I liked the concept of LH more than SAO.

SAO really bored me, to be honest. It was extremely straight-forward with hardly any development. It didn't confront the obvious issue of video game addiction/compulsion that is strongly associated with MMOs, it just immediately set them on their path to trying to get out. Then, after the first few episodes, they might as well have thrown out the entire plot and setting and just been a slash-and-hack fighting anime with some weird romance. It didn't feel like they were actually in a game anymore. The main character proceeded to BREAK THE GAME in a dues ex machina to "win". It was way overhyped in my opinion.

Log Horizon focuses more on the addiction aspect, where they don't really consider trying to get out, since they are extremely happy they are now INSIDE their favorite game. They try to learn about the world they are in. And it maintains the feeling that it is actually in a video game, and not just a fantasy fighting anime.

Also, when I saw this:
EmpirezTeam wrote:

"when you die, you're gone forever"

I immediately thought of this:


Made it even better when Zagros mentioned Fate Stay/Night.

Ganite wrote:

somanysaohaters

Funny thing is that there aren't even all that many. They're just really *really* dedicated and vocal about it.

http://myanimelist.net/anime/11757/Sword_Art_Online/stats
http://www.crunchyroll.com/sword-art-online/reviews
http://www.anime-planet.com/anime/sword-art-online

Rundel and Isuzu > Kirito and Asuna

"The Royal Guard is not coming" Oh man! Judging by Soujiro's face in the next episode preview, as well as the fact that her body has not dispersed and returned to the cathedral, sh*t may have just gotten real!

I cried while watching SAO.
.hack couldn't do that. :(

lets all stand around a fire and talk for 30 minutes, call it a great anime

Fugsnarf wrote:

"Log Horizon" sounds like a BYOND Naruto game.

Oh my god so true I could see that.

.hack is so bad its not funny though...sure .hack was the first to implement the whole trapped in a game premise but cmon...the plot is heavily lacking for alot of the series' the characters are NOT interesting alot of them even lack any sort of a personality...the dialogue is also really monotoned in .hack. There isn't really any kind of "pull" to the series.

In SAO right off the bat this big ass cloaked guy lookin like maplestorys black mage telling people their trapped and can die. Gives the plot a directive from the get go. Furthermore they give some kind of explanation as to wtf is going on...

In Log Horizon were given this potential of a planet sized adventure scaled to half the size of earth(which is rather huge) as well as the unknown premise of whether death is possible and the immediate directive of having to save someones life from some generic grunt types.

In .Hack(im using .hacksign as its the first animated) you get no explanation on anything...you aren't even sure if it is a game world(at the start) and suddenly a Gooey blob grants the protagonist the ability to accidentally kill people in real life without even knowing they have. No directive to the story and a group (crimson knights) who really have no motive for their actions...

The main reason Log Horizon is such a good anime is because you can watch Akatsuki chew on things.



There's nothing in this world I find more enjoyable than watching Akatsuki chew on things.

It was the .Hack Roots/G.U. series I enjoyed the most, but Sign defiantly wasn't bad. Unless you just catch bits of it. .Hack's story trails from manga to anime to games to movies. It's brilliant when you recognize it all put together. I enjoyed the fact that you are unaware that they were in a game originally. I only succeeded in completely following the story of the G.U. trilogy, but only because I missed some episodes of the anime and couldn't get into the original quartet(am I using this right?) of the games to beat them. Never read the manga though, no store I was aware of near me sold any.