YoRHa/NieR alliance raid 5.0

[Vahlnir]

I get that a lot of folks wanted this colab and the game looks pretty neat as well! But Motobikes, Pimp mobiles and now this it's like Eorzea is becoming the junkyard of worlds with no real identity of it's own. Or am I missing something with this genre of MMO Is it common for all these crossovers?

Crossovers aren't a new concept but they do seem to be putting most of their eggs in FF XIV's basket recently. It makes me wonder just how bad of a hit SE took by having to cancel all those FF XV DLCs.

[DevonEllwood]

I've made up my mind I guess so I guess I'll delete my comments since they don't apply anymore? Would people mind editing?

[Daralii]

This seems like it's toeing a fine line to me. I'm going to remain optimistic, and I'm completely okay with a similar story and artistic elements as the other game. I'm not looking forward to the characters and I don't want to have another story where I'm confused because it requires you to play the other game to understand. I think I'm going to treat it as people did Eureka: I'll look into it, but if it's not going to be something I want to see in the game again, I'm just skipping it. If there's enough people skipping it, they will take notice of it. So far, it just looks like a desperate attempt to get people interested in their other games by plugging it into this one.

But Automata did extremely well, and is still really popular. Why would the higher ups even want a new wave of sales for it when they'd have to split the profits between the inhouse developers and Platinum?

[Bright-Flower]

This seems like it's toeing a fine line to me. I'm going to remain optimistic, and I'm completely okay with a similar story and artistic elements as the other game. I'm not looking forward to the characters and I don't want to have another story where I'm confused because it requires you to play the other game to understand. I think I'm going to treat it as people did Eureka: I'll look into it, but if it's not going to be something I want to see in the game again, I'm just skipping it. If there's enough people skipping it, they will take notice of it. So far, it just looks like a desperate attempt to get people interested in their other games by plugging it into this one.

Automata's story is actually mostly self contained, other than people who didn't play Nier not knowing

who Devola/Popola/Emil are

but beyond that, the events of both Nier games are so far apart that you really don't need to play the previous games to get it. Not that Automata cant' be confusing on its own terms, but if anything bringing in Nier 1 would only complicate Automata's story rather than clarify.

[Ninjasmine]

When I first heard about this I was pretty buttmad too(and I’m a pretty big Taro fan). But then, while I still don’t think they’ll make a convincing fit into a story with this, I feel that so much can be done.

What I am hoping is that they do keep the same structure as the rest of the 24 mans with Nier/Drakengard gear being a drop for each role. This isn’t an event fate or trial unrelated to story anymore, so glamour only gear from late game content would be distasteful.

Secondly, I’m hoping for more than Automata lore as well. Since it’s Yoko Taro, I don’t think I really have to worry about that too much honestly. He still made a ton of references to Nier 1 and had a lot of lore outside of the game, so him just sticking to Automata doesn’t seem likely.

Finally, I’m hoping that them implementing his stuff as a main part of the content maybe means savage raids(or at least an option), with the 3rd act/branch being nearly savage level. This I doubt will happen, but I think it would be a nice touch.

[Vaer]

Okay, I'm even more confused. This game is a series? I was specifying I don't want to have to play the game the raid is based off of to understand what the raid is about. I was pretty confused by the ending of the last 24 man raid enough as is. The only game I played in that series was Tactics Advance and that was a long time ago.

Yeah it's a series, it's also sort of related to some of the Drakengard series which is pretty old. The series was sort of a cult classic until it blew up with Automata recently. It's pretty popular now.

/shrug You don't need to know the ins and outs of the story to enjoy the combat or the fights they will put in. You might not appreciate it as much as someone who knows the context surrounding it though. Just treat it like a bunch of boss fights that are themed after something else.

A lot of the game are kind of throwbacks to other FF anyway, like the recent Omega series. You can still do the fights even if you don't know where Alte Roite is from, or Guardian.

[Freyt]

The think about all of Drakengard and Nier... none of them are connected... despite all of them being connected. It's like a cronenberg Final Fantasy. Even still, NieR Automata seems the most disconnected of them all in my foolish opinion.

On a completely unrelated point I much prefer the original Japanese title of Drakengard, "Drag on Dragoon", but "Drakengard" is much easier to refer to in both speech and text, unfortunately.

[Ninjasmine]

Some of you all keep saying they’re not connected....but they are(even Automata). However the genius is that they are all standalone games, so you don’t need to know the lore of the previous games to enjoy each one. It would enhance your experience(if you love the backstory games), but the games are great as is.

Like I get the other games didn’t age that well/are cult classics, but no need to downplay his writing. There are novellas written because the story is so vast.

[Maero]

And events like Yo-kai watch and Power Rangers were connected to FFXIV? Or Monster Hunter which is permanent content in FFXIV.

[Ramesses]

The think about all of Drakengard and Nier... none of them are connected... despite all of them being connected. It's like a cronenberg Final Fantasy. Even still, NieR Automata seems the most disconnected of them all in my foolish opinion.

That is incorrect and the fact is that they are all very well connected... from Dragkengard to Nier, the tale is actually embedded within for anyone who plays through all the games thoroughly... therein lies one of the facets of Taro's genius. The concept arts are also phenomenal all across all the games and I seriously hope we get most of them as rewards from the raids.

To understand how Automata in particular connects to the other games, one has to play NieR Replica (not Gesalt) and get all four or five endings which then gives a clear understanding of how the tale segways into Nier Automata. All the tales, from Dragengard to Automata are indeed almost stand alone but they are all still fundamentally connected. Automata, being the last in the saga, is the one that really attempts to give a lasting resolution to the weave... the feels in it's amazing tale really kicks in when you see A2 swap to her heavy armour

Speaking of the heavy armour an artist made one for 9S...

Returning back on tangent, you know you're playing the right version of Nier if this chap is your character...

You'll also have a much deeper appreciation for Kaine's charcater (in either Gesalt or Replica) by the third playthrough and this helps fill in the pieces in the tales. For this reason, she still remains one of my favourite in the entire saga. And of course, wonderful Emil, whose actions sometimes seem baffling or mysterious but his heart is so very pure. Its no wonder Taro wears Emil's head in interviews.

Finally, if you don't mind spoilers or have played the games already, you might also want to watch this video which helps to understand all the summary timelines and interconnected plots.

Jump to around 23.00 minutes into the video to see the connection between Replica and Automata.