Sword Art Online Alternative: Gun Gale Online

6 years ago when Sword Art Online first aired, that piece of work caused controversy that still generates discussion to this very day. Then Summer 2014 came and we got the sequel known as Sword Art Online II. While being an improvement of the original series, it didn’t really amplify itself as a big improvement. Four years later, here we are again. Except this time, it’s not an actual continuation of the main series. Instead, we got this spinoff known as Sword Art Online: Alternative Online. To be clear, you don’t need to watch any of the previous series in the franchise. In fact, it doesn’t even matter if it’s the first time you found out this show exists. SAO: Alternative Online is the title as it suggests, an alternative story that takes place based on the SAO franchise. The original light novel is written by Keiichi Sigsawa rather than Reki Kawhara although he does provide supervision for the series. It takes place in a shared universe in the virtual world known as Gun Gale Online. The story deals with a university student named Karen Kohiruimaki who decided to join GGO under the alias “LLENN”. Now I’ll be frank. I’m actually a bit of a fan of the Sword Art Online video games. I’ve played Sword Art Online: Hollow Realization and more recently, Sword Art Online: Fatal Bullet. The games actually contains a fair amount of enticing gameplay. After clocking a decent amount of hours in Fatal Bullet, I came to realize that Alternative Gun Gale Online isn’t so much different than the game itself. My impression of the first few episodes felt like the anime dropped me inside a video game. We have the main character LLEEN as she enters the Gun Gale Online world. She’s rather petite with a short height. In the real world, Karen is actually tall and has a height complex. As such, she takes on her chibi form in the virtual world to build her own self-esteem. There’s quite a bit difference in their personalities between her real life and virtual character that they almost seem like two different people. However, the anime spends a majority of the time on her in-game avatar. The show set some red flags at first because of this premise. First of all, how are we supposed to take a character like LLEEN seriously when she looks like a kid dressed in pink and a rabbit-looking hat? The first few episodes chronicles her life in the GGO world as we learn about her role. It also drops a fair amount of exposition about the mechanics of the game she participates in. Similar ro the SAO II, this series mainly involves firearms. This is also similar in comparison to the Fatal Bullet game as we see a variety of weaponry. LLEEN’s choice of weapon is a pink P90 submachine-gun she nicknamed “P-chan”. It matches her style because of her speed and agility. In the meantime, the episode also introduces both allies and rivals as LLEEN spends more time in the GGO world. These include characters such a Pitohui, M, and Fuzarioh. Along the way, it’s easy to see LLEEN’s confidence develop as a player compared to her real life persona. Unfortunately, I can’t really say the main cast of the series are memorable characters. LLENN is probably the only character that’s worth investing time into despite being having a childish personality. This is a bit contrast to Pito, who seems to have some psychological issues especially when she’s on the battlefield. M is a character that may feel like a comic relief after you realize his real personality. Finally, Fuka is LLEEN’s partner and best friend with a big obsession with VR games. While there’s definitely character chemistry between the main cast members, there’s not much development at all involving them. It’s a shame since the show could have really took the opportunity to make them into larger than life characters. Instead, they are just participants in the game for their roles. In real life, their characters are too average to be marketable and doesn’t really sell their personalities in any appealing way. All other characters in the series are easily forgettable and in fact a disgrace to the game itself, especially the perverted men. I think at one point, LLENN even asked “Do only lechers play this game?” By this point, you may be asking yourself if this show is worth watching. Honestly, it’s not a hard question to answer but be prepared for a typical sci-fi/shounen story. The series feels like it’s mainly aimed for gamers and fans of the franchise. If you’re not a fan of this type of genre, then you may not get the best experience from this. Even after I played the games, I felt like show could of done more to develop the plot. Every episode that takes place in the GGO world feels the same with the battle royale-esque vibe and exposition. I do admit that the battles themselves can be quite exciting at times but once you’ve seen a lot of it, the hype dies quickly. The cheesy words used in dialogues borders to creep factor at times while the comedy remains generally lighthearted throughout the show. On the other hand, the real life portrayal of characters in later episodes steps it up to the plate. Some segments are genuinely heartwarming to watch and a few are rather important to establish character roles. It blurs the line between fiction and reality like the way it should be. This is 3Hz’s first attempt at adapting a light novel series. Previously, they worked on original projects and a manga adaptation back in 2016. To me, they did a fair job although not an overly impressive one. I should say that praise should be given for the battle choreography as it feels like how a video game is portrayed. It has a similar style of the Fatal Bullet game including the death scenes. Camera angles, body movements, and character expressions are also well decorated to bring out memorable moments. Even the comedic factors sells well with the clever timings. There’s also a variety of weapons that are accurately portrayed from the light novel and games such as the P90, M107A1 (anti-material rifle), KTR-09 (Assault Rifle), photon energy sword, and among others. It does fell flat in the monster gallery though as the show focuses much more on conflict between the players. Unfortunately, I have to admit the overall world setting really doesn’t set the bar high for a virtual game. Every battleground environment looks the same that after you’ve seen it once, it feels like you’ve seen it all. The barren landscapes may looks suitable for the show but it’s extremely tedious and lacks creativity. There’s not even any diverse maps this season. On the contrary, I will say the anime’s soundtrack lived up expectations and perhaps gone a bit beyond. The battle OST creates an exciting mood as we see players fight for their lives. Character voices may sound a bit generic but I confess that they work wonderfully for their personalities. The theme songs brings back the familiar mood of the previous SAO series if you’re a fan of those. In essence, it really works. Sword Art Online: Alternative Online felt more like playing a video game than a watching an anime. After finishing this series, it felt like the creator wanted us to experience what’s like being part of the GGO world. As I mentioned before, this anime seems to adhere to fans of the franchise and video game players. The sensation of battle royale games has been a phenomenon in the most recent years. It took the world by storm and may remain that way for awhile. For a show like this though, there’s still room for improvement.

