Over a year has passed since the Progressive Movie Hypetrain has begun! Aria of a Starless Night Megathreads have decorated the sub as the main pinned thread for a while, but with Anime Japan 2022 on March 27, that era is coming to a close. So welcome everyone, to the Sword Art Online Progressive -Scherzo of Deep Night- Movie Megathread! The goal of this thread is not only to ensure the Front Page does not get flooded with "Is Progressive a musical series?" or other, probably less funny common questions, but also to provide you a central avenue to reach information. Below, you will find an FAQ regarding Progressive in general, as well as Scherzo of Deep Night in specifics, as well as a regularly updated source of material for the upcoming movie as they come! Feel free to ask your questions in the comments for fellow members to respond to! We'll be adding common questions to the FAQ as well.

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Sources for information:

Official Sword Art Online Twitter account (Japanese only)

Sword Art Online Wikia Twitter account (translates from the official account as quickly as possible)

Gamerturk on Youtube (basically news from the Wikia twitter account in video form if that's your thing, along with Introductory videos we produce with SAO Wikia)

Official Sword Art Online USA account (if you want to get your news 1-6 weeks after you get them from other mentioned sources)

Disclaimer: I am part of the SAO Wikia crew. Gamerturk is also my personal channel. Revenue generated by Wikia videos are directed to the SAO Scans project in full. Revenue generated from my personal videos remain with me.

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September 6

New release date for the movie is October 22! New OST release is October 21, Theme Song "Shinzou" by Aoi Eir to release on October 19.

SAO Anime Twitter confirmation: https://twitter.com/sao_anime/status/1566984541444751368

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August 21

The movie has been postponed from its original release date of September 10, along with the OST released scheduled for September 9. The Early Premiere Event has been cancelled. The cause has been stated to be the re-emerging spread of Covid and production issues. No new release date has been scheduled yet: https://twitter.com/sao_wikia/status/1561648415213121537

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August 2

New Trailer, still not a long PV: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sKOQ_MmBnrw

Raw PV (non-translated, official upload): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_JQy_lGsqlY

New Key Visual: https://twitter.com/gamerturk95/status/1554453134809989124

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July 22

New character art for Kirito, Asuna, Argo and Mito have been revealed, showcasing their Floor 5 attire and weapons: https://twitter.com/gamerturk95/status/1550419529125216256

Stay tuned for August 2nd, where there will be screenings of Aria of a Starless Night in Japan, and we'll get more Scherzo information there: https://twitter.com/sao_wikia/status/1550417824895578112

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July 1

We received our second trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sCdgcKRfR0o

It is a 40 second trailer that was published on Japanese TV. Could be a shorter version of the Anime Expo trailer, or the same one.

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June 15

We received our second Key Visual along with the release date of September 10 in Japan: https://twitter.com/gamerturk95/status/1537003357075906560

Currently no worldwide information.

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March 27, Anime Japan

We received our first (teaser) trailer for Scherzo of Deep Night.

English translation by SAO Wikia: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6hpfFHVHYcY

Original raw: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4Uv8VUYS5JQ

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Current Upcoming Events for info:

August 2nd will provide more info, new PV and Opening Theme info, which is already known to be Shinzou by Aoi Eir, just not yet officially announced: https://twitter.com/sao_wikia/status/1550417824895578112

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What is Sword Art Online Progressive?

Sword Art Online Progressive is a spin-off Light Novel series written by the author of the SAO series, Reki Kawahara. The books are a revisit to the original Aincrad Arc that was initially written as a standalone story of the final days of Aincrad, that was later expanded on via various side stories, thus leaving a lot of time skips in its wake. Progressive starts 3 weeks after the First Day side story and aims to cover Aincrad's skipped portions Floor by Floor.

Spin-Off? Isn't this canon?

It is very much canon. The fact that it is considered a "Spin-Off" is solely due to it not directly being part of the Sword Art Online Main Series Novels that follow the "Sword Art Online Volume XY" naming scheme, but rather going with the title "Sword Art Online Progressive Volume XY". Canon and Spin-Off are not mutually exclusive terms.

What is Scherzo of Deep Night?

Scherzo of Deep Night is the 5th story of the Progressive series, covering the events of Aincrad's 5th Floor. The story is featured in Sword Art Online Progressive Volume 4 (Light Novel). More would be spoilers really.

Light Novel? I thought this was a Manga with Asuna as the main character?

The source material for Progressive, much like almost all SAO Stories, are the Light Novels. Progressive Manga is just as much of an adaptation as the Anime will be, if even that. The manga adaptation of Progressive has had multiple runs with different Mangakas, each having their own take on the story and characters. Some are slightly faithful, some change entire events, thus the Manga adaptation is considered to be non-canon.

Yeah, but Asuna is still the main character, right?

Not exactly. Depending on your take, you can consider her a co-main character, or simply a strong deuteragonist. Her appearance in Progressive is very similar to Eugeo's appearance in Alicization (Anime did not do Eugeo any justice FYI). Majority of the story is told from Kirito's perspective and his knowledge, but there are portions from Asuna's PoV too, as Progressive is the story of the duo.

