⭐Sword Art Online Volume 1 Chapter 5-6: Read Along & Analysis
Added 2021-08-09 07:01:04 +0000 UTC
Sword Art Online Volume 1 Chapters 5-6:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/17sC_9POCRfWYKsMQ_42YnlXyiwJyptau/view?usp=sharing
Comments
To think that this was Reki at his worse writing wise. Even at his worst his writing is still great. It’s not until Alicization and early Accel World does his full skills come into play since most of SAO was written years before. I really can’t wait until you get to Unital Ring (If you read ahead). I agree that Reki’s writing is simple but detailed. It’s written in a way that you can immerse yourself into the world without much difficulty. This is something I’m trying to work on in my own writing, but I find it difficult to do without making it too simple. Speaking of detail, the way that Kirito describes Asuna is always much different than when he describes anyone else. For example, in one of the Sugary Days short stories (Which I hope you get into as well) he says, “I was mutely enthralled by Asuna’s standing posture with all of her equipment taken away. I believe the word, avatar, originated from the Sanskrit word, avatara, with its original meaning, a manifestation of a deity. A fact that crossed my mind with just how beautiful, how unapproachable the existence before my eyes was.” A bit over the top if you ask me, but thats just how Kirito is. As for the Aincrad manga, it definitely exists… I don’t think I’ve heard of anyone who prefers the manga version of SAO over any other medium. Mostly it’s because of the art style. Just one look at it and you might be able to see why. Almost every arc and story that has a manga version is drawn by a different person, including the progressive ones. There are also manga adaptations for two of the games so that’s pretty cool too, though I’d recommend playing the games before reading those. I was going to mention a few things, but everyone else in these comments already mentioned everything I was going to say so oh well. But yeah, like it was mentioned in one of the comments, people call Reki sexist more than anything. They always point to how women are treated in the series (Asuna in Fairy Dance, Ronye and Tiese in Alicization). Of course, that argument does come with them ignoring everything else in the series that shows the opposite (Yukki, Asuna when she fights, Kirito relying on most of the female characters for one reason or another, etc…). I do remember some SAO fans joking that, if anything, Reki would be sexist to men since almost every male character is seen as a villain, creep, or somewhere in between (With the exception of some of the main cast). Anyway, people just try to look for ways to insult Reki. People still call him one of the worst (Anime) writers of all time (Even though he writes the LN and not the anime, but they can’t tell the difference). Something I think I asked before, but I don’t remember if you answered or not, is if you were going to read SAO in release order including Progressive or not. I say this because progressive is referenced in the main series later on and makes things make more sense (Although it is mainly for small details here and there, including how Kirito and Asuna met). The anime even references to a scene from progressive, but there is no context to it there. If you were to read it, you wouldn’t start progressive until, I think, after Alicization 1 (Beginning). After that, I’m pretty sure there is one every few volumes. It isn’t needed perse, but it does make the experience that much better. There are some retcons here and there in progressive, like one of the comments said, but they are never anything to big that affect the overall story. Compared to other times, this comment is pretty short, but that’s mostly because I’ve been so busy lately. I mean, I just started releasing what I consider a test web novel that I’m writing between breaks at work. It’s been a pain, and I don’t think its pretty good, but I am trying to pull a Reki and torture my characters as much as possible, so I hope it works out in the end. Mainly I’m making it to get critiques so I can improve my writing. I’m basically writing this as fast as possible to see what I can do in a time crunch (Which doesn’t sound like a good idea but I’m doing it anyway). Watching your reviews has actually helped me to understand some other things I need to do, even if I haven’t implemented them yet. Anyway, I’ll probably have a fun fact for the next one, and it has to do with the original SAO web novel compared to the published one (One scene in particular).
Gen
2021-08-14 18:03:36 +0000 UTCWhen talking about lacking social skills I can't help but think of a scene on Floor 1 when Argo is barging in on Kirito about to find out that he partnered up with Asuna and his first thought is —I could escape out of the south window to the front yard, jump astride the donkey tied to the stable, and gallop full speed straight down the path through the forest in order to reach the dungeon area. to avoid having to deal with the situation. For the Demographic in game it's pretty clear in the progressive novels. There are like 3 or 4 female players (two of them being Asuna and Argo (who isn't actually full fledged part of the clearing group but a information broker) working around the frontline early on and the remaining about 40-50 people are guys. There is also mention about how Asuna actually has giant popularity later on in Aincrad, like she has fanclub levels of popularity, since she is one of the few female players and a prominent player on the frontline.
