Echoes of Aincrad

Best SAO game

The game has amazing graphics, but many major flaws. First of all it's not open world, the world feels empty, there are only mobs to fight, you don't find any PKr's NPCS or anything to discover, you cannot go outside of quest areas it's teleporting you. To me it feels a game that has incredible graphics and art style but the team that has to make gameplay got fired and left it unfinished.

Biggest disappoinment I have ever experienced. I try to have an open mind about this game, but I just cant help but see its flaws. It is one the most undercooked games I have ever played in my life. So many features missing, exploration is god awful. This game feels so incomplete.

As someone that has beaten the game, I feel that I can now actually make a review worth looking at. And having done the post story bits as well, even more so. I wish I could leave a neutral review for the game, leaning a little more to the positive side, as my thoughts with the game are mixed, with some disgusting bads and pretty tall highs. The things that I liked about this game were the story, the graphics, the combat, the soundtrack, and overall immersion of the game. The story is kind of a mixed bag, as the only reason I liked the story was because the second half of the game picked it up a LOT more, and held me all the way to the end, to the point where I was left wanting more and wondering where/if the story goes from there. No spoilers, but there is a big original storyline in the second half of the game, albeit feeling a little unfinished, contained a lot of very good and strong story elements. Obviously, graphically I don't need to say much, the game looks amazing. The combat felt clean, and I never had the problem with it feeling clunky (I did play on controller, so kbm might feel that way). Immersion wise at least personally, I was able to insert myself into the story and feel those heartfelt feelings of what a "death game" consequently holds. The characters helped a lot, and they were all very well written. As for the bads, there is a pretty hefty amount. The things to mark are the variety within levels regarding their layout, the reuse of bosses and animations for enemies within different levels, the linearity that comes with it being level based encounters as opposed to open world, the mindless running around in order to get to places that felt frustrating, the linearity that unfortunately comes from most SAO game combats, and as well as the absurd price tag. For levels, the one thing that was frustrating and just downright stupid was how the levels were designed layout wise. Since they stuck to the level based encounters, there was no need or feeling of needing to explore the world and see the little intricacies that the world MIGHT have to offer. Towards the end, I felt that I had no reason to explore, and would rather rush through a level in order to experience more of the story. That kills it for something that's supposed to replicate media that uses an MMORPG as it's base. As for the reuse of bosses and animations, it just felt tacky when you would have to do a boss encounter at the end of the level, especially when it was big stepping stones in the story, and for the bosses to just be damage sponges. At the end of the game, primarily the final boss and the post ending final boss, you can see they definitely explored mechanics akin to raid mechanics, and it felt fun, engaging, and challenging. But when it's only the final two bosses, it just feels like wasted opportunity. I don't have to say much about the game being linear, we just lost out on so much when it's not open world. The mindless running around I don't have to say much about, anyone who has played the game can see that there's a lot of running around and "exploring" which is just finding the next checkpoint in the quest rather than really exploring. As for the linearity that comes with combat, the problem with the game is the variety, and by that I mean build variety. It feels as though there isn't enough sword skills to fully enhance skill expression, not enough armor that really changes up the feel of how you play, and just overall not enough reason to keep you engaged, it's just basic attack and wait for your cooldowns, it just doesn't feel like enough. And last but not least, the horrible price tag. I get that we're in a modern era, but this game realistically should've cost $60, or personally what I think should've been the price, $40. The game just doesn't have enough going on to justify the price tag of $70, plain and simple. Overall, the game is again, a mixed bag, but I think it was a good experience, however bad the bads maybe. The game had the bones and potential, and you can definitely see it in parts of the game. It just felt like the budget wasn't there or there wasn't enough time to explore it, and that's how we get mixed reviews for games like these. I look forward to the additional DLC that may happen in the future, and I do sincerely hope the devs get the time and the money to make the game a lot better, but for now, the game will remain to have the bones, but there's not a lot of good chunks of meat to bite into.

Great Game. Especially recommend for those who enjoyed SAO

Honestly so far playing it, even though some monsters and bosses have been reskinned the combat feels much different, I like the feel of combat, and even though you aren't playing the game as main character you are going through canonical events through the anime. The graphics are also amazing, so far the best of the SAO. I would say overall out of all the games they have released this game is a step in the right direction. I would say there are 2 things I would wish for 1. an open world experience, even though you only head out of town when you're on a quest you are exploring a pretty big area just sucks you cant venture out of the area of quests. 2. Another thing I feel should be changed is the fact that once you use your heal items in hand you have to go all the way back into town to restock on more, which has sucked during boss battles. I haven't unlocked the death game mode yet, but playing on the very hard difficulty alone has been a challenge. The bosses hit heavy and some spawn in other monster making the task even more difficult. I think it would be more convenient if you could restock on items by the safe zone instead of teleporting back to town. Nonetheless the overall quality and feel of the games combat do make up for the cons of this game. Even though a 70$ price tag is hefty it has an enjoyable experience and can see further potential if they kept making series like this with a multiplayer mode incorporated in.

It's a simple game, but what it does, it does pretty well. For fans of the anime, there's plenty to enjoy here.

very good game, i hope they continue to add floors to future dlcs

was really looking forward to this game, unfortunately I don't think it's worth the $70 price tag, exploration is literally non existent in this so called SAO game. might buy again during sale

Its like playing a 3d version of ys the boss fights a re fun and the stratgey to think your way through them is fun loving the parallel story line ........ the world is vast and but for many that want instant gratification and dont like hoffing it through zones this will upset you to no end but if you like grindy games and dont mind repetative killing then ya this game is fun but for many. this will prob upset them.