Sword Art Online – 04

I’m pressing B, but it won’t stop evolving!!!

I was pretty concerned when I heard that this was the “pedobear” episode of SAO, thanks to the introduction of a certain young girl. Lolis and I just don’t tend to mix well. Whether or not my concerns were valid…well…only time will tell. That is, if you define time as you reading our post.
Another week of great anime which means more SWORD ART ONLINE! So is everyone over the die-o-rama of the previous episode? I hope so because I really want to move on from the loss of Sachi, but are we going to see a pattern of Kirito meeting people only to watch them die later?! I want some stronger side characters…anyway I hope things shift soon from all the sad drama moments.

Silica-chan the Epic Beast Tamer!?

Foshizzel // When I heard the phrase beast tamer I instantly thought of World of Warcraft’s Hunter class which also uses creatures and animals you can tame to fight with you. Yes, they even die and you can resurrect them after they fall in battle; however in the Sword Art Online apparently if your pet happens to get owned and dies, you lose it forever? WHAT THE HELL MAN!? I guess the programmers wanted to troll the players that got the rare beast tamer class. So anyway what happened to Silica’s pet? During a huge fight when she decided to go solo after her current group leader turned out to be a big jerk! So she went off and almost died to a group of monsters that attacked her, but her pet Pina jumped in the way and sacrificed herself saving Silica’s life. Thankfully Kirito was around the corner because he wiped out the monsters and he agreed to help this new girl on a quest to revive Pina! That and he told this girl she reminded him of his little sister back in the real world by giving her all this free stuff…see girls get all the free upgrades in any MMORPG! Just kidding because they are usually guys right?

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Pseudo Siblings

Sibling quality time…with tentacles, panty-flashing, and head pats. Is this how siblings usually bond?

Overcooled // WHO IS IMOUTO? Okay, now that I’ve got that obvious reference out of the way, let’s talk about Kirito and Silica. Considering that Kirito spent the tail end of last week’s episode in complete despair, it was nice to see some good fortune smile down on him. He was able to protect Silica, and he brought down his iron hammer of justice on Rosalia. He also looks a lot happier! It’s cute, but I prefer him when he’s brooding in between good deeds and acting more socially awkward. Otherwise, he’s just like a typical male lead who is nice to every girl he meets. As a result, this episode really was just a sugary chaser to the bitter tragedies from last week. Less substance, but more fanservice and sweetness.

However, we do get to hear a bit about Kirito’s family life. Finally learning a bit about Kirito and his relationship with his sister, for example, was nice. Although he was using Silica as bait the entire time, I think he really does see a connection between her and his sister. I don’t have any siblings, but I still thought the way he protected and took care of Silica was sweet. I’m not sure how I feel about Silica calling Kirito a big brother given her huge crush on him though <_< Like..please pick one…big brother or potential boyfriend. NOT BOTH. My guess is Silica is either an only child, or has siblings that don’t really pay any attention to her, so having Kirito dote on her was a special treat.

Show ▼

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Cutest Side Character Ever in Sword Art Online?

Foshizzel // Last week introduced Sachi who was a bit on the dull side as far as personality goes, but hey, I understand she had issues with death and being trapped in a game world! That is fine and all but personally this week we meet the adorable Silica; however I know most people out there are like “Fosh she is just the generic moe character.” While those people are 90% right I still feel that Silica brings something fun to SAO, but I can’t really deny the fact that she is cute! Then again the character designer has done some stepped up their game with all the facial expressions this week. Oh and how about those random rape plants; however when dealing with female characters and fantasy based anime you always have the chance for attempted tentacle rape. So what do you think about this character? Is she just another generic moe twin-tail girl or does she make things exciting for Sword Art Online? Also d’awwww that line she said at the end that she might have found an older brother, but does that confirm her as a possible bro-con? Either way I am happy to have a character that gets embarrassed and smiles all the time.

