Reviews

-Nier Automata and The Weight of the World That Comes With It-

"Everything That Lives Is Designed To End. They Are Perpetually Trapped In A Never-Ending Spiral Of Life And Death. However, Life Is All About The Struggle Within This Cycle. That Is What 'We' Believe."
-Pod 153

 NieR Automata is unexplainable. In a sense, This review is pointless I can't convey the feelings I felt or as a matter of fact, what this game is even about. But if I had to chose one word to summarize it all, Beautiful. As cheesy as it may sound, NieR Automata wasn't just a game, it was a life changing experience. It's been months since I've originally beaten the game yet I find myself daily thinking back to reflect on just how phenomenal of an experience it all was. Admittedly like most, I originally bought NieR due to the fact that 2B was extremely hot but instead of hot babes I was left with overwhelming amounts of depression and lots of tears and boogie tissues. Truly, This game unlocked emotions within myself that I didn't know I had. Story besides, The rest of the game shines just as bright. After all, If the game isn't fun, why bother?

-Gameplay-
 NieR Automata is a weird yet extremely refreshing mix of both hack and slash and shoot 'em up gameplay. Admittedly, in the beginning it is a bit jarring and hard to get used too but you quickly adapt and begin to love it. The variety of weapons, the potential for endless combos, simply walking around, shoot 'em ups, and just standing still were all PERFECT. The combat felt super intuitive, allowing you to subconciously know how to juggle and combo enemies. Shoot 'em up sections weren't as good but still implemented the vast customization of your loadout from the hack and slash sections. The almost constantly changing enviroment from mission to mission which has you changing your fighthing style is also a great touch. My one complaint would be if you're planning to play this on PC, Be aware that it will only run in windowed without the image getting stretched in fullscreen. The FAR mod is a great and easy fix for this but nonetheless, heads up.

-World-
 As for the world you'll be exploring for the entirety of this game, it wasn't anything breathetaking visually. There are some areas in the game that the graphics might even appear jarring. It's your average post apocolyptic overgrown city as the "Center Point" for the rest of the areas of the game. Besides overgrown cities, theres a few other areas such as a huge empty desert, a forest, a city almost completely consumed by the ocean, and a (somewhat) still functioning carnival. Now on paper they sound a little bland and that wouldn't be far from the truth but as the story unfolds, it adds more depth and changes to each location. As for the actual size of the world, it aint big. It takes no more than 3 mins to run across the entire city (not including other locations.) However, you very easily look over this as the world is densely packed with content and quest to do (Even secrets im still finding till this day.)

-Soundtrack-
 Easily one of my favorite soundtracks in any form of media ever. Saying it's a masterpiece is putting it lightly. The songs for each battle and location are absolutely breathtaking. Some moments due to the soundtrack simply feel like out of body experiences. I highly recommend you give this OST a listen as soon as possible. However...DO NOT, I repeat, DO NOT listen to the song "Weight of The World" as it makes for one of the most magical moments I've ever had in my gaming career (more on this later.) I found myself standing in so many different locations just to enjoy the soundtrack for hours, it makes for some of the most relaxing songs I've ever heard.

-Story-
 I know this is extremely counter-intuitive but,

I don't want to tell you what this game is about.

 If you want a basic understanding, scroll up and read the description. I believe this game is enjoyed the most when you go in completely blind. However, if you're not into darker and sadder stories then I wouldn't recommend this game because MAN does this game know how to tug on those heart strings. I'm not one to have tears running down my face when I experience any form of media. Whether it be shows or games, the most I'll pump out is watery eyes and a closed throat. But this game is different. By the end of this game I was heavily sobbing, I even had to put my controller down to collect myself. In layman's terms, this game is overwhelmingly emotionally heavy. Once you're done with your first playthrough, It is revealed to you that you must beat the game a total of 5 times to get the "True Ending." My first reaction to that was simply "No." I mean FIVE TIMES?! Seriously?! But once the credits finished rolling and I was greeted to the main menu, I clicked "Load Game" just to get a feel of what NG+ might feel like. "This isn't NG+, THIS IS A WHOLE NEW GAME!" I thought to myself as I noticed the drastic differences in your second playthrough. I wont go any further into what exactly this meant because, once again, the less you know the better. Besides the main story line, this games lore and side stories are absolutely phenomenal. I would search every nook and cranny hopping to find the next piece to the lore to this world I was slowly piecing together. I even found myself to read offical lore books once I completed the game. Just like a piece of music, the crescendo must be perfect as it is the last thing the observer hears. This games ending deserves its own category in this review.

-The Ending-
 Once you beat the game the first 4 times, you can now get the 5th and final ending. I'm not going to say what exactly it entailed but I CAN tell you how I felt. This ending man...I've never felt more moved to my core in my life. It was too emotionally heavy. I couldn't compose myself, all those pent up tears from the constent flow of sadness this game instilled in me, flooding out like forcing open the floodgates with explosives. It's the most intimate I've ever been with a game. To this day, every time I think about it, I heavily tear up. If you have even the slightest chance in the future to experience game then I implore to not spoil this ending as it has changed my life. The song Weight of The World playing over each ending of the 4 ending up till now makes you slowly start to become numb to the feeling it was meant to evoke...but this time, the final time, is so unexplainably different. Maybe it's the slight changes in the song, maybe its the change of context in the song this time around, maybe its the fact that its the storys literal swan song. But the feelings it evokes in you in this moment are as a subtle as a sledge hammer to the face. I lost all composure and just started sobbing in the middle of the night as the credits rolled.


It was the most beautiful thing I've ever experienced.

10/10

While SR isn't a groundbreaking experience is surely an entertainment one (at least in a superficial way), at first is kind of hard to get used to the controls and it's a little weird to control a character like it's a vehicle but once you get it, it's hard to put the control down albeit is a pretty short experience.

You start with 4 selectable characters and 4 selectable stages, the stages are based on stages from the Sonic series and they look pretty solid, you can unlock an extra stage and characters when you met certain criteria: like getting an emerald and get in 1st place in that course or get 5 tokens and get at least in 3rd place, these are pretty basic challenges and you're going to repeat the stages to track down all the items at least a few times, this for better or worse is the meat of Sonic R, at least from a single-player point of view, but is not that bad, since the controls are pretty decent and the stages have several weather forms, this means that you can play a stage on normal, raining or snowing and not only they look different they also have gameplay perks, like when is snowing the water is frozen therefore you can freely traverse bodies of water with the addition that they're also slippery, it adds replayability and disguises the fact (if only by a few runs) that only 5 stages are available. The AI is challenging but not hard, and when you grasp the game mechanics they become just moving obstacles, so most of the challenge will be unlocking the rest of the cast.

One thing that I need to emphasize is the music, it's simply brilliant, it sounds funky and 90's pop that even when you listen to a track for the 20th time it never grows old, it has a lot of charm and fits the Sonic universe quite well.

Although I can mostly say positive things about this game, in the end, Sonic R wears down its appeal once you unlocked all the characters or at least a couple of them, since you're going to do a lot of repetition, this experience can be translated in a couple of hours, maybe double that if you go multiplayer. It is not a deep experience by any means but at least you'll be entertained for one afternoon.