Please note, this is a direct transcript of the panel with minor edits, grammatical errors may exist.

 

Q1: Would you play Sword Art Online (SAO) if it was turned into a real MMO?

Kawahara: As long as you don't die when your hit points turns zero.

 

Q2: Is there any kind of food that you would like to try while you're in Seattle?

Kawahara: I had real oatmeal for the first time in my life and it was very delicious.

-- How about something you would like to try or have yet to try in America?

Kawahara: I would like to try a real American-sized T-bone steak.

 

Q3: In a recent interview, you've admitted that the Nerve Gear system have faults that's creating plot holes. If you had more time or could go back to fix the little things, what would you do?

Kawahara: About the Nerve Gear used to create a death game, I’ve heard questions such as "would it be possible to somehow instantaneously destroy the Nerve Gear that the players are using to make it inactive in time before it would kill the player?" That was one of the things that was brought up to me.

If I were to change something in order to combat such measures, one of the ideas was to have Kayaba announce that should anyone attempt this or even succeed, another player randomly will pay for that action, and may show that scene.

 

Q4: Asuna starts off as an incredibly strong fighter, and plays an important role in the political system of Sword Art Online. But in Alfheim Online, she is caged, sexually assaulted, and virtually replaced with a woman with half her ability and depth. What would you say to the critics who found her role problematic, especially given that misogynist climate of anime and gaming?

Kawahara: As I said previously, I may have made the character of Asuna a little too perfect for Sword Art Online. When she is teamed up with Kirito, there was hardly any problem the two, as a pair, could not overcome. So in order to increase the sense of urgency during the Fairy Dance arc, I needed to put her in a situation where she was unable to help Kirito. I do have some regrets about putting her in that situation. I agree that it became very male oriented setting.

So reflecting on that, I made a follow-up story called "Mother's Rosario," where Asuna was the main character. Should the animated series continue, I would very much like to see that story depicted.

 

Q5: How much of Kirito's personality and character is based off of your own personality or characters that you've played in other MMOs?

Kawahara: I don't tend to put myself into my characters, but there was a point of similarity between Kirito and myself. Both of us are not good at forming parties and we tend to play solo in these games a lot.

 

Q6: Is there a connection between Accel World and Sword Art Online?  The ending illustration of episode twenty-two in Sword Art Online shows Kirito holding a sword which resembles Silver Crow's armor while Leafa is holding Black Lotus' sword.  Were these similarities intentional or did you  implement these to match the theme in both stories?

Kawahara: First, I'll start by explaining the illustration in episode twenty-two. The illustration of the end scene in episode twenty-two was done by the mechanical designer of Accel World, Yousuke Kawashima.  He incorporated the avatar design from Accel World into Kirito and Leafa’s swords.

At this point, the two shows are separate. As an author I consider those two titles separate, but there might be some similarities and points that connect between the two series. Should some issues be resolved with both story lines, I might write a third series that ties both titles. But I can't say for sure at this point.

 

Q7: What did you do between your first submission and your actual publication?

Kawahara: During that period, I was serializing Sword Art Online on my homepage. Eventually that was picked up for publication, reworked, re-edited, and released in 2009. I have to say that the novel only covered a little half of what I have written.

 

Q8: Whether it be the series or the manga, what was your intention at the start when your work was turned into a multi-media?

Kawahara: If I thought that it was going to be a multi-media phenomenon, I might have made the main character in Accel World, Haruyuki, a little bit cooler. In the beginning, I was more worried if I was going to succeed as a writer. So when my editor came to me and said "Hey! They want to animate this!" I was shocked, but was very pleased to hear that someone wanted to see it animated.

 

Q9: What are your thoughts on having the Sword Art Online novels translated into English by fans and published online?

Kawahara: I am so happy to hear that there are fans overseas that want to read the novels to the point of having the translation made. I've brought this up to my editor and asked if English translated version would be released. He said as soon as a publisher in the United States makes an offer, they would definitely be willing to consider it any day.