Video games have been part of our everday life. Either from anime and to our real world, this type of entertainment have grown massive for years and it is still growing until now. Back in Summer 2012, the whole anime community was stunned as the first season of Sword Art Online came. With its mixed reviews saying it was either the worst or the best series, the whole community is divided until now even a season 2 came, along with the movie Ordinal Scale. Looking back to the past recent season which was Spring 2018, we were given a ton of new shows and sequels. Along came a spin-off that will judge anime fans, who have watched Sword Art Online. That is the spin-off 'Sword Art Online Alternative: Gun Gale Online', which I am going to review on now. The setting of the story is alternative to Sword Art Online 2, where we are first introduced to a virtual shooter game named GGO (Gun Gale Online). Alternative, meaning the characters will be different as well and the story, giving us a relief from the main problem of the original series, which are the characters. The plot revolves around Karen Kohiruimaki (Llenn), who has a problem about her tall height. Her complexity have been her problems. From being jealous to cute, little girls and always knocking her head into a high platform, this has become a nuisance on her real life basis. But this complexity of hers is a good character quality. We, audience, have given a bit of a background of her issue which leads us speculating possible outcomes of her overcoming it and we audience are anticipating that. Unlike, the main character from the original Sword Art Online series, which is Kirito, we really don't know his past or characteristics in real life. We just know that he is a beta tester, concluding that he is good with the game SAO and with this we can speculate the outcomes that our main protagonist can get out of the game. Here on SAO Alternative, we have a clumsy main character, who found her dream into the game of Gun Gale Online, which is to be a cute little girl (a loli). Though it sounds ridiculous, it was by chance that she got the avatar she wanted all along. We have seen her going through other games and still having that enormous height of hers. We've seen her struggle because of it making her log-out automatically. She was lucky she got the character she wanted. Another thing I want to point out to the main character of Alternative is that inspiration from the character is there. And that is her favorite singer 'Elsa Kanzaki'. This gives us another information that this MC is not really strong or confident in life (due to her complexity), that is except if she has any inspiration, which is the music of her favorite singer. This applies on real life as well. Each and every one of us have inspiration either to someone, dream or things that can support our works. Then comes her game mechanics. On the first few episodes, I can already tell that she is easy to spot on or killed if she is not taking 'M's advices or go with him. The fact that she is so clueless to the game let us see what she can do. Is she going to be like the main character of SAO, who is so overpowered? Or is she going to be just a nuisance to the team? The answer is right through the middle. Although we see her with her sonic-like abilities, we have to agree that without strategizing, if she goes on to a team fight, she will just get shot to death. That is why 'M' as the character supporting her in the few episodes have an impact to the situation of "overpowered characters" on anime. Unlike other characters from other series that have over the top powers, Llenn... is just a "The Flash" of GGO. A pro team can single handedly deflect her speed advantage and strategizing it to lure her and get the kill. Without M's guidance or knowledge on the first Squad Jam, Llenn would have been butchered by those "kids". Then we have 'Pitohui', the one who give Llenn more guidance to the game and her first friend. Pitohui's role on the story as a villain is quite good as for some reason her antagonistic traits comes part only at the final episodes. Her avatar does look like an assassin or a mercenary, which is have antagonistic traits, but on their first meetings, the two were friends. Though this friendship is tested by upcoming revelations throughout the episodes. Gun Gale Online's Squad Jam showed the viewers other characters but most notable supporting ones are the SHINC, which comprises of tall and strong women on the first squad jam. Earlier I talked about Llenn being useless or can easily be killed if she is not strategizing against a pro team. The SHINC made an accurate example of it on the final battle on the first Squad Jam. Then after their defeat, revelations of their real life self stunned Karen and actually made her more confident about her complexity which backsup to the 'character development' that a protagonist should have. Along with her development and confidence on herselve in real life, we are shown by her strategic development in game on the second Squad Jam. This tells that experience is far more superior than power and along with Shinohara, Miyu (Fukaziroh), the second Squad Jam highlighted the 'Pink Devil' development. It is as if on the second Squad Jam, comparing it to the first one, Fukaziroh was like Llenn (the clueless one in the first squad jam) and Llenn was M (the one who knows what to do). This characters are very notable and unique which gives the anime itself on my opinion a better version of the original series. With its opening having the same singer from the season 2's GGO arc, to the pleasant and heart-warming ending of the anime, this show is really spot-on. Not to mention the art of this anime being simple but watcheable. Who doesn't like a pink loli going up against players and beating the heck out of them? And I am not even done yet. Like in the past, Sword Art Online was a massive, hit not only to the anime community but around the world, as its timing of its genre was very on point. With the launch of Virtual Reality and it being popular to the masses, Sword Art Online was like an intake to the VR world. Giving us questions like what are the possibilities of this technology be?.. Alternative does the same thing but not Virtual Reality but 'Battle Royale' games in a whole. For the past months, this type of games have been popular even if you only have PC, PS4, or XBOX, this type of game hits the masses. From H1Z1, Player Unknown's Battlegrounds then to Fortnite, this games have been trending for months on ever single websites on the internet. Even anime fans plays this type of games and coincidentally, Sword Art Online Alternative: Gun Gale Online came out April 2018 this year which was a month where Battle Royale games like Fortnite and Player Unknown's Battlegrounds are on the top list of online games. This anime deliver the 'Battle Royale' genre into the screen perfectly from tactics, weapons, equipments, team fights, and a whole lot more. Of course there are still some differences of the Squad Jam on GGO being different to the 'Battle Royale' games on our generation for example, the scan and it being virtual reality. Although, I could say it is very close to it and that is why Sword Art Online Alternative: Gun Gale Online is a very entertaining show. With its great protagonist and antagonist which have character developments and backgrounds along with the other characters supporting each other from the action scenes to inspiration, Sword Art Online Alternative is a great show to give a try on if you dislike the original series' intake of characters and plot. Story: 7/10 Art: 8/10 Sound: 8/10 Character: 9/10 Enjoyment: 8/10 Overall: 8/10

Sword Art Online or SAO for short is the most polarising anime series of all time. It is the definition a series that you will either love or hate. Like with many people on net I have a very low option of Sword Art Online because it was a terrible series. While I don’t completely despise the series anymore mainly because I have seen anime that are in my opinion worse than Sword Art Online it is still a series that I really dislike with a passion When I first heard about this series being announced a couple moths back after I watched the painfully subpar Sword Art Online movie I was really excited to check it out. The main reason why I really excited for this is because that they are completely removing three of the nasty SAO elements that made the franchise such a piece of shit. The first nasty element of SAO which the spinoff removed was the Gary Sue preaching idiot Kirito who is by far one of the worst anime protagonists to ever exist from this medium. The second nasty element of SAO which the spinoff removed is that it was going to be done by A1 Picture aka the EA of Anime. There’s honestly not much to say on this part because if you have seen any almost anime from A1 Pictures you would know incompetent the studio and the staff are. The final nasty element of SAO which the spinoff removed is that it was going to be written by one of the worst writers ever Rei Kawahara which was honestly the best part about that anncoument because the spinoff is actually going be done a more talented writer Keiichi Sigawa who also did the Kino’s franchise. With all of these nasty elements of SAO killed off in the spinoff I thought the spinoff could how a different and more appealing light to a series where many other such as myself hate. Now watching all 12 episodes of this spinoff as well the hilarious recap episode I have to say this This show is a terrible SAO spinoff however on its own Sword Art Online Alternative Gun Gale Online is a pretty good anime its own right that barely functions as typical SAO product. Now with that all said hello everyone this is Shawn aka KurataLordStage and welcome to my review of Sword Art Online Alternative Gun Gale Online and with that out of the way let’s begin. Story. The story follows a Tokyo university student named Karen Kohiruimaki, who's insecure about her height and an introvert. One day, she decides to join GGO on the advice of a friend in order to improve her self-esteem, using the name LLENN. Along the way, she makes friends as she plays the game with other GGO players and fight against hostile players aka PKers and monsters. Not gonna a lie I thought the story was pretty good for the most part. Right out the gate this anime makes a great first impression by introducing our main character Karen or LLENN who is trying to adapt to her new surroundings in the Gun Gale Online where instead of being this overpowered Mary Sue she actually takes her time to understand the game as trying to find escapism from the real world thanks to her height complex. The one thing that really loved about this anime is how it was able to present all of it’s game machermise to the audience to a point where anyone can understand the game machemes as well what it has to offer to the player. Unlike the original SAO series were all the games that were featured in that series were fundamentally broken thanks to poor world-building and poorly explained game mechanics Sword Art Online Alternative Gun Gale Online actually takes it’s time to build its world in the game of Gun Gale Online where it actually propley explains the games mechanics from battle locations, weapon types, weapon attachments, battle tactics, etc. This alone really makes the world of Sword Art Online Alternative Gun Gale Online feel alive. It’s not just worldbuiding though. The dialogue too is great as it prefects captures the tone of the battle royal setting where character are seen actually communicating with other and working together instead of being edgy solo players in a battle royal game. Also the way the characters  in the show interact while playing the battle royal game is great as they all feel like actually gamers who would like to work together to accomplish they goal from talking about stragicly, saving teammates from death, actually honouring squad mates deaths with respect etc. These are the type of stuff that I want to see more in a anime that has a MMORPG/ Battle Royal Setting. Another thing that I liked about SAO Alternative Gun Gale Online it how self-aware it is. VR Gaming being overall better it still has that issue where the game uses RNG to create an avatar that’s she want by failing with hilarious results thanks to her height. As much I want to continue praising the show with its solid writing and theme exploration I have now address some of the show issues. While the problems in Sword Art Online Alternative Gun Gale Online not series breaking issue still had a couple of issues that I couldn’t ignore at all. Issue 1. Plot armour. I will admit the plot armour is not as a big problem here when compare to the original Sword Art Online series by Reki Kawahara there were some plot armour moments in the show that kinda upset me. For example in episode 5 after Eva shooting down P chan she literally gets angry and fight backs hand to hand combat Kirito style killing Eva in the progress. I understand that the show want’s to showcase the aggressive hand to hand combat in the series but this was just a cheap and lazy to do it. Issue 2. Weapon damage constantly. Like with Issue 1 it wasn’t really a big problem however they was a certain battle that bother me and that is  one of Fukaziroh Grenade Launcher bullet’s did not explode the target’s face on impact. Grenade Launcher bullet’s don’t work like this. Unless she has some special type of grenade launcher that would not explode on impact where the show never tells us that she has bullets like that her shooting out the bland grenade launcher was an asspull and never explained. While issues 1 and 2 were minor problems that the issue 3 one really made me upset quite a bit of how the show even kept one of it’s SAO elements from the Aincrad arc and that is if you die in the game you die in real life bullshit. The moment when M said that in episode 5 the show kinda lost me because as a person who dislikes main original series of SAO I went into to this series expecting a fun battle royal spinoff that doesn’t feature any of the shitty SAO elements. Luckly that shitty SAO element only affects one to two characters and while everyone is safe from dying in real life by a video game. Speaking of episode 5 the whole episode was out of context and contrived. This was defiantly a low point from this spinoff but least it’s not as bad as any arc in the original SAO series. Overall I thought the story was pretty above average. It may have some issues but I don’t think they were series breaking like in the original series. 7/10 Characters. When it comes to the characters of Sword Art Online Alternative Gun Gale Online I thought they were pretty good. They may not be well written but they were all fun, interesting and entertaining characters that I liked. Karen is a pretty solid protagonist overall. Unlike Kirito her reasoning to escape into video games is more justice as she doesn’t like her own height in the real world so to counteract this she goes to GGO and upon surprise the game let’s her be that cute small girl that she’s always wanted to be. This doesn’t stop there she also discovers that she is genuinely enjoys being in that game and because of that GGO becomes her escapism from the real world. This is how you write a character who wants’ escapism in the real world through video games. Also unlike Kirito she actually a interesting character who develops quite a bit in the show by meeting new friends, and rivals that are in GGO. The rest of characters were pretty solid overall and while they are not excua…

