Is there any reason to play this if you own an Xbox 360 and a copy of Nier you never finished and you hate boys but love dads
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Not particularly no. It is a slightly smoother version with tiny bonus stuff I haven’t seen yet that will just be on youtube.
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I have put a total of 10 hours into Nier across 3 save files. I do not know how often I listened to the soundtrack, I am not really a game music guy but I bought that shit off fuckin’ iTunes and it probably cost more than the game itself* but I was like ‘let’s give renowned artist Square Enix Music a little walking around money’ and I’m sure that composer got every dime I spent. I do not think I could play the new version if it ain’t crossfading the music, that’s the best part of this game. Runner up is diorama-y buildings. #3 is hog drifting. Rankings are preliminary; I never finished this game okay I know it’s supposed to have wild shit happening later but I never got there.
My last attempt to play this game was 2016. I thought it was more recent. I got 80 minutes into that run. I have reached the same point now, on attempt 3. I fully know why I quit then, and before, and may quit now: you actually have to play this game, and it’s a total bore when you aren’t talking to people or riding a hog, all this time spent walking through empty rooms until you run into these fuckin’ possessed origamis that you bop by pressing XXXXXXX and then you move onto the next empty room. These environments are all fine, this is an attractive game, but if a vibe isn’t reinforced by mechanics or if the pace ain’t brisk enough I kinda don’t give a shit, if you don’t wanna give me interesting action-y things to do just make your game entirely menu based and I’ll probably be able to overlook how it’s the 3,000th time I’ve played through Laputa Lite.
I do not know if all these Japanese games with a billion items to collect and carve and craft were aping Monster Hunter but I am just going to pretend they were, I am declaring Monster Hunter one of the most destructive influences in 21st century game design, after 80 minutes with Nier (which as I recall is somewhat tame by PS2/HD ERA harvesting standards) I regret ever saying “I wish Monster Hunter Rise had more hunting, and harvest, and busywork.” That was silly of me.
I nearly had a heart attack digging my 360 out of the closet. It was the most I’ve exerted myself this year. So I am going to beat this game cuz I need to justify actually using my body. I bet I enjoy the game, kinda, just like I enjoyed it, kinda, 11 years ago. I am sure I’ll nail the fishing bit, I am pretty sure I had no problems with it the first time.
I am one with the sea.
*Purchased at a K-Mart on Long Island like a week after release at a steep discount. That chain was chasing the “gamer demographic” for about a month or two there. It did not work out for them. Can you believe it?
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Getting one-shot by a boar was not as funny as it should have been and the beep when your mana bar refills is giving me VMU flashbacks in the worst way. If the remake doesn’t have the beep it’s the version to get.
Authentic list of all the good parts of nier
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I regret choosing that name, for some reason I thought this was some Earthbound shit, I didn’t realize they’d be calling the dad by that name, I fucked up.
Weiss’s VA is doing serious heavy lifting, he is super good and I’m giving a big thumbs up to the localization team for not overdoing it like so many SE games but all his dialogue is pointing out how much everything you’re doing is dumb and bad and sucks and that’s bad writing okay, I bet if you go to college they teach you not to do that in “How Not To Write Bad 101”. If you are ever working on a project and you keep writing stuff about how dumb and bad your story is you may want to take a step back and either quit writing or edit out all the bits that suck or all the dialogue that lets everyone know you know you suck.
I climbed through this Aerie and no one there would talk to me so now I have to go back to a library and this is worse than any fetch quest in any Zelda game (yes even the Wii ones), just huge fucking jerk off motion at all this cynical tedious bullshit, will list this on eBay tomorrow, can’t wait to spend the $30 I get for it on cocktail glasses at IKEA.
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just play it on 360 and if your frothing demand for more nier is still unsated upon completion, play the remake. imo even the “mechanical improvements” don’t amount to much. the remake feels better to play, sure, but I quite liked the combat mechanics in the original too and they work totally fine on their own.
I haven’t noticed any issues with the crossfading? the tracks themselves are re-arranged but otherwise that aspect feels faithful to the original.
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my copy of this finally arrived. put on Japanese voices to begin with, but may end up switching to English because there’s so much incidental talking while fighting. are they decent in this one?
just met Weiss and it’s been fun to get back into this game again. honestly had totally forgotten it had Zelda block puzzles. feels super weird to play a game like this in 2021
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The nier dub is notable for being amazing so yes you should play it in english
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the dub is extremely good, don’t miss out on the talking Alan Rickman book
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yeah english is worth it for weiss alone, but it’s overall a great dub. the original was great too!
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yes, i remember liking the original quite a bit, but i felt like it would be worth it to hear the JP voices this time. that said, the positioning of the subtitles makes it pretty impossible to read and play at the same time and i feel like i’m missing out on some good jokes
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its worth it to hear kaine swear. finally they made a videogame character for me!
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The Japanese speaker has logged on.
Surprised how different the characters are between the languages. The Junk Yard Younger Brother is different.
They really localized Kaine in a great way. I love making Weiss stuck up and British. In Japanese he’s kind of just old and wise. Kaine has a sort of Sukeban air to her and is a lot less snippy back towards Weiss.
There was one prompt where Popolla said two lines of dialog and then I had it silently advance the english text several times. That was neat.
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also noticing that Weiss and Noir are just “shiro” and “kuro” and like…idk, i kind of prefer the localized names
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Hmm! Will have to catch this I only turned it on a bit into a NG+
Actually the real reason to play it dubbed is for the red bag man in seafront who sounds like a more soy version of david cross in halo 2 and says “my wife” like borat
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My brain is roasting in Nier. The side quests keep piling up and I just can’t say no.
In retrospect the library scene with the dark colossus and the Shadowlord is kinda dumb in some ways. Kaine’s gotta hold a door closed while everyone gets their shit wrecked and Emil is temporarily unable to petrify anything. It’s a good turning point in the narrative but the logistics of the scene operate very conveniently. Like what is that door made of? Petrifying Kaine is a cool sacrifice and naturally leads to a good reuniting after the timeskip but why not have Kaine hold the shade down and end up with a giant shade/Kaine wrestling match statue in the library?
It doesn’t bother me too much since the underlying plot is built on certain contrivances of circumstance that you have to accept for the setup to work but that part sticks out as the thing that has aged the worst to me so far.
I say this as I attempt to legitimately grow pink moonflower seeds.
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i love kaine but i dont think the person who wrote her swears regularly in their own lives. its charming but jarring
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Kaine swears like a teenager that just discovered swearing and thinks it makes them the most powerful. It’s great.
Which is to say, I agree, but that works for her.
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