Sword Art Online

[Kraco]

It's certainly possible there could be all manner of methods present to prevent kids from ever entering the game. Although at the same time we are talking about a game that purposefully locked players in and at least claimed they will die in RL if they die in the game. So, I wouldn't really trust any system meant to keep children out in this particular case. On the other hand, if we assume there was some effort to prevent kids from ever acquiring the game even if there was nothing to stop them from entering, then it does explain their lower numbers, but it absolutely contradicts with what we saw in this episode: if they had to be crafty enoug to get the game, they definitely shouldn't be the losers we saw here. They should be either HC or wannabe HC gamers already, despite their young age. Surre, there might be an occassional spoiled brat... But all of them? No way.

Asuna being surprised amounts to nothing. She's a part of the same poor writing, after all.

[fireheart]

I don't doubt that there would be kids that managed to get the game and log in at all, merely stating that Mfauli has a valid point that it would have an age restriction. That, the popularity and the new tech involved simply means there shouldn't be that many and as you said they should be well versed in gaming and not go all "I've never seen anything like that".

True Asuna is part of the poor writing but given the fact that we haven't seen any kids on the front-lines the only other thing we have to go on is Asunas statement. If there had been kids in the high level guilds she shouldn't be surprised since she's planned and seeks out the front liners when it's time to fight the boss. If there indeed are kids in the high level guilds it just reinforces the idea that it's badly written.

[David75]

The creator clearly was wicked to allow children at all.
After all, it seems pretty clear it's possible to prevent children from playing the game.
Nervgear being able to digitize the face appearance, interacting with brainwaves and also the calibration (Klein/Kirito explanation)
With those 3 key sources of data, you can clearly exclude children, it might be a little more difficult for people around majority (16 to 20) but under 10 or even 15 should be fairly easy.

So that guy then locks everyone in a deathgame, without even taking children into account.

Gives another angle to judge the creator of the game.

[Y]

I love that killing innocent children in this case is somehow much worse than killing almost 10,000 innocent teenagers and adults.

[Kraco]

I don't know what kind of a buddha one needs to be to still count on the decency and humanity of somebody who is willing to risk 10,000 people to die for his own little game, yeah.

[KrayZ33]

Would somebody PLEASE think of the children!?

[David75]

[HorribleSubs] Sword Art Online - 13 [1080p].mkv

So they finally get the reality of their bodies that might not remain in a good shape for ever.
I guess being younger helps when you get out of coma, provided you have no disabilities left. I guess it could be the same.

Other than that, it was a much better ep, with a nice escalation and all.

[MFauli]

One-hit-death is just stupid. An MMORPG wouldn´t work like that. It´s also pure elitism, no no-name character could even dream of beating that thing. Also, if that´s, what, floor 77´s boss, just how strong are the remaining 23 going to be?!

As for the real-bodies-topic: What exactly did Asuna mean when she said, there was real world time limit? I´m pretty sure that, unless you have some other kind of illness, staying in coma can be done for several decades. There is no need for you to move your body to stay alive.

[einbreaker]

As for the real-bodies-topic: What exactly did Asuna mean when she said, there was real world time limit? I´m pretty sure that, unless you have some other kind of illness, staying in coma can be done for several decades. There is no need for you to move your body to stay alive.

There may come a point where families lose hope and take the life support off. Given its not like they are brain dead, but after two years and no one seems to be able to clear the final level families and governments may begin to wonder if it is even possible.

[David75]

There may come a point where families lose hope and take the life support off. Given its not like they are brain dead, but after two years and no one seems to be able to clear the final level families and governments may begin to wonder if it is even possible.

Do they even know what really happens?
It's fairly possible the only thing they know is:
-that players die if they try to take the nevergear out
-that some players die at random times, should take a while to get that in game death=real death.

And IRL, it generally takes a lot of time for people and med teams to decide to stop life support. For all we know, these players are soundly alive by the definition we have: Brain and heart are fully functionnal.
They'd be murderers, should they stop life support.

[MasterOfMoogles]

What a place to cut the episode. Pretty epic boss fight for the 75th floor.

[Roko]

That was definitely a much better episode than the Yui fiasco, though I was still rolling my eyes/laughing at some of the blatant romance fanservice. I guess I just have an issue with how their characters seem to completely change depending on the context: strong and individualistic when it comes to battles, yet all needy when it comes to the relationship interaction. Yes, I get that people can be different when it comes to love, yada yada, but how it's been portrayed here so far makes it seem to be too extreme. It's like the characters are complete 180 opposites, a.k.a. unrealistic. Another fault of the writing, I suppose?

