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EP. REVIEW: Sword Art Online Alternative: Gun Gale Online II


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benzone



Joined: 16 Sep 2024
Posts: 35
PostPosted: Mon Oct 14, 2024 12:23 pm Reply with quote
Quote:
My other hope for the season is the furthering of Karen and Elsa's relationship outside of the game. I'd like to see them team up to deal with real-life and in-game challenges.


So you WANT a college student with lifetime self-esteem and socialization issues - Karen - to become closer to Elsa, a professional singer involved in a dom/sub relationship with her manager, who wants to include Karen in said relationship (though not as an equal but as a subordinate to her and possibly even to Goshi) and who mere weeks ago (story wise) was just barely cajoled into differentiating between the online game and reality and oh yeah from murdering her boyfriend and then killing herself over the results of said online game? What "real life challenges" would such a person be able to help Karen with, even if Karen didn't have issues of her own to deal with?
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MFrontier



Joined: 13 Apr 2014
Posts: 13750
PostPosted: Mon Oct 14, 2024 7:48 pm Reply with quote
It's nice to have the show back and doing what it does best by having a fun cast headlined by Lucky Girl LLENN getting into firefights and trying to kill each other and enjoying every minute of it (well, LLENN needs proper motivation to enjoy it).

Also I never knew I needed the sass duo of Pito and Fuka until we finally had them on the same team together.
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Hiroki not Takuya



Joined: 17 Apr 2012
Posts: 2663
PostPosted: Sat Oct 19, 2024 12:02 am Reply with quote
Ep1 it seemed to me that the character personalities had shifted from S1 and Ep3 here it is more evident and I begin to wonder if Mr.Sigsawa really was the writer for this episode. The most glaring reason is Clarence and Shirley's (stupid) running fire-fight.

At the distance shown, a pistol wouldn't have been accurate at all, Clarence had been attacking individuals at close range and had known Shirley was a sniper so she should have immediately ducked for cover when she saw Shirley rather than running out in the open. And Shirley being a sniper attacks from long range under cover so she would have ducked for cover when she saw Clarence with a rifle.

And beyond that, when Shirley's rifle seems damaged and Clarence's pistol is temporarily "out", Shirley opts to charge with a knife (!) making getting hit easier with each step. A "gun nerd" would have considered these behaviors unrealistic and we saw nothing like it except in the GGO arc of SAO (not written by Mr. Sigsawa).
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Andrew Cunningham



Joined: 01 Feb 2006
Posts: 521
Location: Seattle
PostPosted: Mon Oct 21, 2024 2:36 pm Reply with quote
Clarence vs Shirley is one of my favorite fights in the series, and so brutal I was worried the anime version would wind up feeling toothless, but they really nailed it. Early contender for best episode this season.
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Riku157



Joined: 27 Jun 2022
Posts: 11
PostPosted: Mon Oct 21, 2024 3:12 pm Reply with quote
Clarence stepped up again, and that's all that matters.
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MFrontier



Joined: 13 Apr 2014
Posts: 13750
PostPosted: Mon Oct 21, 2024 4:25 pm Reply with quote
This was peak GGO. Two intense and fierce women trying to kill each other and getting up close and personal (with slight yuri undertones).
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Hiroki not Takuya



Joined: 17 Apr 2012
Posts: 2663
PostPosted: Sun Oct 27, 2024 4:09 pm Reply with quote
S2 Ep4-Doesn't look like I can blame A1 Pictures for the story shift as I checked the light novels and Mr. Sigsawa seems to have written it this way. Still, disappointing change away from the character-focus of S1...
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Emerje



Joined: 10 Aug 2002
Posts: 7406
Location: Maine
PostPosted: Mon Oct 28, 2024 10:46 am Reply with quote
Seriously though, what would have happened if one of the remaining teams was just one person? And who wants to win a tournament with a bunch of strangers instead of their tried and true team? Such a strange new rule to throw into a major tournament, just imagine a team winning that didn't even exist at the start. How do you reconcile being the lone winner among your friends in a tournament you entered together? And what if one of those new team members just decides to off his teammates and themself to improve the chances for their original team, then what's this rule accomplished?

Emerje
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Thesarum
Subscriber



Joined: 25 Mar 2022
Posts: 516
PostPosted: Mon Oct 28, 2024 4:08 pm Reply with quote
Emerje wrote:
Seriously though, what would have happened if one of the remaining teams was just one person? And who wants to win a tournament with a bunch of strangers instead of their tried and true team? Such a strange new rule to throw into a major tournament, just imagine a team winning that didn't even exist at the start. How do you reconcile being the lone winner among your friends in a tournament you entered together? And what if one of those new team members just decides to off his teammates and themself to improve the chances for their original team, then what's this rule accomplished?

