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NYR companion: Nier review

Nier 02

A few years ago I wrote a series that engaged with Metacritic’s score aggregates by playing games at various score tiers. As part of this series I actually got through quite a few of the selected games: I almost completed Saw and I finished Plants versus Zombies (I even hand-wrote a glowing review but never typed it up). I also played and beat Nier and wrote this review which has sat on my old site for two years.

As part of this week’s Mirror’s Edge piece I decided to finally get this review out before it disappears entirely.

So, this is a Square Enix game.

It was with this fact in mind that I resigned myself to playing the game and as I sat through the splash-screens I was already mentally writing my review.

Then the first cutscene before the Initial Interactive State occurred and I did a double take.

Did she just swear profusely?

Nier is not your usual RPG: that early swearing is actually a little misleading as to the tone but it definitely serves as a good way to wash away fears of this being another random-encounter-ridden emo snore fest, and the game definitely tries to deliver on that early promise. It almost comes through too… almost.

The game begins in a dystopian future world with you taking control of a middle-aged man trying to protect his invalid daughter from Shades; strange demon creatures that are made of warping energy fields. The action is pure hack’n’slash at this point. You go through the motions of dodging and diving whilst destroying hordes of enemies with a pipe and the assistance of a mysterious book that allows you to conjure glowing spears, giant red hands and thorny spikes from the ground.

GiantBomb coined the word ‘Abilitease’ and it describes Nier‘s opening perfectly as you are given a taste of the crazy arsenal that will, eventually, be at your disposal, but as soon as you have it all it is taken away.

Thematically this makes sense as, once the introduction/tutorial is over, you  jump hundreds of years into the future. What doesn’t make sense, and having played the game to completion I am still not sure I get it, is that you seem to be playing the same character looking after the same sickly daughter except there appears to be no acknowledgement of the opening being canonical.

Regardless of this strange disconnect (maybe it was meant to be a dig at the illogical nature of most stories in games) I feel that Nier and its developers, Cavia, deserve praise on multiple levels in regards to what they managed to accomplish.

Even though it feels a little heavy-handed it was nice to be playing as a genuinely, gauche-in-nature, ugly protagonist and for the team he assembles around him to be so very odd. Admittedly Kaine, the sweary female sidekick, feels too much like a conscious decision to buck the trend without deviating too far from eye candy. However Grimoire Weiss the talking magic book is a genuinely different character to what we are used to seeing. His utter disdain for most of the game’s adherence to JRPG staples is amusing and truly funny. The constant breaking of the fourth wall may be jarring for some but for me it was nice to have someone else complain about endless fetch quests. Emil, the third team member, is also very interesting: when you meet him he is unable to look at anything without turning it to stone. His character progression is possibly the most interesting as well as tragic but I don’t want to go into that as it would involve substantial spoilers.

Shame that she has to be another JRPG female character that makes me cringe in terms of the way she is dressed
Shame that she has to be another JRPG female character who makes me cringe in terms of the way she is dressed

My second piece of praise goes to the music direction. A colleague recently wrote a small piece about the little personal touches in games that shine through in the strangest places and make you understand that passion can be found in the oddest spots. The person(s) at Cavia who worked on the music and the melding of these compositions between areas of the game have done it masterfully. I have never spent so long voluntarily listening to a game soundtrack (with the exception of Phantom Dust) just to see what would happen next. The fading in and out of different instruments in the main two hubs is subtle but when you realise it is happening it feels like someone loved Monkey Island and its similar use of interweaving themes. As for individual compositions, I urge everyone to check out the Junk Heap track as it exposes how bad the elevator Muzak bullshit some of the game’s peers pass off as acceptable really is.

The game also has a wonderfully eclectic attitude towards its presentation. It is never content to stay in one playstyle. One minute you will find yourself running through a slightly generic Legend of Zelda dungeon before finding yourself embroiled in a Portal puzzle, followed by a 2D platforming section and finally a bullet-hell inspired boss fight. Cavia really tries to throw every style of game design at the wall and just see what sticks.

They even have a gardening mini-game where you can cultivate random items. Why? Who knows.

This sense of ‘why the fuck not?’ makes Nier feel dangerously ambitious. Even when certain features don’t work (mandatory fishing sections that made me almost break my controller) it is delightful to see a game daring to be different. Like Deadly Premonition you don’t know what is going to happen next from one area to the next. Text adventure dream sequence? Sure. Gauntlet-esque dungeon crawler? You are more than welcome.

