New Sword Art Online Movie Will Focus Heavily On The Anime's Heroines

In a few months, the Sword Art Online franchise will be coming back with a brand-new feature film. Sword Art Online The Movie -Ordinal Scale- will see characters like Kirito and Asuna return in another tech-filled adventure involving an augmented reality video game, but don't expect heroines like Silica to be pushed aside. In the most recent issue of the Sword Art Online magazine, creator Reki Kawahara confirmed the franchise's female leads will get due attention in the movie.

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Thanks to a fan translation via Dreadful Decoding, fans of Sword Art Online can read up on the creator's announcements. When Kawahara was asked which characters would be featured in the new movie, the writer said that Liz and Silica's screen time increased significantly.

"I was not aware of this while writing the story, but Liz's and Silica's screentime has increased. I even had 120 minutes to work with, so their screentime increased rapidly as I fleshed out the story. Particularly, Silica became a rather important key character."

As for Asuna, the leading lady will also have her role expanded in the Sword Art Online film, and plenty of fans will be happy to see her take up a larger leadership position.

"Asuna had a considerable increase in importance," Kawahara said, explaining that Asuna's role was added onto after the movie was initially scripted. "At first, it was a story of Kirito fighting against the mastermind's plot, but then producer Kashiwada (Shinichirou) said "more Asuna" at a meeting. Since then, Asuna's role became bigger and we decided to depict the relationship between Kirito and Asuna in more detail."

If you are not familiar with the film or want to know a bit more, then you can check out its official synopsis below:

"In 2022, the world of virtual reality was upended by the arrival of a new invention from a genius programmer, Akihiko Kayaba, called NerveGear. It was the first full-dive system, and with it, came endless possibilities to VRMMORPGs.

In 2026, a new machine called the Augma is developed to compete against the NerveGear and its successor, the Amusphere. A next-gen wearable device, the Augma doesn't have a full-dive function like its predecessors. Instead, it uses Augmented Reality (AR) to get players into the game. It is safe, user-friendly and lets users play while they are conscious, making it an instant hit on the market. The most popular game on the system is "Ordinal Scale" (aka: OS), an ARMMORPG developed exclusively for the Augma.

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Asuna and the gang have already been playing OS for a while, by the time Kirito decides to join them. They're about to find out that Ordinal Scale isn't all fun and games…"

Sword Art Online The Movie -Ordinal Scale- will hit theaters abroad on Febuary 18 before it debuts in the U.S. come March.

[H/T] Crunchyroll