My First Review. Square Enix's "NIER"

Published by the infamous Japanese RPG video game company Square Enix NIER is an action RPG that is an interesting cross over of traditional RPG elements combined with some modern action video game elements that resemble games like Bayonetta, God of War, Devil May Cry and Ninja Gaiden. It may sound like a match made in heaven but when you try to appease everybody you please very few. Square-Enix outsourced the game to Cavia, the company responsible for other such unremarkable titles like Drakengard and Bulletwitch, and the result is just as unimpressive.

NIER is the story about a brutal fighter named NIER in a post-apocalyptic world. His young daughter, Yonah, has been infected with the strange Black Scrawl virus, and he'll do whatever it takes to free her from pain and weakness. Along his travels he is attacked by enemies called Shades, dark ghostlike creatures that look almost digitized in their appearance. As the NIER’s quest to cure his daughter progresses the magnitude of the threat grows larger and the characters' plight direr, but the game never loses sight of that heart, coming about full circle for the dramatic climax.



Square Enix’s NIER is more or less a typical Japanese RPG game with mediocre game play mechanics. The reason why the game play is mediocre is because NIER tries to be too much of everything without focusing on refining any single thing. The game play is heavily influenced by games like God of War, Monster Hunter and even the Legend of Zelda games but it does not do anything really new with the source materials.

The game play in NIER consists of very standard moves that play off of God of War. You can attack with sword combination attacks, you can dodge and defend using the trigger and bumper buttons at the top of the controller, and you can quickly swap out different weapons and abilities heal yourself using items. NIER can unlock black magic by using an odd talking book called Grimoire Weiss. The Grimoire Weiss grants you eight different spells but some are more useful than others, such as Dark Lance, which hurls a magical black lance at your opponent. The magical abilities are helpful, but they do something else that’s even more important to the game play in NIER: they add something fresh to the dull and repetitive combat.



The RPG elements of NIER is most prominent in its many side quests which send you out to explore a very large and open world. However some of the quests involve menial tasks such as fishing, hunting, and harvesting much like the game Harvest Moon but on a grander scale. However the side quests are extremely tedious and borderline frustrating because of the amount of walking that is required. And if for example you do not bring the correct item with you, you will be required to return the same way you came and then travel back a second time in hopes that you in fact brought the correct item or items. To make matters even worse is that the side quests are ultimately unsatisfying and they will only stretch the 20 hours it may take to finish NIER to just above 30.

NIER features some of the most entertaining and innovative boss fights in any action RPG. Boss battles can take place in massive playing fields and multiple stages where you battle gigantic creatures, evade energy beams, throw bombs, and disable appendages.

The most tedious part about adventuring in NIER is that the landscape looks horrible. It is not that the game takes place in a post-apocalyptic landscape, it is that the graphics in NIER are neither good or awe inspiring to see. The graphics quality is well below average for a game running on modern video game consoles but the textures look only slightly better than a late Playstation 2 video game. The landscapes themselves are bland and featureless so it makes adventuring feel like a long and arduous process where there is nothing truly ‘fantastic’ to see as a sort of a reward for your time and efforts.



The dialogue is horribly cliché in places and any one who watches enough Japanese Anime will know what to expect. The voice acting in NIER is nothing cringe-worthy or fantastic but the music is ultimately the greatest in recent video game memory. The game will make some of the most wonderful music come out of your speakers, and is often accompanied by a mournful and haunting woman’s voice singing in some forgotten tongue.

The most notable feature of NIER is that it is unusually adult-orientated than most Square Enix titles. This is not to say that there is any excessive nudity or gratuitous violence but the language and situations of the game are a lot more mature than Square Enix’s block buster hit Final Fantasy XIII. Of course there is a sword-wielding hermaphrodite, Kaine, with a penchant for fighting and calling monsters ‘shit hogs’ while fighting in lingerie. But that is another story all together.





NIER’s story is also very depressing at times because when you experience a moment of triumph, something horrible happens. This is especially evident in the storyline for the character of Emil, who spends the game going from one terrible situation to the next. The characters in NIER are truly sympathetic to their situations and it makes what few triumphs they experience all the more rewarding. And the fact that all of the characters in NIER manage to continue forward in the story while still maintaining a wry sense of humor throughout the game is borderline genius.

NIER tries to do everything that has made games of different genres great, but instead falls flat for not going above and beyond in any one area. Gamers who enjoy roaming an open world and killing animals and bad guys will enjoy NIER but if you are expecting a great action RPG then you will need to look elsewhere. The game does have one great strength and that is its more adult orientated themes. For gamers who are getting tired of tame and sugary-sweet RPGs where good always triumphs over evil and everyone lives happily ever after, then NIER is the counterweight. NIER is dark and depressing yet sweet in a bitter kind of way.

But regardless of its great presentation NIER is still a mediocre game that may be a great weekend rental but not worthy of a full purchase.

Umm so what do you all think? Do you think that this is worth of Cheshire Cat Studios?

I'm not the ruling vote, but I would quickly say "welcome to the team"!

I dig it. Now someone just needs to make this review a featured review and we'll have some new content.

Oh God, it's Enchanted Arms all over again....

From what I had heard Nier was supposed to be some kind of anti-Final Fantasy with butt-ugly characters, big battles and extreme action combat. I had some hopes for this game but I'll take your word on it being a 'meh' game.

Can you supply a list of scores? *see our past video game reviews for examples*

Other than that I think you're publishable Congrats man and thanks for contributing. You'll get your Contributor's Corner access shortly.

Click here for more episodes of GameJams!
Join your host, Kenny Farino, explore the world of video games music remixes and earn a new appreciation for video game music, video game music remixes, and of video game music remixers!

Cool review man. It's nice to have you as a reviewer.
I actually like your style of reviews more than most because it is SHORTER and TO THE POINT. I don't wanna be dissing Laughing Man or Zimes or the others because they are really good reads but some of the rants that are written are as wordy as small novels. On the flip side the short reviews need to have their opinions more reinforced. If you say that a game has weak graphics then can you provide some screen shots or maybe toss in a few examples?
The last thing that I really like is your lack of the word "I". "I think" or "I did" ruin game reviews because looks like the review is nothing but personal bias.
This is an awesome start.

Did you know that there are actually 2 different versions of Nier?
In the Japanese version called "Nier Replicant" the titular character is younger and more effeminate, and the main female character is his sister and not his daughter. For western audiences they made Nier older and beefier and the main female character is his daughter.

The only thing that Square Enix did not do was omit the part about the sexy female lead, Kaine, being a hermaphrodite. Apparently they know that Western gamers like brutish and overly masculine main characters, but that hermaphrodites and anything outside of our preconceived sexual 'norm' is still very taboo. It will be interesting to see how Nier does in sales in America.

TY

I was not aware of that fact It is probably worth adding but I think my review is fine for now That was a surprising and risky move It makes so little sense but I dont pretend to under stand eastern culture or their fetishes.