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THIS IS A SPOILER-FREE REVIEW

This is probably going to be the longest review so far. The Sword Art Online franchise has left a questionable mark on the anime community. Some love it, some hate it and there doesn´t seem to be anything in between. To fully dive into the series, i started collecting and reading all of the localized original light novel over the course of two years. This is not the end of the franchise, but for a while it will be the last bit that i will read. This review will cover everything from the Aincrad Arc up to Alicization. I will go ... through this review arc by arc and i will include all the short stories from later on as a part of it´s respective arc ( + ). The „Sword Art Online Progressive“ series is NOT included in this review.

My ranking of the arcs goes as follows:

1. Alicization (Volume 9 – 14) (5)
2. Phantom Bullet (Volume 5 – 6) (3)
3. Aincrad (Volume 1+ 2,8) (1)
4. Mother´s Rosario (Volume 7) (4)
5. Fairy Dance (Volume 3 – 4 + 8) (2)


1. Aincrad - (8/10)

The legendary first arc of the franchise is definitely one of the most iconic and famous anime arcs of all time. But what a lot of people forget is that originally, this arc only consisted of a single novel. Back in 2002, this exact novel won the author, Reki Kawahara, the Dengeki Bunkyo Light Novel award.
Looking back at it you cannot deny how important Aincrad was to the franchise. It was the perfect arc to start of the story and i still think it´s good parts outweigh the bad ones. The world of SAO is genuinely exciting, the setup felt fresh and new, especially when the novel came out originally and the fights were exciting to read. Kawahara put a lot of time into describing the way the sword-skills work, how they feel, how battles work and how to immerse yourself into the scenario. His writing, while not as refined, is calm and slow-paced and he manages to pack a lot of lore and information into every sentence. Like many other Japanese writers, Kawahara uses a lot of inner monologues which might not be for everyone, but i really enjoyed it. I also have to note that this arc by far gets referenced to the most in the following arcs, especially in Alicization.
But there are also very obvious downsides to this first stretch of the story. A big reason why this novel feels so stacked is that to enter the contest, the work could not sur a certain lenght and it had to be a self-contained story. This led to the first novel essentially speedrunning through plot points. We get introduced into the world very quickly, but only after a few chapters we timeskip our way up 72 floors which feels very inconsequential and rushed. The characters suffered the most in that regard. Aincrad has by far the weakest set of characters, especially if we count in the side stories (which involve Kirito helping out cute girls with his superior skill). The romance between him and Asuna felt right, but was also rushed and underdeveloped. All these problems were exactly the reason why Kawahara returned to this setting with the „Progressive“ series, because a lot of potential was lost here.
This arc has glaring faults, but the entertainment value is just incredibly high. Although i think Volume 2, which contains the side-stories involving Silica, Lisbeth etc. is by far the worst novel in the series, the side story in Volume 8 („A murder case in the area“) was fantastic and showed Kawaharas improved writing later on.
This is the perfect gateway into the franchise. If you like this arc, you will most likely enjoy the rest of the franchise too.

2. Fairy Dance - (6/10)

To be honest, after finishing this arc i thought it was absolutely incredible, and for a long time i held it higher than Aincrad. But looking back at it, this arc had a lot of little flaws that i kind of just forgot about.
I think the tone shifted quite a bit after the dramatic Aincrad arc, in which the characters die if they are killed in the game. Here, there is almost no sense of urgency for most of the first volume. Asuna getting pulled out of the story, serving merely as a damsel in distress was already disappointing for me, because she hasn´t even had a strong character arc of her own up to this point. Also, the weird romantic subplot between Kirito and his cousin(!) interrupted the tension a lot. The fights, although pretty entertaining, were harder to follow than before. The implementation of flying hurt the precise description of the action taking place, making it harder to keep up while reading. I also think that the magic system in Alfheim Online is not thought out well enough, especially comparing it to later arcs (Alicization). There is also a very high amount of Deus Ex Machina moments especially in the final fight.
In retrospective, this arc falls a lot lower than it was after my first read. But we cannot forget how it still included memorable fights and a completely new world in which a big portion of the rest of the series is set in. I think the different areas, the towns and the different races make this world a lot more interesting and the final book included a really memorable section towards the end which i cannot get into without spoiling.

