Sword Art Online is probably one of the most polarizing anime of all time. Everyone who has seen it seems to absolutely love it or downright despise it, nothing in between. The first time I heard about Sword Art Online was way back in 2015 when one of my friends who was obsessed with anime, told me about one where a group of gamers get trapped in a video game, and if they die in the game, they die in real life. I began watching the series in 2017 after one of my roommates recommended the series to me after he saw me watching Yu-Gi-Oh! Vrains. I was a little hesitant at first, but I soon gave it a try.

The concept of characters getting trapped in a video game is nothing original. The example that most often comes to my mind is the episode “Power Mad” from The Fairly Odd Parents. In this episode, Timmy Turner wishes for a video game that’s challenging, that you can’t wish yourself out of. While Timmy is indisposed, his friends Chester and A.J. log in to the game. Not knowing of the impending danger they just put themselves in, Timmy has no choice but to enter the game and rescue them.

At the start of the game, Timmy and his friends are granted three lives, and if they lose all of them, they will “disappear forever”. Of course, since it’s a kid’s show, they can’t say “die,” and no one actually does. Sword Art Online, on the other hand, takes the concept of characters getting trapped in a video game and makes it feel like it could actually happen. The only futuristic element in this story is the Full-Dive technology, which is what allows the VR helmet to intercept the user’s brain signals and allows the user to move their avatar in the virtual world without having to move their body in the real world. (Otherwise, we would get a system that’s depicted in Ready Player One.)

So if people were to get trapped in a video game in real life where dying in the game meant dying for real, what would it be like, and what is it that causes Sword Art Online to have such a polarizing divide among it’s viewers? Let’s dive in, or rather log-in, and explore what this story has to offer.

Trapped in a Death Game

The story of Sword Art Online follows a boy who, in the beginning, is known only by his username, “Kirito”. On November 6, 2022 at 1:00pm, Kirito logs in to the hottest new videogame on the market – Sword Art Online. The game is the first of its kind, as a Virtual Reality Massively Multiplayer Role Playing Game, or VRMMORPG, for short. (How’s that for an acronym?) The game was developed for a VR system called the NerveGear, which intercepts the user’s brain signals and allows them to move their bodies in the virtual world without having to move them in the real world. Having been one of the lucky 1,000 beta testers, Kirito already knows the ins-and-outs of the game.

Upon re-entering Sword Art Online, or SAO for short, Kirito immediately starts trying to get back to where he was before the beta test ended, but another player flags him down. He introduces himself as Klein and asks for some tips on how to play the game. He says that Kirito looks like he already knows what he is doing, so Klein assumes that Kirito was a beta tester. Kirito decides to take Klein to the edge of town, where he shows him the basics of combat.

As Klein begins to log out at the end of the day, he notices that his logout button is missing. Kirito checks his menu and notices that his logout button is missing as well. Suddenly, Klein and Kirito get teleported to a courtyard in the middle of the Town of Beginnings, where they first entered the game. The sky turns red, and a hooded figure draped in a cloak of blood descends from the sky. He introduces himself as Akahiko Kayaba, the creator of Sword Art Online, and begins to address the issue of the missing logout buttons. Kayaba assures the players that this is not a defect, but a key feature of Sword Art Online. He announces there is no longer any way to escpe from the game, and if anyone on the outside tries to remove the NerveGear from the user’s head, the helmet will emit microwaves into the user’s brain, ending their life. The only way to escape this game now is to clear all 100 floors of Aincrad Castle, the massive floating structure that encapsulates the world of Sword Art Online. The creator adds one more caution. If a player’s HP bar reaches zero, that player’s avatar will disintegrate, and the NearveGear will simultaneously destroy the user’s brain.

Akahiko Kayaba disappears. All of the players begin to panic. Kirito pulls Klein aside and offers to take him to the next town before all of the resources get claimed, but Klein doesn’t want to leave his buddies who are back in town. Reluctantly, Kirito and Klein part ways.

And that’s where Episode 1 ends.

When Kirito met Asuna

As I said in the beginning, Sword Art Online seems to be one of the most polarizing anime of all time. Everyone I’ve talked to about it seems to either absolutley love it or downright despise it. Nothing in between. I am definatley among those who love the show, but even I can pick out some of its flaws.

