NieR: Automata Spoiler Thread

I probably would have enjoyed Automata more if I hadn't played the first Nier. The game feels more directed at newcomers than those that played the first game. I actually felt like a lot of the plot was easy to predict coming from the first Nier, and some of the attempts to hit the same themes as the first game didn't land especially hard because it had already been done better before. If ending E hadn't been executed so well I was ready to call the game disappointing after the underwhelming C&D conclusions. The best part of the game (ending E) is pretty much completely divorced from any of the larger meta universe or other Taro games.
 
Orcastar said:
I don't think that I read that much about it, just one or two spoiler-free reviews and a few of the review summaries on Metacritic. But then again the reviews I read did praised the game a lot and maybe set my expectations too high. Then again the game wasn't even on my radar before all the positive reviews, so...

One thing's for sure: I'm keeping the hell away from OTs from now on (wasn't the first time I've been spoiled on something either).

Oh, there was one thing that's been bothering me: I remember some character early on commenting on how the time of day eventually stopped changing as the war raged on. Anyone else remember that? I kept thinking that it was a major clue about something, but it never got addressed.
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Not all stories are for everyone, really. Especially Yoko Taro's versions since his story telling mechanic tends to be deflecting you away from what you consider to be the "main" plot with seemingly arbitrary factoids that wind up coming full-circle and being an integral part to the whole story. Once I started figuring things out I immediately ran into something that pulled me away from my current thoughts and either made me question where I thought the plot was going, or just distracted me from the main thread. The best example I can think of this is the A2 stuff in route A/B.

Sumio Mondo said:
Wonder if it will be another DLC like OG NieR's or be more substantial with more story? (And if so, when will it be set?)
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It'll probably be like the OG. I've always felt like Yoko Taro is the sort to hate story-based DLC since it fragments his stories in a way that's just genuinely un-fun for the story he's telling.
 
Here's a morbid little detail. One of the best references to the original Nier is the trophy room in the library. Just like the first game when you beat a boss you get a little trophy for it. If you are an irredeemable villain like me and you kill Emil you get a little Emil head trophy :(. A constant reminder of how horrible a person you are. Now I'm going to listen to Emil Sacrifice and Kaine Salvation on repeat for the next two hours.
 
This game made me discover i'm a little deaf :/ Apparently the pod in the desert emits a loud beep according to my SO, but I couldn't hear it at all despite standing right next to it. Getting old I guess :(
 
Sylas said:
It'll probably be like the OG. I've always felt like Yoko Taro is the sort to hate story-based DLC since it fragments his stories in a way that's just genuinely un-fun for the story he's telling.
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You know that a vast majority of Drakengard 3's backstories (as well as characterization of the sisters) was done through DLC, right?
 
Seeing Yoko Taro do a Noctis impression at a taxi for that documentary made me realize how FFXV staff were so proud of making the Square Enox CEO a boss battle on an unreleased demo disk.

Then, Yoko Taro took it 100 steps futher and made the entire company an unbeatable final boss fight lol
 
I find it interesting that Sterling and Yahtzee had completely opposite thoughts on this game's story.

The former saw a lot of sidequests and story content that, to him, showed 'diving deep into' existentialism and the meaning of being human, and praised it for not simply just 'posing philosophical questions and being smug about it without addressing them at all.'

The latter made a comment about the story being exactly that...so I find it interesting.
 
Primethius said:
That's the reason for Eve's skin? Wow. I totally made an incorrect connection based on my vague recollection of Nier 1.

Aside from the terminals (which were the red dressed girls, right?), your answers don't really go to questions I had. But that onus is on me for not being clear enough with my issues. For me, the issue was more so the story telling rather than the story and themes itself (which I actually enjoyed). What I'm trying to essentially say is that I dislike how I had to construct so much of it or piece it together outside the game. Not necessarily because aspects are not explained, or because the world doesn't make sense but because I don't think the game tells the story well enough outside the core conflict and that left me a bit hollow having finished it.

For me, I think the game needed to be a bit more concise with its main story to be effective. I was actually quite bored with the first repetitive half of route B and maybe that contributed to the story not resonating with me as much (I beat route A within a two days but took over a week to go through route B). Simarily, the way certain story beats were executed did not resonate with me at all even though I think they should have. And I'm still trying to nail down why.

2Es death for example didn't do much for me when it happened. Maybe my expectations and assumptions of where the story was going played a part? I thought at the time we'd get a bit more of her via 2A, another model like her, a flash back or something but that wasn't what really happened. So when I finally understood that 2E was done and there was no more of her , the moment had already passed and I missed that opportunity to resonate with that particular death scene.