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Smooth Criminals

Overcooled // Piece by piece, we’re learning more about SAO – which is my favourite part of the series so far. You can move up and down the levels, there’s a garden for reviving pets, your senses are dulled unless you level up certain skills, and players who commit crimes have specially-coloured player markers. Being the baddy is kind of a sensible strategy when you toss morals out the window. Why work hard when you can let other people work hard and then reap the benefits yourself, right? It’s a sound method, especially for those who are ruthless enough to not care about leaving other players defenseless in a game where every single item is needed to stay afloat. I had assumed anyone adopting that strategy would be the merciless type in real life, but Kirito brought up something I forgot about completely. He mentioned that people often adopt different identities when online. You would think retaining your own body in the game and all the death warnings would make acting a lot harder to do, but it seems like it still happens. Rosalia is able to be cruel so easily because she still thinks this is a game.

In a way, you could say that Rosalia’s way of coping with a situation where every death is real and no one can escape is to just deny everything. She’s a victim of this just as much as Kirito, Klein and Silica. By ignoring the consequences, she can take more risks and shrug off the responsibility of killing and stealing from players. If it’s “just a game” to her, she can resume acting as a scheming bitch to get what she wants. She adopts this viewpoint because it’s the most convenient. She says no one dies in this game because she is afraid of dying. That’s probably why she never takes up the front lines (as Silica accuses her of earlier in the episode) and steals instead of training. There’s a much lower chance of dying that way. I kind of feel bad for some of the orange and red players because they are going so far just to escape the game and survive. Some of them may be rotten to the core, even in real life, but that doesn’t mean they deserve to be stuck in this situation.

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Players versus the Player Killers

Foshizzel // This week Sword Art Online mentioned one important thing about player killers in an online game but this is nothing brand new to fans of something like .hack//SIGN right? In this series they turn the tables on us because player killers or Pkers icons turn red or orange signaling to everyone around them to stay away from them at all costs sure sounds simple right? I would think so, but of course those types of players love to hide in the shadows or in this shows case behind trees? Yeah…great…hiding spot dudes…anyway other than the mention of pkers we got to see some of the various skills found in SAO like tracking, listening, stealth and crazy battle healing regeneration which automatically heals him whenever he takes a hit. Oh and what level is Kirito now? He is level 78 with a massive 14, 500 HP! Good god bro you suddenly became godlike against everyone else! I loved the reactions from those side characters and that redhead? PRICELESS and yes I know Kirito has officially reached epic BAMF status as the overpowered main character.

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Final Thoughts

Well, I know THESE guys weren’t happy about episode 4. Were you?

Overcooled // This was better than last week’s episode, but I’m getting a bit concerned with the decision to go over all of these side stories one after the other. On one hand, I’m learning some interesting things about SAO in the process, but the story doesn’t seem to flow from episode to episode. The jump from story to story makes me feel like I have to constantly recalibrate myself for each new episode, instead of fluidly going through a sequence of escalating events. Whether it would have made more sense to make these OVAs – I do not know. Maybe these things become very important in the future, and maybe we don’t learn about guilds and red players anywhere else. Kirito skipping to the high seventies was fine (he’s a beast at any level anyways), but the switch from “BAWWW SACHIII” to getting an eyeful of loli panties every couple of minutes with a smile on his face was weird. I can see how the event made him the type to seek justice and try very hard to protect people from dying, but his attitude changes so much it’s like he’s another person.

Aside from the continuity issues, this episode was kind of okay. Again, completely average – but at least it felt less rushed, and I felt rather attached to Silica by the end of the episode. This is a great feat since I found her sobbing over Pina (mm..pina coladas…) to be nauseating. After that, she just grew on me. Yes, a typical tentacle-bait loli won my favour. She’s cute and rather capable, so I can’t help it! It’s a bit of a shame that Kirito is a solo player and is going to ditch her next week for a new character-of-the-week but eh…It was fun while it lasted.