The biggest complaint I often hear about Sword Art Online is in its bad writing techniques. One of the biggest examples of that is the story’s frequent timeskips. For example, Episode 2 takes place 1 month after Episode 1 ends. Episode 3 literally has 4 time skips that span over a total of 8 months, and by the time we get to Episode 5, sixteen months have passed since the story began. It seems that the creators of the show recognized this as a problem, as it disappears in later arcs, but for now, we’ll have to trudge our way through and keep track of the time skips as we go.

At the beginning of Episode 2 (which is one month after Episode 1 ends), Kirito attends a meeting hosted by a player named Diabel, where they will make a plan to defeat the first floor boss. Diabel instructs the players to form groups of six. Kirito, who has never been the most social of creatures, looks around the ampitheater for someone to team up with, but everyone seems like they are already in a group. Kirito looks to his far left and sees a lonely girl draped in a maroon cloak. He scoots closer to her and asks if she wants to form a party with him, to which she quickly agrees. After the girl accepts the party invite, Kirito can see that her name is Asuna.

After the meeting, the attendees throw an evening party, but Asuna has seated herself far away from the other party goers. Kirito finds her eating a loaf of bread and sits down next to her. He pulls out a small jar from his pocket and suggests that Asuna try it on her bread. She taps the jar and discovers that it contains cream. She spreads it on her loaf and scarfs it down. Kirito offers to tell Asuna how to get some cream herself, but Asuna refuses.

“I didn’t come to this town to eat good food,” says Asuna, “I’d rather stay myself until the very end than sit and rot away at an inn, back in the first town.”

“I wouldn’t want a party member dying on me,” says Kirito, “So at the very least, don’t die tomorrow.”

This is the first time we start to see the theme of this story develop. Asuna and Kirito are both living in the world of Sword Art Online — a world where death appears to be waiting for them around every corner, but despite it all, Kirito is still finding ways to enjoy his time here and live within the moment. Perhaps Asuna has something to learn from him.

Beta Testers and Beaters

When Sword Art Online was first released, there were only 10,000 available copies, and all of them sold. Anyone who got their hands on one was considered to be super lucky, but a player was said to be even luckier if they managed to become one of the 1,000 beta testers who tested the game before it was launched to the public. You would think that being a beta tester would have quite a few perks, as these players would know more about the game then the others, but as it turns out, being special has consequences.

When Sword Art Online was first launched and all of the players became trapped within the game, the non-beta testers began to accuse the ex-beta testers of hoarding all the best items, hogging all the best hunting grounds, and withholding information that could help them clear the game. This caused the ex-beta testers to become discriminated against, which led the ex-beta testers to distance themselves form the other players.

When the boss fight begins, Kirito and Asuna begin fighting the sentinels, along with one half of the team. The other half engages the boss. When the boss’s HP enters the red zone, Diabel charges at him, but Kirito gets confused because he thought the plan was for everyone to surround it. Kirito looks back at the boss and notices that he pulls out a Talwar, which is different from the beta test. Kirito warns Diabel to stay back, but it is too late. The boss slashes his sword right down Diabel’s chest, launching him back a few feet. Kirito rushes to his side and pulls out a potion, but Diabel rejects it.

“You were a beta tester, weren’t you?” says Diabel, “You know what I was doing.”

“You were after the last-attack-bonus rare item,” says Kirito, “You were a beta tester, too?”

Before he dies, Diabel asks Kirito to defeat thw boss for him. Kirito realizes that when this death game started, he only thought about surviving, but Diabel was different, he fought for everyone else. Henceforth, Kirito vows to finish the job that Diabel left him.

Kirito and Asuna regroup and tag-team the boss. Asuna gets caught in one of the boss’s sword swings, and it rips off her cloak. Now, Kirito can see Asuna’s true, beautiful face. Kirito deals the final blow, and wins a rare item called The Cloak of Midnight.

One of the players in the party named Kibaou accuses Kirito of being a beta tester and not informing Diabel of the boss’s weapon change. Kibaou also suspects there are more beta testers in the party, and demands they rat themselves out. Kirito realizes he has to do something fast or there will be a conflict among the players. Kirito says that during the beta test, he made it to floors higher than anyone had ever reached. Kibaou says Kirito is worse than a beta tester — he’s a cheater. Someone else in the crowd calls him a “beater,” which is a portmanteau of “beta-tester” and “cheater”.

