Sword Art Online Hollow Realization Vol. 1 Review

-Written by: Jocelyn

Diving into the new game of Sword Art: Origin is similar to that of Sword Art Online that once held Kirito and many other players as hostages in a battle for survival. SAO is the franchise that instantly hooked many anime fans, including myself. I played MMORPG’s my entire childhood, so I could easily relate to the SAO game and VR systems. When this new string of manga, “Hollow Realization,” was announced by Yen Press, I was all too excited to read the first volume and it helps to fill the void between weekly episodes of the season “Alicization” currently airing.

In this manga, the art is crisp, the pacing of the story is a little rough at the start, but overall it’s a great new adventure with a similar land and similar friends. By the time I was done reading this first volume I was looking for more and I plan on pre-ordering the second volume just because it left off on a cliffhanger! I really enjoyed learning more about the origin of Aincrad, the small bits of comedy, and slice-of-life moments, like a nice picnic scene. Don’t be fooled, this volume still has its fair share of action and suspense when a mysterious player shows up looking to kill NPCs that don’t have the ability to respawn. I would recommend this book to anyone who is familiar with the SAO franchise and have seen up to at least the Alfheim Arc. If you’re a huge SAO fan like me, I would also recommend other series like: Grimgar of Fantasy, Log Horizon, and BTOOOM!.