 

Q10: There were a few things such as the "Underworld" arc in Alfheim Online (ALO) and during “Murder Case in the Arena” epilogue that was heavily truncated. A lot of that was foreshadow for later events in the anime. Do you feel anything was missed because of these that were not included? When "Progressive" arc is completed, would you want them to include those scenes if you have the opportunity to do so?

Kawahara: Are you talking about where Leafa and Kirito enters the Underworld?

-- They left the joke afterwards where Suguha slips snow down the back of his [Kirito] shirt which is payback for him unknowingly doing that to her. And also foreshadowing during murder case where Kirito storms in with his horse, which leads to an appearance in the GGO arc.

Kawahara: The root behind that scene was when I was originally serializing it on my home page that scene didn't exist, but when it was novelized, we didn't have enough pages, so I kind of tacked that on. So when it was going to be animated, the scene feels added on [afloat], so I think it should be taken out of the animation and that was the choice I've made.

 

Q11: Sword Art Online deals heavily with MMOs. What is your experience with MMOs and do you have any favorites?

Kawahara: The one game I've played the most is World of Warcraft, but more recently, I'm quite enjoying Diablo III. I'm a really big fan of Blizzard's games, but I'm kind of sad that a Japanese version of these games don't exist.

 

Q12: We heard that you said you feel very fortunate meeting with editor Miki Kazuma. Is there anything you want to comment about your editor?

Kawahara: Miki-san is a fantastic editor. He is a person who never raises his voice or get angry with any sort of disagreement with the author. But he is also a person who does not back down from an idea so when we do not see eye-to-eye, it becomes a very, very long conversation.

 

Q13: In the “Aincrad”, “Fairy Dance”, “Mother's Rosario”, and “Project Alicization” arcs, Kayaba played a key role.  However, in “Phantom Bullet," he was seemingly diminished to a non-existent character. If you could redo the "Phantom Bullet" arc, would you give him a more important role?

Kawahara: If Kayaba is the ringleader in the storyline for every story arc, it might start falling into a set pattern. So I intentionally left him out of the “Phantom Bullet” arc so it wouldn't fall into [a] routine.

 

Q14: How were you able to craft such a believable virtual game within your stories? In a lot of other shows, such efforts are unrealistic and corny.

Kawahara: I was able to make virtual Sword Art Online by studying various American science-fiction novelists and movies that featured virtual reality. I was able to incorporate a lot of what I've learned and experienced into my world.

-- Any particular titles?

Kawahara: James P. Hogan's Realtime Interrupt is an example, where a character is trapped in a virtual reality.

 

Q15: In Accel World, Black Lotus’ name was never revealed. Why was it never revealed? Would you like to expand on the story to reveal that in the future?

Kawahara: When I wrote the first volume of Accel World, I had no plans to write a sequel. Volume one was to end revealing her name. Eventually volume two came around, and I lost the timing to reveal her name. I hope to reveal it in the last volume.

 

Q16: What do you like to do when you're not busy? Do you have any hobbies?

Kawahara: If I take games out of the equation, I really like biking. I've recently bought a track bicycle. When I've heard what happened to Lance Armstrong, I was deeply saddened.

 

Q17:  If you were to create a strategy guide for Sword Art Online, what would you include and what kind of advice would you give besides “don't die”?

Kawahara: If I can't put in “don't die”, it would be “don't leave the town."

 

Q18: What were the influences that led to the big differences between Haruyuki and Kirito?

Kawahara: To be honest, Kirito existed first. To help counter Kirito, I made Haruyuki a non-"perfect" character. While Kirito may seem perfect, he is really fragile and weak inside. Whereas Haruyuki may appear to be imperfect, but he has strength inside. Each of them have their strength and weakness, and I have never really considered either one to be inferior or superior to each other.