Foshizzel // Overall this was a huge improvement to the previous sad and depressing episode! For once we have a character that smiles and isn’t freaking out every time you see them, but I know Sicila isn’t completely perfect. I mean she lost her pet really fast and practically everyone knows her…I wonder how she became so popular though? Maybe her cute character design pushed her to idol status in Sword Art Online? Either that or her twin-tails give her extra powers while in a group? Also did anyone cry for the loss of Pina? DAMN THAT CUTE DRAGON! Thankfully she resurrected her pet at the end. So what else happened? Oh right Kirito became a total bad ass this week; however he kind of just stood there taking hit after hit from those random dudes and he was boasting about his HP regeneration which turns him into a basic shounen jump hero. So do you support Kirito x Sicila? Or no way in hell! Just kidding I think we all know he is going to be with Asuna whenever she DECIDES to show up! So I wonder what level she is right now maybe around 100? Anyway this was a great episode this week thanks to the introduction of a cute new character.

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We live, laugh, enjoy and strictly believe on "more the merrier". When together, we usually come up with very chatty, conversation-based episodics and interesting posts.
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54 Responses to “Sword Art Online – 04”

  1. Highway says:

    I actually think the side stories are a good way to handle the time skips we’ll need to get anywhere toward the end of the storyline. They’re going to need people up at level 90-100 to finish out the show, and doing this is definitely better than a training montage.

    I thought Silica as a character was pretty good, and she definitely turned out to be more capable than she initially let on. I thought it was good of Kirito to actually push her to handle things, as well as helping her level up by having her get killing blows. I was also glad that she didn’t do the cliched affronted response to being ‘used’ as bait to allow Kirito to draw out Rosalia. She recognized that she got far more out of it than she could have expected, and she got Pina back.

    I also really like the way they’re characterizing Kirito. His caring for others shows through his superficially mercenary actions. I love the way he has a way he wants to live the game, how he wants to get others to live, and sticks with it and even reinforces it by the side actions he takes.

    • Foshizzel says:

      Yeah I like these side stories, but I can see why most fans hate all the time skips and I wonder about the levels! It seems like Kirito jumps up twenty or so levels every episode? I don’t really want to sit through random “training” episodes because I feel they would get dull watching the MC kill things over and over again…

      I liked Silica she was a breath of fresh air! Seriously after we had to deal with emo Sachi it is a welcome change, but I am sad by the news of us not seeing her again? WHY! SHE IS GREAT!! That is true Kirito did use her to draw out those PKers and hooray for Pina! YAY!!

      Kirito is doing alright for his developments I haven’t found to many reasons to hate him, but I think we have a while to go hahaha

  2. JPNIgor says:

    Fosh, Silica is very know because she is a girl, and well… I’ve read somewhere that girls is extrememly rare on SAO, even though Kirito already met three…

    I thought this episode of SAO was adorable XP Silica is so cute, and she have some aspects that differentiates her from other loli characters.

    Well, I agree with the most part that the both said on the post. The pace is too fast and I was wondering what happened to Kirito be so happy when on the past episode he saw a whole guild being killed, including Sachi and it’s leader killing himself ¬¬ Guess he have memory problems, seriously.

    I wanted to see more of Silica and Pina on the episodes to come, but I know that this won’t happen ¬¬ I’m hoping that at least Asuna will appear again, even if it is to disappear for the next five episodes.

    • Foshizzel says:

      Yep! Girls are extremely rare I thought the same thing about Asuna when she was hiding herself with that cloak as a way to protect herself.

      Totally with you on that Silica is very cute and agreed she a bit different than your usual loli-characters you can find in every other anime series.

      The pace is going by quite fast, but I think it works so far I mean suuureee we are missing out on Kirito’s leveling adventures because they keep skipping out on that part…I just want the two main characters to meet so we can move past any new introductions! Ah well SOOOON!

  3. Finally a good ending episode! Hooray!
    And Yeah i notice too, unlike typical online games, theirs a lot of female players in this episode.

    Im surprise those players that were pretending appearance are still alive, after all those humility revealing them since episode 1.

    How many episodes can Sao produce? Because it appears that their will be more character killings than i can think of. For example: Sachi who i thought might survive in episode-3 since she was seen in OP.

    • Foshizzel says:

      I know right? Finally!

      How many episodes? I think this is a single core series meaning just 13 episodes? If they are shooting for 24 or 26 they better slow things down with Kirito’s levels! Seriously he is already 78…I saw some fan art there are still 2 more side girls to introduce some short girl with long hair and a girl with pink hair? Yeah! I guess we have to give them their own.

