WARNING : Play SAO Hollow Fragment and Lost Song before playing this game...

[SotiCoto]

Just in case anyone is contemplating getting + playing this game... the SAO games follow their own continuity and while this game is apparently non-canon, it branches off from the game-canon continuity.
Several of the characters in this game are from those earlier games and NOT from the anime or whatever. And Lost Song pretty much forms the basis for this game... so... yeah.

These are things I would have liked to have known before playing and wasn't aware... so I'm posting it clearly here for anyone else to see.

[DEAD S.n.A.k.e.]

You forgot about AW part - it is not enough to watch anime, because more than a half of characters/events mentioned/etc. is right from ranobe and you won't be able to understand who is it on the screen or why the hell he/she did what he/she did without reading it.
And, btw, you could just ask before buying the game. People in other SAO games discussions often ask about stuff like that ("Is this game first in the series? Should I play previous games?").
And btw x2 in couple of weeks your post will be buried under others, so either bump it sometimes or... Do nothing, I suppose?
Anyway, hope you will like this game, it's definitely deserves more love, imo.

[SotiCoto]

I didn't "forget" about it. I mentioned it in my review. This topic is just pertaining to game order. The Accel World content isn't covered in games to the best of my knowledge, or at least not on Steam.
I've watched the anime adaptation of Accel World (and SAO, obviously), and even read the manga adaptation... but the original source material isn't my thing. At least over half the AW characters were covered in the anime, though I'd never seen Sky Raker out of a wheelchair... so... yeah. I don't suppose they still intended to adapt more of AW to the anime, did they? The manga is even further behind.

Originally posted by DEAD S.n.A.k.e.:

And btw x2 in couple of weeks your post will be buried under others, so either bump it sometimes or... Do nothing, I suppose?

Is this game even that popular? It seems like one of the less active communities to me. The guides here are completely useless.

I guess everyone already knows of BK Brent's page... can't really top that, and from what I gathered he doesn't like anyone copying his stuff... so.. yeah.

[♡Pure♡]

Originally posted by SotiCoto:

Just in case anyone is contemplating getting + playing this game... the SAO games follow their own continuity and while this game is apparently non-canon, it branches off from the game-canon continuity.
Several of the characters in this game are from those earlier games and NOT from the anime or whatever. And Lost Song pretty much forms the basis for this game... so... yeah.

These are things I would have liked to have known before playing and wasn't aware... so I'm posting it clearly here for anyone else to see.

i beat this game. most characters are from the anime season 1 and from accel world anime. i never played the games u mentioned and had no problem understanding whos who.

the reason the community is low is because its an old game now and multiplayer was kinda pointless except for end game levels dungeon.

i beat the endless dungeon solo.

even the free dlc are characters from the season 1 anime.

its weird u seem to have a sao bias but then dont know who any of the characters are in this game.

[SotiCoto]

Originally posted by Puré:

its weird u seem to have a sao bias but then dont know who any of the characters are in this game.

-_-
I know the anime characters, fool. I'm guessing you just failed to unlock most of the other characters somehow.

Philia and Strea are from the first SAO game and its remake Hollow Fragment. I believe Rain is from Lost Song, though I've not played that one yet. The two "idol" characters, Yuna and Seven, and that bodyguard lolicon Sumeragi around I believe to be game-series-exclusive characters. Lux as well is a game-series character. That is at least seven characters so far that those who never played the games wouldn't recognise.
PLUS there are references in the game to Leafa and Sinon having played SAO, which wasn't true in the anime canon, but is a dead giveaway of game canon because they WERE in SAO in Hollow Fragment.
But the BIGGEST issue is that almost the entire gameworld in AWvsSAO is introduced in Lost Song and doesn't exist in the anime canon at all.

So if you don't play Hollow Fragment and Lost Song first... you're missing out on a LOT.

(p.s. Only 8 of the characters are from SAO Season 1, and two of those are supposed to be dead, and were effectively just DLC add-ons. Another 7 are from Season 2, and I haven't seen a season 3 yet, but I'd bet those last two from the Alicisation Arc would be in it.)

[DEAD S.n.A.k.e.]

Originally posted by SotiCoto:

The two "idol" characters, Yuna and Seven, and that bodyguard lolicon Sumeragi around I believe to be game-series-exclusive characters.

No, she isn't. Yuna is from Ordinal Scale, SAO full-length movie. But yes, Seven and Sumeragi are from Lost Song.

Originally posted by SotiCoto:

Lux as well is a game-series character.

And again - no, she is not game-series exclusive character. She is from canonical manga Girls Ops from another author about Silica's, Leafa's and Lisbeth's adventures with this new character Lux.