I dunno, it's kind of hard to explain I guess. I resonated quite a bit with Pascal's story line. Probably the most out of anything in the game and that's one of my favorite gaming moments. So if I had to give an example, maybe that level of execution is what I was hoping to see out of some of the other plot lines? It felt more concise, more focused. The way it was told made me resonate with the story much more. Going up to Pascal after the memory wipe and having her not recognize 9S was a fantastic moment. And I just never connected much with some of the other plot strings and characters in remotely the same way.

Hopefully that clears up some of where I'm coming from. It's hard to pin down as I myself parse my thoughts on the game with regards to why I felt that way given the medium of gaming and how many factors are in play.
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I think it's just as you said, you prefer games that bring you down the game's lore and wrap its characters up. I don't think that's what nier is going for though. Like your example with 2e. You thought her story was done after her death, but i thought it was only then where we get to fully explore the depth of 2e's character. To me her story didn't die with her death. To me the death was part of arc, not as a way to culminate everything about her story.

If anything going back to the beginning again with that knowledge in hand actually made what i thought were awkward character writing make so much more sense and so much better written now considering what 2e's and 9s's relationship is actually meant to be. Like, that isn't exactly the most direct way to build a character arc, and who knows if it's the best ways to tell a story really because people can miss it, but the contextual clues are there for people to find it, and for me in a way it made me much more invested.
 
So the only ending I am missing is Y. Is it worth it to farm all the upgrade mats and are there any new story bits left when you get all endings?
 
Dio said:
I find it interesting that Sterling and Yahtzee had completely opposite thoughts on this game's story.

The former saw a lot of sidequests and story content that, to him, showed 'diving deep into' existentialism and the meaning of being human, and praised it for not simply just 'posing philosophical questions and being smug about it without addressing them at all.'

The latter made a comment about the story being exactly that...so I find it interesting.
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I was thinking the same thing. I know yahtzee wears his dislike of Japanese games on his sleeve, but I had hoped he would get through those an enjoy this game.

I think he was bogged down with all the other games that had just released and didn't really get into NieR.
 
Mailbox said:
You know that a vast majority of Drakengard 3's backstories (as well as characterization of the sisters) was done through DLC, right?
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As far as I know, he only had so much influence over the game. I'm betting I'm totally wrong about that though.
 
This game made me cry. Fuck this game.

Nobody in this game deserved everything that happened in C and D. E barely makes up for it.

Are all of Yoko Taro games this depressing?
 
Sylas said:
As far as I know, he only had so much influence over the game. I'm betting I'm totally wrong about that though.
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He was creative director and scenario writer for Drakengard 3. I guess all i'm saying is that since he isn't hating where he's working anymore, maybe some interesting dlc might actually happen, since Drakengard 3's dlc are the best parts of that game apparently.

kewlmyc said:
This game made me cry. Fuck this game.

Nobody in this game deserved everything that happened in C and D. E barely makes up for it.

Are all of Yoko Taro games this depressing?
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Well, depressing might not be the overt right word for it, but automata is definitely one of his "softer" games. (Its the only game with an actually uplifting ending XD)
(Just also note that those games had basically a fraction of this game's budget.)
 
kewlmyc said:
This game made me cry. Fuck this game.

Nobody in this game deserved everything that happened in C and D. E barely makes up for it.

Are all of Yoko Taro games this depressing?
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It made me feel emotions that I didn't even know I had. ;_;

Seriously, it's been close to a week since I got Ending E, fully completing the game, and it's still with me.
 
Antiwhippy said:
I think it's just as you said, you prefer games that bring you down the game's lore and wrap its characters up. I don't think that's what nier is going for though. Like your example with 2e. You thought her story was done after her death, but i thought it was only then where we get to fully explore the depth of 2e's character. To me her story didn't die with her death. To me the death was part of arc, not as a way to culminate everything about her story.

If anything going back to the beginning again with that knowledge in hand actually made what i thought were awkward character writing make so much more sense and so much better written now considering what 2e's and 9s's relationship is actually meant to be. Like, that isn't exactly the most direct way to build a character arc, and who knows if it's the best ways to tell a story really because people can miss it, but the contextual clues are there for people to find it, and for me in a way it made me much more invested.
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Regarding 2E, it's not that I had an issue with the way they did her story post death. I just felt that maybe her death was meant to be a moment in which I felt some sadness but given my expectations at that point and how her story unfolded afterwards, I didn't have much of a reaction. Having beaten the game, I almost feel robbed of an emotional scene because of what I know now.

In some ways, I almost wish the route that is repeated content came later (after you've found out more) rather than so early on when your not really able to piece together enough of the game.