In 2012, we are introduced to the world of Sword Art Online, where it features the most hated over-the-top OP character Kirito, the main MC along with his shenanigans of fantasy-drama with the cast of SAO, and his foundation brings him over to 2014 where we have SAO Season 2: the world of Gun Gale Online (or GGO), with an entirely new cast (but not without the original cast (since it’s a cross-over)) that manages to do well but garner less attention from the original series, but in all essence, Kirito stood still: He saw, he came, and he conquered…ALL, with much hate from the anime consensus. This year, we have an entirely different GGO, not written by the original creator Reki Kawahara (thank goodness!), but by the author of Kino’s Journey, Keiichi Sigsawa. Knowing the gun-crazy novelist, as mentioned from Pitohui: “Well, he’s a gun freak and a not-so-novelist but afterword writer (that takes serious pride in his work but doesn’t take himself seriously and just wanna have fun). This is what you get when they are combined.” And much to my amazement, SAO Alternative is a damn good and impressive series of not just its light novel adaptation, but the anime series here provided so much fun and realism that’s NOT what the original SAO had with OP characters, the MMORPG or game-fantasy setting and fanservice, just plain old good shooting and characters to boot AND finally THE SAO series that is worthy to be discussing about here. This story follows the main best girl (IMO) Karen “LLENN” Kohirumaki, not the typical kind of girl that you see on the streets, because she is insanely tall (183cm or 6 ft’) and has problems coinciding with society that are the status quo. Relinquished, but not out, she sets on the task of finding the best VR game that suits her wellbeing of being shorter and chibi-fied, and none other than GGO (with her AmuSphere) is she able to take advantage of her small sized avatar of her dreams! And it is there that she finds the friendly, yet sadistic Pitohui, just the typical friend looking out for each other at first…until her invitation (and pressure) to LLENN to enter in “Squad Jam” (which is SAO Season 2’s Bullet of Bullets (BoB) team battle royale variation) faces both a challenge and a fight to the death as Pitohui’s obsession with the original SAO features made her lose consciousness (or rather, becoming the 2nd Kirito) and her fight in SJ2 proves that. So, with the storytelling and how director Masayuki Sakoi (one of the best from Studio 3Hz) decided to pace Sigsawa’s adaptation, it is apparent that for those who entered this with no know-how of SAO Season 2: GGO will be lost (but not by much), and the pacing of the series which is fast, but progressively it slows down to give the plot more context and its true intentions here and there. Overall, it is a well-thought-out story which gives more exposition and its characters life out of the ordinary. And…not to mention that recap episode where Sigsawa himself has lavished out his own parody (as he is famous for that) in Episode 5.5 where he ‘sponsors’ SJ inserts through his self-acclaimed “afterword” (or after-credit rolls) through silly voices and sounds into the battle footage, oh what a bliss! The characters here tell the exact same story from how they are made from the ground-up, and as a result, they flow much better than the SAO counterparts it came from: LLENN, as a character, much from her chibi avatar cuteness that cannot be mistaken as a kindred spirit in battle, she is a character that goes all-out in doing what she does best: Shooting, make and gather friends, more shooting, and a blood-bath between her and Pitohui rounds up what her activities lie in. Be warned as her real and VR life are two separate entities: the tall yet humble self vs. the crazy, all-pink character mascot that she has garnered popularity amongst Squad Jam players as one with the most potential. Engaging with LLENN felt like a journey of sorts (see the similarity?), from her alliance with Goushi Aousgi (better known as M in GGO) in the first Squad Jam to friendship with Miyu and fighting together in SJ2 against Pitohui and M and their mercenaries. Overall, LLENN is a character that can best be resembled as another Sinon, but not to that extent where it gets all technical, and with her P90 (often calls it P-chan), she can go anywhere. Overall, LLENN’s character writing may not be brilliant, but it’s fun to see her insane adventures and risks to be the best of the best. Pitohui, the character that is out of form and looks hideous, first appears like the stereotypical challenger out from the ashes, but immediately her scarred or tattooed face immediately gives away the vibe that she is not the typical challenger like the many out there in SJ. Suffice to say, it’s her addiction through the SAO back then that made her this way: the aggressive, careful and meticulous yet murderous intent that shaped her the way in GGO, even though the 2nd round of Squad Jam where she mercilessly slaughters enemies the EXACT way how Kirito did in GGO with the light saber. But thankfully, this is one of the few traces of the original series and doesn’t go to an extent to replicate what happened, so crisis averted. Overall, Pitohui is a character you wouldn’t want to mess with, because she gets her work cut out and done on the spot. M, the armour/guards-man, he is the typical buff character…until his deal with Pito shows up his desperate face, just as many out there (but not as stressful as the original series where you die in the game, it’s game over in real life). But I can tell one thing, he’s as robust as a rock with his tank-like shield which repels shots to the maximum and I have to say that M makes light work of how a support character and a team member should be. The man with guts to analyze the best of the situation, I approve! The characters don’t quite have much to boot and/or say, given their exposure that doesn’t give much information from the start, but as the series subsequently progresses, it gives the characters much substance and their identity uncovered and recognized. In the art and animation department, it is absolute proof that Studio 3Hz could take any adaptation, fill in with their own unique quirks and still make the series look as realistic as it is. Unfortunately, as much as the original series (SAO S2: GGO) has been shown, the art style may lack in some areas which A-1 Pictures have done well capturing the essence of GGO in its entirety. But what it makes up for with sacrificing art quality is with animation, and it helps that 3Hz is hands down one of the best when it comes to animation quality, and throughout the immense action, it doesn’t sweat a beat, and fuses with the art style quite well, making a decent art style still look appealing to the eye. The musical department, is quite frankly, the high point of the series. Eir Aoi has done it again, with the 1st OP of SAO: GGO “Ignite” in 2014, and in comes the alternate version with “Ryuusei” as the OP, and honestly, is lit and on fire, and immensely watchable, so much that I never escape the OP just to hear the goddess come back to reign in her high-pitched voice that truly is just satisfying to listen to. And let’s not forget LLENN’s VA, famous seiyuu Tomori Kusunori with her ED “To see the future”, and just like the OP, is a good ED to end the series’ episodes, and overall, this OST is a soundtrack that’s worth having, and is my No.1 favourite this season. Overall, SAO Alternative: GGO is a series that if you’re coming in from SAO and reeling in from the saltiness of the series (which I don’t blame you), it’s hard to get adjusted of this gem of a show, albeit done by an author of jokes and a different production team, but promise me, forget the travesty you know that is SAO and stride into the Alternate: GGO that is everything except what Reki Kawahara had envisioned, with absolutely no expectations, and see how much this show will …

This show is a spin-off in Sword Art Online franchise and features a completely new cast in next “death game lite” scenario. Do these major changes mean improvement over the original? No. SAO:GGO tanks story and characters as spectacular as its predecessor, minus those action sequences, that made SAO at least serviceable. RATING: 3 – bad. STORY: We did not forget the obligatory café info dump & rape scene. I do not research upcoming shows, or the names behind a project, often I don’t even read the synopsis; the only entries I may recognize are the title and the studio. After several weeks I learned, that apparently some big shot was working on the script, thus GGO is already a much better anime. Nope, I do not see any improvements. You don’t believe me? Let’s play SAO-Bingo. I am asking for an overpowered main character, do we have one overpowered protagonist somewhere? Bingo! LLENN is abnormally fast and small compared to everyone else. Plot armor, is plot armor a thing? Bingo! LLENN’s first tournament or Pito’s headshot are nothing but plot armor. Next is an obligatory rape scene, can we see some questionable content? Bingo! Molesting dead virtual bodies is a critical hit for me. Finally, I offer café scene containing info dump! Bingo! But wait, it is not just a scene, it is an entire EPISODE. BINGO! Not only does the show wander aimlessly until the obligatory café info dump episode, it also manages to tell nothing of importance afterwards. This anime is just a slow tournament arc void of any narrative and filled with underdeveloped caricatures. Not to mention that GGO as a game is made even more boring and dumb. CHARACTERS: Kirito is a better main character. Initially, our main character, Karen, was looking for means of escapism, because she has a complex concerning her height. This trait is the only integral point in her characterization and together with the whole escapism theme quickly loses any relevance after first episodes. Motivations are nonexistent. I already mentioned plot armor, so moving on to the antagonist, Pito. She is a good player and nuts. That was fast. The support cast is just as amazing: we have a group of middle school girls, who want to improve their teamwork in a virtual game by fighting against militant squads doing their training in GGO. Makes sense to me. Moreover, there are friend B and friend M. All the other side characters are morons, as players and as human beings. ART & ANIMATION: Pink loli in a brown desert. At least the original SAO had some above average visuals and several well-made action scenes, thus could be discarded as popcorn entertainment. SAO:GGO fails to deliver even this much. Some characters models cater to moe fans, others look like failed experiments; there is no cohesive art style shared among anything. Backgrounds consist of unimpressive desert, forest or grey urban areas. Animation is present, interesting or engaging action is not. SOUNS: Average. Background music as well as OP or ED are average, not even one track stands out in any way, good or bad. Original voice act is anime 101. Honestly, pretty much every anime is better than SAO:GGO, even the original SAO stands above this mess. Just go watch something else. If you value it higher than the original, because some big names were working on it, take off your bias glasses and look again.

