george1234
Moderator
@ Kagaribi no Hanabira: I read the first few chapters of the first volume (you can find all 7 volumes of the novel here http://www.baka-tsuki.org/forums/viewto ... 04#p122072)and the situation seems alot darker that it was in .hack//SIGN even though the develop on the same idea
SPOILERS BELOW
As you can see the situation is pretty crazy and dark enough for that music
SPOILERS BELOW
The story stars with 2 guys (the typical anime one with the dark hair and the the other guy with the thing on his hair that hold them up, the first is a user that had came to SAO since the Beta test version while the other one had came as soon as it got released. To play they game they use a device that called Net Gear which is something like a helmet which the user wears on his/her head and it uses the person's 5 senses so that they can play the game, it also sends some short of electromagnetic waves to the users brain for that purpose and also blocks all the user's body nerve signals to reach the brain so that they can move into the digital world without hitting the wall in the real one (lol).
Anyway at some point these 2 discover that there's no more "log out" button in the game's menu, which was the only way to return to the real world during the beta test. Then they get teleported to a place in the game where all other users were gathered. And a huge boss-like character appears who is the creator of the game and inventor of the Net Gear device. He explain to everyone that:
1. The log out button was removed in purpose so it give a more chalenging feel to it (lol)
2. That if they lose their life in the game they will also lose in the real world since the Net Gear will fry their brain with microwaves.
3. Same thing will happen if someone in the real world tries to remove the device (eg. relative) from the user's head.
4. and that the ONLY way to return to the real world was to beat the boss that's on the 100th floor of the Tower (the one you see in the trailer). To get a feeling on how difficult that is think that during the 2 months of the beta test, 10000 players had only managed to reach to the 6th one.
5. Also there's was no "heal" ability or respawn one.
6. that already 230 users had died because their relatives had tried to remove the Net Gear from them.
Anyway at some point these 2 discover that there's no more "log out" button in the game's menu, which was the only way to return to the real world during the beta test. Then they get teleported to a place in the game where all other users were gathered. And a huge boss-like character appears who is the creator of the game and inventor of the Net Gear device. He explain to everyone that:
1. The log out button was removed in purpose so it give a more chalenging feel to it (lol)
2. That if they lose their life in the game they will also lose in the real world since the Net Gear will fry their brain with microwaves.
3. Same thing will happen if someone in the real world tries to remove the device (eg. relative) from the user's head.
4. and that the ONLY way to return to the real world was to beat the boss that's on the 100th floor of the Tower (the one you see in the trailer). To get a feeling on how difficult that is think that during the 2 months of the beta test, 10000 players had only managed to reach to the 6th one.
5. Also there's was no "heal" ability or respawn one.
6. that already 230 users had died because their relatives had tried to remove the Net Gear from them.
As you can see the situation is pretty crazy and dark enough for that music
.. Seems to be an interesting one... 
..even I'm not a fan of any online games...
)