Squeenix NieR: Automata from Yoko Taro and Platinum Games

[Correct_Carlo]

Got this. The prologue is wonderful in terms of scope and content, but holy fuck is it hard. I play all games on hard, but this is the hardest shit ever. 40 minutes with no save and on hard you basically die in 2 hits. And the first thing the game throws at you is a massive boss that appears after a 10 minute intro with hardly any combat leading up to it, so you have no time to get used to the controls or movesets. The first thing you fight in the game is basically a boss that can one shot you, forcing you to play all 10 minutes of what is basically just an interactive cut scene leading up to it over. And if you somehow make it past that boss, there is 30 minutes of more fighting leading up to yet another boss who can one-shot you........all with no save.

I eventually just figured you weren't supposed to finish it on hard on your first run, so I switched to normal, but it triggers my autism so hard that I had to switch to normal. Especially since the game is absurdly easy on normal. I switched back to hard after the intro and the game is still absurdly easy.

It's very bizarre that the hardest thing in this game seems to be the intro.

 

[Jinn]

It's very bizarre that the hardest thing in this game seems to be the intro.

This is classic Taro. He knew that players like you and I would insist on starting on the hardest difficulty, and bash I heads against the wall repeatedly until we figured out that the difficulty could, and essentially needs to be, switched. As if to ask "What is it that you really play games for?" It's also the perfect foreshadowing for the kind of heartbreaking story that's about to unfold, communicated to the player through a sense of futility in these opening moments and touching on the concept of Eternal Recurrence, a theme which resounds through the entire plot.

 

[Suicidal]

Got this. The prologue is wonderful in terms of scope and content, but holy fuck is it hard. I play all games on hard, but this is the hardest shit ever. 40 minutes with no save and on hard you basically die in 2 hits. And the first thing the game throws at you is a massive boss that appears after a 10 minute intro with hardly any combat leading up to it, so you have no time to get used to the controls or movesets. The first thing you fight in the game is basically a boss that can one shot you, forcing you to play all 10 minutes of what is basically just an interactive cut scene leading up to it over. And if you somehow make it past that boss, there is 30 minutes of more fighting leading up to yet another boss who can one-shot you........all with no save.

I eventually just figured you weren't supposed to finish it on hard on your first run, so I switched to normal, but it triggers my autism so hard that I had to switch to normal. Especially since the game is absurdly easy on normal. I switched back to hard after the intro and the game is still absurdly easy.

It's very bizarre that the hardest thing in this game seems to be the intro.

I spent about 4 hours on the prologue on hard. Eventually I just entered some sort of zen trance and started seeing enemy attacks before they happened.

 

[Correct_Carlo]

Well, I've played the game enough that I can beat the prologue on hard now. The issue with the prologue, as I said, is that there are like 5 minutes of unskippable cut-scene before being dumped right into the main boss, so there's no time to learn the mechanics. My problem was that I thought dodging worked like Dark Souls, where you dodge once and only have a bit of invincibility between dodges. I didn't realize that you can basically warp around inside that giant buzz-saw infinitely without taking damage by just pushing the dodge button repeatedly. It's absurdly easy to dodge once you know that as it requires no timing or skill at all. The only difficult thing is that the game never makes it clear that this is how dodging works. I just learned it by accident like an hour in.

Anyhow, I'm at the section of the game where the ground opens up after the second titan fight in the city. I like the combat over all, but I think the game as a whole is kind of a mixed bag. The levels all kind of have a big empty box feel to them and it's annoying how everything is covered in ledges you can't actually jump on. If you ignore that meaningless window dressing, this game has some of the simplest, must dull, level design I've seen in any game since early 2000s Bioware. It's all basically just large open rectangles with nothing in them, punctuated by the occasional corridor for variety's sake. It feels like the level design of a PS2 game, only with better textures. It also doesn't help that the game has very few areas and repeatedly forces you back to the same ones over and over (that desert level is so dull).

The side-quests are all uniformly awful fetch quests so far and the game's philosophical pretensions seem skin deep thus far. That said, that prologue really was amazing, so I have some hope it will get better. I also like the relationship between the two main cyborgs, and the boss battles are great so far, which is all what keeps me going.

Anyhow, the game has some really great aspects (mainly combat, bosses, and the look and character of the protagonists), but also just seems half empty, dull, and exceedingly cheap. It seems like an indie game that outstripped its ambitions, more so than a big AAA title. Definitely don't like this game enough to 100% the achievements, but I will try to play it through 3 times. Hopefully it will pick up.

 

[Perkel]

Dude you just finished prologue and you complain about themes of the game like they are skin deep.
Play game more.

 

[aweigh]

Playing a game for 10 minutes and then reviewing it, like a true codexah ^_^

also the game has much variety in levels the secret it harbors is that it's not really an action game.

tee hee <(' '<) kawaii desu desu ne

 

[aweigh]

also there are tons of secrets scattered around the maps. I bet you didn't even find the pheonix dagger you fucking newb.

 

[Correct_Carlo]

Just to be clear, I'm like 10 hours in. I was way past the prologue when I wrote that. And, yes, I have found the Phoenix Dagger. Its not terribly difficult to find, given that there's a path leading directly to it.

 

[Zombra]

Too bad it's too boring to want to play through once.