      I assume the first 6 episodes build up these side characters and I guess 6 – 12/13 is the actual “fight to the top” to finish the game? I have no clue to be honest with you…

      • Nipah says:

        This is a two-cours series (www.crunchyroll.com/anime-news/2011/12/09/sword-art-online-to-air-in-july-cast-announced).

        But, considering that the anime’s website lists Lyfa in a main character position they will very likely also animate the second arc ALO.

    • D-LaN says:

      The problem is, why r they still sticking w/h each other lol.

  4. HannoX says:

    I have to agree that since the first two episodes this anime has become rather disjointed. What’s with the side stories rather than getting on with the main story–reaching the top floor and getting out of SAO? Okay, maybe Episode 3 existed to bring some tragedy into Kirito’s life and remind him that PEOPLE DIE FOR REAL here; it’s not a game. And maybe Episode 4 is meant to show how he’s changed since that tragedy. He cares about other players now and helps out. But both of these could have been made part of the main story.

    It’s time to stop the side stories featuring the character-of-the-week (although Silica is cute and unlike Sachii doesn’t mope around and is useful. Although I’m not much of a fan of loli characters I wouldn’t mind Silica sticking around) and get on with the main story. And time to bring Asuna back and have her stick around this time.

    • Overcooled says:

      The character-of-the-week move isn’t a very good one since the series is just started and you want to make sure people don’t drop the series :/ We do learn some important lessons, but I agree that they could have easily worked these things into a more cohesive main story.

      Yes! I’m waiting for Asuna to make her epic re-appearance!

  5. skylion says:

    I thought this episode was terrific! It had great potential to examine youth and gender issues within the game, thus providing a decent metaphor for conversation about those topics. I thought this episode was less than terrific! Little Girl Eating-Plant Monsters. Main-stream anime. We pander.

    Now, everyone pretty much knows I dig the competent loli characters. Why? I enjoy the how it messes with common standards and tropes. That is shows that young girls are capable of setting goals and achieving them within a narrative. Unless they run afoul of Little Girl Eating-Plant Monsters. This is anime. It panders.

    In the context of this episode it could have been considerably worse. But I think even the fanservice was in service to the character’s own narrative. Silica, like many of the younger children involved in the game are having their growth stunted in many ways. She isn’t socializing normally; her idol status goes right to her head and she doesn’t think about it. She has status simply because she was in the “wrong game at the wrong time”; it’s nothing she can earn.

    When we first see her Silica was on the fast track to becoming Drunken Monkey pudu; and she was a crying mess, but she was still fighting the beasts. I admire that in characters. We get a full sketch in less than five minutes.

    Enter Kirito. He is, more and more, starting to remind me of Robert E. Howard’s (creator of Conan…the Barbarian, not CoCO) Solomon Kane. SK was the grim Puritan in black, a man of God. His devotion and prayer was wandering the world serving up big helpings of Ass-kick sammich to evil. He was a savage in combat.

    How they are animating Kirto during the fight scenes, they just capture that savagery. His wanderings, his loses, they are almost the same. Where he differs is his sense of humanity. Kane would not have allowed Rosalia and her band of thugs to live. This character lies to herself with ease; her defeat at Kirito’s hands just set the stage for another lie about herself.

    As an onii-chan, he did good. And I think he may be setting Silica up on a good path. Which kinda sucks because we are never going to see this character again.

    So, excellent episode with some rather foolish tentancled dents in it.

    • Highway says:

      I didn’t even make the ‘tentacle’ connection. Guess it just isn’t something that enters my head.

      And can someone save my first comment from the spam filter? Pleeeeease? 🙂

    • Highway says:

      I’m kind of hoping we see characters like Silica again. She’s got the chops, when she gets past her initial “Eek! Save Me!” response. She’s got a healing dragon. And when she gets in with Kirito, we can see that she actually isn’t just a little idol girl. She recognizes that those two guys just want her in their party as a mascot. And she seems to readily reject that role if there is a chance at a better party and a better reason for playing. On one level, you can’t blame her for partying with people who see her as a cute girl with a cute dragon when she is looking for things to do, ways to progress, but she’s also willing to abandon a group based on principles, as we saw in the very beginning. Sure, it was partly hubris, but it was also conviction.

