1. Character's Individuality/Personality : Kirito is about the most plain protagonist I have EVER seen . He's your typical nice guy that's strong for almost no reason . He has absolutely no spice, nothing that really makes you like him . What's worse is that the author made him very popular among the female characters ; they all fall in love with him although nothing sets him apart from your average teenage male .
2. Storyline/Plot : The storyline itself is actually really fascinating ; how it was played out was what made it so bad . Like come on, getting trapped inside an MMORPG game , how can you even make it bad ? Impossible , yet the author managed to do so . For one , there was never an explanation on WHY the creator of the game confined them in that death game , which really bugged me for a while . In addition , SAO's fairy arc was terrible . I didn't see anything special about it worth mentioning and it practically went farther downhill towards there .
3. Romance : The romance factor of the show was also something that really killed it for me . I felt that instead of focusing on Kirito's and Asuna's relationship so much , the author should have focused more on the action and main problem of the game . Furthermore not only was the romance unnecessary , it wasn't well developed . As plain as Kirito's character was , the plainer the love was . I felt no connection , no chemistry between the two partners . It was more forced than Miley's twerking . They literally were friends one minute ,then became husband/wife, and had sex the next fucking episode . Now I'm not a shoujo expert or anything , but I'm pretty sure that's not how fast relationships should develope .
By now you should understand why SAO is NOT satisfactory. Watch it if you wish , but it's not something that should be so highly spoken of .
