SWORD ART ONLINE Alicization Lycoris

As someone who's kept up with the anime and is a big fan of the series, I adore and love this game. It does have it's downsides, but am hoping on updates and patches to address the issues i'll bring up.
The Bad & Nitpicky:
- Framerate & Optimization (Work in progress)
You can have a decent/mid range PC to run this at 60fps such as myself, however... It's never stable. If it rains, or you are in a place with a lot of enemies, cities etc... You will 100% lag, from what i've seen even with higher end/better builds. It seems that you can't avoid the frame drops.
(UPDATE) As of 9/15/2020 - Framerate has become a lot more stable, with updates the problem has been worked on and seems to only get better!
- 8 Hour's AND THEN you can customize your character but...
Okay, I love playing as Kirito, but man. what da heck. You need to play through all of the 1st chapter to customize your character. Which I suppose is understandable but the thing that drives me nuts, in cutscenes... You'll magically transform back to Kirito. A heads up to those who are hopeful that your waifu or ya boi Eugeo will call you by name, yeah... No. You'll be called Kirito throughout the game no matter what.
(UPDATE) As of 9/18/2020 - Implimentation of Lightmode and Semi-Auto mode, those who want to focus on the story (More anime/manga based) you can unlock lightmode at the beginning of chapter 2! While Semi Auto is simplified combat and focuses on the main story.
- Camera
The biggest issue i've personally had with this game is the camera, it's really difficult sometimes with how the camera will swing and do silly things such as going into enemies... It's a big peeve that I have with the game, i'm hoping will get fixed.
(UPDATE) As of 9/18/2020 - The camera has been tweaked!
- Customization limited
Compared to a game like Fatal bullet in the series, I feel that it had a lot more hairstyles but eh.
The good
Combat:
The combat in this game feels flashy and immersive and reminds me of a final fantasy 7 remake kinda feel. Everybody fulfills a sort of role and you can really make the characters powerful with others. On top of flashy combat, you have a pretty nice skill tree to work on. You can level certain weapon skills and can really tell the difference in power and damage. Out of the SAO games i've played, the combat in Alicization Lycoris is satisfying!
Affinity:
Wanna romance ur waifu/s or the best boy Eugeo??? Cool, cause I romanced Alice huhuhu. You unlock prize outfits as well as traits that help in battle.
Content:
I can't help but feel that although people complain about this, you definitely can make it worth while. There's a lot of fun quests and places to explore while leveling up your characters. I obviously need to play more than I have but it's been fun so far. This game has made me stay up pretty late the last few nights.
Balanced:
When I play the game, I don't ever think it's ever too easy or too hard, of course if you stack your party with crazy abilities and fight with a full 4 squad then absolutely, the game becomes a walk in the park. However, you may find some satisfaction or more challenging gameplay turning the difficulty up in Kirito's tent.
Fan Pleasing:
Again, someone following this anime almost religiously, this is such a pleasing game to play.
Suggestions
CONTINUE TO ADD CONTENT!
I believe that if this game continues to add content, the game has incredible potential to be amazing and one of the best games in the SAO series... If you leave the game how it is, it has also a great potential to be put down after a full playthrough.
More costumes, hairstyles, faces etc
This would make me damn happy. lol, I spend a lot of time making characters and would love to make characters that don't look like others. It would be really awesome to make a character completely unique
Be able to use different 'Enhanced Armament' or 'Release Recollection'
I personally love Alice's and Eugeo's E.A, it would be really awesome to be able to use the Blue Rose sword or the Osmanthus sword to achieve this!
More affinity interactions
I love the affinity system, cause i get to romance my ultimate waifu Alice. Would be cool to have more things to do, such as dates or even kissing. I swear to god im not crazy :(
More weapons
The weapons in the game are great, but new sword arts would be cool beans yenno?

(I will continue to add to my review as I progress through the game and spend more time in it!)
This game is by no means perfect but I can see the potential it has, loved the anime and love the game.
What I would recommend to people who are skeptical of the game, wait for a sale.

