ah, you won't get to see him in lone wolf mode for long.

on another note, this week's SAO was hilarious. Especially the way Asuna pulls kirito away......

Episode 7: Romance on a whim shattered. Aww.

That's all I can say about it, really.

Episode 8: Huh, adding their own stuff. Some of which is probably good, some of which contradicts GAME MECHANICS and makes me want to throttle someone. If you're not gonna respect basic game mechanics why bother making the anime?

My usual sites don't have it yet, but mind telling me what they got wrong?

Also, saying that implies that they're even mandated to stay accurate to the story. I can't even count all of the terrible In Name Only adaptations I've seen, Mayoi Neko Overrun being the worst by far, not even holding a consistent setting or plot throughout due to giving the series a new director every episode and letting them do whatever, including making it a mecha show for one episode.

Be happy it's even this accurate.

edited 25th Aug '12 10:16:21 AM by burnpsy

I don't care about accuracy to the story, or even accuracy to the mechanics as described in the novels, although I'd certainly prefer if they're self-consistent. I care about accuracy to the spirit of games. Real games. I'm a gamer first and foremost, so the idea of them not respecting games rubs me the wrong way, especially given how clear it is that the author is a gamer writing about what he loves.

Specifically: Asuna interfering with the duel. I don't care about Kuradeel coming back with a dagger, although that wasn't in the novel, but you can't get in the way of someone else's duel. It's more important than sacred, it's hard-coded into the game systems. What's the point of declaring a duel at all other than to remove system protection between players? While it's theoretically possible to exploit collision mechanics or visual effects to annoy someone in a duel, stepping in and parrying their weapon directly strikes me as the greatest insult to game mechanics imaginable. And Kirito even won the duel after all that. What's the world coming to when game mechanics allow blatant cheating like that?

edited 25th Aug '12 10:34:30 AM by Clarste

...
...
What is the anime staff doing?

Evidently not a good job, that's for sure.

edited 25th Aug '12 10:37:49 AM by burnpsy

...I can't tell if that's sarcasm or not.

It's not.

This is one of those basic things that teeters into Did Not Do The Research, which is one of my minor Berserk Buttons.

edited 25th Aug '12 11:08:41 AM by burnpsy

I didn't understand why Asuna said it was all her fault for being too strict and Kirito replied she should be allowed a day off. From what I understood, the guy following Asuna around wasn't bothered that she was getting a day off, but that she was walking around with a 'dirty beater' while disregarding his protection. Why would this be due to strict training? Unless, of course, she goes around her guild ordering people not to walk with suspicious people? But then Kirito's answer doesn't make sense...

edited 25th Aug '12 1:31:06 PM by Fabelyn

x5: The thing is, I haven't read any of the light novels, and even I found it off that Asuna was able to intervene in the duel. Forget violating the game mechanics of this specific setting; that just violates game mechanics, period.

I did like the episode apart from that, though, especially with how people are starting to treat the game like it really is their life. (Perhaps making the game impossible to log out of until it's beaten and death being, well, real death is having that effect on everyone?)

Ignoring a few details, I really enjoyed that episode. Asuna is a graceful fighter.

I seem to remember it made more sense when I read it in the light novels. I think the wording got changed around.

edited 25th Aug '12 1:36:19 PM by MurkyMuse

I think she just thinks that she created a certain oppressive atmosphere in the guild. Not like a specific order she gave or anything, she just didn't treat them in a friendly manner so like they don't act like friends. It's supposed to be a callback to how she acted towards Kirito in episode 5.

Of course, Kuradeel is just a stalker. That's certainly not Asuna's fault.

ASD Fnjkejbhuir3u8940uifbszjkbnd AS Bdjavwjhrgbwjkerhj;;;

Kirito killed a bunny.

:<

I'm more pissed at Kayaba for programming the game like that, but still, am twitching so hard.

ANYWAY THOUGH.

Other stuff.

This whole time, I thought that Asuna was wearing a chestplate. But according to Kirito's hands, its just a shirt that looks like a chestplate.

Dat duel cheating.

I've seen more than enough glitches in MM Os, though I guess that the kind of person who made SAO would allow as little of that as possible.

So what of this stuff was anime-original anyway?

Asuna is wearing a chestplate. It got pushed up when she fell,and Kirito's hand is underneath it when he grabs her boob.

And as far as I can remember, only Asuna interrupting the duel and maybe the Laughing Coffin guy were anime originals. Not positive on that though.

If you look closely, her chestplate is falling of her chest because it doesn't seem to be fastened anywhere but the top. So it's swinging down away from her and Kirito's hands go underneath it. ...maybe I paid too much attention to this scene.

Off the top of my head, the only anime additions were having Kuradeel come back with a knife instead of giving up after his sword broke, Asuna parrying the knife (why?!), and Laughing Coffin guy being in the audience.

Was the duel still on or did it officially conclude after Kirito broke his sword? From what I saw the duel ended allowing for interference again. Not sure if there's a "rounds" system inherent to the duels but it seemed like it was finished and when Kirito said he could come at him again with another sword he meant to start another duel or another and another until Kuradeel was satisfied.

It didn't end until Kuradeel teleported away. That when the "Kirito Wins" message was shown anyway. I suppose it might have ended earlier, but there was no indication of it. According to the rules of the duel, it ends when someone gets a clean hit on the opponent, and I don't think breaking the sword would count since that's essentially Kuradeel parrying very badly. In the novel Kuradeel manually resigned after his sword broke, although admittedly it might work differently in the anime. Kirito's taunt was a "you can keep trying, but I don't think you'll do better so you should just give up and end the duel."

And if the duel was already over, attacking Kirito with a knife would make even less sense.

Thinking about it more, we've already seen the way system protection works on players back in episode 6 when Kirito threw his needles at the cloaked guy. They bounced off several centimeters away from the player, before it even hit the armor. Logically, that's what should have happened to Asuna's sword.

edited 25th Aug '12 3:31:08 PM by Clarste

In any case next week is Kirito's reveal of his dual blade skill. Looking forward to that.

I wonder if they intend to animated chapter 16.5...

Now that I've finally gotten a chance to watch the episode... Yeah, that doesn't make a whole lot of sense, and they're being as utterly stupid as Accel World was with Full Physical Burst and a few other things. As I said back during the episode 2 discussion, it looks like thus writer's just plain unlucky when it comes to getting people to animate his works properly.^note To be perfectly honest, before anyone points out yet again that they're not from the same studio, that's irrelevant. XEBEC and SHAFT aren't the same studios either.

With this episode, there are only two characters in the opening that haven't appeared yet. I assume those are their daughter and Heathcliff, correct?

I agree with the duel part. Asuna really didn't need to intervene, especially since Cradil/Kuradeel was fairly obvious with his attack. Did it occur to anyone else that the manner violation prevention code would intervene when Kirito was grabbing Asuna? :/ Yeah, it follows the LN, but I feel that was kind of a fanservicey thing more than anything.

I hope I'm not the only one who cared about Asuna's knife spin. Basically the same as pen/baton spinning, but the balance... meh. It's a game world and physics is messed up.

That fight scene! Starburst Stream! Dual wielding!

Asuna's relief! Klein being bro....

Alright! anyone got any complaints about THIS episode?

edited 1st Sep '12 8:50:57 PM by Pryun

T_T its still RAW for me. Y U NO sub SAO N Wanime?

Wait, you guys even have the RAW right now? :/

Yeah. N Wanime has the raw right now.