I'm almost certain that at some level, I'd connect with the game more if I replayed it given what I know now. But I also think that speaks to a weakness it has given that it does make you repeat content for one of the routes. So I think the method for executing on the story was there but I don't think it did it well enough for me.

In essence, my favorite parts of the game are when I connected the bits of the story while playing the actual game. Having done the side quest for the robot who rejects the advances of several female robots and then doing the singer boss battle where you make that small, but key connection was fantastic. Along those lines, when I had to go out of the game to piece portions together, the impact was far less.
 
Primethius said:
Regarding 2E, it's not that I had an issue with the way they did her story post death. I just felt that maybe her death was meant to be a moment in which I felt some sadness but given my expectations at that point and how her story unfolded afterwards, I didn't have much of a reaction. Having beaten the game, I almost feel robbed of an emotional scene because of what I know now.

In some ways, I almost wish the route that is repeated content came later (after you've found out more) rather than so early on when your not really able to piece together enough of the game.

I'm almost certain that at some level, I'd connect with the game more if I replayed it given what I know now. But I also think that speaks to a weakness it has given that it does make you repeat content for one of the routes. So I think the method for executing on the story was there but I don't think it did it well enough for me.

In essence, my favorite parts of the game are when I connected the bits of the story while playing the actual game. Having done the side quest for the robot who rejects the advances of several female robots and then doing the singer boss battle where you make that small, but key connection was fantastic. Along those lines, when I had to go out of the game to piece portions together, the impact was far less.
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Correct me if I'm wrong but are you saying that you didn't believe 2B was actually dead when she died? That instead of feeling something when it happened, you were under the impression that she would come back later?
 
im currently watching the VOD of Kyle McCarley playing the game on twitch and just got to the part where 2B dies. and ive seen her die before but i was still getting teary eyed. anyway, you guys know western dubs of games are recorded individually, so they only see and record their lines in a room by themselves without interacting with other voice actors most of the time. this is how Nier Automata was recorded.

he started getting more and more emotional during the lead-up, because he does know that she dies, he just doesn't know what that's going to look like. he's been playing the game for a few weeks on stream, and he's had the experience for himself of playing as 2B and having her alongside him and interacting with 9S on his own just like we did. and he gets to understand how his lines fit with Kira Buckland's lines now that he's played through it himself. but he doesn't know what Kira will say until she's said the lines in the game.

he just hit the moment right before she falls where she says "Oh, Nines..." and Kyle weakly says "I didn't know she said that..." and i fucking started BAWLING again. and he actually started crying too

fuck this TRASH GAME ITS GARBAGEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

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if you want to see for yourself, start at 1:55 and watch from there. that's his wife sitting next to him in the video. she's been watching him play it.
 
Oh this final Emil fight, literally the last thing in the game for me. It's kicking my ass. Man. I'm almost tempted to run back and switch to 9S, but no. If you're going to fight a giant centipede boss composed of individual spheres that are remnants of a Nier 1 character, I believe precedent is clear and A2 is the only right answer.

But...Man. Even at level 92 he can basically two shot me.
 
Finished it.

The YoRHa project makes a lot of sense, from the perspective of androids with single-minded goals but are still capable of evaluating ideas and sussing out the truth. You can't just say "Humans are on the moon, so uh, fight hard." They'd see through it, you have to really create and live the lie.

It's exactly the kind of thing you'd expect hyper-logical beings would come up with.
 
Primethius said:
Regarding 2E, it's not that I had an issue with the way they did her story post death. I just felt that maybe her death was meant to be a moment in which I felt some sadness but given my expectations at that point and how her story unfolded afterwards, I didn't have much of a reaction. Having beaten the game, I almost feel robbed of an emotional scene because of what I know now.

In some ways, I almost wish the route that is repeated content came later (after you've found out more) rather than so early on when your not really able to piece together enough of the game.

I'm almost certain that at some level, I'd connect with the game more if I replayed it given what I know now. But I also think that speaks to a weakness it has given that it does make you repeat content for one of the routes. So I think the method for executing on the story was there but I don't think it did it well enough for me.

In essence, my favorite parts of the game are when I connected the bits of the story while playing the actual game. Having done the side quest for the robot who rejects the advances of several female robots and then doing the singer boss battle where you make that small, but key connection was fantastic. Along those lines, when I had to go out of the game to piece portions together, the impact was far less.
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Hmm, but the repeat content route for me is was an important route that contextualises what is to come? It wouldn't make a lot of sense of you didn't find out what 9s found out during B.