For years, Sword Art Online franchise told us a story about being inside a VRMMO game (or ARMMO in Ordinal Scale case) and while the setting or the world building is very good enough, they never have given us any good story or protagonist characterization (I'm looking at you, Kirito). Suddenly an adaptation of a light novel spin-off based on Sword Art Online franchise came to us and exceeded its original story it based on. Using the game setting of Sword Art Online : Phantom Bullet arc, the VRMMO game called Gun Gale Online, I will tell you why this spin-off is far more better than its original story. The most important thing is of course, characterization. They used one important theme around building LLENN as a character and that is insecurity. It is very shown that LLENN or Karen have an insecurity about her height that is far taller than anyone else. She thought that being tall was not cute at all. Hence, she hoped that if she entered the world of VR, she could become shorter and cuter. She hopped from one game to another just to get a perfect avatar for her to fulfill her insecurity. Pitohui on the other side used game to suppress her suicidal tendency and sadistic nature just for LLENN to enter the fray and snap her out of it. For me, I have the same way of thinking as LLENN. Game is somewhere that you should have fun because sometimes reality is harsh and you just want to run from them for a while. While the original story itself has already made a good game mechanics, this spin-off really used them well and even added more things that really interesting. First, how the stats really pay off at the battles. LLENN have more AGI than most people it made her very insanely fast while Fukaziroh have more STR than most people it affected her ability to wield more weapons than anyone and of course, her power to do melee. Second, how they used the bullet line as a signaling system. Until now, bullet line just shown as a prediction line to avoid the bullets. To actually used them as an effective way of communication, it never crossed my mind until this adaptation came. They used it as a marking for party members to move stealthy or separately. And lastly, the immortal object. I think it is very smart to use dead bodies as shield as it was an immortal object that cannot be penetrated. It was a perk that is very interesting to be part of our strategy in a game about guns and bullets. The music is certainly good. The songs that being sung by the voice of Kanzaki Elza have this vibe of Aimer in her voice making the songs feel deeper and better in my opinion. Of course, you should never miss the opening song. After a long time of hiatus, Eir Aoi came back and sang the opening for this anime. For me, it is fitting since she was the one who sang the first opening of SAO II and it was a great reunion for the fans of both SAO and Eir Aoi in general. Overall, this anime has exceeded all of my expectations and rise above its original source, Sword Art Online. With how the anime ended, I do really wish to see this anime being continued into second season if the source material or the light novel still have more story to go. It is a huge kudos for the writer of both the source material and anime.

I cannot describe how utterly disappointing this shit is. I had this hyped up by my friends as GGO but actually written well and was super excited bc i love all the worlds in the SAO series just hate the plots. I want to clarify to anyone looking to watch this, and with a similar mindset i had, this is 1000 times worse than anything written in SAO. It starts of with a great concept as any of the other stories and characters you could see being interesting, but dont worry, this series does just as much to throw it all away. My first point is the sheer amount of pedophile/loli shit represented in this, its literally 75% of the humor of the entire show. There are very questionably aged relationships and idolization of childlike partners. My next point is the characters. There is not a SINGLE instant of growth in any of the characters mindsets or personalities to the point where the villain of the story, does not stop their villainous shit by the end and there is no actual resolution. Now i want to talk about the writing. i swear to god not a single scene flowed into another, every single character is written with 2 personality traits (one to identify them, and the other being i hate my life so im someone else online *it also proceeds to never give an explanation outside of 2 characters*), no plot points are explained OR resolved, the writers constantly decide to skip over important information when moving from one point to another, and they write everyone like a damn psychopath. This whole show is garbage and i pray to God the creators of SAO never write a story again.

Honestly this anime is insanely enjoyable. This review is spoiler free by the way. After finishing this show I went to write a review immediately because of how much I loved the ending and how it wrapped up. First the ending. This is the most complete, wrapped up, and satisfying endings I have seen in a while. I felt so complete after watching it. The characters ALL grew and developed and it fit so perfectly that I wouldn't have ended it another way. In the trend of seasonal, 12 episode anime; this is definitely one of the most complete anime I have seen. The story progressed very well, from the beginning to end the motivations were clear. LLENN/Karen wanted to play a video game to kind of escape here height anxiety. Probably one of the most realistic motives I have seen for a VRMMORPG series I have read or watched. A lot of people, but not all who go online and make online friend do it because of issues/insecurities in real life as LLENN does in this story. This alone really gives the watchers a lot of reason to relate to LLENN as a character even if you aren't an internet person, people go places or do things to escape the hard parts of reality. The characters are all very enjoyable LLENN is fun to watch, while some people see her as annoying, I can only disagree. M is very funny to watch especially as it gets closer to the end and seeing LLENN's reaction to some of the stuff he says. The gel of characters really adds natural sort of unforced comedy that I think is hard to come by these days. Overall without spoiling I don't really have much to else say but, this show is VERY enjoyable and worth the watch, the real rating of the show is probably closer to an 8 but because i enjoyed every second i gave it a 9. The bad in this show is just a lot of the logical stuff though, all the characters beside the main ones of course have a lot of trouble aiming because they aren't main characters. LLENN is extremely broken and can run faster then anyone, problems with the game mechanics etc. These issues are able to be over looked easily by me due to my personal investment with the characters and story, I don't really see the game mechanics and game logic flaws as a problem because i don't see it as a focus, but I can see how some other people might find this awfully annoying and are unable to get over it. This show is worth your time and thank you for reading my first review.

Story: The story takes place a few years after the release of Sword Art Online. It centers around our main heroine Karen Kohiruimaki. She enters the world of Gun Gale online to get away from the issue she has being a very tall woman. She tries many different games but each one gives her a tall default character. That is until she enters Gun Gale online and becomes the Pink Devil LLENN. I actually liked the idea of why Karen wanted to play games. Because honestly thats what we do. When we are sick of dealing with situations we don't want to deal with we turn to Anime, Video games or whatever else to distract us from our problems. She then meets a fun amount of people including Pito, M, the Amazons. With this the Gun Gale story builds into something stronger. Art: The art and animation were fantastic in my opinion. Taking out blood and replacing it with red pixels was a great. you could still sense it when someone was getting shot or cut. The main thing I liked about the animation was the First Person Point of view they went to at certain times. For instance LLENN is running in episode one but they have it so that you, the viewer, is seeing what she sees. I though that was pretty awesome. Sound: The Voice acting was great and i thought the BGM and music throughout the anime was really well done as well. A lot of intense parts were paired with some great music. Characters: Aww man Pito and LLENN were all you really needed in this anime. I was constantly struggling deciding who my favorite is between the two of them. (After the last episode it ended up being LLENN/Karen) The supporting cast was really fun too. M was hilarious at times and Miyu was pretty funny. I wish she was in the anime more in the beginning. Enjoyment: I am surprised how much I enjoyed this anime. I thought it was not going ot be anything special but it turned out to be really great. Overall: I honestly found this better then the original Sword Art Online. Now I did like Gun Gale better but only slightly. I just felt like this anime had everything that Sword Art didn't. An overall better cast of characters, better story, no romantic drama garbage, and a good ending. It's nothing like Sword Art and is basically a stand alone show. I would highly recommend it to anyone looking for a fun shootem up type of anime.