Ryuuji Gremory
2021-08-09 18:38:50 +0000 UTC"The commander picked every member himself." - that line makes me think of Heathcliff as a bit of a collector. Of course, it's to monitor the best players himself, but it also gives another reason why he wanted Kirito to join his guild so much, one last missing strong card in front of him. Plus, he likes RPGs, he likes surprising events, and if Kirito was to come closer to Heathcliff, the impact of the turnaround would've been stronger. The treachery would become the antagonism to push them into more interesting fight. At least how I see his logic there. On related note of joining the guild - there's so much in Asuna's line suggesting Kirito to join some guild. Maybe some see it as her being a vice-commander of the guild, recruiting a new member... but it was her "I want you to be safer, so I will be less worried, I want you to be closer to me, so I can protect you, be near you, and if you join my guild, it would achieve both", but she doesn't know yet why Kirito is avoiding guilds, and people... People could say, that their relationships are rushed, but I would see them as oblivious to what is going on as Kirito was xD There are so many details you have to pick up from what is said and going on, not just experience as events, that many miss it all. Yes, Asuna's way of doing it is a little headfirst at times, directly bringing up the marriage theme and asking "Let me guess—you’re not that close to anyone else, either.", which although isn't as direct if people missed the meaning behind that line as Kirito did :) But it took months (since she started, but really, more than that if read everything) to realize her feelings towards him, and at the same time - to understand, that less forceful approach just wouldn't work. Kirito is way too closed in himself at this point. I've heard complains about her falling in love with Kirito way too quick ("and all the other girls too") and for reason that he's the protagonist, but in my opinion, they at least missing the point that it's *because* *they* are the protagonists of the story, that we see their story. If someone is saying that it is a typical case of "hero getting a girl by the end of the story", I think they completely missed their development. Yes, it's easy to miss, but if you don't want to see it - even easier. "It feels like I was born here. Like I’ve always lived in this world." and as we know - she was, in a way, finally herself in this world, finally living her life instead of following the path provided to her since childhood without a choice. Which, for me, explains why she is so definitive about wishing to leave this world - to use that new achieved life, will to live, in the real world too. She knows now, how much she was missing out in the real life, and that's something she wants to experience. It's easier for Kirito to forget about the real world, for that is something he tried to escape from the start, but Asuna is here to show him, that there are things to look forward to in life too. I also want to comment a bit on the moment where Kirito said, that Asuna is an exception in terms of being a helpful party member. That would mean, that they did partied up before. And as we know, it was explored later, but I can see the hints to it there. At the same time, Asuna's "I’ve always wanted to see if you’re as good as they say." would mean then, that they partied up long long ago, for her to not know his current strength. Most likely before "Being in charge of arranging boss raid parties" :) The last part I wanted to comment on, is something that was developed over the years, thus the line that aged not that great - "the most I’d ever interacted with Asuna before was at boss strategy meetings. I’d never even stopped at an NPC-run restaurant with her..." I should add for him to its end, that it was "... in a long time" or "...since we partied up" - something among these lines :) 2 years are a long time, so he could've seen some of events separately from his current state of mind, especially given the trauma in-between his interactions with Asuna. Reki knows there's a little disconnect with that one place, but he wrote it almost a couple of decades ago, so he apologizes and making what's best for the series now in Progressive ignoring that limitation :)
Саша Одинец
