"Feeling or causing despair about something."
The subject of hopelessness has come up in a few animes I've watched, but a more recent and very interesting case is Sword Art Online. My friend introduced this series to me and just recently I caught up to the current episode it is on.
The short hand plot to SAO is, a new virtual reality MMO game comes out called Sword Art Online. It has a big launch and a ton of people sign in to the game on the first day, and to their surprise can't sign out when they try to. This game was a big experiment for the creator of SAO that traps people into the game and if the player dies in the game, is actually dead.
This is where the first symptoms of hopelessness show up from a majority of the characters because, understandability, this is not a game it's more or less, a death trap. Which make for a intriguing look at how all players interact with each other, either it being hostile or helpful.
Hopelessness really does bring out a more believable side to a story that is fiction and makes SAO seem less far-fetched than if you explained it to people. Which is in comparison to the average character of an anime, who usually is the super hero of the series and barely, if even doubts himself for a second.
Sword Art Online is one of more recent animes to come out this season, so I don't feel too comfortable actually analysing the plot any further. So when the series comes to an end, I might touch on it again or maybe I will have a different topic to discuss.