Why Sword Art Online: Ordinal Scale was almost a good movie

Sword Art Online is the marmite of the anime world. Very few people feel anything other than immense adoration or intense hatred towards the franchise. As one of the few that does sit in the middle, it’s pretty easy to see things from both sides: virtual reality gaming is an interesting and fun concept, it’s a pretty anime and there are some fairly interesting characters. On the other hand the pacing can be poor and we have the go to example of a ridiculously overpowered protagonist.

This evening I went to see the latest instalment in the franchise, the two-hour long movie: Ordinal Scale. And once again, having seen yet another part of the SAO story, I still feel indifferent towards it in terms of quality.

Official poster for Sword Art Online: Ordinal Scale

For those of you who don’t know much about the film, here’s Aniplex’s synopsis:

In 2022, the world of virtual reality was upended by the arrival of a new invention from a genius programmer, Akihiko Kayaba, called NerveGear. It was the first full-dive system, and with it, came endless possibilities to VRMMORPGs.

In 2026, a new machine called the Augma is developed to compete against the NerveGear and its successor, the Amusphere. A next-gen wearable device, the Augma doesn’t have a full-dive function like its predecessors. Instead, it uses Augmented Reality (AR) to get players into the game. It is safe, user-friendly and lets users play while they are conscious, making it an instant hit on the market. The most popular game on the system is “Ordinal Scale” (aka: OS), an ARMMORPG developed exclusively for the Augma.

Asuna and the gang have already been playing OS for a while, by the time Kirito decides to join them. They’re about to find out that Ordinal Scale isn’t all fun and games…

Face off: Sword Art Online vs Log Horizon

I do like trying new things here, in fact we all do. It’s why I try writing new types of articles and why you might, after watching Sword Art Online, decide to watch Log Horizon. In this new article format I’m going to be picking two shows that are similar or are often compared. And yep, you guessed it, for my first comparison I’ve chosen one of the biggest clashes in the recent anime world: MMO vs MMO – Sword Art Online vs Log Horizon.

Kirito and Asuna get on really well… eventually.

At a very basic level, the link between the two shows is their grounding in an immersive RPG world that they players cannot escape from. In SAO, we have the world of Alfheim, where ten thousand players have been trapped by evil mastermind and game creator Akihiko Kayaba and if they die in the game, they will also die in real life. In comparison, in Log Horizon we have Elder Tale a desktop MMO that after an update became the reality for all of the players around the world who were logged in.