    • skylion says:

      Ah, the underwear scene. Yes, pandering to the market. But, it’s pacing was rather keen. Her character wasn’t so dull as to have her blythly open the door like so many other fanservice girls. She realizes what she is doing at that last second and takes care of the problem. Other shows, embarrassment comedy out the wazz….This show. Fanservice Level Up! (thanks, Fosh)

      • Foshizzel says:

        wuahahahaha you are welcome king of da little peoples <3

        • skylion says:

          King of the Lolis? I don’t know how to take this. Other than taking and running……

          • skylion says:

            No. Seriously. I like the loli characters that excel; take any character in an anime that has a military bent. You take out the old crusty battle hardened solider and you put a competent, struggling, cute loli in his place. The show becomes a thing of marketing, and it becomes a fresh new place as well. Asteria and the Princessess’ Serenity are just two expamples. And you make them like a hundred years older than they appear.

            What is great about Silica is that she is portrayed as a realistic enough adolescent; as is Kirito.

            Damn, this story has some chops.

            • Foshizzel says:

              True! There are countless “loli” girls that fall into that list I mean take most of the strike witch girls? Yeah Asteria and the princess girls…yeah…hahhaa

              Silica!! <3

  6. skylion says:

    Rosalia was deliberately insulting her, and it the insult worked as it got her to leave the group. Whatever else that foul character had set up, getting her to leave was a means to an end: tabs would have been kept, traps would have been sprung, and Silica would have gotten the Bad End.

    That and there is nothing wrong with her wanting to party because she is a cute girl. Cause she, as you say, has the chops.

    • Allergic2Cats says:

      Actually it was the opposite, Rosalia wanted her to stay in the group because she had planned to ambush the group. Silica’s rage quitting was unexpected. She said something along the lines of Silica “being the primary target but too bad she got away” when Kirito first confronted her. Which is why she added that she was pleasantly surprised when she heard that Silica was going for the pet rez item, an even better target.

  7. skylion says:

    Arrgh. This is why I am not a reviewer! Thanks for pointing that out.

    • BlackBriar says:

      I understand what you mean. I hate it when I miss certain important parts.

    • Foshizzel says:

      Awwwww don’t worry! It happens to me on certain topics or when I leave things out…yeah…been there done that LOL

  8. Gecko says:

    I’m pleased with how this is going. I don’t mind the side stories so much, although it is a little awkward when Kirito is just jumping around. The plot kind of starts at the beginning of the episode and then ends at the end, but it’s nice to know that at least that character probably won’t show up again. And plus, through this we get to see all the sides of SAO and how many different people treat their fates of being trapped in the game. I was a bit worried we would only get one perspective, but here we get to see the people who are afraid, vs the people who deny everything. One perspective for this kind of situation would get dull quickly for me.
    I was happy that this episode was happier as well. I was worried the entire time that Silica was going to die or they were going to get to the Pet Revival item say, 5 minutes late. Thank goodness it was smooth.
    I’m also happy to see that Kirito is gaining levels and getting strong, and on the front line. He seemed rather indifferent to everything at the end of the third episode, but it seems that time healed some of his wounds and helped him realize what he should be doing- being the “Beater” and getting through this game. At the end of the second episode, I was ready to say “Oh, he’s going to go beat this thing and be the first out,” although right now I’m wondering if he’ll be the first out with Asuna rather than alone. It seems like all of these encounters with different characters are setting him up to trust others more and more so that he’ll be ready to team up with Asuna.

    • Overcooled says:

      When I first heard about SAO, it was the promise of seeing everyone cope with a deadly game that really got me excited. I wanted to see how everyone would react and how chaotic things would get. SAO has been good at showing different perspectives from Sachi’s “I’M GONNA DIE” to Rosalia’s dirty way out of things.

      Haha, I was also wondering if they’d get there late or Silica would do something dumb like accidentally smoosh the flower. I know it’s a game, but that’s still a really fragile-looking item!

