Series to air for full year to adapt entire arc from original novels

The official website for the Sword Art Online: Alicization anime began streaming a new promotional video for the anime on Monday. The video previews LiSA's opening theme song "Adamas" and Eir Aoi's ending theme song "Iris."

AnimeLab is streaming an English-subtitled version of the trailer, which is available worldwide outside of Japan.

The show's staff also revealed on Monday that the anime will air for four cours, or four quarters of a year. The site did not specify if the anime will air for four consecutive cours.

The show will premiere on TV in Japan on Tokyo MX, Tochigi TV, Gunma TV, BS11, and MBS on October 6 at 24:00 (effectively October 7 at 12:00 a.m.), before airing on October 9 on TV Aichi. The show will stream in Japan on AbemaTV.

The anime's hour-long first episode will have a premiere event in Japan on September 15. The episode will have a premiere event in Los Angeles on the same day. The series will also have premiere events in Australia, France, Germany, Russia, and South Korea.

Manabu Ono ( Horizon in the Middle of Nowhere , Saki , The Asterisk War ) is directing the anime at A-1 Pictures. Sword Art Online the Movie: Ordinal Scale animation directors Gou Suzuki and Tomoya Nishiguchi will join Shingo Adachi for the character designs. Yuki Kajiura is returning to compose the music.

The series will again star Yoshitsugu Matsuoka as Kirito and Haruka Tomatsu as Asuna. Ai Kayano will play Alice, and Nobunaga Shimazaki will play Eugeo.

The anime will cover the entirety of the novels' "Alicization Arc." The Alicization arc is in volumes 9 through 18 of the original novel series. Ono said in an interview on the anime's official website that he accepted the job as director around the time of the Sword Art Online: Ordinal Scale film's preview screenings, and he has heard from Aniplex staff since that time that the plan is to adapt the original novel series all the way to the end.

The novel series has two television anime adaptations, an anime special, and a recent film. The franchise has also inspired multiple manga series, games, and a virtual reality demonstration in Japan. Aniplex of America releases the anime in North America. Skydance Television is planning a live-action series on Netflix based on the novels.

Update: Added English-subtitled version of video from AnimeLab above. For readers who live in Japan, Aniplex's original video is below.

Sources: Sword Art Online: Alicization anime's website, MoCa News