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NEWS: Sword Art Online to Air on Toonami Starting in August

I get it fencedude you hate sao, I thought it was 3 out of 5 series personally. It was average with a lot of wasted of potential but it was far from being terrible IMO. Now if you want terrible for 2012 go watch "so i can't play h or Sengoku Collection"

He said the reasons were "not well defined" (which is true) not that it never offered any explanation at all.

HitokiriShadow wrote:

He said the reasons were "not well defined" (which is true) not that it never offered any explanation at all.

No, that statement is also in error. What's "not well defined" when when a certain character specifically says that spoiler[Kirito was the only person to get the Dual-Wield skill because it was a reward for having the fastest reaction time in the game]?

There are things to legitimately complain about concerning the series. This, however, is not a place where the writing is in any way at fault.

HitokiriShadow wrote:

He said the reasons were "not well defined" (which is true) not that it never offered any explanation at all.

No, that statement is also in error. What's "not well defined" when when a certain character specifically says that spoiler[Kirito was the only person to get the Dual-Wield skill because it was a reward for having the fastest reaction time in the game]?

There are things to legitimately complain about concerning the series. This, however, is not a place where the writing is in any way at fault.

Then perhaps you'd like to address some of the things he actually considered to be major flaws rather than trying to descredit those by picking nits?

Fencedude was also being very selective in picking out details to use in his criticisms of Asuna as a character, effectively ignoring other things she did which showed strong points.

HitokiriShadow wrote:

Then perhaps you'd like to address some of the things he actually considered to be major flaws rather than trying to descredit those by picking nits?

Oh, don't give me that. Picking nits was the bread and butter of SAO critics when the series was airing. The critics didn't give a damn about them being nitpicks back then, so it seems rather hypocritical to condemn someone else for doing the same thing now.

he pacing of episodes 8-13 and the dramatic build-up in episode 13 (which, BTW, I would point to as one of the examples of the series getting things right) made it clear that something big was going to happen besides just a boss battle in episode 14, and a foundation had been lain earlier for spoiler[Kirito figuring out that Heathcliff was Kayaba], so the general course of events there was sensible even if certain details ended up being ridiculous.

Fencedude was also being very selective in picking out details to use in his criticisms of Asuna as a character, effectively ignoring other things she did which showed strong points.

Good for Toonami. They put .hack//SIGN on a long time ago, but it was too wordy for people who were not really into anime already. Or at least that was the complaint I heard at the time. If they wanted a gamer series, it's better that they chose Sword Art over that repetitive sentai-wannabe show Accel World.

Except that, as much as I hate SAO, I also think that a lot of the complaints are nitpicky bullshit. I was one of the ones DEFENDING SAO during the early episodes (so was Fencedude, for that matter) from that kind of stuff. Frankly, even if there really was no further explanation regarding the previous issue, I wouldn't really care. So no, I'm not being a hypocrite on this, but hey, thanks for making assumptions about me!

Key wrote:

Fencedude was also being very selective in picking out details to use in his criticisms of Asuna as a character, effectively ignoring other things she did which showed strong points.

And I think you, and anyone else that tries to defend the show when it comes to female characters overall and Asuna in particular, are doing precisely that but the opposite.

Key wrote:

Fencedude was also being very selective in picking out details to use in his criticisms of Asuna as a character, effectively ignoring other things she did which showed strong points.

Such as? No, seriously, I'm interested.

Also some of your rebuttals here are pretty hilarious consider some of the things you've used to claim that Horizon isn't even worth your time to review

I agree with your argument - hell, I've said essentially the same thing myself on many occasions - but not your use of SAO as an example. (I haven't ever seen any of the other two, so I won't comment on those.) If you had said "it's not a top-quality series" then I would fully agree with you; heck, I gave the series only middling grades on writing for both arcs. And I don't think that I've ever denied that its entertainment value well exceeds its qualitative value. I will vociferously disagree with you, and anyone else who wants to comment, that the writing is total s***, however. I know what "it's awful but it still entertained me" looks like, and that's not SAO. You and others claim that there are incontrovertible writing flaws; I can point to things that the series does right which should be equally incontrovertible by the same writing standards you claim to be judging the series by. If the series was truly as awful as you claim it was, would those factors still be there?

I do, to an extent, believe that there are certain qualitative factors that can be objectively good or objectively bad. When people get such a mad-on hate for a title that they refuse to acknowledge what a title does well that is objectively meritorious then their evaluation become opinion. That's what I see happening with SAO when people refer to it as utter garbage. For all that it may do wrong, it does enough other things right to compensate.

And, for the record, SAO is far from the only title which gets this kind of reaction. It's just the most recent one.

Love this show tbh, mostly because the protagonist is a badass and he knows it from the beginning. Theres not enough shows like that.

Key wrote:

I agree with your argument - hell, I've said essentially the same thing myself on many occasions - but not your use of SAO as an example. (I haven't ever seen any of the other two, so I won't comment on those.) If you had said "it's not a top-quality series" then I would fully agree with you; heck, I gave the series only middling grades on writing for both arcs. And I don't think that I've ever denied that its entertainment value well exceeds its qualitative value. I will vociferously disagree with you, and anyone else who wants to comment, that the writing is total s***, however. I know what "it's awful but it still entertained me" looks like, and that's not SAO. You and others claim that there are incontrovertible writing flaws; I can point to things that the series does right which should be equally incontrovertible by the same writing standards you claim to be judging the series by. If the series was truly as awful as you claim it was, would those factors still be there? I do, to an extent, believe that there are certain qualitative factors that can be objectively good or objectively bad. When people get such a mad-on hate for a title that they refuse to acknowledge what a title does well that is objectively meritorious then their evaluation become opinion. That's what I see happening with SAO when people refer to it as utter garbage. For all that it may do wrong, it does enough other things right to compensate. And, for the record, SAO is far from the only title which gets this kind of reaction. It's just the most recent one.

It really just comes down to the degree of things. Yes, there are things the show does right. I won't deny that. For example, the first two episodes are still some of the best opening episodes to a series I've ever seen and I have no problems with them at all. But I see these good parts as few enough and not impactful enough to make a difference in my overall judgment of the series. (For the record, I don't think I've actually made my view of SAO well known on this site, but I do consider it the worst anime I've ever seen) There are simply too many glaring flaws, some actually seeming to exist just to ruin things that were previously good, rendering them null anyway, for me to consider the positives able to save the series.

I wouldn't go to say it the worst but it does have its flaws and is pretty silly at times with its logic. It's a dumb fun entertaining series. It's kind of like your big blockbuster summer movies. They can be fun and entertaining and even fun to watch but not really all that great. SAO is kind of like that, a good popcorn movie.