.hack, the never ending franchise.

I read .hack//A.I. Buster a few days ago and if you are a fan of the franchise I seriously suggest just reading the damn thing. Especially if you read the manga "Legend of the Twillight Bracelet" as it fills in quite a bit of important information. It's strange to see in the grand scheme of things how everything managed to fit together. A.I. Buster focuses on Watarai (a debugger for CC Corp) hunting down a vagrant AI. In the middle of that you get all sorts on insight into Liminality (the OVA packaged with the games), and events that happen years later in the manga.

I can't help but wonder how .hack//G.U. is going to fit into everything, since it supposed to take place years after the manga. I'm going to assume Balmung won't be in it, which is a shame since his character was the only overarching person in all the stories (except liminality- but that's because that takes place at the same time as the games). For Balmung to be in G.U. would mean that he'd have to have been playing the same online game for over 10 years. Eep. (Even if he was being paid for it.)