NIER REPLICANT
Yoko Taro, PlatinumGames
2021
Xbox, Playstation 4

“Weiss, you dumbass! Start making sense, you rotten book, or you’re gonna be sorry! Maybe I’ll rip your pages out one by one, or maybe I’ll put you in the goddamn furnace! How could someone with such a big, smart brain get hypnotized like a little bitch, huh? ‘Oh, Shadowlord, I love you, Shadowlord, come over here and give Weiss a big sloppy kiss, Shadowlord.’ Now pull your head out of your goddamn ass and start fucking helping us!”

These words greeted players eleven years ago every time they booted Cavia’s NieR Gestalt, released in the United States as NieR, an action RPG largely dubbed an interesting failure with a great soundtrack. Yoko Taro’s name at the time was completely unknown. That he has managed to transform NieR into a juggernaut uttered in whispered tones alongside Hollow Knight, Persona, and the like is the sort of project every game hopes to endure. Working with PlatinumGames, Taro remade NieR Replicant, the Japanese version of NieR, from the ground up, with rerecorded voice acting and music, new graphics and gameplay, and a new ending. He titled the remake NieR Replicant ver.1.22474487139… – I will be referring to the remake as NieR Replicant and the broad collection of games as NieR from here on.

NieR takes place in a fallen world. Whatever security existed before has succumbed to an encroaching plague known as the Black Scrawl and the progressive incursion of monsters the people call Shades. Our protagonist (named by the player, known by fans as Nier) searches for a cure to the Black Scrawl for his sister, Yonah, who lives in a village led by two twins, Devola and Popola. The Black Scrawl leaves Yonah an outcast, as no one knows how the plague spreads. When Yonah finds a rumor of a cure known as a Lunar Tear, she sets out to forbidden, dangerous ruins, where Nier rescues her and encounters a magical tome. The book speaks, informing Nier that his magic may be able to combat the Black Scrawl, and their adventure begins.

NieR adventures with gameplay in shocking and delightful ways. Without giving anything away, it references the history of adventure games and horror in surprising, funny moments that take the gameplay off-model. The remake, Replicant, has taken the moment-to-moment action gameplay outside those setpieces and transformed it into a modern, high quality Stylish Action Game, similar to a Bayonetta or Devil May Cry, but with so many accessibility options to remove as much difficulty as you like. If you find yourself frustrated by the combat, NieR Replicant is incredibly accommodating in letting you focus on the story. I think more games should offer experiences like this one, which don’t change the core experience on-screen and instead offer options to make it easier to see it through.

The NieR franchise, or the Greater Yoko Taro Project, is largely contextualized by repetition. Players of the breakout sequel NieR Automata will be familiar with his recurring approach involving replaying portions of the same game with minor variation that lead to different narrative outcomes. Players of any two Yoko Taro games in the NieR or Drakengard franchise will recognize his recurring tropes, themes, interconnections, and affection for his characters and lore. And, yes, to see NieR through to endings D and E, you will need to play through NieR roughly two and a half times. I love this fact – it remains one of the most powerful ways to build familiarity with characters and heighten the inevitability of its high highs and low lows.

The protagonist starts the game loving his sick sister, Yonah – he will come to love his ragtag party. From the foulmouthed Kaine, to the snobbish animate tome Grimoire Weiss, to the strange chipper child Emil, this found family comes together to care for one another so deeply that it will change the fate of the world. NieR Automata takes a science fiction approach to relationships, beginning from programmed remove and showing where emotion causes things to break down. NieR Replicant is an epic fantasy. Instead, its emotions are operatic from the very beginning. It uses that passion to focus on how everyone is capable of violent, world-changing love. 

NieR Replicant is also a dark fantasy. The protagonist loves Yonah, but over time, we also come to understand how he resents her illness and wishes he could have a normal adolescent life. Kaine and Emil undergo incredible trauma in their assistance to Nier, facing incredible sacrifices in the face of an immature, egocentric brat – a brat they love. The answers they find about the Shades, the Black Scrawl, and the world they live in are horrifying and raise existential questions about everyone they’ve ever known. NieR Replicant is special because it finds a way to marry intense, sincere kindnesses and awful, melodramatic tragedy.

Even if games aren’t for you, I have to recommend Keiichi Okabe’s music for the game. His style marries emphasis on acoustic instruments (strings, guitar, harp, piano) and women’s harmonized vocals. All of the vocal music in NieR Replicant is performed in the game’s fictional language, a language that sometimes sounds like Japanese, sometimes like German, sometimes French. Okabe’s musical themes communicate the emotional heft of its characters’ decisions and devotions. The soundtrack’s melodic drive, intense control of arrangement and orchestration, and willingness to vary between the familiar and the subversive reflects the game’s own mission.