Kirito’s plan here was to redirect the hatred that non-beta testers had for ex-beta testers towards himself. Kirito likes the title of “beater” and reminds the players not to confuse him with the other beta-testers. He dons his newly acquired “Cloak of Midnight,” disbands his party with Asuna, and accepts his fate as an eternal solo-player.

Guilds and Solo Players

In the world of Sword Art Online, players can form groups called guilds. In a guild, players benefit by relying on each other’s strength and skills. The strongest guilds are known as the Assault Team – they are the ones who lead the charge in defeating each boss and advancing to the next floor. Players who choose not to join a guild are called “solo-players”. Kirito is one of these. One advantage of playing solo is that the player doesn’t have to dispute on how to divide the spoils of war with others, but the biggest disadvantage is that no one will be around to heal the player if they get paralyzed, leaving them wide open for the next attack.

Fifteen months after Kirito and Asuna separated, they reunited as member on the Assault Team. Since their departure, Asuna has joined the highest-ranking guild in SAO – the Knights of the Blood Oath. As if that wasn’t noteworthy enough, Asuna was the guild’s second-in-command, next to the Commander himself. Kirito is still playing solo.

After a meeting among the members of the Assault Team, in which they discuss a plan to defeat the Floor 56 boss, Asuna finds Kirito napping under a tree, and she is not happy.

“What are you doing?” says Asuna, “The other lead group members are all working hard to clear the dungeon. Why are you out here taking a nap? Even if you’re a solo-player, you need to be serious.”

“It’s Aincrad’s nicest season, and its nicest weather setting,” says Kirito, “Entering the dungeon on a day like this is a waste.”

“Do you not understand? Every day we spend here is one we’ve lost in the real world.”

“But right now, we’re alive here, in Aincrad. The wind and sunlight feel so good.”

“Do they? There’s nothing special about the weather.”

“If you were to lie down like me, you’d understand.”

So, Asuna decides to lie down next to Kirito. After the soloplayer gets fully rested, he sits up and stretches, but to his surprise, Asuna has fallen completely asleep. When she wakes up, the sun is setting, and she finds Kirito perched on a stone fence. Feeling embarrassed, Asuna draws her sword, then re-sheathes it and says, “One meal! I’ll buy you one meal of any kind. Then we’ll be even, okay?”

Asuna brings Kirito to a restaurant where she thanks him for watching over her as she slept, since murdering players in their sleep is a rising trend in SAO.

This scene of Kirito and Asuna resting under the tree seems to be pretty trivial, but this is actually one of the most important events in all of Sword Art Online, as it will be a defining moment in Kirito and Asuna’s relationship.

Marriage in SAO

Kirito and Asuna soon begin investigating a murder mystery involving two players who were married in the game. During the case, Asuna tells Kirito that marriage in SAO is both romantic and pragmatic because married players share their inventory. Thus, what was once private before can no longer be hidden.

An unknown period of time later (which is at the beginning of Episode 8), Kirito was wandering through a forest when he obtained a very rare piece of rabbit meat. He took it to his friend Agil’s shop to sell it, but to his surprise, Asuna showed up shortly after. Revealing what he caught, Asuna invites Kirito to her apartment so they can cook up the rabbit meat, but her bodyguard objects. The bodyguard, whose name is Kuradeel, says that Asuna should not let someone with such a dubious background into her abode. Asuna dismisses her bodyguard for the day and orders him to return to the HQ of the Knights of the Blood Oath.

Asuna brings Kirito into her apartment, where they cook up the best meal they’ve had in two years. Afterwards, Asuna asks Kirito if he would consider partying up with her again. Kirito says that party members tend to get in his way. Forgetting that a former party member was sitting across the table from, Asuna threatens him with a butter knife. Kirito quickly accepts.

The next day, Kirito waits for Asuna at the teleport gate when she suddenly comes frantically falling through. Kuradeel follows shortly after and demands that Asuna return to guild headquarters. He grabs her by the wrist, but Kirito quickly intervenes. Kirito says he could do a better job protecting Asuna, so Kuradeel challenges him to a duel. Kirito and Kuradeel clash their swords, but Kuradeel’s breaks in two. Following his defeat, Asuna tells Kuradeel to return to the HQ of the Knights of the Blood Oath and wait for further instructions.

