on volume 3 now. i really like how they added in volume 2 into volume 1 in the anime.

I am on volume 5 now! but it was nice how they put volumes 1 and 2 together. that means that we will probably cover all the way though volume 4 with the current season. and volume three made me scream!!! i wanted kirito to kill the main villian in this one so bad!

"The beta testers didn't have time to reach the endgame content"

Two problems with this:

First of all, I wasn't saying this is bad because it wasn't explained, but because of how it's explained.

Again, it's just bad business sense. You don't release a game without testing content, ESPECIALLY when you have a dedicated testing team. It's not like they haven't signed NDAs and release forms anyways, seeing as part of the testing involves access to prototype perhipherals that TAKE OVER YOUR FREAKING NERVOUS SYSTEM.

And yeah, I get that being evil overlord and all, the lead designer wants to keep it all under wraps from the testers. But he clearly changed a lot when shifting to his evil overlord version of the code as seen in the first boss's altered attack pattern, so why not make waves in the endgame content too. In fact, giving and then altering what players thought they knew would only make things harder (as again shown off in the first boss room). Not only would it keep people from being suspicious, but this method would also fit with the evil overlord designer's strategy.

The second issue comes from where the information comes from - Kirito. At the point where he says the testers only breached floor 14 or so is around the same time he says he never made it out of floor one. It's when he's still lying to the audience and downplaying both his knowledge and skill. Then, not only does he reveal himself as a beater, he also mocks regular beta testers, saying not to group them on the same level. Even if he was telling the truth about how far the testers got, he also categorizes beaters separately and thus could easily have progressed far beyond the progress regular beta testers supposedly made.

The pain thing IS mentioned in the show, albeit briefly in the first episode when showing whats-his-face the ropes. I know their explanation. The problem is the implementation. I get that sometimes it affects people and sometimes it doesn't based on the individual person's mentality upon getting hit. That's great. The problem is that garden scene. Not only is Kirito completely unflinching when hit by seven swords at once, he's also completely unmoved. First of all, he clearly shows his ability to completely negate the pain emotion here, but reacts to pain regularly in other episodes. Then the second problem is knockback. Even if the swords don't affect him reaction-wise or damage-wise, they should still manipulate his body on a physical level. In all other cases, when he or any other player is hit, their body is affected by the offending weapon's momentum. Just for this one scene, however, it's like the physics engine was just shut off for kirito's body and he stands there unmoving while getting pummeled. This is the inconsistency I'm talking about.

The hack thing, I'll grant you that depending on how it's implemented. A DDOS attack doesn't actually alter any code, it just spams a server with requests until it overloads and crashes. Any hack failsafe would have to be client-side in order to stop a DDOS hit.

I'm assuming the food thing is all the players were hooked up to ivs, i've assumed as much since the second episode. I was only raising the question of how come nobody in the last two years has ever thought to pose that question. I guess since you have an answer from the future via manga that it WILL eventually get asked, but I'm just saying you'd think that'd happen before now. Especially in more recent episodes that have at least in part focused on food.

I notice you skipped over the whole game ratings board thing. I'm actually curious if that was brought up in the manga or not.