I missed Nier Automata when it released and after seeing a generous amount of praise for that game and Replicant I thought I'd pick up this remake before playing the -as I understand it- very loose sequel Automata.

I dont want to get into any spoilers for the game as its a very story heavy (apparently?) but I'm about to pick up the second companion from what I can tell.

Overall I guess I'm kind of lukewarm on this game - after learning about this originally being a Last Gen console game and reading up on those impressions I feel maybe I'm in the 2010 impressions camp.

It seemed like everything I read about the game described it as being very story heavy which is what initially sold me on it (I prefer my games as interactive stories) but I'm around 10 hours in and I'd reckon I've spent about half of those hours back tracking across the same five or six maps the game has presented to me so far.

Now the individual set pieces of the game that stand out are very unique and excellent - I've enjoyed a lot of the puzzles and boss fights as well as the strange out of genre leaps it takes like the Resident Evil Mansion or the bizarre text adventure of the Forest of Dreams.

I find the characters to be quite charming and the story to be interesting and compelling when its presented but those moments are so brief I ponder the design decisions to pad out the intensity of the gameplay with mindless running back and forth between fetch quest NPCs.

I've avoided most side quests but have dabbled in a few to find the pay off lacking. The only real reward being more charming dialog between Nier and Grimoire Wiess. Again 10-15 seconds of content for 10-15 minutes of questing.

What are everyone else's thoughts? Does the game pick up?

For a larger discussion - if a game does turn the corner in the later acts does it excuse a middling opening?

So far this game seems to be made of excellent individual components that somehow feel lesser then the sum of its parts.

Maybe these days its just because my time is so limited that I'm less enthused about spending it on filler.

The side quests are just optional fetch quests. Avoid them if you want and enjoy the story. Their only use is to gain cash and a few reward weapons you'll need for the 3rd ending (use a guide for that).

I just finished ending E this afternoon. I played the original release and still greatly enjoyed the remake, but I definitely found myself resenting it slightly for not fully valuing my time. I'd still recommend it wholeheartedly for anyone that has never experienced it, there's really very little like it, but I definitely don't see myself going back for a 3rd time.

Nier was my favourite RPG of the last generation, and this remake just brings back those great memories. It does require you to commit to it and know you'll be finishing it multiple times, but I think the story is worthwhile. The music is absolutely fantastic too.

Weiss is endlessly amusing, great voice acting too.

I loved Gestalt back in the day so there is definitely some nostalgia at play. But I was actually really concerned about the "value my time" aspect of things since I remembered the vast majority of side quests being bullshit.

And they are. But I actually like that? Like you say, it is 10-15 minutes (really more 5-10) of questing., But that makes it so that I can "accomplish something" almost every time I pick up the game. Some of it won't make sense until the second part of the game (you'll know it when you get there) or even later, but it has been interesting how much of everything gets foreshadowed or hinted at early on.

But also, this is a ps3/360 game and has the same problems the Demon Souls remake had. They did a LOT of work to make it "feel like what I remembered" but it is still fundamentally a game that was jank for its time and has been done so much better in the decade or so since.

But above all else, this is not a tight experience. It is loose with a lot of padding and the high likelihood that you do main story stuff in an order that is "weird". So if you find yourself hating it, there are other games to play. But I do think it is well worth sticking through until at least Ending A. If you don't want more after that then it is a good stopping point. And if you do, you'll rapidly find out why so many of us love this game.

Playing Nier on release is one of my favorite video game experiences ever, but yeah especially in the first chunk of the game it can feel very underwhelming. If you are finding the characters and story interesting, I would say that those aspects start to take center stage more and more as you get further to the true ending of the game. I didn't love Nier because the quests and combat were good - I loved it because it ended up doing things that I never expected. You do have to put some time in until you get there though.

In general, the '20 hours until it gets good!!!' thing sucks, but I don't know - it feels almost intentional when you take into account the overall themes that the game is going for.

I'm happy to hear the consensus for this game is pretty darned consistent - and yeah I'm not finding it painful to play or anything so I'm going to stick it out until it 'pays off'.

I agree especially with the parts where the game does something unexpected or different as a real stand out.

Even some of the little side quests I did I would notice the occasional little remark, joke or commentary on the videogaminess of what I was doing. Overall I dig it - but as others have mentioned the 'value my time' factor seems to be pretty off the chart. I cant help but feel this would have been better appreciated in the hands of 17 year old me or ported to a handheld so I can chomp away at it while stuck in a hotel for work.