2021-08-09 18:12:18 +0000 UTCI love how Reki characterized Kirito and Asuna even in the way they picked their places to call their own in the world of Aincrad. For both, their towns of choice represent something that reminds them of their real life, but at the same time, it's a chaos of Algade that helps Kirito to blend in and not stood out in any way. Just another dark figure in the unwelcoming labyrinth of streets. Which makes him even more surprised (or should I say oblivious for a reason she did it), that in this place where he hid himself from people, Asuna managed to get through this defense and come to find him. "Normally" you would expect a person just to make a look at the city, and then check the friend list instead of trying to navigate through such a place. And even though my next thought is most likely just overthinking, but in a way, Asuna's Selmburg serves her as same but opposite protection as Algade to Kirito - when there's so much to look at, it's easier for people not to look at her. I'm sure it's not the reason she picked up the place, but it's partially what helped her make it her place of comfort. Even as Kirito entered it, he got distracted by the surroundings, yet still noticed - in this place, people weren't staring at Asuna. "We passed no small number of players, but none of them stopped to stare at Asuna’s face." As for Kirito being a teenage boy - as I was writing this comment, MasterAries7 pretty much covered what I was thinking about, but I also add a bit. I guess many (haters) do not consider it, but 14 to 16 is a very important period of life to built up the social skills in a natural way. And Kirito, naturally, *did* tried and socialize when he felt he can do this... Only for every one of his new friends to die, leaving what he sees as plenty of blood on his hands. For the last one to call him a beater and blaming Kirito in what happened without leaving any way to redeem himself in his eyes (because there's no one anymore to do it for) - yeah, great socializing experience. And he is still locked inside the eternal battlefield at the same time. That's... great foundation of "self-insert" "overpowered" "blank" character... We already know, that he's a beta-tester, and that gave him a head start in being one of the strongest players in the game, but to keep this status after 2 years of all that (and beta was up to floor 10) - it shows his character too. It's a result of trying to make himself safe in the beginning, by becoming stronger. To reckless not caring about safety (in despair after what happened to his guild) or himself, that pushed him further in lvl-ling than other people. To a wish to become stronger to be able to save people, out of the endless regret that he already *was* not strong enough to save his friends. And etc. Yes, that makes him the "OP character" having such power for *no reason at all* that "he win any battle and solo the boss"... As for the "sexist" part - I think people said it more about Reki than Kirito, but if someone sees Kirito's behavior in looking at Asuna this way as sexist one, then I'm sorry, but where from his experience in handling himself in front of a girl would come from, exactly? Just let him grow up over time, it's easy to say it from the point of view of someone who passed that period of life, especially being in a much safer environment at the time. Although, I don't really see a problem in what he's doing - even he himself clearly sets up a line of what is appropriate and what's not. To add to the "anime kinda misrepresents the world a bit" from MasterAries7 comment about gender disparity - that's one of my initial concerns about what I've seen so far in the Progressive movie. This book series adds a number of important female characters, one of the very fan-favorite one especially, but instead of exploring that, we see a completely new one in the trailer, that somehow participated in events where Asuna was originally the only female player present and nobody except Kirito on the field knew about it too, until she specifically chose to show who she is... So I'll hope for the best, but that's a very simple example of the situation.
Саша Одинец
2021-08-09 18:12:02 +0000 UTCFrom a little research the first floor of Aincrad...is about the same size as the GTA5 world map. The floors vary in size, but not sure how much, so...assuming they are all the same size that would be 80km^2 per floor, so 80,000 square kilometers, so roughly 4 times bigger than New Jersey, or about the same size as South Carolina. But since the First Floor is probably the biggest floor, (from the art of the castle we can see the floors get smaller as you go up) its probably considerably less than that. Asuna is one year older than Kirito (although neither of them know that at this point). Kirito was 14 when SAO began, the scenes you covered today he was 16, Asuna was 17. So take a 14 year old boy, who as you say has social anxiety, so he has stunted social skills to begin with...then dump him in a death game...and then he spends most of 2 years alone, fighting for his life, and rejecting social interactions...so yeah probably has horrific social skills, lol. Also the anime kinda misrepresents the world a bit. SAO is populated by 10,000 japanese gamers...so the gender disparity is probably VERY one sided. Added to the fact that most of the "clearers" are probably the hardcore...so the number of women most ANY ONE on the frontline encounters on a day to day basis is probably very...very...very...low. Would be interested to see if Reki ever actually detailed the demographics of Aincrad. But yeah Kat thanks for doing this, you have gotten me back reading the novels as well because of this.
MasterAries7
2021-08-09 15:40:06 +0000 UTC