 

Q19: When did you decide that you wanted to become a novelist? Did it start in your childhood days, where you simply loved writing or did reading stories lead to your current career?

Kawahara: It started during my childhood. I was always interested in a career writing stories. Initially, I strived to become a (video) game scenario/story writer, but I wasn't able to accomplish that dream. At some point after that, I decided to become a writer.

 -- When did you switch from wanting to become a game storywriter to becoming a writer?

Kawahara: When I was a student in school, I still wanted to become a (video) game writer. In order to become a game writer, you had to work at a gaming company. Getting hired at a gaming company was a high wall that I wasn’t able to climb over. I found myself wanting to become a writer after becoming a student. It was some time in my twenties when I decided to switch.

 

Q20: What was the most challenging story arc you had to write for Sword Art Online and Accel World?

Kawahara: In Accel World, one of the difficulties I had was when [the characters] go into the virtual world. Accel World has a setting where you're moving at a thousand times that of normal speed. So in the game, let's say it's been ten hours. I had difficulty trying to calculate that into the real world which would be the equivalent to many, many days. So I resented the fact that one minute equal sixty seconds and not one hundred seconds.

 

Q21: Looking at the sales figures for Sword Art Online and Accel World, Sword Art Online is a lot more popular than Accel World .  What do you think of the discrepancy between their sales? I’ve heard that one of the explanations was that Sword Art Online is more “girl-friendly.”  What do you think of that?

Kawahara: I think that one of the possible reasons why the numbers are so different is that the fanbase for Sword Art Online has a lot more female fans, as well as younger fans. However for me personally, I wrote Accel World with a younger audience in mind. After seeing the discrepancy between the numbers, I personally am a little disappointed with it [despite my intentions]. For me, worrying about numbers is the publishing company’s and animation company’s [Aniplex, Sunrise] job. I try not to think about the sales figures.

 

Q22: What did you expect coming to Sakura-Con? What were the good, bad, or weird experiences that you had?

Kawahara: I have to say at Sakura-Con, I was very happy to see so many Kiritos (cosplayers) here. Seeing the panel rooms filled with so many fans reacting positively in such a forum was a big surprise and a happy experience for me. I can't imagine such an event happening in Japan in the middle of a large city at such a large venue and receive that type of reaction.

 

Q23: In the “Project Alicization” arc for Sword Art Online there is a concept where time is set by a thousand and willpower is key to everything.  You said that there was no direct connection between Accel World and Sword Art Online, but wasn’t the technology used in “Project Alicization” arc the same concept?

Kawahara: In terms of technology, the "Soul Translator" technology in “Project Alicization” could be or is the foundation of the technology used in Accel World. At this point, as I said before, it might be a similar technology having a technological chain, but it hasn't been made clear that it is in fact the same world. The two worlds could just have similar technological advances.

If I said that the two worlds are the same right now, there would be numerous problems that would need to be solved leading up to ten times the problem that I can even hope to do right now. I really admired how the creative staff of The Avengers, managed to weave multiple storylines into a cohesive one.

-- The changes made in “Project Alicization” arc, where it focuses on willpower rather than skill, was that meant to bring Kirito down to more human level compared to his overpower god-like form like in the other arc?

Kawahara: It is true that the decision might of been to make Kirito, as you put, less "god-like." But at the end of the “Project Alicization” arc, all of that work would have been for not, considering what happens to him.

 

Q24: In “Alicization Turning,” Cardinal has been personified as a NPC, or an AI. From an all-powerful program to a program that is unable to do its original function, what was your intentions of doing this?

Kawahara: The first story was about Kirito fighting against Kabaya, and at the same time, it was a battle against the system. So then what exactly is the system that he is suppose to fight? So I needed to give that system a personality. It controls the game and I needed to give a problem, a situation, and a story. I wanted those things to exist, where it ended up with a personality and limitation.

_{Images © Reki Kawahara/ASCII Media Works/SAO Project}