I honestly cannot understand where the love for this game comes from. Sporadically cliche-but-effective writing is hamstrung by some of the worst looking and playing levels I have ever seen in a game, additionally weighed down by shitty sidequests and wildly varying production quality levels.

The game as a whole feels unfocused, and the addition of having to complete the game multiple times to get the full story feels like a cop-out meant to draw out your time with the game. To make matters worse, Nier ALREADY recycles areas twice, sometimes 3 times in the main game. This is absolutely inexcusable, especially when your reward for slogging through the Lost Shrine for the sixth time is a crowbarred-in cutscene that depicts how the giant shadow monster you're fighting is a single mother of 12 or whatever.

Also Kaine's outfit might be one of the worst designs I've seen in some time. It's not even hot; it just looks absurd.

The soundtrack and story elements of this game linger in my mind all these years later after playing it for the first time. The worldbuilding includes some of my favorite tropes that I won't dive into here because it is pretty late game spoilers. I'm uncertain if I would call this a must play given the rough edges when it comes to gameplay and requirements for seeing all endings being quite tedious at times. The primary difference between this version of NieR and the remake (Called Replicant ver.1.22474487139...) is the protagonist. While this version you play as a father attempting to save his daughter, the remake features brother Nier trying to save his sister. I find the former more compelling but do believe that Replicant is probably the version to seek out for a modern audience who may be coming to this game off the heels of a Nier Automata playthrough.

Nier é um dos jogos mais singulares q eu ja joguei, tem umas inspirações bem claras mas consegue fazer uma mistureba que sai um negócio muito belo, é um dos meus jogos favoritos, única coisa que achei um porre foi farmar todos os materiais pra upar as armas pra pegar o final D, de resto ele se torna repetitivo mas isso não me incomoda, certos jogos acho que até da uma sensação de hipnose, e os dois Nier são casos que senti isso, falando ainda dos personagens, pelo fato de terem alterado o irmao nier pelo pai nier, é meio bizarro ver um macho daquele tamanho falando igual um adolescente, mas da p relevar, e o Weiss é simplesmente top 10 melhores personagens all time, é isso jogos bom demaise

¿Qué decir de este juego que no hayas leído a más gente?
Me encanta la historia profunda y desgarradora que cuenta, los personajes tan vivos y realistas que tiene, las criaturas fantásticas y los detalles que deja intuir el ambiente del mundo.
Es un juego muy triste y muy bonito que me ha llegado al corazón.
Y tristemente me ha inmunizado contra el resto de juegos de Yoko Taro, pero qué le vamos a hacer.
Le agradezco mucho a este juego que exista y me alegro de que a más gente le guste.

Imported from my Backloggery:

Despite a relatively dry beginning and slow start, I found myself absolutely transfixed by the end of NieR. The combat left a lot to be desired, in addition to being repetitive, I found that I was having a better time if I was overpowered for each encounter. The story is basic, but it becomes quite a unique narrative 10 hours in. I found myself highly invested in the narrative, even if it did come across as sadistic to the point of comedy at times. NieR is highly flawed but very special.

A game with an emotional story, a cast of complex and hilarious characters, incredibly music, and intensely deep lore; Nier is my favorite game of last gen and something every gamer should play. The bulk of Nier’s gameplay is hack and slash but also has a plethora of diverse minigames including bullet hell and text adventure. While I’d rate the gameplay as decent the real star here are the characters and story. The main character is a straight forward gruff hero and acts as a foil to the other characters in your party whose dialogue wants you craving more. The story unveils different shades of melancholy as it deals with unconventional issues and different stories of tragedy, even sidequests unveil unexpected sorrow. The story also talks about how the world has been messed up and leads into a lore with a doleful outlook on the world, regardless of which the characters persevere against with or without knowledge of it. Nier has the best music arrangement I have heard in a game, ever. If you don’t get to play Nier you should at the very least listen to it.

When NeiR was first released in Japan, there were two versions. The protagonist of the PlayStation version was a young man, and the brother of one of the main characters. The protagonist of the Xbox 360 version was middle aged and the father figure of that character. When NeiR came to North America - every platform got that 360 protagonist.

Also, when NeiR came out in April 2010 - I had been a father for less than six months.

Together, these facts made playing this weird and often clunky video game an extremely powerful experience.

One of the best games of all time for me. The music is some of the most beautiful I've ever heard in a game. The story was extremely heart-wrenching and superbly presented and, above all, the themes dealt with here are very mature and really profound. The fact that you have to play through the game several times and that the playthroughs only differ minimally is a little annoying. The combat system was also ok at best and the graphics rather mediocre, but I don't give a damn :D A top 10 game for me at the moment.

I was one of those kids growing up whose parents wouldnt let them play any game where you killed a human. I sold Nier Automata to them under the premise that it was just killing robots and by that point they had also kind of stopped caring so I picked up the first game on Xbox too. I remember it was kind of mindblowing at the time just how flashy it was. Changing perspectives was and still is a very cool trick in this kind of game.
So I have nostalgia here, and the plot of this game, despite being a lot more "mass appeal" than Drakengard, was engaging and fun. It definitely has more of a "the gang goes off to do one off adventures while the overarching plot looms" vibe which I think works in its benefit. This, or more specifically the remake because it addresses my main issue with Nier I'm told, is what I'd recommend someone looking to get into Yoko Taro games to check out.
Unfortunately the big issue that emerges in every Yoko Taro game pre Automata is that the combat is supremely ass. It's not anywhere near on the same level as Drakengard, and I daresay it approaches being fun sometimes, but it's stiff and gluey and janky.
It's a game that I see a lot of potential in, and so did Platinum Games and that's why Nier is much more of a household name now. I haven't played the remake and I'm sure plenty of reviews here are .5 stars complaining that they changed the ambient occlusion in the fifth room of the desert dungeon and it ruins the entire experience, but I'd recommend playing that instead of the original. Dad nier is still better though.

This unassuming Action RPG stole my heart back in 2010. It's rich characters, melancholic tone, and breathtaking music make for an experience that few games can achieve. It contains one of the greatest stories ever told in a video game (I'm a sucker for the whole Do Androids Dream? trope, even if it isn't literally androids in this case.) The concept of beating the same game over and over again to experience the full story is one that this game introduced me to, and now I love it. Any game that can pull off something like that should be commended. The gameplay is a little rough around the edges in that it's pretty basic. There are a lot of optional side-quests that are also very fetch-questy. But no minor complaint can dampen this tremendous game.