Emerje


I guess this is what happens when a game becomes a sport, and worse than that, a spectacle. This "twist" is all about the spectators back in the bar, and presumably the things they spend their in game currency on (which has an exchange rate with real world cash iirc?). It's very much not about the experience of the teams fighting in the competition.

I agree with you and Richard that I'm not a fan of this development, unless it intends to dig in to the idea of becoming so focused on the business of putting on a show you lose sight of what it was everyone turned up to watch in the first place.

Quote:
• My favorite part of the opening song is the visual of Elsa and Karen both head to foot in the fetal position. They form a yen-yang symbol representing that they are opposites yet part of the same whole.

I'm reasonably sure this is a reference to a very similar arrangement in the OP for Utena (which also features Anthy and Utena spinning in the fetal position individually much as this OP does).
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Takkun4343



Joined: 19 Jul 2007
Posts: 1574
Location: Englewood, Ohio
PostPosted: Mon Oct 28, 2024 4:52 pm Reply with quote
PROTIP: MMTM was the fourth team involved in the SJ2 endgame, not ZEMAL. That said, their "Hell yeah!" to the idea of using shopping carts as improvised weapons was the biggest laugh I've had so far this season, though their confused expressions seconds beforehand had a huge helping hand in that. Laughing

Richard Eisenbeis wrote:
Did we really need the flash forward of Karen watching the replay as a narrative device to see what the other teams have been up to? Her commentary was sparse and didn't really add anything.


Personally, I found it to be a slightly inspired way of framing the events that were happening concurrently to the previous episodes, making it feel a little more naturalistic than if the narrative itself took the reins and flashed back without context.
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Richard Eisenbeis
ANN Reviewer


Joined: 17 Dec 2018
Posts: 95
PostPosted: Mon Oct 28, 2024 5:17 pm Reply with quote
Takkun4343 wrote:
PROTIP: MMTM was the fourth team involved in the SJ2 endgame, not ZEMAL.


I wonder why I wrote ZEMAL when it was obviously MMTM? Anyway, the error has been fixed.
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MFrontier



Joined: 13 Apr 2014
Posts: 13750
PostPosted: Mon Oct 28, 2024 8:13 pm Reply with quote
It's funny how they tried pulling this allied team plan to take out the major contenders only for said major contenders to promptly kill them all and take advantage of their plan.

I'm going to laugh if T-S wins again because everybody else dies and their building hasn't been consumed by water. But it probably won't be that convenient.

I question the twist rule but I feel like LLENN being the "traitor" would have been more interesting than just making LLENN have to fight Pito again. Even though the idea of LLENN and Fuka fighting feels wrong. But having them all be on the same team was what was making SJ3 so fun. It feels like they're kind of repeating themselves.
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Florete



Joined: 21 Jan 2018
Posts: 382
PostPosted: Tue Oct 29, 2024 12:18 am Reply with quote
Yeah, I hated the twist of the episode. Seeing LLENN and Pito team up was the big thing I wanted out of this season, but right when we're supposed to really get it, it's ripped away. Pito being their team's traitor is also the most boring option possible.

Plus, there's just no way this rule change would ever happen in this kind of game, unless it was specified as a possibility before sign ups began. It would go over horribly with players and viewers alike.
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Emerje



Joined: 10 Aug 2002
Posts: 7406
Location: Maine
PostPosted: Sun Nov 03, 2024 10:16 am Reply with quote
I have to laugh because each team seemed to embody every problem with this new rule.

If that cruise ship somehow is able to float when the water comes in I guarantee it's floating past that roof top.

Emerje
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Thesarum
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Joined: 25 Mar 2022
Posts: 516
PostPosted: Sun Nov 03, 2024 10:29 am Reply with quote
Emerje wrote:
I have to laugh because each team seemed to embody every problem with this new rule.

If that cruise ship somehow is able to float when the water comes in I guarantee it's floating past that roof top.

Emerje


I guess it's good that the writing recognises that this is a terrible rule, and the players (other than the insane drama junkie Pito) would hate it? Still feels like a contrived twist though.

Pito's plan using the lifeboats was good though! The rest of the teams being cagey because most had lost one of their best players/leaders, and Pito taking full advantage felt smart and believable.
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