Asuna and Kirito begin exploring the Floor 74 dungeon. They eventually discover the boss door and decide to peek inside. The Floor 74 boss is revealed to be a large, demonic Minotaur with blue skin and a long sword. Kirito and Asuna run out of the room before they can engage it.

While resting outside the boss room, Kirito and Asuna see a guild approaching known as the Aincrad Liberation Army. The party members of the guild are very weary, but their leader is stubbornly forcing them to press on. Kirito and Asuna follow them into the boss’s room where they find the guild unable to withstand the boss’s attacks, and also, they are unable to teleport out, so they rush in to rescue them. Kirito engages the boss but realizes he can’t defeat it with his current skill set, so he asks Asuna and Klein to swap in while he prepares something. (Oh yeah, they ran into Klein’s guild in the dungeon too.)

Kirito switches back in and equips a second sword. He begins slashing his dual-blades at the boss until he defeats it. Afterwards, Klein asks Kirito what that skill was. Kirito explains it’s a skill called Duel Wielding. He found it in his skill list one day as he was scrolling through it, but he doesn’t know how he got it.

When Kirito and Asuna get back to town, Asuna puts in a request for a leave of absence from the guild, but it gets rejected. The Commander summons both Kirito and Asuna to guild headquarters, where he challenges the solo-player to a duel. If Kirito wins, he may take Asuna on a leave of absence, but if the Commander wins, Kirito must join the Knights of the Blood Oath. Kirito accepts the challenge.

The following day, Kirito and the Commander proceed to an arena to begin their duel. The Commander, known as Heathcliff, uses his large shield to block Kirito’s attacks. Eventually, Kirito builds up enough speed to get passed Heathcliff’s shield, but before he can make a strike, something strange happens. The Commander’s shield moves to block the attack, seemingly automatically. After the block, the Commander strikes his sword at Kirito, causing him to enter the yellow zone, meaning that Heathcliff has won the duel. As per the terms of losing, Kirito must now join the Knights of the Blood Oath.

A few days later, Kirito goes on a mandatory training exercise with a man named Godfree and someone who he never wanted to see again — Kuradeel. Godfree says this will be a chance for Kirito and Kuradeel to bury their differences. He also says he will be testing them on their reaction to danger, so he confiscates both player’s crystals. Both of them reluctantly obey.

Godfree leads them into a canyon where they begin their training. Eventually, the crew stops for lunch. Kirito begins drinking a bottle of water when he suddenly notices the terrifying grimace on Kuradeel’s face. Kirito quickly tosses the bottle aside, but it is too late. The water has paralyzed him, rendering him unable to move. Kirito looks over at Godfree, but he also has been paralyzed. Kirito tells Godfree to get an antidote crystal, but Kuradeel kicks it aside. Then, he stabs Godfree until his avatar shatters into thousands of sparkling polygons.

Then, he turn to Kirito. Kuradeel stabs his sword into Kirito’s leg and lets his HP bar slowly drain, but before it goes completely out, a sudden gust of wind comes rushing through the canyon and knocks Kuradeel away. It’s Asuna! She uses a crystal to heal Kirito back to full health, then she turns to Kuradeel. Asuna begins cutting him up rapidly. Kuradeel begs for mercy, but while Asuna has her guard dropped, he suddenly moves in for another attack. Kirito finds the ability to move again and jabs his hand into Kuradeel’s chest, ending his life.

The Confession

Asuna starts breaking down and claims that all of this is her fault. Kirito looks her in the eye and plants his two lips next to hers.

“My life belongs to you, Asuna,” says Kirito, “So I’ll use it for you. Let’s stay together until the end.”

“And I’ll protect you too, no matter what,” says Asuna.

Kirito asks Asuna if he can stay the night with her. Later that night, Kirito proposes to her, and Asuna says yes.

Kirito and Asuna return to the HQ of the Knights of the Blood Oath and once again request a leave of absense from the guild. Understanding their situation, Heathcliff grants it to them this time.

Kirito and Asuna buy a cabin on the 22nd floor of Aincrad, where they begin their honeymoon.

While out on the balcony, Kirito asks Asuna if their relationship only exists in the virtual world.

