Chapter 321 Discussion and Broadcast

Sword Art Online's TV animation is not produced by Xia Yan Company, and its broadcast time is also the result of joint discussions between Liuli Publishing House and Xianliu Animation.

After all, the light novel of Sword Art Online officially became the best-selling work in the history of Dragon Country novel industry in the last quarter. However, please note that the "volume average" will not only increase. If the single volume released later sells If it is not as good as before, then this data will fall back.

Of course, the sales of Sword Art Online have been very stable, but Liuli Publishing House wanted to strike while the iron was hot and quickly widen the gap between Sword Art Online and the second place, so they directly moved Sword Art Online to the spring schedule anyway.

Although Xia Yan was the original author of this work, he did not get too involved in the business considerations of the novel book club.

Anyway, as long as they are not aired at the same time slot to compete with each other for ratings, it will be fine. Sword Art Online will be aired at 8:30 pm on Saturday night, and Lelouch of the Rebellion will be aired at 8 pm on Sunday night. If all goes well, the two works will become Two masterpieces in the animation industry in the spring schedule.

This is Xia Yan’s idea, and it’s also the idea of ​​Liuli Publishing House and Hesenryukama Animation.

But actually

This is not what fans think.

Wherever there are people, there is competition.

Historically, fans of Xia Yan's novels, animations, and comics have always helped each other, and most of them are even three fans in one person.

Previously, the three works were in different sections, and everyone enjoyed it.

But since it was confirmed in early December that Sword Art Online would air in January, the atmosphere has completely changed.

"Brothers, I'm sorry, I'm going to rebel."

"Although I am CC's loyal licking dog, there is nothing I can do about it. Asuna is my true god. I am a member of the Sword Art Online party."

"Lelouch has been arrogant for more than half a year. That's enough. Last year, the animation world was dominated by Lelouch. This year, it seems that a new god has ascended the throne in Sword Art Online."

"My favorite saying among Lelouch fans is that Lelouch is invincible. Hehe. I can't wait to see Lelouch's ratings and popularity being lowered by Sword Art Online."

"You are overthinking. Sword Art Online novel fans are indeed scary, but Lelouch has been airing for more than half a year and has accumulated a lot of anime fans. Do you really think Lelouch will be surpassed by Sword Art Online?"

"Anyway, I am a neutral player. I also like to watch Lelouch and Sword Art Online. I used to watch one anime a week, but now I watch two anime a week."

"Speaking of which, does it make sense whether Sword Art Online or Lelouch has higher ratings? After all, they are not both the works of old thieves, so what's there to argue about?"

"You don't know this. In the field of novels nowadays, the most popular female character is Asuna, and in the field of animation, CC. The protagonists of the two works, Li Tongli and Lelouch, are more powerful. No one cares at all. What the fans care about is The result of the battle between CC and Asuna for the title of popular queen. It is obvious that as long as the ratings of the work are higher, then whoever has the capital to ridicule the other party will be able to enjoy it. "

"."

"?"

"There's something wrong with you, right? What's there to argue about?"

"What's the point?"

"No matter what, I just can't allow CC to lose to Asuna.

"Hey, Asuna won't lose to CC, a heartless witch."

"You Asuna fans, in the novel Asuna lay in the SAO game for two years, and then woke up and kissed Li Tongren who rushed to the hospital. You can see how Asuna is described in the animation. Sina’s tone of voice is that she hasn’t brushed her teeth in two years.”

"Come on, the idiot cc fans above are just cc, an old witch who has lived for hundreds of years, and she is still in love with Lelouch? This is not something that can be explained by mother-in-law and grandson love. Even if Asuna hasn't brushed her teeth for two years, she still can't. It must be delicious. cc It’s not necessarily true. With the appearance of a girl and the heart of an old witch, it’s a dream to compete with Asuna for popularity!”

January 1st, New Year's Day.

A group of two-dimensional fans in Long Kingdom started arguing on various forums early in the morning.

Before Sword Art Online was confirmed to premiere in January, fans of Lelouch's work were wandering around the two-dimensional world.

Even if Xia Yan has so many negative fans, no one would dare to take the lead. After all, Lelouch's animation has almost become a myth in the hearts of fans.

until today

Everyone in the Dragon Kingdom two-dimensional industry finally saw what it would be like for fans of Dragon Kingdom's two super-popular works to tear each other apart.

There is no room for discussion of the third animated work in the two-dimensional section of the Jiuxiao Forum.

On the forum, look from top to bottom.

Posts related to Lelouch and Sword Art Online appear alternately.

All major two-dimensional news media and commentators have published articles. .

