Spoiler section (not just for season 1 but some things from the following seasons as well):
The main character is a normal person with a boring job and no known desires to kill or torture any real people or game characters. He is the last remaining member of what was once the greatest guild in a dead mmorpg that is being shut down. He finds himself transported into another world as his game character with his guild's base and npc characters brought to life and turned into actual living and free thinking beings. At this point I loved the show, amazing setting and world building and as these characters are at max power they are all basically gods in this world (although it takes them a little while to realize that) and it is incredibly fun to see what they will do with that power.
But then things quickly go downhill. In the first interaction he has with the new world he finds himself in he decides to save a village but not resurrect the people that died in the attack before he arrived even though it is easily within his power and if he wanted he could also erase the memories of the people that died and those that saw them die so no one would know he had this power. He could make a huge difference in the lives of these innocent people but instead chooses not to for no reason other than that he doesn't feel like it. That just isn't a good enough reason. So many cool things could have come from that, maybe those memories could come back at some point/be discovered by an enemy that captures someone from the village in the future, ect. A lot of cool things could have developed from this moment but instead nothing happens just to demonstrate how uncaring the main character is. This isn't a show ruiner but it was the first red flag.
Later he accompanies an adventuring group. A group of friends that band together and go on adventures just like the friends he used to have and lost and misses dearly. This new group is all killed after the adventure and he leaves them dead. Once again he can easily revive the dead and erase memories. He has the power to stop something in the past that traumatized him from occurring again but he chooses not to. (I'm told in the light novel he looked down on the party but in the anime he was friendly enough with them so the adaptations clearly differ and it is wrong to say that he should act the same way in every adaptation even if the events play out differently. The author also agrees because the actions he takes in the anime differ in places from the actions he takes in the light novels so this is clearly not a 1:1 translation of the light novel). Someone that has lost all their friends they used to adventure with and explore a world of mystery together with should see this happening and think "I have the power of a God now and this will never happen again" and bring those dead adventurers back to life. But he doesn't. They remind him of something he lost so his reactions should either be to protect them so he can feel like he protected his friends memories or he should feel like they are a pale imitation of his relationship with his friends and get angry at them for the perceived mockery of that bond. But instead he just shrugs it off. This is the moment the show was ruined for me. I've played a dying mmorpg and lost all my friends one by one. I am a borderline sociopath so I don't give a crap about most of what happens around me. But I would spit in the face of God if it would bring back even a small part of the fun times I used to have adventuring with my friends. The way this character behaves does not fit himself or his personality at all and that is why this show is terrible.
Yes he is a sociopath so he feels no emotions but allow me to phrase it like this: If you see a random object of no use to you lying around do you break that object? Just because you don't care about something doesn't mean you have a desire to destroy and get enjoyment from it. Some people just throw away paper plates when they are done with them and don't crush them up for the thrill of crushing something just because they can. Now imagine that paper plate was a plastic plate and had a picture on it that reminded you of something special to you. It would make a lot more sense for you to clean that plate and keep it when you were done instead of snapping it in half just because you're so cool and edgy. Not caring about something isn't the same as wanting to destroy everything. This author clearly thinks being a sociopath is cool and dark and that honestly isn't the case. Mental illnesses are not cool no matter what the media wants you to think. This is just another failing on the part of the author to display anything accurately. Not his characters, not mmorpg players, and not sociopaths. Everything is just how he wants it to be to satisfy his desire to show us evil characters acting like shitheads.
At the finale of season 1 the main character needs to fight against a npc guild member under mind control (The only challenge these characters have in this world is against each other because they are the only beings even close to the power level of the main character). And you get all excited because you finally get to see a serious fight using their mmorpg spells, items, and abilities. And how does the main character win the fight? He uses cash shop items that are stupidly overpowered and break the mechanics of the game. Do you know what real mmorpg players/gamers in general hate? God damn microtransactions that break their game. Selling game breaking items/xp to make money off the corpse of your game is sickening to anyone that actually loves the game and wants to have fun in it. No real mmo player would be like "oh boy gotta show off those cash shop items in my anime and have them be the main mechanics in how this fight is won". It's terrible.
Many other things continue to happen in later seasons as well. For example:
Even if you want to argue that those earlier adventurer group he watched die should have been left for dead because he didn't care about them the same way he cared about his actual friends/guild members one npc of his guild saved a human woman in need. The person that created this npc once saved the main character in the exact same way. Is the main character touched by these actions reminding him of his cherished friend he lost that once saved his life? Nope. He instead tortures the npc, dragging him in front of him and joking about having the girl killed before bringing the girl in and ordering the npc to kill her to prove his loyalty. That is not the actions the main character should have taken based on his background and personality. Once again the author clearly only cares about making him as edgy and cool as possible. It is dumb and written terribly.
Even if you want to argue that him threatening an npc is in character you can't because he previously revived the npc he had to fight at the end of season 1 and showed great concern for her. So not only do his actions not make sense based on his personality and backstory they also don't make sense based on the things he has previously done in the show. The author is clearly a terrible hack.
Later on a village of lizardmen are attacked, they all band together and the main character sees use in keeping them alive but he still kills a bunch of the village leaders who have the strongest abilities just to prove how edgy and cool he is even though this directly goes against the reason why he decided to recruit the lizardmen in the first place.
After that his base gets invaded by adventurers looking to loot the place and he personally kills a group of them that have bonds of friendship so strong all of them agree to band together and try to hold him off so a young female member of their party can escape. As you should expect none of this reminds him of his lost friends that he cherishes so deeply. He cares nothing for their teamwork and personally kills them all, except for the girl they let escape. He orders one of the npcs to kill her instead. (In the light novel she is kept alive and tortured).
All this show does is make you care for characters by showing off how much fun and adventure they have together and how strong their bonds of friendship are before torturing and killing them to show how cool and edgy the main character is. It's a terrible show and I can't suggest skipping it strongly enough.