SAO Alternative GGO: A fun series that served as the opening act SAO Alternative GGO had only one function: to warm up the public for the arrival of the main dish of the franchise, Alicization, which is coming in October. And the series fulfilled. The novel written by Keiichi Sigsawa (known for novels like Allison and its sequels "Lillia and Treize" and "Meg and Seron", which resulted in the anime Allison & Lillia) and supervised by Reki Kawahara (creator of SAO) was never ambitious nor did it seek to overshadow the original story Therefore, it was foreseeable that after the announcement of the start of Alicization for next October, the GGO anime will be released before; this in order to prepare the stage. Doing it later or during would not have made sense because all the attention would be focused on the work of Kawahara and this spinoff would have passed without pain or glory. Let's not forget that the 3Hz studio, with just 5 years of foundation, is still a novel studio that seeks to position itself within a highly competitive industry; for that reason, seeking to adapt something from one of the most successful franchises in the medium, and then try to compete with their Magnum Opus would have been totally absurd. From there, I'm not even going to enter the debate on whether this spinoff is better or worse than the original work. It is true that the arches of the novel adapted in the first two seasons of the anime (Aincrad, Fairy Dance, Phantom Bullet, Early and Late and Mother's Rosario) have many flaws (for something Kawahara himself is rewriting all that in the SAO Progressive saga ); however, when we enter the world of Underworld, within the arc of Alicization, everything changes and the rest of the frames, spinoff included, are reduced to mere companions. When I have to talk about Alicization I will elaborate on this point, but for now let's go back to what brought us here today. SAO Alternative GGO was a series told in good form, with an easy to follow plot, loaded with good action and combat sequences that were handled in a great way. By the way, from here Spoilers come. In fact, if it had stayed there it would have been a series of round action. Unfortunately, Sigsawa wanted to put the element "someone's life in the game is in danger" and that's where the plot (and therefore the series) showed the seams. Since then, there were many attempts to sell us that Pitohui was in danger of death; however, the more they explained it, the more absurd it was. So much so, that it went against the much-needed "suspension of disbelief", which ends up taking the spectator out of the plot. Not to mention that trying to make us believe that the only way to help this maniac was defeating her in the game was even more bizarre. And the police? Even in the Aincrad incident, the government got involved almost from the start; which also did in the case of Death Gun, so there is no reason to believe that they would turn a blind eye on this occasion. Even accepting that Goushi really is a good for nothing, that he is, Karen from the beginning proved to be a competent woman, so her attitude did not make sense. It would have been more reasonable for everything to be taken for a game and to simply go with the flow. However, seeing her try to defeat Pitohui with the conviction that she was saving her life; and worse, with the fear that the maniac could die was simply surreal. Therefore, every time this was mentioned, all the magic and atmosphere of the series was lost. It was as if all of a sudden they turned on the light while they told you a horror story. Fortunately, in the end that did not have all the relevance that was tried to give and the focus was always more towards the side of the action and the combats; Otherwise, the series would have ended very badly. In fact, it seemed to me a good point that the whole matter of Llenn and Pitohui's encounter in the real world was handled with humor, because it marked a change of tone that was unexpected and appropriate in equal parts. Above all, considering that the series did a terrible job hiding the true identity of Pitohui. In addition, the fact that the letter that Karen sent to Elsa was used as a main part of the outcome served very well so that point would not remain as a loose end. Regarding the technical section, 3Hz studio did a competent job in character design, direction and animation. Of the three, I highlight the last because the combat sequences were very well worked; and let's not forget that they are the heart of an action anime. Regarding the soundtrack, I'll say that Kajiura-sensei's absence is quite noticeable, but Starving Trancer made a great effort to show us themes that accompanied what happened on screen without clashing. Of course, within this section I have to highlight the opening "Ryuusei", played by Eir Aoi, which came as a glove to this anime. It was a nice touch to choose Eir as a gesture to connect with the main series. In short, a very moving series, with excellent combat sequences and a simple, but well-armored plot, which fully fulfilled its role of heating engines for the arrival of the crown jewel, Alicization. It is true, that its attempt to sell us that Pitohui was in danger of death and could only be saved by beating her in the game was a joke; But at the end of the day, SAO Alternative GGO was not a dramatic series, but an action anime, so do not give it too many laps. SUMMARY A series of well-armed action that only got messed up when it wanted to get into the drama.

First things first, if you disliked original SAO you can safely test this series for yourself, it's nothing like it. Just to be clear here I did enjoy the original SAO immensly (almost all of it) even though it had quite a number glaring faults. What makes or breaks animes and mangas for me these days are mostly characters and their interactions, then cpmes the story and then the rest, and SAO:GGO unfortunately seems to have it all the wrong way round. The GOOD things first: - Sound design is on point, there is not a single moment in this anime where sound would take me away from the action or I would be disappointed with it, on the other hand, when it shines you do notice it (songs made for this anime are really good) - The Art doesn't feel out of place, it's not soaring among the stars like masterpieces from Makoto Shinkai, but the animation is mostly smooth, texture quality is pleasantly high, nothing to really be picky about, very well done. And now the BAD things: - The Characters! My god... Someone truly misunderstood interesting for "having a mental problem". Most of the characters should see a psychologist for some guidance and two of the characters (second female main and her "lover") should actually seek out professional psychiatric help. The interactions between them feel extremely artificial, basically you can feel that things happen between them to drive the story forward and not the other way around. And since I already mentioned the story - The Story is simply boring, at least for me, it seemed like a nice idea at first but by the end I didn't really care for it at all. For me it's not utilizing the setting at all. Why are they playing GGO and not some other game? Why even play games to go about your problems at all? It sure is explained in the anime, but it feels flimsy. Also it lacks a general direction. In the original SAO it was always clearly defined: First clear the game, then save Asuna (because Kawahara has some bondage fetish), then uncover the truth behind the Death Gun and finally the mini-stories. There is no such goal in here at first, then we get a sort of goal, but again, it feels flimsy and artificial (and looks like a job for a psychiatrist and the emergency services, not a 19-y.o. with a complex about her height). Now finally the golden standard of the whole SAO series: Game Design is absolutely horrible! If it felt a bit more real, if it felt a little bit more tangible, maybe, just maybe I would have enjoyed the story more. But all it did was take me out of the experience. Unlike in the original SAO where I had some characters I cared for here there was nothing stopping me from pointing out the stupidity of the game simply because I wasn't engaged enough in the struggles and problems of the characters. I'll try to mostly list them because there's just too many issues to go into details (some of them are shared with the original SAO since not much has changed in GGO): - The way the guns are obtained in the game is very unfriendly and unfair to new users - PVP is does not have weapon balance at all, pretty shit for a pvp-focused game - Prediction lines, the rules when they appear or not are extremely inconsistent - If you could shoot without them, every player would simply train to shoot without them - Teams in the team-battle-royale can wildly vary in size - makes the game extremely unbalanced for professional gaming - Rules for getting damaged are extremely inconsistent - You can heal yourself from a headshot! - Weapon damage doesn't seem to matter when the story asks for it - Weapon range is inconsistent - Making bodies bulletproof after death - Giving a player a bulletproof object to carry! - If there is no killzone that's getting smaller and smaller, there's nothing stopping you from gettin an 8-player sniper party, bringing a mix of normal and anti-tank rifles and some powerful shields, gettin on a vantage point and waiting there for days... - Explosives range and damage is horribly inconsistent - Dual-wielding grenade launchers (both extremely stupid and inefficient) - No way to replenish ammo other than to beg the enemy for it - Massive fields with nothing in it! This game is basically shouting "Get a sniper rifle and annihilate everyone" - There is no upside to having a big player model apart from being able to carry very heavy shit, no matter how big you are a team of lolis would be able to dance around for for days on end and make you look silly Also this tournament is supposed to have the best of the best teams possible from thousands of players. Why then everyone in here is retarded? People walking around without cover in the middle of the street/field, having no spacing between them whatsoever (I guess it's only because the story needs them to be killed quickly with a single grenade). Found an opposing team? Shower them with bullets instead of regrouping and flanking them. Found a guy in a cave behind a waterfall? Shower him with bullets instead of throwing a grenade in. See a target behind a heavy shield you have no means of destroying? Charge him for no reason (remember to shower him with bullets) instead of retreating and going around his back, forcing him to switch positions. As you can probably tell I kinda enjoy my FPS games, and GGO is one of the shittiest FPS games ever conceived. It made watching the show incredibly difficult for me. Was the original SAO any better? GGO part was a bit less bullshit, but SAO and ALO were also fucked in the head as RPGs so no, it wasn't. The difference was that I cared for the characters there and here I couldn't bring myself to do that. TL;DR: You can give it a go, if you'll end up liking the characters the rest should be decent enough for you to have a fun time.

