Review of Sword Art Online Alternative: Gun Gale Online

This is such a baffling franchise. Not even a month ago, I was an outsider, I followed the common toxic hive mind of the weeb culture, if it's SAO, you must hate it. Turned out, all washed up words for the sake of hate, I enjoyed the first season, and found the second decent as well, but then, I stumbled across this one, the alternative story that the fans praise to death, “This is better than the real thing” they always say, guess what; Not 👏 Even 👏 Close 👏. - Story (6/10): With SAO II, we got to explore the game GGO, as we've been fed, it's adusty wasteland, filled with dark plot points, but with this side story, we get to see the actual fun part of the game, the competitive side that does not give in to the cliché SAO trope, a literal game of death where the stakes are high until it was not.

Karen, a 20 years old introvert with a giant complex, having been always the tallest among her peers, she sought an escape from VR games, she would try several of them until she played GGO because of how tiny and cure her avatar looked. Simple and straight forward to kick in a plot so far.

Most of the fun comes from the fact of how competitive GGO under the hood really is, watching it feels like diving into an intense Battle Royal stream by professional, but I have to say, it felt so forced to have the players stress out over a certain somebody's death it had me mumble “Oh yeah, this is SAO, it's been SAO and it's going to remain as SAO as SAO was itself”. Running after this fake goal of mind ruined a big portion of entertainment, having me literally say “It's just a game bro”. The story was very brief that seeing the first 5 episode was enough to get the complete experience, I had already seen all that GGO could offer, and I would argue that it was the better half too.

People would make a big deal on how plot-armor reliant SAO was while on the same breath praise the living hell out of how this one was superior in every way. This show literally has a talking, conscious plot armor shoved in on your face more than one occasion. People always miss the hit on the protagonist, and what's the universal excuse? “Ah, she's so tiny”, ok, I'll buy that, not a problem, but for the 100th time in a row? And then they call it luck. And it does not stop there, I guess, missing from less than 10 meters would be a stupid logic, so what do we do in that case? Ah, let's have the P-50 talk and invoke its own will to alter the outcome of the battle.
I'm so done.

- Art (7/10):
It's very weird with this show, I guess I'll have to blame that on the setting. It's very weird to see the character in real life act all moe and stuff while looking moe as hell, only or a few moments later, they are battlefield gorillas covered in dust and scary expressions all over their faces, it was not coherent at all.
The huge absence of close combat action (except for like 2 times) took a huge burden on the animators it seems, the scene is moved more by dialog and tactic monologues than it does by sheer movement and motion. Everyone lines up shoot several rounds of fire and then takes cover, all while looking fabulous.

- Sound (7/10):
Definitely, the weakest in the franchise when it comes to the vocals. None of the voice actors struck me surprised or anything, Pito's laugh was annoying and unbearable to listen too, a bit unnecessarily over the top. And everybody else was just average.
The opening and ending theme songs were alright, nothing that keeps you going back, but they were just kind of there.

- Character (7/10):
Surprisingly enough, a doll plot is driven by some interesting people.
Karen was a good lead for this story, Fuka was a great support character and M was just the best, this dude even gives the cast from the main plot a run for their money, that dude should make more cameos in the parent show.
Pito, however, was just off-putting. Annoying laugh, no so good voice acting, and contradicting personality, I think that they were trying to push her as a quirky sadist, they managed to promote the sadistic part, but fail everything else. I wouldn't say she's a villain per se, I mean, =It's just a game bruh, but man, she does not get that line.

- Enjoyment (7/10):
This would have been a notch higher if it stopped at episode 5, by then, I had already seen what the show can offer, but it kept on repeating the same thing over and over again.
I gotta give it to the show though, the fact that the stakes weren't as high really made me root for everyone, not just the protagonist, I would be cheering some random background filler squad all the time.

- Overall(6.8/10):
One thing keeping this show ahead of the original is the fact that it's a standalone show that one can enjoy without having seen the parent shows, it shares the same world, following the events of the Phantom Bullet arc from SAO II but man, everything else it does itself. It's always nice to see references from the parent show but not noticing them cuts nothing from the overall experience. Although referencing the dullest nitpick is more satisfying than anything about the show. Watch with caution.