[Will the launch of Sword Art Online end Lelouch’s dominance in ratings for half a year? 】

[CC or Asuna, who is the most popular girl in the anime industry? 】

[Lelouch's status is not guaranteed, and he will face the biggest challenger this quarter. 】

[Estimated ratings for the launch of Sword Art Online: Whether it can recreate Lelouch's original glory. 】

[It turns out that Lelouch is not invincible, he also has opponents! 】

[Looking back on his six-year creative career, Xia Yan realized at this time that his only enemy was himself. 】

This wave of online quarrel between fans of Sword Art Online and Lelouch was beyond Xia Yan's expectation.

and

He has absolutely no control over this kind of thing, and he doesn't even dare to send messages or make comments.

If fans think that Xia Yan, the creator of this work, intends to help any other work, then he will definitely be criticized by another group of fans.

This is no joke.

The plots in Xia Yan's previous works, whether they were fragmentary or depressing, only affected the supporting roles, and did not involve the main characters at all.

Now fans are fighting fiercely over the ranking of Asuna and CC. If Xia Yan handles it improperly, it is likely that he will be blocked by angry fans on his way to work in the future.

However, Liuli Bookstore, Xia Tang Animation and Xianliu Animation actually reacted quickly.

Although it is New Year's Day, Xia Yan and the senior executives of the other two companies also gathered the employees of the operation department who were on vacation and launched a wave of marketing planning for this matter.

Short videos, various posters and speeches on the company's official website have made the competition between the two animations more intense to a certain extent.

The fans of Sword Art Online and Code Geass actually made another part of Xia Yan's fans envious.

That is the fans of Hunter x Hunter.

The Hunter x Hunter comics were born just over a year ago, so animation is naturally on the agenda, but the speed must be delayed.

In the best case, there may be news in the second half of the year. If it is slow, we may not see it until next year or the year after.

The news of the fans of Hunter x Hunter finally did not make the controversy over the popularity of the heroine of this work more uncontrollable.

However, in just a few days, the atmosphere of the entire animation industry has completely changed.

After the New Year's Day holiday, a number of Dragon Country's Spring Festival animation works finally started broadcasting one after another.

Basically, there is an unspoken rule for the broadcast of these animation works in Dragon Country.

Low-cost, low-popularity animations are often broadcast from Monday to Friday.

TV stations will not give them any good schedules, and if they really give them any good broadcast time slots, they will basically become cannon fodder.

The Sword Art Online broadcast on Saturday and the Code Geass on Sunday are known to the entire Dragon Country animation industry and TV stations. These two time slots must be avoided.

After a few days, the situation of the Spring Festival animation market is basically clear.

As before, there are no popular works, but there are many high-quality animations.

If Xia Yan had not risen to prominence, the ratings of these works could even be called excellent.

It's a pity that it's now.

The 2% or 3% ratings at the beginning of the show are just that.

Many writers in the animation field are too lazy to even comment.

Finally, the first Saturday of January has arrived.

The first season of Sword Art Online, the first episode has been aired.

Since the animation of Sword Art Online is not produced by Xia Yan's company, Xia Yan cannot control many production details.

For example, the animation's BGM, production budget, character settings, etc., can only be determined by the specific discussion results between Xianliu Company and Liuli Bookstore.

In fact, many fans are also very nervous.

There are countless novels and comics about Longguo that have been animated.

They don't want to see a Sword Art Online animation with a strange style.

But after the first episode was aired, most fans were relieved.

Of course, Xianliu Animation did not design the animation characters completely according to the character images in the Sword Art Online light novel illustrations.

Although the images that Mo Ran helped to design at Xia Yan's request were excellent and even deeply rooted in the hearts of fans.

But Xianliu Animation itself is not a small company, and they are also quite experienced in animation adaptation.

The character settings have been slightly changed. Compared with the original work, the painting style is more gorgeous and beautiful. Asuna's character dress is also more sassy and less erotic. Fans may like Asuna with the kind of erotic character dress, but the person in charge of Xianliu Animation hopes to shape Asuna more beautiful and handsome, not like a vase.

Moreover, the bgm of the animation is also purely original by a well-known musician in Longguo, who helped Sword Art Online animation to design in line with the theme from beginning to end.

Of course, this kind of adaptation to a certain extent is just the cultural difference between the two planes.

Xia Yan used to like to pick out the successful elements in the original animation of these works in the parallel world and integrate them into the Longguo version, but this does not mean that practitioners in Longguo cannot do these things well. It's just that Xia Yan himself wants to avoid risks and strengthen the ready-made things.

Finally. After the first episode of Sword Art Online animation was broadcast, it received a high rating of 9.4 points.

The only point worth criticizing is that the transitions in some places of the animation are not delicate enough.

But this is understandable.

