Nier is a third person hack and slash RPG set into the far future where a disease called the Black Scrawl has infected and wiped out most of humanity leaving behind a frozen post-apocalyptic wasteland. Straight from the off the game thrusts you into a scene where you start off in a derelict corner shop, and you begin defending the entrance of from oncoming hordes of shadowy creatures called Shades. These will be your main adversary throughout this game. You wade through a good eighty of these creatures before fighting a giant boss, complete with large HP bar on the bottom and you’ve levelled up about 20-odd times already and learnt a whole host of magic skills.

Then the game ACTUALLY starts and you’re in some fantasy kingdom like something from Willow, your skills all gone and back down to level 1. So what was the first bit eh? A teaser? A flashback? A premonition? The worst part is that it never tells you. It’s like they inserted a demo as the intro and forgot to take it out.

The graphics for the most part are really impressive, much like Final Fantasy 13 the landscapes are flowing a detailed.Unfortunately there is no real variety as there are only like 6 locations in the entire game. When you take into consideration that Final Fantasy 7 you could fly around the WHOLE WORLD and visit about 20 far away places, the evolution to Next-Gen console deserves a bit more than grinding in the same 6 dungeons.

The soundtrack is probably one of the best soundtracks you’ll hear in a game, it’s really appropriate music and really well composed and is definitely up there with the likes of the FF games like X and 7.

The combat is not bad either, the X button mainly used for charging in Dynasty Warriors style and battering your opponent, or if you prefer using the shoulder buttons to unleash a variety of magic attacks. Nothing too complicated. This game does remind me in elements of Devil May Cry certainly in its approach and delivery, yet has the RPG levelling up element. The storyline is also very clever, most games which force you through multiple playthroughs to get the different endings, the whole game’s focus shifts on each of the A, B, C and D playthroughs which adds depth and the twists in the story are also well thought out. Plus each different storyline focuses on the different characters in the game and all their back stories. This is good as for the best part of your first playthrough, they’re just support characters and you as the player have a tenuous care as to anything about them. The humour of them is very good mind although the shock of the rampant obscenities from Kaine was an amusing shock. Having an RPG character shouting “fuck” is quite something and the trade off of insults between Weiss and Kaine itself is a great slice of comedy.

What’s not very thought out is the rest of the side missions. For the best part, the side missions which you get off talking to people in the village, are painfully stupid and feel like a complete waste of time. Most missions comprise of take this from A to B and it feels like the actual creative team charged with coming up with the side missions were just drunk or lazy. They are just inconsistent as well as the game makes you go through the rigmarole of playing relay between the only six locations swapping insignificant items for more insignificant items repeatedly. And the worst part is that Nier massively falls down as an RPG because side missions DO NOT AWARD ANY EXP points. This is fundamental in an RPG! It’s like doing an extra GCSE after school and instead of getting it marked, the examiner shows you picture of a big veiny cock instead. It’s doesn’t achieve anything and it’s just a waste of time.

Nier also loses the plot in the side mission of the fishing mini-game. Now this is simply awful. They don’t really explain how to do it and they thrust you into the action and give you an earful if the fish swims away which for the first 56,234 times it does. And then there are 10 side missions for catching different types of fish! The other massive failing with the side missions is the random encounters, in fact anything with a random element in an RPG is just a no no. You rely on the fact of everything being there like clockwork in a game of this magnitude and you can’t have a random event jeopardise all your hard work, except Nier thinks that’s OK. I am actually stuck on the third playthrough of this game because I need to get every weapon in the game to finish playthrough 3 but I have to defeat a giant shade in order to get the last weapon I need. Alas this boss fight is RANDOM so I’ve aimlessly running up and down the same expanse of land hoping this creature will appear and I can actually finish the game. But no. It’s the same way levelling up weapons is stupid as half the components required are so rare that you have to farm the same spawn point repeatedly that you can spend about 5 hours looking for just one rare drop which might not necessarily be there. Plus why would you need a fucking egg to upgrade a sword?! It doesn’t make any sense!

The other major annoyance with the game is your support characters Kaine and Emil. Not only do they do next to NO DAMAGE to enemies, they also have the irritating habit of getting in your way. In the junk level where you have a bomb which goes off in like 2 seconds and you need to throw it at an explodable door, the NPCs will quite happily stand between you and the door so the damn thing blows up in your face and you lose health. This is quite a common recurrence and is still fucking irritating each time.

I think the thing that is the most annoying in the missions in this game is the reliance on long sequences of essentially reading paragraphs and paragraphs of story. Most games have elaborate cutscenes which pads out the game draws you in. Nier on the other hand deem it necessary to waste about 40 minutes of your life with leafing through endless pages of storyline in the Forest of Myth. Seriously game, if wanted to read a book I would have bought a book! This is another example of sheer laziness in the creative department and the fact that they ask you questions about it so you can continue is just fucking ridiculous. If I wanted to do some comprehension homework, I’d go back to school!

It does strike me that this is another Square-Enix game to come out which feels like it could have potentially been brilliant and got stuck somewhere between OK and mediocre because of sheer laziness in the testing department. Don’t get me wrong that this, Final Fantasy 13 and Just Cause 2 are all great games, they all just have the same feeling of being slightly rushed, and subsequently unfinished.

So in summation, Nier is a competent RPG game whose brilliant storyline and soundtrack are ruined by stupid game mechanics and poorly designed implementation of side quests.