I was liking the first ep of Sword Art right up until the 'oh by the way you can't log out' gimmick.

 

I'm ok with the whole 'you can't log out' premise because I know stranger/more contrived things have happened in anime before and it honestly doesn't even bug me anymore.

I will say this about Sword Art Online: 1) the art is amazing, and 2) the protagonist is a boss. There's no super-wimp hero here. Shit goes down and his first thought isn't "Oh woe is me, what do I do? Someone tell me what to do!" No, it's "Grab mah buddy, cuz it's time to get the fuck out of Dodge. We got shit to do."

It's been a while since I've seen a fantasy anime with a truly determined protagonist. Even if other stuff starts sucking, I'd keep watching because of that first impression alone.

 

Agreed on all counts although I have to say that the gratuitous engrish was kind of terrible. When the blue-haired guy was directing everyone, I actually cringed when he kept saying "block" and "switch".

 

Watched the first two episodes and yeah, looks pretty cool. Concur with Sin Saiori, main char is rather likable. Love how he pretty much says "yeah, gotta grind like crazy" xD

 

This is the first time I've genuinely liked a protagonist in a long time; definitely going to be following Sword Art.

 

Like Minion said, Sankarea was the best show in the season. And SAO is going great! Also Campione! (by the same author as SAO and Accel World) is gradually coming into its own, after deviating from the books pretty sharply - a chief reason it got so much flak from me till now.

 

Not sure if it was recc'ed before but Sket Dance is a good lighthearted comedy. I've watched around 8 episodes yet but it's surprisingly fun to watch.

 

Watched a lot of Black Lagoon and have to say, it is quite the awesome anime, really love it, thanks for the tip. Although, the ending of the episode with the creepy twins was such a downer that it killed any enthusiasm to continue watching. Will finish the series this week.

Saw the first three episodes of Accel World and while I like it enough, the protag is a way too whiny and pathetic to be truly likable. But still, great visuals and the sci fi elements are nice, so, I'll stick to it.

Thanks for both the reccs, guys.

 

Lol, episode 4 of Sword Art Online was totally geared towards pedos and people with a little sister complex. Full off cutsy behavior, "kyaaaaaaaah's", panty shots, "did you see"'s, tentacles and finally finished with an oni-chan.

Class act, guys, class act. Really subtle.

 

Ah, Japanese culture.

 

Having read the light novels now, all I can say is that they're using the side stories as filler episodes. Well, that and to give the characters some more, er...character.

The onii-chan was about as shameless as it gets, but these kind of episodes exist for a reason.

That, and:

 

SAO is steadily murdering a really great premise. The whole players killing players for items plot line really brings the show down.

 

Make sure you watch the OVAs too. If you thought the anime was good, the OVAs are a whole level above. =]


As other people have mentioned, Sword Art Online is slowly starting to disappoint me. It's not that last episode was terrible so much as it's leaving me wondering if this anime is just going to be made up of single episode short stories of the main character helping random chicks within the game.

I also though that the previous episode would have led to a fairly big turning point in terms of character development - what, with seeing his entire guild killed and all. And yet, at the start of this episode we seem to be back to the status quo. I hope from here on the plot starts to develop more naturally.

Similarly, Accel World has gone from decent to utter shit. I think what made me lose interest was what they did to Taku. After Haru beat him, he could have been an interesting (albeit stereotypical) rival type character. Instead he becomes exactly like Haru - Kuroyuki's bitch. Then to make matters worse they destroyed her character too. She was interesting as the person who was pretty much just blatantly using Haru, but now apparently, she's head over heels in love with him. Retarded, and a struggle to watch.

I finished Zetman from last season. First episode was all over the place, but after that got mildly interesting. The pacing is retarded, which I assume is a result of it being crammed into 13 episodes (I assume the manga is a lot longer?). But it presented some very interesting characters, situations and a very dark feel - particularly where Kouga was concerned. I'd love to have seen it explored properly instead of rushed.

Another one from this season is Kokoro Connect. Reading the basic premise - body switching - made me think this was going to be a rather typical ero anime, but surprisingly it probably has the least amount of fan service out of any of the anime I'm currently watching. It seems to instead be an anime focusing on character exploration and interaction. So far it's kept me interested, though the latest episode felt a bit forced when it came to creating the characters' 'issues'.