2. Phantom Bullet - (9/10)

This arc completely subverted my expectation in almost every regard. From the very start, this story line had my full attention. Kawahara has always told his stories from the perspective of multiple characters. But whether it was Asuna, Leafa or someone else, these sections were lackluster because their respected character wasn´t build up very well before. The big difference in this arc compared to the previous ones is the amount of depth that was given to it´s ing characters. Sinon feels complete, well rounded, with her own goals, fears and ambitions and is in my opinion a way better female lead than Asuna.
The world of Gun Gale Online, combined with the fantastic tournament setting gave this arc a sense of urgency and suspense. The post-apocalyptic sci-fi scenario was a nice change of pace from the medieval vibe of Aincrad and Alfheim .I also think that this arc has the best pacing of all the arcs in SAO. The absolute nerve racking reveals later on in the story were incredibly well set up. There are no random subplots like in Alfheim and no unnecessary side characters or filler like in Aincrad. The story focuses solely on Kirito, Sinon and their respective goals.
The fighting here is of course extremely different to every other arc, but Kawahara delivers on the action. With a few notes taken from „Star Wars“ and „The Hunger Games“ he made every fight fun to read. Another great thing is the villain we got in this arc. Kawahara does not have a good track record when it comes to his villains personality, so here he decided to completely avoid that by making him an anonymous killer. He doesn´t have much depth, but the way the story flashbacks to his origin, as well as the new reveals about Aincrad really help with building up the tension. Volume 6, which covers the second half of this arc, was my favorite novel in the whole series, probably the most fun i had reading in a very long time.

Mother´s Rosario - (7/10)

This is a special arc, because 1) Asuna takes the role of protagonist from Kirito and 2) It only consists of a single volume.
Having Asuna as a lead finally gave her more of a background as a character. The pacing is dense and the story takes a lot of time off the action to focus on her family situation, her relationship with her mother, insights to her feelings during the Aincrad arc and her building up a bond with someone else than just Kirito. Speaking of that, the story line about Yuuki was a complete turnaround for the series and felt more small-scale and personal than other arcs. But the tone was consistent and the ending was especially well done. Still, this arc of course lacks the adventure and action of other arcs which led to some calling it forgettable, but I think it still stands as a nice little change of pace before entering the next story line.

Alicization (9/10)

Which of course leads us to Alicization. In my opinion the single best arc in the whole series. Spanning more than 5 whole novels Kawahara rejects almost every rule and every character we knew before and sets up a completely new world. Not just a video game, but a true alternate reality.
The scope and scale of the plot is enormous. Underworld truly feels like a complete world with it´s own history, people, laws and boundaries. The whole setup for the story and the complex build up of rules is done phenomenally. The action is some of the best in the whole series as well. We get a completely new magic system, which stayed consistent for most of the time, as well as a completely different approach to sword-fights.
The pacing of the novels is extremely slow. Every little rule of the world gets explained for multiple pages, there is an ongoing mystery which kept me on edge and the inner monologues are even longer, rivaling the ones from classic Japanese literature like the “Koten-Bu” series. Kawaharas approach to worldbuilding is extremely interesting and highly unique as well.
Another plus for this arc are the characters. The authors improved writing talent really shows here. Eugeo is a fantastic character and stands as an equal lead character besides Kirito here. Alice also got an immense amount of characterization, especially in volume 13.
So why is this arc not a 10 out of 10?. Well, the strongest element in this arc, the worldbuilding, is also holding the actual story back quite a bit. The pacing feels extremely fractured. The lore of the world, while being extremely well written, logical and interesting, is not evenly spread out throughout the arc. A good storyteller can seamlessly feed the reader with little bits of information over a long period of time without interrupting the flow of the story, which by the way, was the biggest strength of the Phantom Bullet arc. But with the insane scale of this world, i think Kawaharas fantasy simply outran his writing skills. He fills up page after page with important lore, which makes it really hard to keep up with the flow of information. Volume 12 is the biggest culprit of that, with over 100 pages in a row that are filled with nothing but info-dumps, lore and dialogue.
But still, this arc stands as the greatest one in the series, and may as well be one of my favorite anime/manga arcs period.