Please note this review is intended to be read by those that have finished watching SAO AGGO and while care has been taken to minimise story related spoilers there may still be spoilers within character analysis. You have been warned. The Rise of Llenn a university student’s journey to gain confidence and overcome a personal complex by fighting and facing down fierce opponents as a cute and speedy girl on the bullet-ridden battlefields of GGO Online. Based off a popular light novel of the same name Sword Art Online Alternative Gun Gale Online is a spin off of the popular Sword Art Online media franchise that took the world with storm back in 2009 with the release of its first novel and again in 2012 with the release of the first of its hit anime. Sword Art Online Alternative Gun Gale Online often shortened to SAO AGGO gives us the opportunity to see what will happen if a university student wanting to gain the confidence that her real-world self-lacked were to discover the world of VRMMORPG’s and decide to use this to gain the confidence that she needed in the real by facing countless dangerous foes and finally live the dream of having an avatar that she wanted for so long a cute and petite avatar that contrasts with her one and greatest complex that has bothered her all her life. The first episode of the series did a great job at reintroducing me to the war-torn and bullet-ridden world of GGO and introduced quite the intriguing main character and I'm glad that I decided to stay and watch the series right to the very end. The overall story follows the life Karen Kohiruimaki a university student that has recently moved to Tokyo from Hokkaido. As a result of her abnormally tall height, Karen has struggled with having to face weird glances and questions all of her life that resulted in the creation of a complex that has affected her life greatly. A chance encounter with an ad promoting the newly resurgent game genre of VRMMORPG’s created within Karen an idea to make use of this game genre to create an avatar that she can be proud off and use this to overcome the complex that has been bothering her all her life and bring to her via her interaction with her avatar the one thing that she needs the most. After many failed attempts and after finally reaching the last game that she had chosen Karen finally gets what she had dreamed off and desired the most an avatar that was not abnormally tall but rather cute and petite. While fighting across the war-torn and bullet-ridden world of GGO Karen as her new avatar Llenn would fight many powerful and dangerous foes that will not only raise her fame as a GGO player but also give her real-world self the confidence that she needs to overcome the complex that so bothers her in the real. As she fights in the many battlefields that GGO offers Karen would encounter many different players that both help and hinder her in her quest to become stronger in both worlds. These include the calm and rational veteran sniper M, the energetic and unpredictable Pitohui and the confident and overly energetic Fukaziroh. But as Llenn and the others fight and match their opponents in battles of wits and firepower Llenn realises that even as they fight and kill each other in a hail of bullets each battle is also a chance to create and promote understanding between players that can create friendship both in and out of the game and even stop someone from committing a grave mistake in their life if need be. Karen Karen Kohiruimaki voiced by new seiyuu Tomori Kusunoki is one of the main characters of the series and is the main protagonist of the series. A university student that recently moved to Tokyo from her hometown of Obihiro in Hokkaido Karen is a positive if shy person by nature that while intelligent and fast thinking is someone that prefers to be modest and not stand out. As a result of her shy nature at the beginning of the series, Karen was noted to be someone that got nervous quite easily and as a result, had few opportunities to make friends that she can count on. However, despite her quiet and shy nature, it can be seen that Karen is a kind and caring person by nature and is not someone that will bear grudges against other people even if they had faced each other on the battlefields of GGO. At the beginning of the series Karen was noted to have an unusual complex regarding her unusual height something that had bothered her since she was a teenager and as a result of this had to endure many unfortunate experiences as a result. As a result, Karen viewed this aspect of her with something approaching disdain and did not see herself as cute as some people say but rather uncute. As a result of this disdain for her height, Karen’s greatest wish was to somehow become something that was the opposite of her real-world self-something that was both short and cute. A chance encounter with an ad for the VRMMORPG game genre though soon gave her the opportunity that she needed. As a result of finding the world of GGO and being granted her wish of having an avatar that was short and cute Karen while happy that she had managed to find the one thing that she wanted for so long was also introduced to the world of GGO a world of varied battlefields that were filled with intense battles between players armed to the teeth with automatic firearms. In the beginning, Karen who chose the character name of Llenn was a calm person that tried her hardest to get used to a game genre that she had never been in before. While often getting scared at times especially when faced with situations that don’t go her way she can often get surprisingly brave and tenacious especially when she has a strong motivation to succeed which is best shown in her SJ battles and her battles with the members of SHINC. As a result of this determination and her persistent attempts to improve her skills and fight against more and more tougher foes Llenn soon built up a solid reputation within the GGO community as an ultra-fast attacker that was quick as the wind and able to down you in a matter of seconds with her preferred weapon the powerful SMG the P90 and given the apt nickname of the Pink Devil for her small size, her records and her creative usage of small unit tactics. However, despite her impressive record and fame that she has gained Llenn displays none of the arrogance that many a player with her achievements have developed and instead remains humble and willing to learn from others that have been playing the game longer than she has showing her humble nature. As the series goes on and as Karen through her avatar Llenn fights through countless battles in GGO she gradually becomes braver and more confident of herself and begins to slowly overcome the complex that had so bothered her in the real world. While becoming more confident and determined Karen also become clear-minded and sure of her choices and actions and willing to fight even her mentor and best friend if it meant that she can save her from the obsession that has taken control of their life. This is a far cry of how Karen was at the beginning of the series and showed just how much fighting as Llenn on the battlefields of GGO have changed her. The character of Karen I felt was one that was both well designed and developed and showed that with determination and courage and perhaps a bit of luck by fighting to overcome your real-world deficiencies in a VR world one can maybe not just become a better person in the real but also find and make many great friends that you meet along the way. I felt that her seiyuu Tomori Kusunoki really did an excellent job in portraying the character of Karen. Goushi/ M M voiced by veteran voice actor Kazuyuki Okitsu of Aoki Hagane no Arupejio fame is one of the main characters of the series and is one of Llenn’s allies within the series. A calm, quiet and experienced player that Llenn meets early in the series M unlike Llenn is not an attacker but rather is a veteran…

Repost 3rd Time in a row Has some spoilers in it. WTF were Studio 3Hz thinking when they come up with shit like this? the story plot was basically this was a drker version of Net Juu where prople were finding an escape from reality and enter to a a level of excitement away from the mediocre in the virtual world. So pretty much, the plot is cliche and pretty much lack any excitement since the characters were safe behind their console. anyway the fact is this anime's story plot was as boring as Isekai wa Smartphone. The art was no concern of mine, since I don't give any shit in it and seeing the main character wore pink as oppose to black, grey or green was just soooooooooo pathetic. Sound, geeezzzz, no comment on that, but it was kinda odd that Seiyuu Hikasa Yoko's voice were cast differently , were in the game she's Pitohui while in the real world she is Riza's manager. So overall. this is one way of desecrating the SAO franchise, so my verdict: Story-Mediocre 5: Since the plot itself was just too cliche as any anime that has a cyber punk genre in it. Art-Pathetic 1: And that's for LLEN's combat outfit. Sound-fair 6: I need not say why cu'z I just don't give a fuck. Character- Pathetic 1: We have a university girl who has some form of inferiority complex about his height and her friends were a bunch of middle school girls and another gamer whom she partnered up for the Squad Jam 2 to beat a player who has some suicidal tendency, a guy who is a lolicon/ masochist/ loser who should die in the real world, an antagonist in the game world whom for some reason is either stupid for not realizing how lucky she was for not getting into the 1st SAO or nuts who should be seeing a shrink either way she the main pathetic character here. Enjoyment - Poor 3: This is one anime where it's ok to skim some episode since the main characters were gonna be safe anyways and they're just as pathetic both in the game and in the real world. Overall-Poor 3: This was just another knock-off of the ff: Net-Juu no Susume, Isekai wa Smartphone, Netoge no Yome and Gamers.....so realistically Studio 3Hz just desecrated the SAO franchise, and just watching this makes me wanna go to Japan and do what Sanzo of Sayuki does to Goku when he is pissed to the, studio exe and the original creator of this cliche thing.

Much like SAO, the big shame is that the setting the show is set in COULD have been super interesting. Instead, we just get pure Mary-Sue wankery that turns the entire world of GGO into a lazily written dumpster fire. I can't tell if the show is trying to be serious or silly. On one hand it's all "Ohhh suicide, and teenage edge" and on the other we have a sentient P90... sorry make that TWO sentient P90s that -BLOCK BULLETS- when story convenient. God, the antagonist is like an edgy rp character written by a 14 year old. The way she's presented its like she has some serious real life psychological issues... Oh... what's that show... Nevermind, let's all just laugh it off like it's the end of a Scooby Doo episode. Ho Ho Ho let's all be friends now.

