LogFAQs > #962248866

Blightzkrieg posted...

This is the greatest retcon of all time

that's been around since gen 1 or 2 in some supplementary book apparently, but it was never mentioned again outside of that

Nichtcrawler X posted...

The world being virtual disqualifies it?

it's more like the goal of the villain was to explicitly create an artificial isekai, and he did for the most part succeed, but it was a very hacky solution

however in later parts of SAO, i'd argue Alicization is absolutely unquestionably an isekai, because it's a simulated world with hundreds of years of history and fully-realized AI NPCs, some of which have formed souls

isekai like sao had been relatively common in the decade up to sao's anime adaptation in web novel and light novel format (Leadale, an isekai anime airing this season, was written in 2010, and sao itself was first written in the early 2000's) but none really took off