      I’m glad Kirito is in a better place emotionally right now. I wish we could have seen him crawl out of his depressive period, to see what got him to think more positively. Anyways, Kirito is proving to be a super nice guy despite being a solo player, so I wouldn’t be too surprised if your prediction came true. I mean, he has to team up with Asuna sooner or later, right?

      • Highway says:

        Yeah, I was also worried, based on the previous week’s storyline, that they’d do something to crush hopes and dreams – be too late to the hill, lose the item, lose Pina’s Heart, kill Silica 15 feet from the item – but thankfully it didn’t do anything like that.

        I agree that these episodes are doing a lot to help frame the world and the different types of players that are in it, even to the ones who don’t believe that death is permanent. A question that comes up: Does Rosalia actually believe that real-life death doesn’t happen? Or does she just tell herself that to make her feel better about her amoral desire to PK? If you proved that a person she led to her death was actually murdered, would she change her tune? Or would she just switch to another self-justification, like “Well, they should play better / they should have more friends / they should just accept death.” I wonder if we’ll get more exploration of that ‘trollish’ attitude.

        • Overcooled says:

          Thank goodness, that would be overkill. We already got the message and Kirito learned his lesson. I was still worried when I was watching it though…

          It’s hard to tell what she actually believes given how little we’ve seen of her. It IS a very convenient viewpoint for someone who helps people PK. I’d hazard a guess and say she really does believe her philosophy, but she’d cave easily if enough evidence to prove otherwise was shown to her. You can only run from reality so much.

          However, it really is hard to tell if she’d change her actions since she actually seems to enjoy PKing and stealing items. Look at how smug she was confronting Kirito and Silica! What do you think? I think she’s a selfish character, so she’ll pick the dirty method no matter what the truth is. If she finds out death is real, the only thing it will change is how much she worries about herself. I hope we run into more people from this Titan’s Hand guild to see how they justify murder.

          • Gecko says:

            I feel like Rosalia isn’t going to change her philosophy, she’ll just say “Oh, well, I guess I just have to seriously win, then” and sacrifice the people around her and end up with no friends. At some point no one will follow her, and she’ll end up a red player. But of course, there will always be the manipulative players who sneak through the system.

        • Gecko says:

          I was thinking all of those things too, and I almost skipped to the end just to reassure myself, but in the end I didn’t. But my stomach was just a big black hole through the entire episode…

          I can’t see Rosalia switching her attitude, though. She seems to be pretty stiff with her ideas and philosophy of SAO’s workings.

  9. BlackBriar says:

    Thankfully this was a big brother episode of SAO instead of “pedobear”. The fanservice is being increased as much as the story. The people playing the game in locked in a life and death situation, so why not apply it for the animals as well?

    Kirito using Silica as bait was wrong but at least he didn’t try to kill her once her role was finished. For Silica being so attached to him, I’d have to go with the part with her having siblings and no one pays attention to her because she looks like the neglected type. Right now, it’s too early to judge if she’s just another generic character given this is simply her introduction but it’s a safe bet she’ll be useful.

    Rosalia was trouble to me from the beginning for some reason. She just gave such an untrustworthy feel and I was right but she’s hot with red hair. I think anyone who licks their lips with a sadistic expression has nothing but bad intentions in mind. She is able to be cruel but is also quite naïve. If it was just a game, she would have been able to log in and out at will but she is ignoring the fact she’s locked in. Not that her state of mind isn’t understandable.

    When I heard the phrase “Player Killers”, I immediately thought of the PKs in .hack//Sign and .hack//Roots. At least here, you have a better chance of identifying them. With anime logic, hiding behind trees are one of the perfect hiding spots there is.

    Kirito is worthy of his “beater” title. Level 78 with a massive 14, 500 HP?! He should tell those PKs: “On your knees. I want you to beg for forgiveness”. And he didn’t only become godlike, he went DBZ mode while standing there and everyone is just slashing him.

    • Overcooled says:

      Yeah, there was fanservice – but not a crazy amount. Definitely more than last week though.