“You’re making me angry, Kirito,” replies Asuna, “Even if this is a virtual world, my feelings are real. If we make it back to the real world, I’ll find you again, no matter what and fall in love with you again.”

A few days into their honeymoon, Kirito and Asuna find a mysterious girl draped in a white dress wandering through the forest. They take the girl back to their cabin and ask her where she came from. The girl can’t remember anything except that her name is Yui, so Kirito and Asuna take her back to the Town of Beginnings to help recollect her memories.

While at the Town of Beginnings, Kirito and Asuna learn that Thinker, the leader of the Aincrad Liberation Army has been trapped in a high-level dungeon deep beneath the town, so they go to rescue him. When they find the room where Thinker is being held, they suddenly get ambushed by a dangerous boss monster called The Fatal Scythe. Kirito and Asuna triple block the monster’s attack, but end up losing half their HP and their ability to move. Yui stands up to the monster and draws a flaming sword twice as big as her from thin air, which she uses to defeat the monster. Then, Yui turns to Kirito and Asuna and says she remembers everything now.

Yui reveals that her true identity is a mental health counseling program created by the system’s master control program. When SAO first launched, Yui was prevented from interacting with any of the players. She could do nothing but watch as they suffered from intense mental trauma. Gradaully, errors accrued within her and she began to break down.

“But one day, I saw two people whose mental parameters were far different from the rest,” says Yui, “Joy, peace, but it was more than that. I wandered through the field hoping to get as close to you as I could. Kirito, Asuna, I’ve always wanted to meet you. It’s strange, isn’t it? It should be impossible for me to think that. I’m only a program.”

Yui says she wants to be with Kirito and Asuna forever, but she disobeyed the system’s orders when she defeated that monster and will soon be deleted. Before she gets completely erased, Kirito uses the nearby GM console to convert Yui’s data into a game object called Yui’s heart. He backs up Yui’s data to his NerveGear so she will be safe even after the game gets cleared.

The End of the World

A couple weeks into their honeymoon, Kirito and Asuna get a call to return to the headquarters of the Knights of the Blood Oath. Commander Heathcliff reveals that the first party they sent to defeat the Floor 75 boss has all been wiped out. In response, the guild will prepare the largest army they have ever assembled and raid the boss room. Kirito pulls Asuna aside and asks her to stay behind so she won’t risk her life in the battle. Asuna tells Kirito that if she doesn’t go and he doesn’t make it back, she would kill herself, as she would have no reason left to live. (At this point, I think we say that Kirito and Asuna have an unhealthy, obsessive relationship.)

Kirito, Asuna, and Heathcliff, along with a host of other players, including Klein and Agil, arrive at the Floor 75 boss room and begin fighting a massive skeleton-centipede monster known as The Skull Reaper. The boss’s scythe arms are so powerful that they kill two players instantly with one hit. However, during the boss battle, Heathcliff uses his shield to block the monster’s attack without even entering the yellow zone. Once the boss is defeated, Kirito gets really suspicious of the Commander, so he charges at him with his sword, gets passed his shield, and exposes him for having an immortal status.

“Something has always bothered me ever since I arrived here,” explains Kirito, “Where does he hide while he watches us and adjusts the world? But I’d forgotten a simple piece of psychology. Something any kid knows. There’s nothing as boring as watching someone else play an RPG. Isn’t that right, Kayaba Akihiko?”

The Commander is surprised that Kirito figured it out so quickly, but confirms to everyone in the room that he is indeed Kayaba Akihiko. He also reveals that he is the final boss who would have awaited them on the 100th floor. Kayaba paralyzes all of the players except Kirito, then he offers the swordsman clad in black a chance to fight him one-on-one. If Kirito wins, the game will be cleared and all of the players will log out. Asuna tells him to stand down, but Kirito thinks about all the players who have died at the hand of Kayaba’s death game and wants to make him pay for what he’s done.

As the battle begins, Kirito uses his dual blades to slash at the Commander’s shield, but one of his swords breaks in two. Kayaba is about to finish off Kirito, but Asuna breaks free of her paralysis and blocks the attack. She says goodbye as she shatters into countless shining polygons. Kirito picks up Asuna’s rapier and begins slashing at Kayaba, but his swings are void of energy, as he has just lost his only reason to keep fighting. Kayba sends his sword right into Kirito’s chest until his HP bar depletes to zero and his avatar disintegrates. And them, for an unknown erason, Kirito’s avatar reconstructs in an array of dazzling golden sparkles. His form is staticy and his eyes glow yellow as he sends Asuna’s rapier into Heathcliff’s chest until his HP bar slowly reaches zero.

