There's a new venture to make anime real! IBM Japan has taken up the challenge of realizing the VRMMO from Reki Kawahara's Sword Art Online light novels, hopefully without the thousands of deaths, in what they're calling Sword Art Online: The Beginning. A site has launched taking applications for 208 brave souls (able to comfortably wear a head set, have their bodies and walk without assistance) to alpha test SAO! 

Applicants selected by lottery will try out the experience at a Tokyo location March 18th and 20th.

The venture looks to showcase the potential contribution of IBM Cognitive Computing (remember them from their Steins;Gate promotion?) to the future of gaming.

Participants will be scanned into a 3D then interact with a virtual space using IBM Cloud Services and SoftLayer technologies.

Kirito's Yoshitsugu Matsuoka, Asuna's Haruka Tomatsu and Yui's Kanae Itō legend their vocies to the project.

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Scott Green is editor and reporter for anime and manga at geek entertainment site Ain't It Cool News. Follow him on Twitter at @aicnanime.