The TV anime series Sword Art Online - airing in Japan from July 2012 - is created by studio A-1 Pictures, based on a light novel series by Reki Kawahara. The story revolves around a boy named Kazuto "Kirito" Kirigaya who enters a virtual-reality, massively multi-player online (MMO) world called "Sword Art Online". There is no escape from this world unless the player clears the game, but "game over" means the death of the player.