And with that, the game has officially been cleared.

Kirito gets teleported to a platform high above the world of Aincrad where he reunites with Asuna and Kayaba. Kirito asks Kayaba why he did all this, to which Kayaba responds that it’s been so long that he forgot. (That’s literally the best explanation we’re given.) Kayaba bids Kirito and Asuna farewell before he and the rest of the world around them disappear.

Kirito wakes up in the real world laying in a hospital bed. He grabs his IV and carries it down the hallway, as he looks for Asuna.

And that’s where the story ends…for now.

Conclusion: Is Sword Art Online Good?

So now, the question is: What do I think of Sword Art Online? When people criticize the writing of the story, I see where they are coming from. The story has a lot of time skips that make the flow feel very choppy. It also ends kind of abruptly. I mean, they were trapped in the game for 2 years, but the arc only ran for 14 episodes and only covered a handful of months. I feel like the Aincrad arc could have been extended to at least 25 episodes, or maybe even 50.

One more criticism that I more or less “catch the vibes” of, is that compared to Shonen anime, Sword Art Online has more of a melodramatic tone rather than a hyperactive one. With a title of Sword Art Online, you would think this show would have a lot action sequences, and while it does have some, it mainly focuses on the drama between Kirito and his love interests. And when it does have sword fights, they are often pretty short or even cut. For example, we never saw Kirito fight Nicholas the Renegade, and his duel with Kuradeel only lasted for one strike.

But desptie all of Sword Art Online‘s flaws, are there any redeeming qualities? Yes, I believe there are several. The story of Sword Art Online is primarily a metaphor for life. It’s a world with no magical abilities and everyone has only 1 life (sound familiar), but despite all of the death and despair around them, the players try to make the best of their situation. Whether it be through forming friendships, enjoying the weather, or falling in love, the victims of the SAO incident strive to find renewed purpose while trapped in the death game.

The choppiness of the story makes it difficult to determine what the overarching story is, but one major theme that seems to be consistent throughout is that people can find happiness and purpose despite all of the death and despair surrounding them. Kirito embodies this theme well, but I believe it was depicted even better by his love interest, Asuna.

When Sword Art Online first began, Asuna was terrified of losing her life to the game, but it seems like she even more afraid of losing her personality. Day after day, the only thing she could think about was clearing the game and returning to the real world. But one day, she saw someone taking a nap under a tree and realized that he wasn’t losing a day in the real world, he was gaining a day here. Asuna summarizes this to the fisherman Nishida shortly before they cleared the game.

“At first…it felt like every day that passed here stole another piece of my real life away. After I cried, I’d go and fight as hard as I could. My only thought was of winning, moving forward, and getting stronger. But then, I saw someone napping in the shade at the plaza. It made me so mad. I told him to stop wasting his time. And he replied that it was Aincrad’s best season, and its best weather setting, too. So entering a dungeon would be a waste. Then I tried laying down, as well, and I slept like a baby. When I awoke, it was evening, and he looked a bit annoyed. But as we partied up together…Even in a world like this, he was really living. He wasn’t losing a day in the real world. He was gaining a day here. The one who taught me that was Kirito-kun. When I began thinking of him as I fell asleep, I stopped having nightmares. I began to look forward to seeing him. For the first time since I arrived here, I was happy. To me, Kirito-kun is the meaning of my two years here…and proof that I’m alive. The reason I tried the Nerve Gear that day was so that I could meet him.”

To me, this theme is what makes the story redeeming despite all of its technical flaws.

When I began watching Sword Art Online, it was 5 years before the launch date of SAO. Now, it’s been over 2 years since the launch date. While we haven’t quite completely developed Full Dive technology yet, our modern era seems to be in the early stages of Virtual Reality. Personally, I think being inspired to create a Full Dive VR game after watching Sword Art Online is like creating a theme park of living dinosaurs after watching Jurassic Park. (It’s like, did you not understand the point of that movie?) Whether or not Full Dive technology becomes a real thing in the future, Sword Art Online will keep us wondering what kind of an experience it will be like.