I recommend everyone to turn off their v-sync, once you do the game run smoothly with little load time. I can play on max setting easily even when my spec does not reach the recommend requirement.

While i only 6 hours so far in the game since release, i feel its getting bashed for things people might have "over hyped" or what not, and yes while there is some if an and's, What game doesn't, some more then most, however i am enjoying the game for what it offers, the combat is really nice ONCE you get you're grasp on things and find the weapon type you like. Honestly, the only gripes i have about the game is, The camera is a bit bleh in terms of control and it has a sort of transition when you swap characters and While i dont have the technical problems other people seem to be having i will say like every other review as a reminder, Turn off the V Sync once you can cause that might solve most the problems people are having. All in all i think it is a good game for sao fans, but im also one who of all the current games, there isnt one i like over the other so take my text with a grain of salt if you like.
Edit: I feel the need to make an update into the post, now having a bit more time put into the game now getting into the chapter two content, its safe to say thats when the game picks up, granted the ending of chapter one is pain staking...(I almost feel asleep during the last lengthy cut scene.) Im enjoying the game even more now that i have access to more things in terms of weapons, zone exploration, one thing i will point out is the game has a way of making you look forward to more high level content with the sort of hunts the put in. (Granted most are just over sized normal mobs but does make sense given the current state of everything at this point.) For the most part they just taunt you and force you to go around as they will be greatly over leveled to what you might be at the time. Still, im finding little to truly talk bad about the game, or at least dissuade you from getting the game yourself. And even now i still enjoy the combat, with my current grasp of the system it is very rewarding when chaining together skill combo's of the party for that massive chained burst. All in all, no gripes other then what i mentioned the first time around. 7.5/10

Every player has their own opinion and I think this game is really great. It's a game for true anime fans. SAO: AL marks a new era of SAO games, both graphically and descriptively.
It is an RPG that retells the story of the first of the Alicization season and then progresses to tell it's own original story, introducing new characters along the way and providing you with an RPG experience, that will certainly please the fans of Hollow Realization. If you're coming from Sword Art Online: Fatal Bullet, know that this one is very different.
The full season is only the first chapter of this game, but it takes around 10-15 hours to complete. It does have a lot of cut scenes. So if you were to skip all of them to get to the good stuff, it will probably take you around 3-5 hours or so. Chapter one works a bit like a very long tutorial. I highly recommend to watch the first season of Alicization before playing this, because the game tells an abridged version of the story, but also introduces a few original story elements. It's more than Alicization which is really nice.
The voice acting is very impressive, but the cut scenes are not so great however. They are poorly paced with a lot of filler dialogues. You can spend ~ 10 minutes in a cut scene without any real story progress and a lot of them have "visual novels" style.
The first chapter will give you quite a few areas to explore. This is not a true open world, instead it has a lot of open areas with loading screens between them, pretty long loading screens I would say!! And within these areas you'll find side missions, boss encounters, chests that contain new weapons and the statues. At first the statues will be inactive, but as you progress they start talking to you and most of them just want you to kill X amount of monsters.. well it’s pretty boring stuff.
You finish the game at around level 40, the final boss fight is a level 50, but in the world you'll find level 80 bosses.
This is not a cheap game, and the good parts of this game are mostly it's RPG mechanics, which have nothing to do with the characters or the show. It's just a solid RPG with a lot of performance issues. The graphics are really good, plus the idea of the game is really unique and fun. I love it and it's definitely worth a bit of your time! 7/10

