Did Sword Art Online help Final Fantasy XIV?

[Ramesses]

SAO? Solid Story? Wat. The animation was good, that's about it.

Then it seems all the subtleness of the entire series was lost on you. Shame really, because the real attraction to SAO is its storyline. A very distinct reoccuring feature about japanese anime are the subtle content that is always inherent within... and for SAO there is a lot going on that shows several facets of the characters. Viewers are able to identify with several aspects of the series, which is what really makes it popular... not just the art and animation style.

Here's a hint... the real life Kirito dives into online games for certain reasons regarding his family, and his online xter shows various sides of his extreme strong will, his humility, his weaknesses and so on. Same goes for Klein, Agil and even Asuna (whose very wealthy family has some corporate ties to the company that developed the Cardinal and ALO software).

Heck, even the name "Heathcliff" was likely chosen by a certain someone in the series because of its significance from a very famous real life book.

Finally, I think its also HIGHLY recommended that you read the light novel and the various wikia sites online... they will flesh out a lot more about the series and make you understand why it now has almost 7 million copies in print.

[Hanemakikaze]

Then it seems all the subtleness of the entire series was lost on you. Shame really, because the real attraction to SAO is its storyline. A very distinct reoccuring feature about japanese anime are the subtle content that is always inherent within... and for SAO there is a lot going on that shows several facets of the characters. Viewers are able to identify with several aspects of the series, which is what really makes it popular... not just the art and animation style.

Here's a hint... the real life Kirito dives into online games for certain reasons regarding his family, and his online xter shows various sides of his extreme strong will, his humility, his weaknesses and so on. Same goes for Klein, Agil and even Asuna (whose very wealthy family has some corporate ties to the company that developed the Cardinal and ALO software).

Heck, even the name "Heathcliff" was likely chosen by a certain someone in the series because of its significance from a very famous real life book.

Finally, I think its also HIGHLY recommended that you read the light novel and the various wikia sites online... they will flesh out a lot more about the series and make you understand why it now has almost 7 million copies in print.

You'll just have to accept not everyone likes the anime in the same way as you, all the time skipping, the completely boring romance, then theres that one extremely disturbing scene where two of their guild members(one who is a friend) are killed (literally), Kiritos arms chopped off and they decide it's a good idea to get engaged at that exact point? I pretty much stopped caring about the story at this point, and just enjoyed the action since it's very well animated. So no, a statistical number of sales will not change my mind, the anime is over and I'm done with it. Now I just patiently wait for more Pyscho Pass.

[Soukyuu]

Then it seems all the subtleness of the entire series was lost on you. Shame really, because the real attraction to SAO is its storyline. A very distinct reoccuring feature about japanese anime are the subtle content that is always inherent within... and for SAO there is a lot going on that shows several facets of the characters. Viewers are able to identify with several aspects of the series, which is what really makes it popular... not just the art and animation style.

Ramesses, the reason why you can see all those good points is probably because you read the novel and your memories overlap. SAO does have a solid setting and a good story with likable characters - in the novels.

The whole development between the characters was severely cut in the anime's SAO-arc though, which hurt the overall story. Not to mention people were too busy leering about the 16.5 chapter. I have no idea why they decided to squeeze the SAO arc into 12 EPs, in the end the pacing got screwed up completely. And why the hell did they remove nearly every piece of dialogue that showed the main chars getting closer?

They did a decent adaptation of ALO, though the pace there was a bit too slow. Should have allocated more episodes for SAO arc, like not shortening the red nosed reindeer story as well animating the full aria in the starless sky.

All in all, I don't think the popularity of SAO comes from the anime, but the anime serves as a good way to attract people to the novels, making SAO overall more popular. The author even started re-writing the story in a chronological order filling in the gaps, I doubt he would be doing this if the novels didn't sell well.

As for most novel fans, the anime was disappointing. The only good about it was seeing the best scenes animated.

one extremely disturbing scene. [...] Now I just patiently wait for more Pyscho Pass.

That's... kinda contradicting. As for why they decide to engage there... the novels did a much better job at leading to that scene... and it made sense.

[Molic]

They did a decent adaptation of ALO, though the pace there was a bit too slow. Should have allocated more episodes for SAO arc, like not shortening the red nosed reindeer story as well animating the full aria in the starless sky.

Kinda hate when anime make a episode out of a side story, i just see that as filler D:. Wish they would just stick to the main story for the anime, then have bonus ep of side stories or make a movie of them.

[Soukyuu]

Kinda hate when anime make a episode out of a side story, i just see that as filler D:. Wish they would just stick to the main story for the anime, then have bonus ep of side stories or make a movie of them.

There are not side-stories in that sense. If they left the Aria out, it'd end up with Asuna coming out and marrying Kirito out of nowhere. It was already bad as it was with half of the developing dialogue being cut.

The timeskip was supposed to be there, since it's what the novel does, too. The reason is simple, the author had a submission limit so he had to cut a lot. The second volume, the "side stories" are an attempt to flesh the story out, and if you ask me, it does a good job.

So putting those side stories into the anime was definitely a good idea. Cutting them beyond recognition, wasn't. That's why they feel like a filler, there is 50% of their content missing.

[Molic]

There are not side-stories in that sense. If they left the Aria out, it'd end up with Asuna coming out and marrying Kirito out of nowhere. It was already bad as it was with half of the developing dialogue being cut.

The timeskip was supposed to be there, since it's what the novel does, too. The reason is simple, the author had a submission limit so he had to cut a lot. The second volume, the "side stories" are an attempt to flesh the story out, and if you ask me, it does a good job.

So putting those side stories into the anime was definitely a good idea. Cutting them beyond recognition, wasn't. That's why they feel like a filler, there is 50% of their content missing.

Ment more like in general toward all anime just not sao, but yea they butchered them pretty bad at the start missing most of the content.

[Shurrikhan]

Then it seems all the subtleness of the entire series was lost on you. Shame really, because the real attraction to SAO is its storyline. A very distinct reoccuring feature about japanese anime are the subtle content that is always inherent within... and for SAO there is a lot going on that shows several facets of the characters. Viewers are able to identify with several aspects of the series, which is what really makes it popular... not just the art and animation style.

This is what I normally watch anime for. I was disappointed in SAO, however, because these exact features were really shallow. I still enjoyed it; even reading the light novels simultaneously didn't especially hinder that. But, it was still disappointing for me.

On topic, I think SAO might help the hype for MMOs if ARR can catch the wave, but I doubt any particular features of the series will have a clear connection into future MMos for quite some time. Even then, the multi-(consistent) party raid style and AGDs (auto-generated dungeons), special acquired skills with a limited total number across a given server, and breaking up the overall world in favor of distinct levels/zones are probably the only features that will be carried across.