I think what you're expecting is a difference in where the catharsis lands? Like the singer boss for example. It is contextualises through a diffuser that you can miss and can only be gotten in the b route, but by the end of it you know why she is the way she is and when she died her story ended. Period. I think that might be your problem with how the story is handled.

Adam, eve (i think you just expected more or out those 2 to be honest seeing that i do think a fair amount of their characters and motivations are revealed before their end as characters) and 2b seems to follow that pattern of landing the catharsis before more context.
 
Astral said:
Correct me if I'm wrong but are you saying that you didn't believe 2B was actually dead when she died? That instead of feeling something when it happened, you were under the impression that she would come back later?
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Not necessarily that she would come back later but I did have an expectation of something more. And I think in a way I got that. I found 2B a better character once I knew what I did at the end of the game rather than at the moment of her death. But the knowledge that came later didn't make the earlier scene more impactful.
 
I have been trying to decide if Ko-Shi and Ro-Shi have anything to do with Koro, the delusional disorder that your genitals are disappearing and you're losing your sense of biological sex.
 
Primethius said:
Not necessarily that she would come back later but I did have an expectation of something more. And I think in a way I got that. I found 2B a better character once I knew what I did at the end of the game rather than at the moment of her death. But the knowledge that came later didn't make the earlier scene more impactful.
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I'm not really sure how Taro would have gone about doing this, but I wonder what the experience would have been like if the 2E twist was dropped earlier, possibly as early as the end of A or beginning of B.
 
Man I forgot Kyle was playing through the whole game. "Fuck you Yoko Taro. Shit." got me lmao. He's almost done. I'd love to see his reaction to the ending.
 
Dio said:
I find it interesting that Sterling and Yahtzee had completely opposite thoughts on this game's story.

The former saw a lot of sidequests and story content that, to him, showed 'diving deep into' existentialism and the meaning of being human, and praised it for not simply just 'posing philosophical questions and being smug about it without addressing them at all.'

The latter made a comment about the story being exactly that...so I find it interesting.
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Normally I never really have a problem with Yahtzee saying shit because he's meant to be entertainment first and foremost and his shtick is whinging and making fun of but his statement about it's philosophical musings seemed incredibly off-base enough that it annoyed me. It's like he got caught on superficial symbolism and was like "THIS GAME SURE ISN'T SAYING ALOT" which distracted him from everything else it was doing, or like making fun of someone's math skills by pointing out the doodles they did on the sand while on the blackboard behind him they're doing long analytical proofs.

Satch said:
im currently watching the VOD of Kyle McCarley playing the game on twitch and just got to the part where 2B dies. and ive seen her die before but i was still getting teary eyed. anyway, you guys know western dubs of games are recorded individually, so they only see and record their lines in a room by themselves without interacting with other voice actors most of the time. this is how Nier Automata was recorded.

he started getting more and more emotional during the lead-up, because he does know that she dies, he just doesn't know what that's going to look like. he's been playing the game for a few weeks on stream, and he's had the experience for himself of playing as 2B and having her alongside him and interacting with 9S on his own just like we did. and he gets to understand how his lines fit with Kira Buckland's lines now that he's played through it himself. but he doesn't know what Kira will say until she's said the lines in the game.

he just hit the moment right before she falls where she says "Oh, Nines..." and Kyle weakly says "I didn't know she said that..." and i fucking started BAWLING again. and he actually started crying too

fuck this TRASH GAME ITS GARBAGEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

if you want to see for yourself, start at 1:55 and watch from there. that's his wife sitting next to him in the video. she's been watching him play it.
Click to expand...

Someone should clip it and send it to Taro. That should make his day.
 
Damn, that game was awesome. Probably gonna try to 100% it before I give up my data though. Speaking of, I was pretty disappointed that ending E was only a bullshit bullet hell. After C & D I was hoping there would be another stretch of actual gameplay and was pretty bummed that it was over.

Also what the fuck you can buy achievements??????
 
Despite the overall sadness, this was the first game in a while to make me laugh. It has a pretty good sense of humor at times, whether it be self depreciating, morbid (like when certain robots killed themselves) or silly like petting the pod.
 
Voliko said:
Despite the overall sadness, this was the first game in a while to make me laugh. It has a pretty good sense of humor at times, whether it be self depreciating, morbid (like when certain robots killed themselves) or silly like petting the pod.
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"Die Romeo! Thou stupid asshole!"
 
Voliko said:
Despite the overall sadness, this was the first game in a while to make me laugh. It has a pretty good sense of humor at times, whether it be self depreciating, morbid (like when certain robots killed themselves) or silly like petting the pod.
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The part that made me laugh hardest the first time through is the most depressing in retrospect ("Friends call me Nines, soooo..." "I'm good.")

:(
 
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