Now after playing some time and leveling up, i am gonna leave my mark here and say what i like and dislike about the Game
Let me say at the start, that i am a HUGE fan of SAO and all the Games that got released (including the later released lost song and the coop accel world one)
I had high expectations in this game and the new battle system including...prepare for it...MAGIC and sacred Arts!
One thing i always wished to see in SAO Games and in GOOD Quality, were sacred Arts and good working Magic that you can use in Fights, not only for utility
But that's just one point.
Now we come to the game itself and if i would recommend playing it:
First of all, if you are fan of the series/books/story of SAO, it's definitly worth a look, even if you give it back after 1-2 hours of playing.
The Battle System is pretty similiar to the one used in Realization, with chain tactics and mass attacks, a high leveled Skill tree and Weapon leveling, with which you are able to obtain even better Skills for the Fight.
The World we play in is the one from the Alicization Season, Underworld also called and works with the Incarnation System ( Further Explaining through the Anime and Manga )
The Cut Scenes and Conversations also remind me of the ones shown in Realization, while instead of Medina, we had Premiere on our side to work with, but that's just a short notice.
Story related events are a way to go and you get pretty fast used to it, that in Order to beat enemies, that you need to become stronger in a hard way.
Coming to the , in my opinion, good points:
- Battles are hardfought, even if you are on the same level as the Boss Characters or a level above.
You need to learn how to use your Spells and little breaks of the Enemies Defense in your favor in order to perform Damage and keep yourself from dieing over and over again.
Patterns and little Lights signal when an Enemy is about to attack and when it's better to grab your sword and Dodge/run away for a period of time.
It's less : "Farm up and oneshot the enemy before it can oneshot you" and more "Get your Ass up and work for the XP you want to earn"
-Second point: Various Numbers of Enemies and their own style/Fight Art/Chests
Every Area's got 2-3 Zones with Enemies above your level, that will kill you within flap of a Birds Wing, BUT the rewards which you can obtain through sneaking through the spawn Zone and grab the Chest gives you a good boost to handle smaller Enemies.
Every Enemy shown in the game has a different Pattern and different Animations which you need to learn in Order to defeat them, from the little Ant which bites you, to the Holy Spirit Beasts which will clap your butt if you don't act carefully enough.
But if you KNOW how to fight them, it's only a matter of time.
You can Dodge/Parry every single ability they use, with the right timing and use the window of actions to perform your own attack to hurt them.
The more you know, the less they hurt!
-The Third Point and i think the most important one
Even tho you are playing the Story of Kirito and Eugeo climbing their Way up to the Administrator to rescue Alice, the whole game offers itself for you to explore.
I've head from friends, that the multiplayer activates itself later in the game and the REAL open World only after the tough fight with Administrator, but after that, the whole Alicization world is open for you and ready to get explored once by your own to hands and eyes!
Enemies encountered in the Anime and the Manga, Armor and Weapons shown in the previous Seasons are injected in the Game and ready for you to use if you know how.
The Game offers you everything Sword Art Online built up until this point and only waits for you to climb up into the sky!
That were the good points i found for myself
Now i've sadly got some bad points aswell which robbed me some sanity
-Long Loading Screens
-Performance Issues (constantly dropping below the 60 FPS mark)
-Bugs where the characters stops moving/bugs itself into the wall/doesn't jump out of the water/isn't able to focus an Enemy and stops Chain attacks
-"Quality of Cutscenes"sometime drops and the image shown of character is a bit fuzzy
-And for the last and for me hardest one: Auto Saving takes way toooo long to react. Sometimes you are even forced to play for more than 10-20 minutes just to reach a new saving point and save from there, because Auto Saving takes way too long time to activate
But that are just some "little" points that i find annoying. The Devs are highly working on fixing them and from today (19.07.2020) there are already many many little hotfixes released to delete these negative points in order for us players to have fun and enjoy playing the Story of our Heroes Eugeo and Kirito.
Sit back and relax in the wide world that opens itself up for you!