The exciting thing is I really have no idea where this game can go in terms of story and spectacle. I really didnt expect to be running from barrels of blood in a creepy castle via text adventure!

I kind of stopped paying attention to this release once they announced it was just Replicant; have they made any announcements about ever including Gestalt? As someone who loved Gestalt, I have no interest in an alternate version of this story with a different protagonist.

@relkin: I mean, why though? It's worth seeing what's different and honestly it's kind of clear throughout that Replicants protagonist is who this story was designed to be about, and I say this begrudgingly because conceptually Gestalts protagonist is far more interesting of an idea.

@relkin: dad Nier is awesome and I was super bummed at first, but brother Nier is very good and I didn't really think about it too much after a couple hours in.

@relkin: I think I still prefer Papa Nier but Brother Nier makes for a more interesting protagonist in terms of how the story impacts him.

Mild Spoilers: Having a meaningful timeskip where the child becomes a pretty jaded and broken man actually works really well and it makes his viciousness toward the shades hit a lot harder.

That being said: just like you did the DLC (?) arenas as Brother Nier in Gestalt, you do it as Papa Nier in Replicant.

@efesell @mrbrightday@gundato: I don't have any connection to that character, and it's weird considering everyone else is the same. I guess I'm just not interested in seeing an alternate take on the same story; if I was to replay it, I'd rather just replay the story I'm familiar with. Obviously I can do that already by just hooking up my 360 again, but I'd rather not do that.

I dunno, it would be like if that re release of the Mass Effect Trilogy only let you play as Male Shepard. It probably wouldn't matter too much in the end for folks who played FemShep, but a lot of people have attachments to specific versions of that character; not just any Shepard will do.

Not a one-to-one parallel, but I think it makes my point well enough. Also, I really liked the VO for Papa Nier; he was a good straight man in between Kaine and Weiss's bullshit. Ah well, maybe they'll add in it at some point?

I fell off this game pretty hard. I never played the original so I don't have the same fondness for it that other people do.

I played and finished Nier Automata which I thought was really great and I was hoping Replicant would be more of that. But it isn't, except for maybe the combat and some other gameplay mechanics and systems. I find everything else about the game not even remotely as interesting. I played around 10 hours and I had to ask myself "why am I even playing this, I am not enjoying this at all". So, I stopped and I haven't gone back to it. The game probably picks up and gets good after a while but I really have no motivation to get to that point. I wanted to like it, I just don't :(

I picked up Nier Replicant Numbers on release and have so far only played enough to confirm the falseness most of the worst horror stories about the PC port. I loved the original Nier at the time, but I've been having trouble finding the motivation to play the remake with many other interesting new or unplayed games being available.

I think a lot of the revisionist history of coverage of the game has put a bad taste in my mouth too. Similar to how it was hard to enjoy Disco Elysium while a mob of psychotic fans were harassing Abby.

I just finished it yesterday. Overall I found it very interesting and I totally see why people love it. But to be honest, as someone whose first Yoko Taro game was Nier: Automata, this game felt like a "rough draft" of Automata in terms of what it is trying to do.

I think I burned myself out on it and that dulled the emotional impact of endings C/D/E. I was determined to finish it yesterday no matter what, and there were a number of hours more left in it than I expected. It just KEEPS going, in ways that are just not as interesting as Automata IMO.

But then again the reason I wanted to marathon it was because I was SO ready for it to just be over. So maybe I just wasn't gonna love it either way.

I would love to hear (would love to have heard?) Alex's thoughts on it since his love for Automata is what convinced me to try it in the first place, when it would never have grabbed my attention otherwise.

Lastly, huge spoiler (ending E)

I finished Replicant recently, and have started replaying Automata. I am noticing a lot of things in Automata that I wouldn't have noticed before playing this remake. I had watched videos of original Nier's plot before, but seeing the same upgrade materials showing up in Automata after grinding for hours for Black Pearls and Eagle Eggs in Replicant was real neat. I missed that playing automata first in 2017.

As for the Papa Nier vs Teen-Nier differences.... Its so inconsequential, that if your only issue with this remake is that you can't be Papa Nier anymore: Trust me, I get it, I ALSO prefer Papa Nier...... But its really not that bad. The differences are so incredibly miniscule, and its real clear that the game was designed around Teen-Nier in the first place. You just gotta move past that.

For you personally, I'd recommend finishing that first ending, and diving into the second "Route" to see a bit of the new route content. If that still doesn't do it for ya, then maybe just watch some youtube videos. I'd still recommend seeing the game through to Ending E though, it was Quite Rad.