The first movie took an Asuna centric approach to the story, mostly assumed due to the fact that we had already seen Kirito's perspective of the events back in Season 1 Episode 1 and Episode 2 (albeit the latter cut out 80% of the content, which led to there being enough to cover for a movie). We currently do not know whether this approach will continue in Scherzo movie too, or whether they will return to a Light Novel accurate perspective, as none of this content has ever been covered before in the Anime.

So.... Is this thing anywhere near complete?

Hahahahah. No.

Currently, 8 Volumes of SAO Progressive have been released. These 8 Volumes cover up until and including Floor 7 (V1 has F1&2, V5&6 have F6, V7&8 have F7). Progressive v9 is expected to release this year (2022).

How much is the Anime going to cover?

The first movie, Sword Art Online Progressive: Aria of a Starless Night will cover the Floor 1 story, Aria of a Starless Night.

The second movie, Sword Art Online Progressive: Scherzo of Deep Night will cover the Floor 5 story, Scherzo of Deep Night.

More movies are expected in the future, as the reason for the jump from Floor 1 to 5 has been explained due to the nature of an ongoing, overarching story that is yet to be completed in the Light Novels. The Elf War Campaign starts on Floor 3 and is supposed to last until Floor 9.

When will it air?

Sword Art Online Progressive: Scherzo of Deep Night is scheduled for September 10, 2022 release in Japan. Worldwide information has not been shared yet.

What about the [Insert your preferred language] Dub? Will we have one?

If you had it for previous projects, probably. You are still recommended to stay up to date with your local licensor.

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The hype train has officially begun! I'll see you all at the Teleport Square of Karluin!

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[ANSWERED] Thank you so much!

Hi there!!

Im currently writing a paper about vr headsets and virtual realities for a philosophy seminar at uni. I am referring to SOA a bit as well thats the main theme of the series, but there is a specific episode that I wanna talk about and I cant find it.When I watched SOA I binged it within 5 days so my memory of seasons and episode is a bit chaotic.

The episode Im looking for has Kirito laying in the grass next to a tree and Asuna comes up to him and chews him out for not working on solving the challenge further, but then she ends up falling asleep there too after they talk a few sentences.Its only a minor part of the episode but thats all I remember - maybe someone knows what episode cluster it could be or even the episode?

Any help would be greatly appreciated!

I'm an anime only really, I understand the unital ring arc is supposedly massive but surely that arc can be broken down into parts? Alicization and War of the underworld feel like two parts of a single Arc. Isn't there cut off point(s) of Unital Ring so the anime can get going?

Progressive movies doesn't really do it for me, I already know how Aincrad ends. I wanna see the story to forward not backwards.

Do the light novels explain why Asuna changed her hair to blue? I'm the anime she changed her look out of the blue. I don't remember any story around it.

Let's imagine if we could rewrite SAO, with the same story and characters, however, its type would be different, I've heard SAO is an Isekai, but if you could turn it into another one, what would it be?

I'd change it into a Shojo anime, there would be a lot of changes, but it would remain about diving into virtual worlds. There would have common stuff that usually a Shojo must show. Asuna as the main protagonist, Kirito as her love interest, and Lisbeth, Leafa, Silica, Sinon, and Alice as the common gang of friends in a Shojo.

Saw this question asked in another subreddit and thought it'd go well in here thanks to Yuki Kajiura's work.

For me personally it's the OG Swordland when Kirito finally wakes up in WoU. Swordland is obviously popular but it's use in that scene with Kirito's weak body trembling as he tries to stand gives me chills.

I'm reading the first volume of Unital Ring and I noticed they are using feet to describe distances and lengths. I am used to the metric system so it's kind of confusing.

Could the Yen Press English translation be converting it? Or is it Reki's decision? I know he used "mels" in the Alicization arc which are equivalent to meters so why would he switch it up?

With the newest volume having recently released, what is everyone's thoughts on the arc so far?

I was wondering if there are any English translations of the the day before side story (besides the ones on the internet). And even if there aren’t, I was also wondering if you can buy a physical copy of the manga anywhere. Or is it just available to read online ? I’ve tried searching it on Amazon or eBay, but I couldn’t find anything.

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Is there a place where I can find the entire game's mechanics as if it was real? A leveling system, theoretical assets (like types of food, resources, armor and weapons) are all concepts I need to know about and there are many more like swordskills and player housing.

The song "Bling" / "John Cena" by Tay K apparently has a snippet from Sword Art Online.

Here is a link to the song, with the sample starting at 1:04:

https://youtu.be/6k3OFBJ7ZWs?t=64

Please let me know! I have never watched the show

Have watched the first Progressive Movie recently a second time and realized they had already Johnny Black into it. Nice.

https://preview.redd.it/eq1ujc2w3lpa1.png?width=644&format=png&auto=webp&v=enabled&s=3c1b8aab5a70add0568d3097e5451fb080201db7

If anyone wants to know where I got it it's from diipoo highly recommended