 

[Dayyālu]

Who the fuck needs to hunt for achievements when Taro trolls you about them (and gives you a chance to skip them directly) with one of his self-inserts?

The only ones worth it are the skirts&pants ones anyway.

Regarding your mini-review, Juan_Carlo , the fetch quests are kind of a tradition (Nier fetch quests again were borderline trolling, some of them made fun of the player for being a OCD slave and some were outright bonkers). Automata's main areas are boxes: but it's an attempt to be open-world with a cheapo budget. The mission areas are usually well-designed, and the design keeps up until the end: honestly some of the better designed areas come up quite late in the game. The bot hacking section with 9S in particular, and I dislike the twat.

 

[Delterius]

i never played this game but i like the ost

 

[Dayyālu]

i never played this game but i like the ost

We all know that the best ost is Drakengard 1's.



" TAKAYUKI WE HAVE NO MONEY AND NO TIME AND WE HAVE TO GET SOMETHING"

"NOW"

"I have NO IDEA what to do"

"Neither do we! Take classical music and cut it into pieces! This game already makes no sense, we can at least rape the player's ears a bit! GO FOR IT!"

(I unironically like Drak 1's soundtrack. It's completely bonkers, and Drak 3 kept up the tradition with boss themes that sound straight out of Red Alert and not from a fantasy game.)

 

[Jasede]

Drakengard is amazing. The soundtrack hates you .The protagonist is the biggest ass in the world . The ending is a giant troll after a troll boss. Everyone but the main character are also assholes.

This game is a miracle in that it didn't bankrupt Cavia. The balls on Taro must be the size of melons .

 

[CthuluIsSpy]

Drakengard is amazing. The soundtrack hates you .The protagonist is the biggest ass in the world . The ending is a giant troll after a troll boss. Everyone but the main character are also assholes.

This game is a miracle in that it didn't bankrupt Cavia. The balls on Taro must be the size of melons .

And even more importantly, its not on PC. That is the greatest troll of all.

 

[Jinn]

And even more importantly, its not on PC. That is the greatest troll of all.

I hope that someday they release a Drakengard 1 and 3 remaster on PC. And the first Nier too, of course.

 

[CthuluIsSpy]

What's wrong with Drakengard 2?

 

[Dayyālu]

What's wrong with Drakengard 2?

It's more of a stock JRPG kind of game instead of the "WHAT THE FUCKING FUCK" typical of Taro's games. It wasn't directed by him, and it shows.

I hope that someday they release a Drakengard 1 and 3 remaster on PC. And the first Nier too, of course.

Drak 1 and Drak 2 are, methinks, playable on emulator. I don't know Drak 3 situation.

But why would you want to play Drakengard 1? It's seriously a game better seen than played. I know it does not make any sense, it's simply how it is.

 

[Jinn]

But why would you want to play Drakengard 1? It's seriously a game better seen than played. I know it does not make any sense, it's simply how it is.

I've actually played it before. I appreciate what Taro is doing enough with it that despite being a fairly mindless Dynasty Warriors clone, I can enjoy thinking about what is being said about the medium. As stupid as it sounds, enjoying Taro games is only fully possible when you recognize the meta-narrative being presented.

 

[Socur Toxanarosa]

You need to play it 5 times. Trust me.

Don't trust this guy.

 

[Saark]

Only good thing about Drakengard 2 are the few scenes where Manah shits her pants because Caim appears.

And let's not forget the scene where he literally kills Death.


God I miss Caim.

 

[lightbane]

It's more of a stock JRPG kind of game instead of the "WHAT THE FUCKING FUCK" typical of Taro's games. It wasn't directed by him, and it shows.

Even then, somehow it still manages to critizice common aspects of JPRGs and animu, in general, having the protagonist be the biggest tool of the universe (in all meanings of the word) that is easily manipulated by everyone. At least Dark Id had made a fun lp of this so you won't have to play it.

 

[TheHeroOfTime]

The game gets better if you press both L3-R3 buttons and selfdestruct. But only with 2B and A2. Trust me.

 

[Revenant]

Lol, so today I figured I actually *can* heal myself using the mousewheel during stages of boss battles in which the regular Esc menu is unavailable, thus this game is now playable. Given that I can now get decent performance in Wine with the DXVK wrapper, I've finally beaten the sea monster and Adam and am now back in the resistance camp on the first, 2B playthrough. Any hints which side quests I should do in the 1st playthrough?

 

[Projas]

The quest where you go to the flooded city and fight the sea monster is a cutoff where most sidequests become unavailable, so you don't have to worry about that now I suppose. In general you should do all the sidequests you can do. There's like 3 that are p. high level and you should probably save them for route B. Some sidequests have your progress persist between routes A and B (like the scientist machine one). Most sidequests are shared between routes A and B, but there's couple that are exclusive to their specific route, so you might miss out on those for now. You get to unlock chapter select after you finish Route C though, so you will still be able to do them then.

 

[Jaedar]

Lol, so today I figured I actually *can* heal myself using the mousewheel during stages of boss battles in which the regular Esc menu is unavailable, thus this game is now playable. Given that I can now get decent performance in Wine with the DXVK wrapper, I've finally beaten the sea monster and Adam and am now back in the resistance camp on the first, 2B playthrough. Any hints which side quests I should do in the 1st playthrough?

Do all sidequests you have available.

Equip the auto-heal chip.