Dengeki Online publishedan interview focusing on the upcoming PS4, Xbox One, and PC JRPGSword Art Online: Alicization Lycoris.The interview is withSAOauthor Reki Kawahara,SAOEditor Kazuma Miki, andSAOconsole games Producer Yousuke Futami. In particular, multiple parts through the interview and comments from Producer Futami hint that futureSAOgames might not necessarily feature Kirito as the protagonist: Instead of being able to make your own avatar but still follow a story specifically written with Kirito in mind, it seems future games could be closer to whatSAO Fatal Bulletdid (outside of Kirito Mode).
Here’s a translated summary of the interview with the main subjects brought up. Note that this contains spoilers of theAlicizationarc.
The story behind the development ofSword Art Online: Alicization Lycoris
The development ofSword Art Online: Alicization Lycorisstarted around 4 years ago in 2016. The initial development phase was quite hard, as adaptingAlicizationinto a game was quite difficult. Reki Kawahara said he initially thought Gun Gale Online could never get adapted into an actual game, with its systems like Bullet Lines and Bullet Circles. But then it happened withSword Art Online: Fatal Bullet. Likewise, Reki Kawahara thought it’d be definitely impossible to make a game adaptation of the Alicization arc. Because the worlds of SAO, ALO and GGO are all games in the novel, but the world where Alicization takes place, Underworld, isn’t. It’s more like a “Civilization Simulation”, and the Alicization arc is heavily story-driven.
As you already know,SAOAlicization arc is currently getting an anime adaptation. The final part of the anime,Sword Art Online: Alicization War of Underworld Part 2will start airing in Japan July 11.
In Japan, this part of the anime is namedSword Art Online: Alicization War of Underworld -The Last Season-.Similarly to this title, Yousuke Futami believes thatSword Art Online: Alicization Lycorismight be the end of Kirito’s original game story. Producer Futami further explained in the interview what he means by that. In 2013, the very firstSAOgame adaptation,Sword Art Online: Infinity Momenton PSP (and its enhanced versionHollow Fragmenton PS Vita), had an original story where instead of following the events of the very firstSAOlight novel volume, Aincrad would continue from floor 75 to floor 100. All the games since then similarly have original stories rewriting events from the novel.
Back in May and multiple times since then, Producer Futami also mentioned how he “plans to end Kirito’s game story withAlicization Lycoris”. He’s been hinting that futureSAOgames from now on could feature an original protagonist similarly toFatal Bullet. He also said it’ll be “up to the future generation to think about it”, hinting this might be his last game as Producer onSAOgames, and he’s switching positions after that. Producer Futami also said something very similar on a live stream we covered a few weeks ago,on how he’d rather let a new Producer try to tackle a possible game adaptation for Unital Ring,the latest and current arc ofSAOin the light novel.
Next up in the interview, Producer Yousuke Futami revealed Yoshitsugu Matsuoka, Kirito’s seiyuu, has around “15,000 words” voiced inAlicization Lycoris. This is nearly the double of voiced lines in the previous console game,Hollow Realization, which had around “8000 words” from Kirito voiced.
Producer Futami also mentioned how Ai Kayano, who voices Alice, mentioned during the recordings it was a bit hard to get back to voicing Alice during the timeframe when she acts coldly toward Kirito and Eugeo. Seeing it’s been a long time since she voiced those parts in the anime, and is now used to voicing the current Alice.
Yousuke Futami also wished to include the Zakkaria Swordsman Tournament inAlicization Lycoris, as it wasn’t shown in the anime. However, the development team couldn’t manage to finish that part of the game in time without ending up affecting all development, so they abandoned the idea and cut that part. The game will have a summary of the event instead. However, you’ll end up seeing a new side of Zakkaria as there’s a point in the game’s story you go back to the Norlangarth North Empire.
PastSAOgames all pretty much had one hub city. Meanwhile,Sword Art Online: Alicization Lycorishas at least 5 big cities you can explore. There’s one in each of the four empires of the Human World: the Norlangarth North Empire, the Eastabarieth Empire, the Wesdarath Empire, and the Southacroith Empire. The fifth city is Central Cathedral. You also have multiple smaller inhabited areas such as Rulid Village.
Next up,SAOEditor Kazuma Miki explained his role onSword Art Online: Alicization Lycoris:
Together with Reki Kawahara, Kazuma Miki helped theAlicization Lycorisdevelopment team decide what kind of game to make in early plan phase of development. The development team had around 10 different proposals on how to adapt theAlicizationarc into a game, before settling on what became the basis forAlicization Lycoris. They also helped decide which story elements to include in the game, and when to start the game’s story in Alicization arc. And ultimately settled to start at the very beginning.
As a reminder, the game basically covers from the beginning of Alicization up to the Administrator fight, and then goes with an original story instead of doingWar of Underworld.An original story centered on new original character Medina Orthinanos,which we detailed in another article.The devs decided on that as all otherSAOgames so far also had original story elements.
Lastly, together with Reki Kawahara, Kazuma Miki would regularly check the game’s elements to make sure there’s no discrepancies with what is written in the novels. And in turn, decided to change a few things to make the story work better as an RPG, all why properly explaining these changes in the game’s story and exposition. For example, the fact that there are monsters in the Human Empire even though there shouldn’t be any. This is properly explained inAlicization Lycoris. Kazuma Miki stressed that the original story inSAOALis in line with the novels, and is full of scenes and developments fans always wanted to see.
Sword Art Online: Alicization Lycorisis coming to PS4, Xbox One, and PC, on July 9 in Japan and August 04, 2025, worldwide. In Japan, players who preordered the gameâs digital version are able to play part of the game (until Kirito and Eugeo arrive at Central Cathedral) since July 6 as Beaters, hence why you can already see screenshots of the beginning of the game on social media.
Meanwhile, as you wait for the game, you can read much more via our previous coverage: Our summary of thelatest stream and gameplay,gameplay trailers forLisbeth, Silica, Leafa, Sinon.More on the gameâsoriginal story and characters. Thebattle systemalong withcharacter creation and online multiplayer.Planned DLCs, the returnof bed scenes.The game’sopening sequence was also revealed.
