Scan barcode
morganoffey's review against another edition
3.0
I'm going to be entirely honest - I hate Sword Art Online. Aside from the amazing music, the anime has nothing going for it, and several things, from harems to OP characters, going against it.
Even the concept of Sword Art Online as an MMORPG is flawed, featuring broken mechanics and procedurally generated sword skills. (Think No Man's Sky, but instead of the planets being procedurally generated, it's your attack abilities.)
Mother's Basement has a full analysis of these complaints here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3GXCo-InnpU
So why is it that the Sword Art Online light novel left me with a smile on my face?
I think a lot of it has to do with Kawahara's afterword at the end of the novel. It contains an apology for making Kirito interact with mostly females and an explanation about these small side-stories. They are, in fact, just that. Short stories to show how players of lower skill levels saw this world they were trapped in.
My problem with all of these same stories being told in the anime was the way they were placed in the middle of Kirito's adventure as some big plot points with the girls he met along the way being his rewards. Kawahara's intentions, however, weren't to create a harem for Kirito, but rather showcase other lives that intersected with Kirito. In a way, this did serve to make the world more alive.
Sure, this novel's form and language are very childish, as is the overexplaining of simple emotions. But at the end of the day, this all just served to make it that much more endearing. Kirito is much more of a character here than he is on screen, and Kawahara even admitted to having written him as a sort of stand-in for himself, so that he could feel like a badass in an MMORPG for once. And honestly? Props to him for admitting this. We all write self-indulgent fanfiction where we put ourselves in ridiculous situations or pair our original characters with existing ones we happen to like. Kawahara's indulgent writing just happened to be liked by a ton of people.
Besides, as far as self-indulgence is concerned, this is not a bad novel. If you are a fan of anime and enjoyed Log Horizon light novels, I would even recommend picking up the SAO light novels if you're looking for a simple and heartwarming book that you can close with a chuckle and a feeling of "aww...".
Even the concept of Sword Art Online as an MMORPG is flawed, featuring broken mechanics and procedurally generated sword skills. (Think No Man's Sky, but instead of the planets being procedurally generated, it's your attack abilities.)
Mother's Basement has a full analysis of these complaints here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3GXCo-InnpU
So why is it that the Sword Art Online light novel left me with a smile on my face?
I think a lot of it has to do with Kawahara's afterword at the end of the novel. It contains an apology for making Kirito interact with mostly females and an explanation about these small side-stories. They are, in fact, just that. Short stories to show how players of lower skill levels saw this world they were trapped in.
My problem with all of these same stories being told in the anime was the way they were placed in the middle of Kirito's adventure as some big plot points with the girls he met along the way being his rewards. Kawahara's intentions, however, weren't to create a harem for Kirito, but rather showcase other lives that intersected with Kirito. In a way, this did serve to make the world more alive.
Sure, this novel's form and language are very childish, as is the overexplaining of simple emotions. But at the end of the day, this all just served to make it that much more endearing. Kirito is much more of a character here than he is on screen, and Kawahara even admitted to having written him as a sort of stand-in for himself, so that he could feel like a badass in an MMORPG for once. And honestly? Props to him for admitting this. We all write self-indulgent fanfiction where we put ourselves in ridiculous situations or pair our original characters with existing ones we happen to like. Kawahara's indulgent writing just happened to be liked by a ton of people.
Besides, as far as self-indulgence is concerned, this is not a bad novel. If you are a fan of anime and enjoyed Log Horizon light novels, I would even recommend picking up the SAO light novels if you're looking for a simple and heartwarming book that you can close with a chuckle and a feeling of "aww...".
pato_myers's review against another edition
3.0
I really appreciate the short glimpses into the life lead by the characters not on the front lines. Way to end on a downer though.
wells140's review against another edition
5.0
Enjoyed this one as well, I liked the insight about the girls. It made me appreciate Lisbeth a lot more than I did just watching the anime.
djinnia's review against another edition
5.0
Okay, I have to admit to watching SAO before reading the books. But what I found was that the anime brought the stories to life in the best way. The four stories were great as their episodes. There was bits that were missing in the anime that I got to read about in the stories. The only problem was that the four stories were not chronological in time. The last story should have been the first in sequence. Other than that, loved it.
jklong's review against another edition
4.0
This is not a continuation of the story from vol 1. This book is a series of 4 short stories that occurred during the first book. The author wanted to flesh out more non-essential characters. I enjoyed this book, but the stories weren’t necessarily needed. Definitely ready to start the next volume to get a continuation of the story that vol 1 left on a cliffhanger.
gitadine's review against another edition
3.0
The reason I found this book a bit boring is because I already watched the episodes, so I knew about the side stories (except for the third one). It was still the same straight-forward style though, and I like it that it felt like fan fiction (which is not a bad thing!).
wyvernlordthor's review against another edition
3.0
Ah, the second volume of SAO. If you didn't read my review of the first one, let me fill you in on what it said: don't read volume 2. It's not a terrible book, and some of the later chapters I actually quite enjoyed, but it is completely unnecessary. The thought experiment of the first volume has been fully explored, so all that's left to do is go back and tell a bunch of pointless side stories about various girls falling in love with the main character, who is already in a relationship. It is also told from these girls' perspective, which gives Kirito a lot more credit that he deserves. The series is much more interesting when we can see his thoughts and can tell how much of a socially awkward teen he really is.