Story: 3/10
I don't really know how the creator of SAO handed his work to his editor. I figured he gave him a piece of paper with "CLICHE!" written on the middle, I might be wrong.
As gamers might be aware of, reaching the final boss of any MMO is a tough job, you need to train a lot, get the best equipment and skilled companions to aid you. Considering the fact that the very first boss of SAO (the weakest) was incredibly hard to handle, you could picture the amount of work our "heroes" will have to reach the end... pretty much none. Every episode occurs around 3 to 6 months after the previous one, in a desperate attempt to make the story move forward, I don't really see why, especially when the first episodes are nothing but useless fillers. I could write a novel with the flaws of this poorly made excuse for a story, but the other reviews do a good job on it.
Art: 7/10
Being of 2012, the animation is quite good, doing all those flashy sparkles and carefully designed background is not an easy task. But still, it's not really impressive, because most new animes have the same detail and definition, so it doesn't really stand out that much.
Sound: 6/10
Like the art, good. I can't really say much, because I rarely pay attention to background music, unless it is really amazing.
Character: 3/10
Kirito is a Mary Sue, that reason alone is more than enough to make me hate him. "This boss is way too strong to defeat alone!" Kirito does it. "We need to work together to survive!" Kirito survives alone. "You can only wield one sword!" Kirito gets two of them, and the list continues. Despite being a boring, anti-social, party-pooper son of a goat, he manages to make every single girl in the series to fall for him with no effort. The same goes for his experience and skill, you would expect the other characters to be also experienced, and they kinda are, but our "hero" is always stronger than everyone by 700 miles!
Now, the girl... Asuna started of as a completely mysterious person, some time-skips later, she was the strong, independent and ruthless captain of the strongest guild in the game! Some time-skips later, she was the very cute and innocent, dinner-preparing house wife... for our "hero" of course! I enjoy character development, but this young lady is doing it wrong... I can't really say many things, unlike the other girls, she is not very fond of Kirito, but like ALL the other girls, she falls for him and actually marries him. You don't see the love, you don't see the process, they spend some time together, next thing you see she's undressing for him... But don't panic, the secondary characters are actually kind of nice, you might like them, too bad 90% of the time is dedicated to the "perfect couple"...
Enjoyment: 4/10
Other than an occasional joke over here and there and the rare appearance of some secondary characters, there's not much to enjoy. You can still watch it for the pretty colors.
Disappointing, overrated, lame in general... Don't bother to watch this. The feeling is similar to "Two girls One cup". You start with something good, but in the end you get sh*t, except not literally this time...