1st i would like to say is make sure you meet the req spec for the game, at lest mid way.
this game has a lot of issues and since my CPU is Intel 7-4770k, i was Crashing a lot at 1st, thankfully there's work around's.
going to the forums and looking up with i can do to help make the game playable.
2nd the Story Imo is Great, but some of the Scenes are long.
takes 8~ish Hours to unlock Co op (yes thats Full Co op with Story, Not the Boss Raid from FB, Or Free Roam like HR) that's if you not Skipping Cut Scenes/Text.
After that
Questing, Leveling, Trying all the Weapons, and unlocking all the skills, I can go on from here, The main point is, you can do anything you want from here.
I spent most of my time boss hunting with groups of people, unlocking some skills and testing Weapons.
i will say that Co op can use some work. (I saw someone hitting a mob with a Sword like he was shooting a bow.. but they informed me that the mob was right next to him and it takes some time for the mob to sync if i'm not hitting it)
lastly I've played all the SAO Games, and by far i believe this is the Longest SAO game to date with most likely more to come.
Added note, they added Daily Quest that are easy to complete, and new 4 Player Raids.
with a group of friends you can take your time killing everything and having fun, or join random people.(note Random groups will Rush to the boss.)
would i recommend this to people..
If you like SAO games this is not one to miss,
if your new to SAO, watch some Game Play Vids and decide for you self,
If you cant stand bugs or long loads at times/Crashing on low spec pcs, Dont Bother, save your time and rage.
i hope this helps people when they think about buying the game

I want to bring some truth to these reviews. It is pretty to similar to Hollow Realization mechanic-wise. From what I can tell, it isn't well optimized for low-end pc's. I have a 1060, recommended settings and still get 40 fps in certain CUTSCENES. They aren't the best animations for them either. I will admit, I have seen better optimized games that can run fairly well compared to this. I am still kind of glad they went for 3d cutscenes rather the 2d dialogue from the other SAO games. As far as combat goes- I have nothing against it. People say it feels slow, but if anything with all of the combos and sword skills, it only feels just slightly slower than Hollow Realization. So far the gameplay itself is not bad- it is the story telling and the way it can jump from one thing to another. I will most likely update this review the more I play.
EDIT: I have to make a point that graphics aren't everything, they just enhance the gameplay, which is why I made a relatively big deal about it
EDIT AGAIN: Ive played through a little more, I haven't encountered any glitches yet- either I'm lucky or i have no clue. The frames have picked up a bit, I now get 60 fps most of the time- which I find decent considering that I have a GTX 1060. People are complaining about slow combat, but personally, considering how diverse it is compared to the attacks in Hollow Realization, I'd say the combat is a great fit. I want to make a point that if you were able to QUICKLY hack-and-slash, the visual effects and timings would serve no purpose. Considering that in the Alicization arc that Kirito found himself planning his attacks throughout the match- in the game, you can't just spam X, Square, or whatever- IT WOULD DEFEAT THE PURPOSE. People are criticizing the same things and are not looking at what is great about them. As for the controls, I'm using a controller, as the mouse and keyboard can be clunky- similar to Hollow Fragment and Realization.
Sure, this is just the first day, I have faith in the devs to release an optimization update offering better performance. As for loading times, I have it on a hard drive, a regular 1 TB Seagate hard drive, and my specs are GTX 1060, i7 8700, and 16 GB RAM, and the loading screens aren't that much of a big deal, most time I've seen was 30 seconds- idk if im just lucky. As for the dialogue- I can agree it can be lengthy and poorly scripted to an extent. For the most part, it follows the story line- only switching some parts for a video game perspective. As for time sake- YOU CAN SKIP IT, even if you want to see some of it, you can fast forward the dialogue and change the speed.
***This game is from a series. Personally- I am just glad they make these games in the first place as a spin-off to the original. I think this is nothing compared to the boring drag along like Tokyo Ghoul:re Call to Exist
I will wait for them to apply a few updates before my review is final. I do not want to leave with a false impression on this game, therefore, my thoughts are not completely final. I can only hope that they release a performance patch- as it seems to be the main issue for most people.
EDIT: as far as performance goes, I have the worst FPS (~29)in the first area in the south, and in the shopping area of the Central Cathedral. They are both caused by relatively poor rendering of the objects- If you are in an area, it pre-renders the objects, which causes noticeable frame drops. Less shrouded areas tend to have significantly better frame rates.