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Parents' Guide to

Sword Art Online: Hollow Realization

By Marc Saltzman, Common Sense Media Reviewer

age 13+

Average role-playing game for fans only.

Game PlayStation 4 2016
Sword Art Online: Hollow Realization Poster Image

A Lot or a Little?

What you will—and won't—find in this game.

Community Reviews

age 10+

Based on 1 parent review

age 10+

Lost song is better.

If you have a choice ; get lost song. This game isn't bad but it's not that good either. My chief problem are the sidequest; if it's not on the quest board or involving premier it's all cutscenes. I just played for about 2- 2.5 hours; I think 20 min was actual gameplay and the rest was the random quests that you just watch drag on. After a few of them you really start to wish there was a skip option or that you could leave the area without triggering another. One thing I love though is how good the character customization option is (even if the game treats you like kirito. I named myself suki, I'm a girl, and the story still treats you like kirito.). That parts great becuase unlike the others it's basically a full character and not just 5 options.

Is It Any Good?

Our review:
Parents say (1 ):
Kids say (2 ):

If you're a fan of this franchise, you'll no doubt appreciate the familiar story, characters, and locations, but repetition and boredom will keep many players away. Sword Art Online: Hollow Realization is very faithful in its look, dialogue, and atmosphere to the anime and manga series. There's a ton of content here -- comprising many dozens of hours of gameplay by yourself or online with other players -- and the controls and gameplay are accessible, even for newbie players. While you might think the real-time battle system is mere button-mashing, you'll soon pick up on subtle tactics and strategies to help you take down bigger foes as a team. The artificial intelligence (or AI) of the computer-controlled players is quite smart and will prompt you to switch places during combat. You can also instruct your AI party to perform tasks such as healing and retreating, and they'll comply. Some battles against boss characters can take upward of 15 to 20 minutes to complete.

But the game has its issues, too, such as repetition -- you might get a sense of "rinse and repeat" actions after a few hours of continuous play. More variety in the missions would've been ideal. Plus, you can't skip out of lengthy dialogue sequences, and there are plenty of those. Certainly, those who love the Sword Art Online fiction will eat this up, but it can get pretty boring and seemingly unrelated to the bigger story. All things considered, Sword Art Online: Hollow Realization is a good but not great role-playing game. Still, there aren't many other PS4 games like it, so it certainly fills a gap -- especially for fans of the franchise, but they're probably the only ones who will gravitate toward it.

Game Details

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