      Silica didn’t seem to mind being bait AT ALL. He was nice and still protected her, so I can see why she isn’t mad, even though what he did was technically wrong. I wonder if she’ll ever come back for us to say if she’s more than just a charming loli with a dragon D:

      Do you read Game of Thrones? I imagined Melisandre when I saw her, so I instantly took on a cautious stance. Also, she was being a bitch, so there’s that. Denying that people die in the game when the situation is obviously odd (people can’t log out for crying out loud) is indeed very naive. She actually believes that? *siiigh*

      Well, all MMOs where there’s a PvP element have PKers, it’s an actual term that’s commonly used. One thing to learn from .hack//SIGN is that PKers get what they deserve at the end. Do you remember Sora?

      • BlackBriar says:

        I hope Silica comes back. It would be a shame if she’s just another pretty face. Kirito is doing great personality wise keeping a balance within himself. Where did his title, “The Black Swordsman” suddenly come from? I hope nothing serious happens that he undergoes a change like Haseo in .hack//Roots. After a personal loss, he had become more of a villain than a hero.

        I’m not familiar with Game of Thrones’ story although I seem to remember watching at least one episode on HBO. Apparently, Rosalia is using denial as an escape from the reality of it all but the more she does that, the worse it will be when she finally has to face the truth.

        If you mean that insane green haired guy constantly stalking Tsukasa, then yes. But I don’t remember what happened to him. Hopefully, he got a severely gruesome end.

        • Foshizzel says:

          I KNOW! I hope we haven’t seen the last of Silica! I know most people are like to bad we will not see her again!? Yeaaaahh right! This is the adaption of the novels so even if she doesn’t appear again in those she can still pop up in the anime…

          Damn those PKERS!

          • Overcooled says:

            @Fosh: I want to see her again too…D: OVA maybe?

            @BlackBriar: Yeah, that’s the one. Okay, SPOILAH TIME. If you haven’t seen up to the last episode of .hack//SIGN, don’t click the spoiler tag! Show ▼

            • D-LaN says:

              Dunno is it spoiler…..

              Show ▼

  10. D-LaN says:

    Look at tht shot where Silica finish off the plants. Show ▼

    XD And lol those G.I.R.L and fake bishie get another cameo.

    Whaddaya mean by PEDOBEAR episode??? And it doesnt even look THT tentacle r0p0y lol.

    BTW, there actually no Beast Tamer class in SAO. Its a nickname lk Beater.

    • Overcooled says:

      Kirito sure got an eyeful this week…

      Ah, okay, so there’s just a pet system in SAO. I was wondering how she was able to do sufficient damage without her dragon if the whole draw of a beast tamer is having animals help you fight :B I get they’re just expensive so regular players don’t bother buying them?

      • D-LaN says:

        Its actually more like tht she saw one and unknowingly feed the dragon with its fav food and thus she “capture” the dragon. Its said to be really rare and hard to capture.

  11. Bob from Accounting says:

    Definitely an improvement over last week’s mess, if only because the episode’s story felt like it ran for the right length this time. Of course, while the episode itself avoided being a mess, the big leap from last week did contribute to making the series as a whole seem even messier.

    • Overcooled says:

      Pretty much. It was a good episode, but in the grand scheme of things, the disjointed presentation of the series from a macro view is a bit off so far.

    • Foshizzel says:

      Lots of huge improvements from the previous episode that is trueeeeeee

  12. Liza says:

    I loved this episode but at the same time was wondering about these massive time jumps. Like seriously? At the rate they’re going, the plot looks like it will be over in the next two episodes or something. My friend did accidentally spoil herself and she told me the plot will come in soon. I’m hoping it does and Asuna comes back. For the main female protag to have so little appearances…that’s weird.

    • Overcooled says:

      I guess they’ll slow things down once Kirito gets near the top. There’s usually difficulty spikes as people increase in level in MMOs, so that’s my only guess. Otherwise, yeah, it’d be over in like 3 more episodes lol.

      Well, I guess Asuna is just a side character for now…until she joins up with Kirito. I want to see her in action again, but I don’t mind as long as we have one constant (Kirito).

  13. D-LaN says:

    PS 4 episode in and we ady have this

    DUUUUUUDE!!! Choose Asuna!!

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