially for Asuna and Kirito who are the main focus in the LN and anime. I seriously have no idea why they cut the scene after the boss fight when Asuna talks to Kirito, thats maybe like 30 sec and its so goddamn important.
Additionally they want to do “Red-Nosed Reindeer”. They will either have to cut out a lot again or it will be 2-4 eps for a “side-story” which is a lot.
I do enjoy the anime but so far it could have been better.
@slyfox
I understand that part, but it’s not like it was necessary for him to act like a lonely bastard.
But what I really don’t like is not the reason, but the way he acts. He’s exaggering. I mean, sure, they risk their life, but it’s still a game. They’re not warriors, just players, and it’s as if they don’t realize it. Also, they don’t feel pain, why the guy(don’t remember the name) seems to be in pain before he dies ? Anyway, I’m just unable to take it seriously. But don’t take me wrong, I don’t really dislike the anime so far. I haven’t read the novel yet, though.
Wow, I haven’t read the Novels, but I LOVED this episode. And 204 comments… My god is this anime popular XD
@Enam
I’m still unsure whether you understand why he was acting like that.
The reason why he was ‘exaggerating’ and acting like an asshole was because the blame was essentially being placed on all beta testers and as you can see their group was falling apart. Take this a step further and this persecution against beta testers would have led to all the players in the game fighting amongst each other which would lead to more deaths (can’t beat the game by yourself etc etc).
That being said, kirito singles himself out as this evil underhanded person who is worse than what they consider the worst, takes the blame and pretty much saves any other beta testers that were there and any other kind of uprising that might have occurred because of it.
well i read the manga and have to say this episode was totally new stuff for me sice the manga does not cover any sidestory.
it jumps 2 years into the game right after the events from ep 1 (thats around the 75th floor) so no i did not feel any rush at all.
i agree with @Strifer,
like i said before, shouldve been made starless night into a 2 ep anime, and start with the sidestory first day+part of starless, to have enough time properly creating the setting.
IMO, it’s side -effect of this anime for using chronological order despite the LN hadn’t been made with chronological plot. SAO anime is lacking in char development because of chronological order and they still cut many scenes, thus making some people feel, “Kirito, why?”, “Diabel, why?”, and “Asuna, who is she?”. SAO anime has only give us minimal info so far. Hope it’ll be better next time….
It did feel a bit rushed. A complete character was cut out entirely as well. Though like everyone else… not bad just could have been better.
I read the LN yesterday and loved it. I read the entire first Vol.1 chapters 1-25 and I have a question. Which one is the technical “next” part. I know there are lots of side stories which I will read, but the end of chapter 25!! I want to read what happens next in order. Any help as to which is next to read, or does it even exist?!?!
@bnekki7:
Volume 3 should be the absolute next part after Volume 1. There is a timeline on Baka-Tsuki’s webpage if you didn’t notice. If you absolutely must read in chronological order, there are dates on most of the chapters/side stories as well since some of them aren’t on the timeline. Also, since there may be spoilers on that timeline… I’ll do my best to actually give you just the book/chapter names.
V=volume
CH=chapter
ME=doujinshis/Material Editions under his pen name
SS=Side story not under any volume or ME
If we’re starting on Chronological order:
V1: It’d be like the first chapter or so of Volume 1 (Aincrad 1st floor, November 2022)
V8: First Day (Aincrad 1st floor, November 2022)
SS: Aria in the Starless Night Side Story (Aincrad 1st Floor, December 2022)
ME7: Continuation: Aria in the Starless Night (Aincrad 2nd Floor, 4 December 2022)
M8/SS?: Rondo of the Transient Sword not in any volume(incomplete translation) (Aincrad 2nd Floor, 8 December 2022)
ME9: Monochrome Concerto – first chapter (Aincrad 3rd Floor, 14 December 2022)
V2,CH4: Red-nosed Reindeer (Aincrad 46th Floor, December 2023)
V2,CH1: The Black Swordsman (Aincrad 35th Floor, February 2024)
V8: A Murder Case in the Area (Aincrad 57th floor, April 2024) (SAO Side Story)
V2,CH2: Warmth of the Heart (Aincrad 48th Floor, June 2024)
SS: Sound of Water, Sound of Hammer, not in any volume (SAO Lisbeth Side Story) (Aincrad 48th Floor, August 2024)
ME4: Cold hand, Warm heart (Aincrad 50th Floor, September 2024)
Forgive me on the next two, I don’t know which order(same month) they go in since I have not read them.
