SWORD ART ONLINE: FATAL BULLET

We are seeing a sudden blitz of bad reviews for this game. Nearly all of them can be safely ignored, they are due to the newest SAO game Fractured Daydreams drop in review score so they are bombing this one. This is safely the best SAO game ever made, but more importantly it's a competently made game, you don't need to be an SAO fan to enjoy. It won't blow your socks off, but it's a solid experience as long as you don't expect an engrossing story. Played this game for countless hours on PS4 and it's one of only 2 game I've re-bought for Nintendo Switch and Steam (other being NFS Hot Pursuit remake). If you have to choose between the two, pick this one over the newest SAO game, that one will surely drop in price soon with it's trajectory.

This is like the only SAO game I feel that isn't an awful cash grab. They genuinely cooked with this one and I wish other games were like this. End game does get extremely grindy and I tend to not like that sort of repetitive mind-numbing gameplay but it was always fun in Fatal Bullet. Online is basically dead, it was hard enough to find people to play against like 5 years ago nevermind now but speedrunning the leaderboards and despite the AI being quite easily to manipulate the game is really fun. Would love for a higher budget game to be made just like this one. Never watched any SAO although I know vague bits of it and this was my first piece of media relating to it and it was easily the best

I have played more than 200 hours on PS4. This game is absolutely fantastic as a just generic shooter.

DO Buy this game if you're looking for something that you'd see in the background of a movie to show you that a character plays video games, and if you want a subpar story with poorly written characters, that treats you like you're the noobie, while also giving you gear that ONLY YOU have access to. Like I said, poor writing. BUT despite that all. This game is genuinely fun. You don't need expansive skill trees, and tons of features, it's just here's a gun, here are missions, go shoot things, and farm bosses and materials. AND here's a ton of different outfits to boot. And the character creation is EXACTLY what you want out of an anime character workshop. I also recommend modding the game turn of gender lock restrictions on clothing, because the clothing is equally cool for men and women, so you may wanna mix that up a bit, I don't judge, you wanna put a boy in a bikini? May as well allow yourself the freedom. You wanna put a girl in a coat that DOESN'T show all the skin? Offer yourself that freedom.

DO NOT buy this game if you: do not like Kirito(optional), do not like Asuna(optional), do not like Sinon(optional), do not like grinding, do not like farming, do not like complex loot systems that make very little sense, do not like when games have very few QoL features, and do not like generic gameplay that somehow NEVER gets old.

I rate Fatal Bullet a solid 8/10, it's ONLY that way because some features are locked behind difficulty walls, beating the game, certain game modes you unlock by beating the game, you cannot import your character when going into NG+, so have fun remembering all of your settings if you want the same character. BUT I rate it so high because the gameplay loop is more fun than you're gonna find in a lot of games.

I stand by my words when I say Bandai Namco makes good concept games, but subpar experiences. This game feels like a beta for something to come, and it's a GREAT beta at that.

Actually really fun ONCE you get past the crazy amount of cutscenes/dialogue that seem to drag on forever at the beginning. The gameplay loop is solid and addicting but the story is whatever and really forced. 6/10
Not bad considering I got this for ~$4 on CDKeys.

I wish this was the direction they went for with the other SAO games! It is seriously interesting getting a new story to make our OWN as the player, rather than reliving the anime to a T. The character customization is extremely satisfactory as there's various options for your base look along with costumes and gear to look like existing characters of the franchise! Also, you get to give your robot companion a unique look as well!! I personally enjoy the look of the UI and world design, but the character CG's are the real masterpiece and imitate the SAO style perfectly while offering new content! The only downside I have is that the online/multiplayer portion of the game is almost completely dead, BUT this game is 6 years old and not meant for longevity. ╮(￣▽￣"")╭

Honestly an okay looter shooter. Can't talk for the story as I skipped most of it (80%, most of the time they're just talking so meh) but for the lootin' n shootin' it's a good game for just turning off your brain and going ratatatataatat a lot.

Please keep in mind if you are playing this in PC; the AI mobs will kill you as if you owe them money. Most enemies would literally become Deadshot and dodging their attacks becomes nigh impossible, especially if you're playing in Extreme Mode, which I did because why the hell not.
That said, it really is fun to play this game, there's a lot of options for how you want to optimize you characters skill sets, so be creative and wild out there. And it was quite nice to see the game implement the whole MMORPG elements with guns, as I don't think I've read that in the light novel or seen that in the anime.
In short, I love everything about this game except for Facsimiles. Because Facsimiles are the spawn of Satan. Also, the BoB tournament was pretty rough, both Death Gun and Kirito one shotted me like an NPC.