Favorite anime at the moment is definitely Kuroko's Basket(ball), which is currently airing and started last season. I'm a real big fan of well executed sports anime and this is a particularly good one - probably the best since Giant Killing. Animation is top notch and looks really realistic. There's no crazy special attacks involving Tezuka killing the dinosaurs and it generally stays within the realms of what is physically possible (with the exception of the main character's 'lack of presence'). The other major issue would probably be the progression of skills themselves - with dunking being the standard way of shooting and only afterwards do people start shooting, or rejections being the standard defense until they learn to 'box out' later on. But it's a shounen anime - it's to be expected. And the games seem more and more natural as it progresses.

If you like sports anime, I highly recommend it.

Tried first 3 eps of Campione and was very much unimpressed. Seemed like utter rubbish. Most overrated thing since Shakugan no Shana.

Also watched a few episodes of Hagure Yuusha no Estetica. It's a straight up ecchi. The only thing which keeps it mildly interesting is watching the main character troll everyone in as many erotic ways as he can.

If anyone has tried Kingdom, let me know how it goes. I've heard the story is fairly good, but I just could not get past the fact the animation looks like an amateur attempt at 3D cel-shading. It's horrible.

 

Sword Art Online has apparently been slated for a 25 episode season.

Here's some general info on how the light novel volumes break down. I'll keep it general, but spoilers just to be safe.

Spoiler

Volume 1 follows Kirito as he plays the game SAO. It begins at the moment he starts playing the full release and ends at the moment he wakes up back in the real world. Volume 1 also didn't include any filler content at all. None. It was pure plot from start to finish. But it also skipped a whole 2 years of the story and went straight to the climax and conclusion of the SAO saga.

Volume 2, conversely, is a collection of four short stories that essentially retell parts SAO from the perspectives of people Kirito has helped or met.

I'm still conflicted about this volume.

For the most part, it comes off as poorly disguised wish fulfillment, supplying characters like Silica to make Kirito the protagonist in a harem anime.

On the other hand, it does do its job of fleshing out some of the characters some more.

Then Volume 3 follows Kirito and what happens directly after the end of Volume 1, and begins the story of SAO's successor, ALO. I honestly don't think the anime (at least, this season) is even going to get this far.

As it stands right now, there are 10 released volumes, each one following Kirito in whatever adventure he's found himself on now.

The anime, however, is so far a mix of Volumes 1 & 2, jumping ahead in month-ish intervals and going from plot to side story and back again. At this point, I don't know if they're gonna reach the end of Volume 1 and continue into Volume 3 in the same season, or if they're even gonna finish Volume 1 by the time the 25 episodes are over.

 

If it's 25 episodes then I think they could manage the first three volumes.

 

Wait, he finds himself trapped in another game? Isn't that sort off lame?

 

Spoiler

Not trapped. He enters a different game voluntarily in search of someone and can leave whenever he wants.

 

Watched the first few episodes of Rideback and I am enjoying it immensely, definitely going to stick with it.

Concur with Jarik on Accel World, the main character is rather unlikable and while I liked the fact that he became subservant to Kuroyuki, she is by far the best character of the series, I too find the sudden "love" angle to be shit. This "falling in love after two conversations" is just garbage. Coupled with the fact that the fights weren't really all that good, that the majority of the characters were uninteresting and yeah, Accel World is nothing special. The only good things about the show was its animation, which looked great, especially the interfaces of the fights, and the character of Kuroyuki which went downhill.

About SAO, yeah, the last chapter was a bit...worrying but it's not really bad, so far. Am still going to stick with it, if only because the main character is so refreshing in his badassness.

@ Jarik: watched the OVA's as well but have to say, my favorite character by far is Revy and she kind of took the back seat on that one, so, I enjoyed the series more. Not that the OVA were bad, I liked them, very much even, but, I just didn't enjoy it as much as I did the series.

Am really hoping for a continuation, the manga has been on hiatus for a few years now, right?

 

Episode 5 of SAO: Didn't really like this one. The protag is regressing into a pussy/pushover/doormat and the story seems like filler. Don't really care about this guild that lost/backstabbed their captain for a ring of +20 agility (not that interesting of an item, by the way). I want to see the frontlines and the main character being a boss. His manga self seems much more badass. (although, the female in the anime is more badass than her manga self).

Last episode, at least, was kind of entertaining with its shameless loli catering, this one just seemed boring and uninteresting. It seems to be a two parter too. Just hope this gets resolved next week and we get back to the better stuff.

 

It more or less is filler. The plot won't be kicking in until after the next two episodes, the next one wrapping up this story and then a stand-alone before we're back into the contents of Volume 1.

Or at least it should be.