The first SAO novel was great. The concepts, the setting, the MC and the villain looked promising. Then the amateur writer tried his hand at romance. Then we got that power of love shit. It was nothing to REEEEEEE about since the overall story was still ok.
Then Fairy Dance happened and gave us an uninspired copy paste world complete with a self-insert power fantasy story and a matching MC that has a cheat ability. The prototype for the modern isekai.
I read the progressive version a few months ago hoping it was him fixing SAO since he now had more experience at writing. It follows the same trend. Starts of great then slowly devolves into shit but does it at a much quicker pace. Not even 1/10th into the Aincrad arc.
TLDR: SAO was a fluke and Asuna a shit.