The Sword Art Online stage panel at the " Dengeki Bunko Aki no Saiten 2017" ( Dengeki Bunko Fall Festival 2017) event in Tokyo announced on Sunday that a television anime adaptation of the Alicization arc in Reki Kawahara 's Sword Art Online light novel series is launching. The third series is titled Sword Art Online: Alicization .

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 Alicization arc is in volumes 9 through 18 of the original novel series.

The Sword Art Online: Ordinal Scale anime film (pictured at right), which opened in Japan on February 18, had teased that " SAO will return."

The anime series has two television anime adaptations, an anime special, and the 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 television series based on the novels.

[Embedded video via pKjd]