GGO Alternative is basically SAO with all the things that made SAO great without all the things that, in the long run, ruined SAO so bad. We have the possibility to explore the gaming experience, a realistic future gaming experience. Stakes are really high, but without the plot-holes we found in SAO. No harems, no imoutos, no fanservice, no forced romances (even if I think KiritoxAsuna is one of the most solid anime couples). Only a good game. Characters are really really good, the protagonist but even the "normal" gamers. And the "antagonist" is really a good and solid character, with real motivations and I think real motifs to act like she acts. Another nice thing is some "adult content", some grown-up jokes that remind us that the main characters are not high schoolers but college students.

I know, many people do not like this title due to it being a "SAO Copycat" but I really enjoyed watching it. I will explain my ratings below: Story 6/10: The story feels often predictable but you get to form your own opinions of characters and it is binge-worthy for action in my mind. Art 9/10: I love the animation style of the weapons and fights. Seeing a pink loli character with a P90 obliterating her enemies is the best experience of all. Sound 9/10: The guns seem realistic enough and the microphone quality is good. The soundtrack is great too. Character 8/10: I know that this is a contradiction to my rating for story is but there is almost an absence of story and it is just a videogame. The characters however, have personalities and things that cause them to do what they do. Enjoyment 10/10: I binged this show in a day and it did not disappoint. I was eager to see what happens at every turn and every action sequence. I love the idea that if our finger is on the trigger, others can see your bullet's trajectory and that leads to terror and suspense. Overall 9/10 (Not my personal rating, personal is 10): It is a very good anime for people just starting out, it is action-packed and doesn't waste a moment. I feel like it is too short but the haters will say otherwise.

Apparently this show is a spinoff of something called "Swordo Artto Onrainu"... Never heard of it myself, but apparently it's a big deal in some circles. That attachment seems to be, as a person who has never gone near it, a blessing and a curse. On one hand, it's certainly brought a ton of eyes on something that clearly would not get much attention otherwise, being a budget-ish anime about not-lolis, guns and video games. On the other hand, it is a curse because the show effectively doesn't spend time selling this world to the audience at all. It is explained... but not sold. You are clearly meant to already care because it's SAO, and that is a great opportunity lost to make a setting that fits the story. Technically, the show is competently enough made. Usually it's straight up good looking. Characters look nice. Backgrounds are actually very well made, I really like them, and consistently too. Then eventually something really sticks out as having totally screwed perspective or scale or being hastily drawn, usually the guns. It's kind of funny, in fact, when the show sells itself as gun porn but the guy who drew that AK or whatever clearly hasn't seen a gun in his life and it ends up looking like a misshapen children's plastic toy. Well, these days characters usually carry some sort of medieval implements as weapons, so it's not really a surprise if firearms fall out of the comfort zone of fresh faced animators. One thing I noticed is that in the ED art, probably subcontracted to another studio as is traditional, the characters look totally different. Better, I would say. I mean, damn, that's an epic thigh gap if you ever saw one. Ahem. Sound design is pretty good. There was even a point where I really was stunned by how good it was. When some gunfire is heard and identified by the characters.... they actually sound exactly right. Like, if you paid attention to the sounds in the background, you could have literally come to the same conclusion as the people on the TV at the exact moment they did. Boom, you are instantly inside the fictional world, believing that the celluloid paintings you are looking at are actually genuine reality unfolding. Everyone in the industry take note. Music is pretty good also but also very light, easy, boring. AGAIN, I have to complain about the mixing. MAKE. THE. MUSIC. LOUDER. You know how movies make loud things loud and quiet things quiet? Yes, it's an insulated theatre, yes, they have massive audio equipment there. But people watch movies at home all the time and literally nobody complains ever that the audio isn't mixed to a monotone drone that turns into pleasant a white noise you can fall asleep to at a low enough volume. Gah! The characters are all pretty enigmatic and not in a good way. In fact, the whole show has a "tell, don't show" thing going on. Partly it's the franchise spinoff thing, partly it's the story. But it's also a conscious or unconscious decision to not sell the audience everyone's motivations and worldviews. Things are just delivered: "This is how it is." and you should just swallow it. Not good. Should be much better. Oh yeah by the way, almost forgot. The show has a whole bunch of utterly glorious jokes. It says PG-13 on the tin, and you can really get into that vibe after a while. Then the show suddenly unleashes a real Bruce Lee kung-fu punch straight into the gut by saying something that nobody under 25 could appreciate. So you might wonder, since I have mostly said bad things about this anime, how and why the hell did I give it a nine? Well, for no objective reason whatsoever. I just really like it. It's my thing. It's made for guys like me. I like the characters not because they are well written but because I like them as people. I don't like the story because it's brilliant, I like it because it goes the way I like it. I don't like the world because it's diligently built, I like it because it has all the stuff I like in it. I don't like the art because it's high budget, I like it because there's a small pink girl with a machine gun. So einfach ist das.

“ GGO: Alternative has a lot of potentials, specifically near the mid-end of the series, but it ultimately leaves the viewer unsatisfied. “ GGO: Alternative begins a bit slowly - to the point where I almost dropped it - but the first few episodes are effective in establishing characters, real-world settings, and virtual game mechanics. The action scenes in the Space Jam competition (revealed at the beginning of episode one) are lacklustre, mainly because there isn’t much purpose behind the battles aside from the basic “I’ll beat them all and become the winner!” idea behind all contests. I stuck with the anime because of the protagonist’s reasons for playing GGO, and because I saw potential in what the show was doing with the escapism motif. The anime picks up its pace, and by episode six I’m sort of invested. This is where a bigger conflict is presented, and where the new motifs of life versus death and virtual versus real are established and connected to the already existing escapism motif. Still, something about the plot makes it feel like it lacks substance. It is a light watch even after devastating events are brought to light. The development of the characters continues and the plot thickens, with the tension building slowly but gradually. When the climax finally arrives, it is splendid, wild, and unpredictable. It’s the part I most genuinely enjoy watching and that has me at the edge of my seat. After the final confrontation, I feel a sense of shock and satisfaction, and it feels like sitting through all the episodes preceding these had been worth the watch...but then it keeps going. The final episode of GGO: Alternative brings me back to square one, or even farther back than that. The satisfaction I felt from the climax was utterly crushed! The ending is predictable, the motifs and themes were shit on SO HARD, the characters abandon all their development for a comedic little skit to finish off the show, and none of it even makes any sense! There is no closure at all! I had initially thought the show would improve, which is why I stuck with it, but I am not exaggerating when I say that the ending threw away all my hope for this show. To sum it up, I believe GGO: Alternative has a lot of potentials, specifically near the mid-end of the series, but it ultimately leaves the viewer unsatisfied. The development of characters is one of the things I like, but even that wasn’t done outstandingly; the art is good but basic; the action is decent throughout with a few truly outstanding moments (mainly during the climax); the soundtrack is pretty good but tends to serve more as a sensory overload tactic in battles (the intro is pretty solid though!), and the themes are promising but left somewhat undecided on what they want to say because of that TERRIBLE ending. Oh, and there are two bisexual characters, both of which are viewed as weird and predatory. That was a bit off-putting... This anime is far better than the one it was adapted from, which I have also watched a bit of, but that by no means makes it good.