They finally addressed the real world questions. I really wish that they had explained the whole disconnection thing a lot earlier though. We're what, halfway through the series now, and they only address it now? That's just shoddy writing/world-building, especially given this bit of information seems to be quite crucial to explaining the SAO world.

This fight is looking to be epic; will be fun to watch. I feel like the last third of this episode really reawakened some of the feelings I had when I first watched the 1st episode/the previous bossfight, and peaked my interest in the series yet again. It's been a while since I've looked forward to the next episode.

Every series has its highs and lows, but SAO really seems to bring you on a roller coaster ride that reaches the heights of Everest yet drops you back down to hell immediately after and stays there for a while. The premise of this series has so much potential; I can't help but feel that so much of it is squandered on the crappy side stories and amateur writing in some parts.


Edit: Response to David above
You have to realize though that we're talking about 6,000-10,000 comatose bodies over a 2 year span. That is a lot of resources and money to support so many bodies. Yes, morally it may not be right to "kill" them, but practically? If no one was able to clear the game over a long period of time, there has to come a point in time where you have to accept the reality that in all likelihood, it won't happen, pull the plug and apply those resources to better use. Of course, when that happens is the question we all can't answer, and which the characters are wondering about as well. So I think this was quite a realistic dilemma.

[Buffalobiian]

That is a lot of resources and money to support so many bodies. Yes, morally it may not be right to "kill" them, but practically?

When we're talking about "murderers", that's in a legal context. Same with brain/cardiac death.

I like the lovey-dovey shit, but was somewhat disappointed that the man who oversaw the network security couldn't help them out with any real information.

[Roko]

When we're talking about "murderers", that's in a legal context. Same with brain/cardiac death.

I understand that. But with how widespread and unique this particular situation is, I wouldn't be surprised if an exception was made. But here we're just striking out into speculation territory, so I'll just leave it at that.

[MFauli]

Ok, real-talk: NOBODY would turn off life-support for a comatose patient with perfectly fine heart- and brain-activity. It´s stupid to assume otherwise.

I totally forgot about the temporary disconnection. Wonder what happens if you´re disconnected during, well, a bossfight like the one right now. Are you screwed, or do you enter some kind of invincibility mode for the period of your offline-time?

[Kraco]

It's useless to speculate about pulling plugs in a realistic perspective, since in reality it would have taken at max a month or two for an elite team of specialists to disable the nervgear safely, possibly much less if raiding the game company's offices had produced any results.

But yeah, I'm immensely pleased we got back to action (I won't count the stupid Yui arc action). As glad as I was that Kirito and Asuna got together, I'd have preferred battlefield romance instead of the filler feeling episodes. This was quite a badass boss, and I reckon it indicated that the bosses either don't level up linearly (there might be weaker bosses after this) or this one has some fatal weakness nobody in the company just hasn't figured out.

[David75]

2 years to get a player to a 75 level boss out of 100 levels.
IRL time limit warning
Is it even possible to clear the game in their universe?

[MFauli]

Oh, and one scene I found mightily stupid: When Asuna killed the fish and everyone went "OHHHHHHH, sugoiiiii!" :/ There´s no skill involved. She grinded to a higher level, therefore gained this strength. Anybody can do the same. Don´t be so impressed, please :/

[MasterOfMoogles]

Those people couldn't achieve that level in the same amount of time.

[Ryllharu]

I actually liked the fishing part. It reminded me a bit of Summer Wars with the whole festival air to it. This was a side story done right, and it even pulled in game functions as a part of the micro-plot.

Lakes have different skill requirements, and for a game, the largest lake unsurprisingly has the highest.

Kirito wasn't aware of something about the game, that's huge. He didn't know that you could Switch on secondary skills. It makes sense because most of his secondary skills we know about (Listening, other detection abilities, stealth?, etc.) were totally focused on combat until just recently. Skills that can only ever benefit oneself.

It fits because he is so anti-social and "I'm going to survive!" that he never for a moment thought he might enjoy himself in the game, the whole reason he should have been playing for in the first place. Being in the beta, he would have had a chance to try it out, but never did. This leads us to believe he was only in it for the grind. Perhaps he finally learned something this episode, instead of just throwing out soundbites that were meant to somehow imply he grew as a person.