Summary

I really enjoyed collecting and reading this series and consider myself as a big fan. Every new arc brings something fresh to the table, the characters are memorable, the worlds are exciting and the action is a blast to read. I am really eager to get into the newer arcs, especially Unitial Ring, but who knows if it ever gets localized in Europe.
If you like Light Novels, this is a must-read in my opinion. If you never read one, or only watched the famous (or infamous) anime adaptation, i´d say this is a great starting point to the medium.

- Marco_Yooo

FINAL SCORE - 9/10

As a native speaker of mandarin, i am lucky enough to enjoy the novels without needing to wait the long translation time or the english translation of the book. Although the first story about Aincrad have seem to be unorganized and messy in structure due to its original purpose is for a novel contest, the story construction skills of Reki Kawahara is something that is definitely worth praising. Both the ALO arc and GGO arc provided a thorough and organized storyline, that are easy to read, understand, and enjoy. Kawahara together with his incredible skills of building tensions and setting the mood while reading, shown ... in book 7 (mother's rosario) cause the story to be attractive for readers that doesn't reject sci-fi or fantasy stories since the whole timeline is based on future with currently undeveloped technology.

The illustrator abec's work is fantastic, with each page of illustration builds up and add on to the feelings or mood that Kawahara wants to present, like the illustration for return of Kirito at the near end of the UW arc, and the scene of Yuuki laying in Asuna's lap at the end of Mother's Rosario.

For english readers that are still waiting for translation of the Alicization/UW arc, the story is definitely worth the wait. The whole arc could be a master piece in the category of light novel. The complicated yet understandable setting and plot connected with the illustrations of abec is just pure enjoyments when reading.

Reading this arc was so enjoying that i wouldve want a brain wash so i can re-read the series again.

Note: I will only be talking about Project Alicization arc (volume 9 to 18), which isn't in the anime. I found the previous 8 volumes not much different from the anime.

Story (10):
The setting is unique, different from the other settings in the first 8 volumes. It's more similar to an alternate universe, than a virtual world. The virtual world isn't for entertainment uses, which makes the functions within the virtual world which is called Underworld, different from the other three virtual worlds. The Project Alicization arc is set in 2026, after the Mother's Rosario arc. It introduces new technology, and it's not just going from ... the NervGear to the AmuSphere. This new technology made the virtual world incredibly different and realistic. There are many things that happens throughout the 10 volumes, and is separated into two sub-arcs - Human Empire sub-arc (volume 9 to 14) and War of the Underworld sub-arc (volume 15 to 18).

Art (9):
There isn't much to say about the art. It's just the art is drawn very well and the scenes which are drawn makes sense.

Character (9):
Kirito - Unlike the first 8 volumes, Kirito doesn't seem to be as much as a Gary Stu. Even though he does defeat enemies by himself, he does require help to overcome challenges. It's true that there are females who likes Kirito, but there isn't as much as a harem.
Eugeo - Eugeo is a likeable character, and is the one who is very different from Kirito's reckless behavior.
Alice - Unlike Asuna, Alice isn't just there to be shipped with Eugeo. She's pretty strong, dependable and actually fights throughout the whole story.

Enjoyment (10):
With all of the events which you wouldn't expect happening, it's hard to not like it. Especially from volume 14, every volume has a main event happening, and it's not Kirito being a Gary Stu.

Overall (10):
I highly recommend this to people who are interested in watching the anime or have already watched the anime before.