[SotiCoto]

Okay fine. You got me there. I didn't know either of those things even existed. I thought that Ordinal Scale stuff was probably game content too.
I'm only partway through Hollow Fragment at present.

[Wicca-san]

So I've played HF and LS, haven't watched Ordinal Scale yet (just got it lol). Should I watch that before this? And would this come before or after Hollow Realization?

[SotiCoto]

This is before Hollow Realization... I think.
And is Ordinal Scale content covered in the first two games or not? I didn't see any references besides that apparent one character and the outfits in this game...

[Wicca-san]

OS isn't covered in ANY of the others that I was aware of. They all came out before it, apart from Fatal Bullet and the latest one.

[SotiCoto]

Hmmm... The original reason I foolishly played AWvsSAO first was because the Steam release date was earlier than any of the others... and didn't account for the fact that they were ports + remakes of games released in a different order.
Anyway... given there are Ordinal Scale references in AWvsSAO, does that mean the game was released after said content, or that it was simply patched in later on the original format?

Honestly I only gave it a cursory glance. Seems most characters get an "Ordinal Scale" coat... but I took a glance at a few of them, thought "This looks crap" and never gave it a further thought.

[Wicca-san]

Apart from the extra character who as yet has no meaningful interaction with anyone (apart from the standard SAO "getting to know you" side quests, I'm sure) and the outfits, I don't think there's any other connection. Those could easily have been added in later. Like I believe the God Eater crossover bits were in a couple of them.

[DEAD S.n.A.k.e.]

I won't quote anyone and just explain.
As you possibly know, the games were released in that order:
Infinity Moment (Re:Hollow Fragment)>Lost Song>Hollow Realization>Accel World vs Sword Art Online>Fatal Bullet>Alicization Lycoris.
HR and AWvsSAO were released near 2017 (on October 27 in 2016 and March 16 in 2017). Ordinal Scale was released on February 18 in 2017. So, just as I said earlier somewhere, all the mentions of OS in HR or AWvsSAO were made purely for promotional purposes. Moreover, in HR OS costumes were added with one of the DLCs and it wasn't there when the game released in 2016.
But! In the last Fatal Bullet's DLC Dissonance of the Nexus characters of the OS movie are playing a really big role in the this DLC's storyline. So if you are planning to play FB and all of its DLCs - and, of course, want to know what exactly is going on - you should watch Ordinal Scale.

[SotiCoto]

Originally posted by Wicca-san:

Like I believe the God Eater crossover bits were in a couple of them.

... Wait... what? What God Eater crossover bits?

Originally posted by DEAD S.n.A.k.e.:

Infinity Moment (Re:Hollow Fragment)>Lost Song>Hollow Realization>Accel World vs Sword Art Online>Fatal Bullet>Alicization Lycoris.

Hold on.... so Hollow Realization is before AWvsSAO? ... Hmmm.... okay. When I looked up the timeline the first time after my screw-up before, the source said it was after...
Now it feels like I screwed up even more... Damnit, series like this should be clearly numerically labelled in advance.
I bet I'm going to have a hell of a time when I start playing all the Atelier games.

Originally posted by DEAD S.n.A.k.e.:

So if you are planning to play FB and all of its DLCs - and, of course, want to know what exactly is going on - you should watch Ordinal Scale.

Yare yare... So this Ordinal Scale standalone film thingie... Is it part of the same canon as the anime series? And if so, where along the timeline would it fall? I'm kinda used to films either being remakes of series elements or non-canon, which is why I don't generally go looking for them.
Asking obviously because the Game Canon is a separate thing entirely. A branched timeline, so to speak.

[Wicca-san]

The GE stuff was just outfits and I think maybe a non-story character addition for one of em. And Ordinal Scale comes before Alicization.

[DEAD S.n.A.k.e.]

Originally posted by SotiCoto:

Yare yare... So this Ordinal Scale standalone film thingie... Is it part of the same canon as the anime series? And if so, where along the timeline would it fall? I'm kinda used to films either being remakes of series elements or non-canon, which is why I don't generally go looking for them.
Asking obviously because the Game Canon is a separate thing entirely. A branched timeline, so to speak.

Yes, film is canonical just like all other parts of anime adaptation - but it has no ranobe behind it, story was written by Kawahara especially for this movie.
Just like the previous person said, it is after Caliburn/Mothers Rosario arc and before Alicization arc.
Moreover, in Alicization anime adaptation they added some references to Ordinal Scale to show that what happend in film actually happend in SAO universe in general.