Today Bandai Namco Entertainment released a new batch of screenshots of the upcoming third-person-shooter/JRPG hybrid Sword Art Online: Fatal Bullet.
The hero (or heroine) of the game is a newbie who just logged into Gun Gale Online for the first time. A new feature called Artificial Financial Adviser System, or ArFA-Sys for short, has just been added with an update alongside a new area named SBC Flugel.
By sheer chance, the hero obtains a rare Type-X ArFA-Sys, and he suddenly becomes the focus of the attention of many other players.
Alongside the hero, we meet his childhood friend Kureha, who is a veteran player and is the one who convinced him to join the game. She is bright and cheerful, and thinks it’s her task to protect the newbie. She plays GGO to find her strength and she’ll stop at nothing to become stronger.
Zeliska is a mysterious solo player who is well known in GGO, and will meet the hero in the middle of the story. She is trying to figure out how he got a Type-X ArFA-Sys. At time she speaks to him harshly, and her hobby is wearing pretty clothes.
ArFA-Sys is the partner of the hero, and can be customized both as male and female, on top of the appearance. She or he can fight, and manage assets and items (hence “financial” adviser).
Incidentally, the hero can be customized in both looks and stats, among six different parameters. Strength, Vitality, Agility, Intelligence, Dexterity, and Luck.
We also see the new look of Kirito and of many more waifus from the original series.
Last, but not least, we take a look at the rich collector’s edition that will be released in Japan, the early purchase bonuses (which are a Sword Art Online costume for Asuna and a Silver Gun). Players that will pre-purchase the game on the Japanese PSN will get the “Betaer Player” bonus, granting the ability to play part of the main story ahead of release.
Those who will purchase the Season Pass (including three DLC episoded), will receive a PS4 theme, a “guitar launcher” weapon, and two colors for the photon sword, pink and green.
We also learn that before the launch of the DLC, a free update will come, implementing new features like the addition of tournament rules.
Check out all the images below, and if you want to see more of the game, you can check out the latest trailer and character creation gameplay, another trailer showing the custom hero and new members of the cast, on top of some PS4 gameplay that yours truly recorded in Tokyo.
Sword Art Online: Fatal Bullet will be released in Japan on February 2nd. We still don’t have a date for the west, but it’ll come in early 2018 for PS4, Xbox One and PC.