I want to assault the person who wrote this for their awful, tiny-brained contrivances that continue to make this series insufferable. That is essentially all you need to know about this review if you don't feel like reading the rest because that was originally all I wanted to write, but I'm afraid MAL's character requirement forced me to elaborate. The main character's entire personal conflict centers around her being "too tall," apparently to such a disgustingly monstrous degree that she can't fit in anywhere. She's 183 cm by the way, 6 feet, and is otherwise a completely conventionally attractive person. What a fucking joke. I don't care about this person or her exaggerated problem. Fortunately for her the game decides to make her character model a loli, which is simple pandering to a common archetype that has no other apparent narrative purpose. It isn't explored at all beyond her finding comfort in a smaller form, which could have been accomplished if her character were just a shorter adult. The fact that she is a child is otherwise never a talking point in the story. At any rate, the issue she has with her size is apparently resolved just a few episodes in, and the little bearing it had on the story ceases to matter at all, and her character essentially has nothing of interest to say after that point. On the topic of size, I want to talk about what an awful piece of game design it is for Gun Gale to not only have randomized, predetermined avatars for its players, but for them to have physical differences that provide tangible advantages to the player. Her being tiny has a demonstrable effect on her mobility and the chances of other players being able to hit her. This is retarded. Gun Gale seems to be a terrible game in general, like everything else in this universe, and it's a miracle anyone still plays it. Now let's talk about plot armor, baby, because there's a lot to get through. In its prominence, this is arguably the second biggest issue with the show (the first place winner we'll get to later). The protagonist is shown to have ridiculous, unrivaled speed that is never justified in terms of either gameplay or personal ability. Everyone is shocked at how fast she can move, but why this can't be recreated by other players isn't explained and she can just do it because ??? There are numerous instances of her facing immensely uneven odds where any sort of satisfying, clever tactics are unnecessary because she can decide she's able to outpace a group of 6 people and can dodge every bullet and physically overpower them in any circumstance. This is in addition to random idiocy and incompetence on the part of her opponents, such as firing their entire magazine into her *weapon*, which works as a shield for some reason. Or when she's completely vulnerable and at point blank range, but firing every shot into the one part of her body that happens to hold a small, impenetrable object that protects her. Instead of, I don't know, shooting her in the face. This very quickly dissolves any sense of danger or tension, in addition to making every single encounter completely meaningless because the show can't even bother to pretend that they're legitimate threats. They're just more opportunities to demonstrate how impressive the character is, despite showing very little to earn that. In any instance where she does fail, her opponents fail even more to balance it out. This show has an immense amount of issues that would take pages upon pages to cover, the two most extensive areas probably being pacing and characterization, but I don't expect people to read all of that so I'm trying to narrow it down to the few biggest examples that stood out to me. To that end, I'm punctuating my thoughts with what I consider to be by far the most troubling and genuinely insulting part of it. The antagonist, Pitohui, is demonstrated to have a very severe psychosis that primarily manifests with sadism and sociopathy, taking pleasure in killing other players while blurring the line between the game and real life in doing so, not to mention manipulating people close to her with threats of death, whether theirs or her own. So she doesn't even place much value on her own life. It's very apparent that she's severely out of touch with reality and that this would not be a simple thing to fix. While the show portrays this problem in an utterly cartoony and exaggerated way that lacks any nuance to the subject, it nevertheless tries to play the consequences of it fairly straight. But then you get to the end, and after sharing a brief, melodramatic anime moment with the protagonist, all of these crippling mental issues of hers seem to magically be solved. Not only is it an ignorantly reductive view of the problem she has, it's also an unearned redemptive moment because all of the horrible things she did or threatened to do, whether they had lasting consequences or not, are completely forgiven or forgotten about. Even if she really does have no intention of hurting anyone now, am I to believe that the person who was willing to kill herself a day ago will never consider that again, just because a character was nice to her? Boy, Sword Art, you certainly have a profound understanding of human issues. If only more people were willing to witness your convenient, trite anime solutions to life-ruining problems that can plague people for decades. But wait! This gets worse. At the end, a male character explains the relationship she had with the antagonist. Namely that she was abusive, physically and verbally, and manipulated and blackmailed him into being her lover. This is a bleak thing to discover about a character near the very end of the story, and in an intentional tonal shift it is immediately played off as a joke, because he's a masochist. That's it. No one comments on how fucked that arrangement is, or how the woman in question is clearly a dangerous, unhealthy person who requires help, or that the man should not be making light of the abusive relationship he's in. They don't even really bring it up to the woman when she's there. I was utterly baffled and confused when this came up because I couldn't understand how the writer could have had any respect for his story when he thought capping it off with a joke about domestic abuse and how mentally unhealthy two of the main characters were was a good idea. I want to clarify that this is not me reading into it to make it seem darker than it was, the *joke itself* is how dark it sounds when he starts describing it. I will remind you that the abuser in question just had her redemptive moment and is considered "fine" now. Despite no talk of this behavior. And this is what elevates Alternative above simple poorly-made garbage. There's a disconnect with reality, and in particular the way humans behave, in the writing that leads it down asinine and immature lines of thought, which ends up insulting everyone who watches it. Whoever was responsible for writing those parts clearly didn't know what the fuck they were writing about and didn't realize how badly it assassinated their story and their characters by making the whole thing feel so unsympathetic. There are disturbing, unresolved threads that they don't even realize exist because they're too insensitive and witless, and ultimately the story has no point because the *very resolution* of it is half-finished due to that ignorance. I'd love to confirm if this is the installment of Sword Art I hate the most, but I don't have the willpower to trudge through all these dumpster fires again to find out for sure. Suffice it to say, Alternative still has the typical SAO seal of quality.

While I found the other SAO anime series and movie to be relatively fun albeit flawed romps through a fairly basic setting with some cool ideas, Alternative distancing itself from its family so strongly by dropping ALL connecting characters and most connecting events was an interesting move. Does it pay off? Well... let's see. The story, such as it is, is tripe - without going heavy into spoilers, they tried to recycle the OMG IT'S A DEATH GAME OOOOO vibe from every other SAO so far, and like most of them, it falls flat - and unlike even Ordinal Scale or GGO the paper thin explanation for it here is so utterly trite and idiotic that it breaks all suspension of disbelief. The tournament structure is equally meaningless; you CAN tell a decent story within the structure of a tournament sure, the original GGO did that alright, but Alternative fails to pull it off due to its characterization. Ah yes... the characters. Do not look into this dark abyss if you have even a passing interest in character depth. Even Jesus-Kun himself, the almighty Kirito, at least has hobbies and interests and strengths and flaws, while the main girl Karen has... a height complex. And I guess she likes music. That's it. She doesn't really grow or get much more interesting from there. At least her bunny loli version has a few good moments. The deuteragonist/antagonist Pito is gratingly obnoxious from start to finish, loud and frustrating and uninteresting, though a few scenes paint her as slightly more intriguing and show the intriguing depth she COULD have had, if not written by monkeys on typewriters - sorry, the monkeys don't deserve that insult. And these are supposed to be the lead friggin' characters? There sure as hell isn't any charisma or intrigue to be found there, they don't even feel like they have a damn bond! Side characters, ironically, fare slightly better but still fall hard. M starts off interesting and becomes a one-dimensional joke from there for the most part; similar to Pito he has a few good scenes but otherwise is a boring caricature. The high school loli squad's entire depth is "lol we look scarier ingame" but at least they're amusing to watch bicker. Every unnamed character and most of the foes are obviously NPCs; looking identical, all standing next to each other to die instantly, so on and so forth. The ONE character who actually has some depth is the self-aware grenade loli, who happily abuses her small stature and femininity ingame to mess with people, who has obvious flaws but also a spark of actual charisma, and as a result actually feels like a real person. Unfortunately she never does that awesome grenade rain from the opening theme and mostly just gets stuck acting as support for Jesus Bunny-Chan. Oh and a bunch of NPCs are randomly super perverted and really horny for lolis in completely unnecessary and creepy scenes that never go anywhere, add any real depth or heft to the anime, and just feel like random pandering - though I can't tell if they were trying to pander to lolicons or people who hate them or just thought it'd be funny to have a grown ass man try to rape a little girl in a fucking televised tournament fight. Ah yes, the fights. We all know Kirito was overpowered, but at least the series made a token effort to justify it; the special skill from Heathcliff to end SAO in a hero vs villain battle, ported maxed stats, years of death game experience, great reflexes, crippling autism. Were they valid excuses? That's kinda in the eye of the beholder. But at least they made an effort to explain why he could do what he did, and to me that made it more tolerable. Not the first time a MC in anime has been overpowered after all. The Loli Rabbit of Caerbannog? Not so much. She has blatantly superhuman speed and reflexes for no apparent reason, pulling off vastly superhuman feats such that even other Agility builds have no way to react to them, and worst of all her feats vary by scene - sometimes she can casually dodge bullets, other times she's just running at normal speeds, neither is ever explained and we are never given a clear view of what her limits are. Every fight she's in is either a casual clusterfuck of her casually ripping apart trained soldiers and pro gamers, or... her randomly struggling with nobodies who aren't even set up to be scary. More often than not she wins by deus ex machina that makes Kirito's dumbass 'breaking the rules of the MMO' at the end of the first series look fair and balanced. In the end, none of the fights have much meaning or heft to them, which is a pity because there actually are some cool shots and strategies scattered throughout the anime - just drowned in a tide of mediocre Mary Sue bullshit that puts Kirito and even that imp girl's garbage to shame. Now, I've been pretty harsh so far, and I don't regret it - the anime overall is heavily mediocre. But it does have some redeeming qualities and I would be remiss in not at least mentioning them. The art style is solid, as long as you don't ever look at any of the minor characters. Major characters generally look alright, if not memorable, and the viscerality of the fighting occasionally pleasantly surprised me; most kills are pretty generic but higher powered weaponry occasionally rips avatars in half or blows off heads and makes the fight more visually exciting. The music was... honestly I just finished watching it an hour ago and I can't remember ANY of it, it was all that underwhelming. I didn't hear any that was outright bad, but it was all utterly forgettable. Overall I don't regret sticking through the anime, but don't see myself ever watching it again - it's SIGNIFICANTLY worse than 'normal' SAO in almost every regard. The first GGO is a far superior anime overall if you want shooty gun stuff; Sinon is a much more interesting deuteragonist, the story is still forced at times but at least is kinda believable, and there's more meaning to the fights.