V2,CH3: Morning Dew Girl (Aincrad 22nd Floor, October 2024)
ME6: Algade Showdown (Aincrad 22nd Floor, October 2024)
V1: The rest of Volume 1 (October 2024)
V3-4: Fairy Dance(2025?)
V5-6: Phantom Bullet
V8: Caliber
V7: Mother’s Rosario
V9: Alicization Beginning (2026)
V10: Alicization Running
I am not familiar with any events past SAO volume 1 and part of 2 and some of the side stories as I have not read them, so I can’t really put any of the other events without spoiling myself either, which include the placements of ME1, ME2, ME3, ME5, “There is but one ultimate way” SS, “Cradle of the Moon” SS, and then of course, there are some years that are missing since I don’t know them. “Versus (Roppongi, April 2026) Accel World crossover” would fit somewhere near the end as you can see with the years.
As you may notice, Volume 2 is fit between all those stories, and even the chapters themselves were deliberately put in anachronological order, the first event being chapter 4. I have not read the second volume myself, but I believe there is some significance in actually reading Volume 2 the way it is.
“For those of you who havenβt read the novels, did this episode feel rushed to you?”
Nope. :3
From non-LN reader point: No and Yes. Pacing is quite tolerable but the producer assume the audience knows the inner workings of an MMORPG
From LN reader point: The compressed and altered version of Aria. They’d omitted Argo due to their stand point, she doesn’t not play significant role in SAO and in ALO. Hence, the guide book is written by an anonymous beta tester.
I think ANN inadvertently released the seiyuu name for [spoiler]Lyfa. ALO after SAO?[/spoiler]
After looking through the OP, [spoiler]they will include the Murder case arc and the honeymoon arc (most probably the Morning Dew Girl chapter, featuring their “daughter”, Yui which is important to the Fairy Dance/ALO story. They might or might not include the fishing battle on 22nd floor). Scilica arc would be follow after the Episode 3 and the meeting with Lisbeth after the conclusion of Murder case arc.[/spoiler]
No way they gonna fit Vol.1 and all the related SAO side stories in a season of 12 episodes. Just no freaking way.
Well as Lyfa is also another character that appears in SAO, I can’t really be sure that they will put ALO in this season. If they do well…. let’s hope for them they are genuises because putting 4 volume in 25 episodes would be quite hard, if not impossible (unless you cut half the story).
@Allucyfer
If they are such a genuis let see how they handle [spoiler]the raunchy part Chapter 16 [/spoiler]. The comedy ensue…. Awwwww yeaaaaah
Let’s hope an oav in it’s nice uncensored BD version ;P
Come on release ep.3 already I dont want to dl it from horrible :p when can we expect it ? π
@Allucyfer
Like Princess Lover! much? :3
After finally reading Aria in the Starless Night, yeah, it was rushed, to much got left out, it’s strange, it didn’t feel rushed at all when I first watched this episode, but when I read the novel, DAMN, I just couldn’t believe this piece was 100 pages long!! Just from that I could assess that A LOT had been cut, it’s a shame some real good scenes (yeah, I’m talking about the bath scene ~w~) just won’t be ever showing up uwu
With the adaptation of LN, I think we gonna see some new candidate for Saimoe tourny. Esp would ne delicious Asuna :3
well i have read all the novels. and i with each episode i admire the series even more. but after reading the whole web novel i found out that most of the details are missing. many imp scenes are cut off. i understand that they wish to just finish the series in 25 or 30 episodes and probably wont show the acilization arc. but still with so many fans it must go on longer. the sAO arc only must have atleast gone for 20-25 episodes since even the novels version has 30 chapters(vol 1+2)……….but still awesome series and i also like the song…..
i wish that chapter 16.5 is reintroduced int the novel and even serialized…….:P