Xianliu animation is not Xia Tang animation, which can easily have a return rate of several hundred percent. People will definitely be more conservative when investing in animation. Funds and other things will only be used on the blade, without distinguishing insignificant details, which is not as good as Lelouch.

But the next day, the ratings of the first episode of Sword Art Online were still released.

5.46%

A very good ratings data.

Although it is not as high as Lelouch's 6.50%, in fact, everyone in the Dragon Country animation industry knows it.

The ratings of Sword Art Online are just the beginning.

At least most of the 5.46% ratings are contributed by Xia Yan's novel fans, but if a work wants to be popular, it must not rely solely on the original fans.

In particular, if a work wants to achieve a rating of more than 6%, it is basically impossible without good popularity.

Just like a traffic star, no matter how high his traffic is, the top box office of his movie is 10 billion. If you want the box office to go up, but you can't attract passers-by fans to enter, then everything is in vain.

Xia Yan sat in the office, looking at the ratings of the first episode of Sword Art Online animation sent by his subordinates.

This result was actually better than he expected.

If everything was normal with the Sword Art Online animation, it would be normal for the ratings to reach the same level as Lelouch.

Both are excellent popular works that lead their respective eras in the island countries of parallel worlds.

But the 5.46% rating at the start was really exaggerated.

"Is it the result of the quarrel between the Sword Art Online fans and the rebellious Lelouch fans? They helped the two works to advertise and gain popularity on the Internet for free." Xia Yan raised a smile at the corner of his mouth.

He looked at the foundation forum.

There will be statistical agencies on the relevant websites of Longguo to publish these data, so the people in Longguo who pay attention to the Sword Art Online animation also know its opening results like Xia Yan.

This result

can only be said to be within the guesswork of most people in Longguo, but even so, many of Xia Yan's colleagues in the animation industry took a breath.

In fact, no fool would think that the ratings of Sword Art Online would surpass Lelouch as soon as it was broadcast.

After all, a considerable part of the ratings of Code Geass are from casual TV viewers. The absolute number of this audience group of Sword Art Online, which has just started, is definitely not as good as Code Geass, which has already started.

But what does it mean to have 5.46% at the start?

Anyway, when the first season of Code Geass was just started, the first episode of Code Geass, which inherited the attention of a lot of cyberpunk animation fans, had this rating.

"According to this situation, it won't take long for Sword Art Online to catch up with Code Geass?"

"Don't be too confident. It took four months for Code Geass to break through the 6% ratings. Although the ratings of Sword Art Online are good at the beginning, who knows what will happen in the future?"

"That's right, but the plot of Sword Art Online is actually quite good. In other words, the first chapter of Sword Art Online is the most exciting chapter of the whole work so far. I think its ratings will break 6% faster than the first season of Code Geass."

"I have been in the industry for more than ten years, and this is the only After two years, I finally saw an animation with a rating of over 6%. But is the market telling me that in the same quarter, there can be two animations with a rating of over 6%, and these two works are created by the same author? "

"Don't brag. The plot of the Sword Art Online novel is fine, but you have to be careful about the animation production. Wait for a few more weeks to see if the fairy animation has changed the original plot and caused fans to be angry. Don't brag too much now."

The opening data of the first episode of Sword Art Online caused a huge wave in the animation industry the next day.

In the evening, the fourteenth episode of the second season of Lelouch of the Rebellion, which Lelouch fans have been looking forward to for several weeks, was broadcast.

The plot connects to where it ended in mid-December last year.

Lolulu plotted against Shirley, but Lelouch could only watch Shirley's life slip away at his fingertips.

He was determined to eradicate Lolo, but on the surface, he had to continue to handle his relationship with him properly.

Even when he saw Lolo again, he had to praise him for doing a good job.

Killing Shirley helped him deal with a threat that knew his secret identity.

And after that, Shirley's sudden death also made Suzaku suspicious of Lelouch.

The plot of the whole episode basically promoted these contents.

It was not particularly exciting, and there was no plot that fans expected Lelouch to kill Lolo directly in anger.

But the ratings remained stable at 6.45%.

It also did not go up to the next level.

Lelouch, while seeking to break the ratings record of Madoka Magica.

Behind its tail, there is also a challenger "Sword Art Online" that has just started airing and is catching up with it.

Dragon Country's spring animation market this year.

In the eyes of many people, it is finally a little fun, and it is not Lelouch who swept everything in the previous few quarters.

However.

The current situation is very subtle.

Did Lelouch animation break the ratings record of Madoka Magica first, or did Sword Art Online catch up with it before that?

Can the popularity queen competition between CC and Asuna come to a conclusion this quarter?

Related topics have become a new focus of discussion for all people in the animation industry.