The final part of the puzzle that pushes Nier up as a contender: its story. I would like to call the developer’s approach refreshing but to say that doesn’t really convey what I mean.

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In short, Nier is depressing. Not in an ‘Aerith just died’ sort of way. No, instead of a couple of unhappy moments the entire game is littered with snapshots of depression, decay, illness and misery. You can’t help but play this game and feel like shit if you pay the slightest attention to any side-quest, mission or even casual banter. More specifically you’ll feel like the shit that clings to a sheep’s arse, dries, and causes the animal irritation.

The main story is glum enough as it is; one man’s attempt to prevent his daughter from succumbing to illness with no clear plan on how to actually do that while the daughter remains resolutely positive despite all evidence indicating that she is going to die.

The game’s casual nihilism is what struck a chord with me, particularly as it is content to go for the long con in its attempts to punch you in the emotional gut. The example I am going to use starts at around the five hour play-through mark.

You come across two brothers and you need their help to forge a weapon, so you agree to go search for their mother who disappeared some days previously. Grimoire Weiss immediately points out that she is probably dead. You go through a nearby dungeon and fight a boss to find her dead next to another man. She has a note that she planned to mail to her sons to tell them that she was leaving them behind to start a new life, to be ‘free and happy’.

You go back and lie to the offspring about their mother, pretending to never have found her. The younger sibling thinks that you are incompetent. He runs off crying, only for the elder son to confide in you that he knows the truth and that he is glad that she died happy and with someone she loved.

Skip to about the ten hour mark: the two boys end up having to leave their home in search of supplies. The elder brother is killed and the younger brother goes insane with his thirst for revenge (he still charges me for weapon upgrades, though).

Skip to around the fifteen hour mark: you are given the rather innocuous task of trying to track down a woman’s fiancée. You wander through each area of the game and as you do so you encounter tales of the man’s infidelity and attempts to woo as many women as possible. Eventually you come across the insane kid, only to piece together that the dead body next to his mother’s was the Casanova you have been searching for. Chances are she didn’t die next to some one that loved her back.

Now if that doesn’t get you down there are also stories about suicide, failed marriages, unrequited love that ends with one of the pairing dead and the other an ageing curmudgeon (who dies before finding out the truth), dead dogs; you name it the game has it.

With all of the above in mind some of you might have already looked at the score at the bottom and are scratching your heads at how I came to that grade. But for all the things that Nier does right – the superb sound direction and the dovetailing around character stereotypes – and all of the things that it attempts – eclectic game design and downbeat story – Nier still suffers from being a repetitive hack and slash RPG.

It might gently mock the traditional side quests but it can’t hide the fact that 50% of what it has you doing are fetch quests. Furthermore the world is just too small; this works in the game’s favour most of the time as many of the quests are not sign-posted on your map and require familiarity with each locale. The problem is that after twenty hours of trudging back and forth between the six areas you really want to see something new.

Nier‘s combat is also lacking in diversity. The are only a smattering of new moves handed out after the first five hours and none of them are necessary for your advancement. The same can be said of the magic powers; almost all of the bosses can be defeated by using the first ability you are given in the game, leaving little necessity for a second power.

As a dressed-down and compact eight hour experience Nier would have been something to recommend and I would definitely have given it a higher score. Sadly the amount of filler and the empty promise of progression leaves this game a curiosity and not a necessity.

7/10 


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Comments

23 responses to “NYR companion: Nier review”

  1. @radian_ Avatar

    Well, sounds like it's necessary that I play this.
    Just me though.

    1. badgercommander Avatar
      badgercommander

      I think you will love it. Just promise me that you go to Youtube for the proper way to finish the fishing tutorial as the game LIES in its text.

      I got so angry with that fishing tutorial that I slammed my controller in the wall hard enough to damage the chatpad connected and shave the black colouring off the edge of the controller.

      1. @radian_ Avatar

        Fishing minigame and "bullet-hell inspired boss fight"?
        Ambassador, you are spoiling us.

        1. badgercommander Avatar
          badgercommander

          Yup, there is so much shit in this game that you can do. The text adventure section is kind of hilarious.

          1. @radian_ Avatar

            Sounds genius.
            Just reminded me of the best bit in Baten Katos where you're taken from default JRPG-world to some sort of Candy Kingdom and then you're suddenly in the NES version of Tower of Druaga for no reason.

        1. badgercommander Avatar
          badgercommander

          Did that happen before or after my review? But shit, I missed out plenty of rage moments. Like playing Call of Duty 3 on Veteran difficulty, I threw a controller at of 4th floor apartment window. I retrieved it from the alleyway and it worked fine.

