“Wait, why don’t I have boobs. Every girl should have boobs, right?”
So we’ve finally reached what everyone is talking about this arc: the genderbent Kirito. And I gotta say, I’m very underwhelmed, because Kirito barely even looks like a girl here, let alone a cute one. He still mostly looks like a male, but with long hair. Way to get my hopes up for nothing. Then again, this is Sword Art Online, where the only thing to expect is disappointment… and terribleness.
Odd thing is that avatars in the MMOs in Sword Art Online are just predetermined to players without any customization options whatsoever, something no actual game would do. And there’s no real explanation as to why Kirito suddenly has a female persona, much like everything else in this crap where something happens and you’re just expected to go along with it. Anyway, with the exception of Sinon, there appears to be no female players in GGO whatsoever. I guess the idiot writers thought that only manly men only play these kinds of games.
And quite similar to ALO, his previous stats have transferred over to GGO. You know, I’ve revisited The Matrix trilogy and found out that The Matrix: Reloaded and Revolutions aren’t that great, mainly due to one thing: Neo is pretty much the most strongest force in the Matrix, so aside from Smith after absorbing the Oracle, no one can beat him. There is literally no suspense in the fights because he cannot be beaten. The same applies here.
Now Kirito knows how it feels to be on the other end of the stick. Karma’s a bitch.
Anyhoo, upon entering GGO, Kirito decides to attract the attention of Death Gun, only to attract the attention of horny male players giving sleazy looks towards him. Now I’m reminded of that sleazeball from Sinon’s squad a few episodes back. Do GGO players get a sudden boner whenever a female player is around? Considering there are no women in GGO, I’m willing to assume that the game environment is a very sexist one.
Anyway, Kirito meets Sinon and asks her to show her around GGO, but decides to back off because she’ll think he’s hitting on her. Um… what? You have a female avatar. Why would she even think that?
Ugh. Kirito, stop it. Your pretending to be a female sucks, and it only makes you look like a fool.
Anyway, since Kirito’s has only 1,000 credits, not enough to buy any kind of weapon, Sinon recommends he gains more money by playing gambling games that consists of dodging shots from a robot cowboy that speaks surprisingly good English (Fun Fact: He is voiced by Jeff Manning, who you might recognize as the voice of Master Hand from Super Smash Bros. 64) and tagging him. The jackpot is stated to be over 300,000 credits and it’s a game that is stated to be impossible to beat (read that once more time for clarity), and what’d you expect? Kirito wins. He even dodges the lasers that were too close for him to dodge. I’m not even calling it beginner’s luck; I’m just calling it bullshit.
Even Good English-speaking robot cowboy can’t believe this nonsense.
With his new winnings, Kirito decides to buy some equipment, however he only becomes interested in not a gun, but a photon sword, which I’m actually going to call a lightsaber because that’s exactly what it is. Some examples are usually subtle about it; this one is being absolutely blatant about it. It even makes the exact same humming noises from the lightsabers from Star Wars. Anyway, energy swords have pretty much no practical use in GGO and thus no player ever uses them, but they apparently only exist for Kirito.
And as you’d expect, Kirito makes his lightsaber the one color that matches his soul.
Anyway, with the rest of his credits, Sinon recommends an FN Five-Seven handgun as a secondary weapon. With only 10 minutes before registration for the BoB Tournament closes, and they can’t get there in time on foot, so they decide to take a buggy that is very hard to control and almost no one can use them (read that once more time for clarity), and yet surprise surprise: Kirito is able to operate it easily, because he “used to play racing games,” which is a complete bullshit. He’s been seen with a motorbike. So far, Kirito and Sinon’s newfound friendship is built on nothing but lies, so it’ll probably be a matter of time until this blows up in his face.
As if this show can’t seem to stick its own head up its ass even further, it somehow shoves itself further up there. I’m sorry, people said this was “the best storyline?” I’m glad I didn’t take that one with a grain of salt. So far, this arc is still succeeding in being the stupidly written, misogynistic power fantasy that it is. Some things never change. If this is what I have to deal with this arc, then I might as well scratch this off as a bust.
This is Strike 1, Sword Art Online.
[the jinxed darkstar blog] 
Amen.