I personally think the series was very good. yes i read some of the book so there are things that make more sense in the book than the anime. Sometime can be confusing to some, some episode may be though of " whats the point of showing me that" and many other things didnt make sense.
For all those negative reviews I've seen and read, they are not wrong. but thats because they were like judging everything the the series. the last time i check if you judge every damn details in something then i doubt any movie series of any genre would be good cause there is always something bad about them.
Anyways, in the end. watch the series and judge it for you self. it all a matter of ones opinion in the end. i wont recommend it to those who need to have everything explained to them. But for those who play games, who watch "dot hack (.Hack)" or for those who like survival adventures, give it a try and judge it for yourself.
(Everything after this is just the reason i give it 10)
I gived it a 10 only because its been a while that an anime made me want to watch it and finish. ive seen many good anime. but majority of them is always a repeats. what made sword art different, well yes it kinda of a repeat in a different aspect but its not something thats has not been done. I mean think of the matrix, .Hack or ghost in the shell ( not fully the same but the ideas are still there).
In the end it was the adventure adventure, the felling of what would you do if something had to happen to you. And finally it relates to many of us MMORPG player, Many of us (World of Warcraft, Eve online, etc....)
And finally the main reason which might be only me. It absorbed me into the main story ( not the side story since they were not really complete in the end, since many were lost in there purpose) which usualyl happens very rarely. Sometime i tend to drop many who started good or take a few years to finish some of them.
OVERALL
Watch it and judge it yourself. Don't let some guys who comment bad on something to tell you whats good and what is bad. We are all different individual, our opinion are different no matter what how similar someone can be to you. You might like what you see. and if every you want to understand what really going on, then read the novel, this will differently fill in the gaps that are missing. But for those who don't like reading the anime concludes the story very well in my opinion.