          1. ShaunCG Avatar

            I cannot like this comment as much as it deserves to be liked.

            Although my favourite is still the Dreamcast / stairs story.

          2. badgercommander Avatar
            badgercommander

            UFC has a lot to answer for.

            That console never saw it coming.

  2. Richard Goodness Avatar
    Richard Goodness

    Did you play through and get the alternate endings? It's one of those rare games where all four endings are crucial.

    Nier is ultimately about the impossibility of communication. It's a game where there are no real "sides", just a bunch of people with different philosophies. The two "sides" in the game just kind of happen because neither side is able to trust each other and immediately assumes the worst. It's a game where everyone is right and everyone is wrong. Both sides are justifably terrified of each other; a very long drunken conversation would solve matters, but no one's willing to take that step.

    1. badgercommander Avatar
      badgercommander

      Yeah, I started the second playthrough after finishing the write-up for this review and I could already see that there was a lot of stuff going on that wasn't in the first play through. Maybe I will go back and do further retrospective work on it as it seems to me that it would be well worth it.

  3. badgercommander Avatar
    badgercommander

    "A colleague recently wrote a small piece about the little personal touches in games that shine through in the strangest places and make you understand that passion can be found in the oddest spots."

    Hhahahahhahahaha, that links to an article from over 2 years ago.

    1. ShaunCG Avatar

      I had almost forgotten that Woolie had an account on AR!

  4. Simon_Walker Avatar
    Simon_Walker

    The single thing about Nier that interested me was the way the subsequent playthroughs show things in a new perspective and shed more light on the events and situations of the game.

    Not quite enough to get it, but that kind of thing is something I'd like to see done more, my being rather fond of replayable games.

    1. badgercommander Avatar
      badgercommander

      Play Way of the Samurai then. Doesn't take as long to play through and does exactly that.

      1. Simon_Walker Avatar
        Simon_Walker

        I intend to. When I find a reasonably priced copy somewhere.

        That would be number three, obviously, due to my strong personal convictions.

        1. badgercommander Avatar
          badgercommander

          http://www.amazon.co.uk/s/ref=nb_sb_noss_1?url=se

          You can pick used copies up for about 10 pounds.

          1. ShaunCG Avatar

            Not sure if Amazon have a Finnish site. But if it helps, Walker, I can buy you a copy and post it over?

          2. Simon_Walker Avatar
            Simon_Walker

            Amazon delivers to Finland no problem, but if I start using it to check off entries on my List Of Games To Get I'll break my budget and end up with a stack of games I won't find the time to play any time soon.

            When I find a copy in a store somewhere it will be purchased in place of some other game at a time I'm actively looking for a new distraction. Yeah, I miss stuff, but every game I do buy gets a fair outing.

  5. Sid Menon Avatar
    Sid Menon

    This sounds like Drakengard 1, but with just a depressing story instead of an entire experience that turns its detestation of the player into an art form. I didn't even bother getting the final ending of Drakengard that leads into NIER, but I think I've been jackhammered enough. NIER is on my list of games to get, for sure.

    Also, did you consider calling this article NYeR?

    1. badgercommander Avatar
      badgercommander

      I have a copy of Drakengard lying around, I might have to give that a go. As for Nier, it is definitely worth giving a go, I cannot stress how awesome the music is in that game.

      NYeR? Fuck, I total missed a beat on that. I am going to have to get more punny,.

      1. ShaunCG Avatar

        I played a bit of Drakengard back in the PS2 days and have got to say that the combat is dull, repetitive and slow.

        It was as if someone played Dynasty Warriors on ketamine and thought "this is an experience I must bring to market".

        1. Sid Menon Avatar
          Sid Menon

          Yeah, it's extremely noticeable that enemies tend to attack you in groups of five and are always looking for an excuse to go back to their positions if you get above that number. Also, FUCKING CROSSBOWS. All you can do against them is guard, which still damages you. I used magic almost exclusively on them. And while it's great that weapons have unique animations for their 13-hit combos, most any enemy will use their combo breaking ability or be dead before it's finished.

          But I just can't bring myself to sell it! Maybe if it's ever worth a good chunk of monAHAHAHA.

          I played Drakengard 2 first, which was actually mostly enjoyable, though getting successive endings required replaying the entire game which was a terrible idea. I did sell it, but that was when I was in the same mindset that led to me selling anything without "replay value" (I miss you Silent Hill 2).