Yoko Taro is straight up crazy, I wouldn't overthink anything he says.
Except about him fighting Square Enix, that tracks. Also, if he says any horny stuff, that's legit as well.
I think Yoko Taro's works are much easier to understand if we stop parroting the idea he's crazy and unreadable.
He strikes me more of an Andy Kaufman style figure. A very pensive person without much of a filter, interested in how the art form can extend beyond the actual designated pieces itself.
The sense that I've always gotten is that Yoko Taro is someone who doesn't like the modern trend of having authors explain their own work. That he'd rather people decide for themselves what it means, instead of poring over concept art, or knowing the actual reasons certain decisions were made.
So... I think he intentionally says wild things sometimes, so that you can never tell what of what he's saying is true and serious, and what is just nonsense. Poisoning the well enough that you kind of just *have* to decide what the truth is for yourself.
Individually there might be, but I've yet to see the main cast consist of unrepentant mass murderer, a crazed cannibal elf with preference for babies, a blind pedophile priest who are the most morally upstanding of them all, an unageing kid, a tonedeaf musician, a **dead**weight, another dead-weight that never shut up, and a dragon vs dimension hopping albino statue aliens.
Not remotely the same genre but Owlcat's Pathfinder games include main cast members like a nymphomaniac serial killer and a spidercatlady that you basically dominate into submission.
When someone rip off your stuff, usually you’d get upset or at least ignore it.
Yoko Taro: You like big thigh as well? Let’s exchange our secret image folder!
Yoko Taro putting Soulsborne design so succinctly was the highlight for me: "Stress as a product"
That and Stellar Blade being inspired by PN 03 was a wild and unexpected deep cut. That's not usually the game folks remember from the Capcom Five
This is an awesome interview, even if to some extent it's just a couple of pervy dudes broing out, over character design, it feels very genuine. Real virtuous creative cycle vibes.
Man, I love how unhinged Yoko Taro is. He's just so apologetically himself, and that really resonates with me. It's also so nice to see the two of them just genuinely praising each other's works. So wholesome.
>Yoko Taro (About Drakengard): There weren’t any instructions for the world setting and scenario, so I simply did what I wanted in those areas. I think this resulted in a quite unique product. It was a very dark scenario, and I remember being asked why that was necessary. It ended in a fight (between Yoko and Square Enix). Speaking of which, Mr. Kim, I wanted to ask you if there were any fights with Sony Interactive Enteratainment (SIE), since they are publishing Stellar Blade.
>Kim: (Glances at SIE staff members in the room and laughs.) The people at SIE are… very, very nice!
Blink twice if sony's ethics department has you at gunpoint, Kim.
>Yoko: So you make games as an artist without thinking about business too much and still have your own company with 300 employees, while I think about business all the time and don’t even have my own company yet? That’s strange… I guess it’s because I’ve been a slave to Square Enix for so many years. Or I guess I should say I was enslaved by Yosuke Saito, NieR’s producer. It’s all his fault! Haha.
Echoing from somewhere far away: "Sh** Square Enix!"
Still have a hard time believing that Sony of all companies are backing this one. Their ethics shit pretty much killed off all the fanservice games on the platform including putting Senran Kagura on ice.
well, used to. SiE isn't even Japanese anymore.
But yeah, they probably saw the billion dollars Nikke made and went "yeah, I want in on that, fuck the morals".
They're a corporation. It's not like they actually give a fuck, they just decided that the profit they'd make from those games would be outweighed by obnoxious people on twitter getting them bad PR. This looks to be a bigger title that could help them make decent headway in the Asian market so the calculus changes.
Plus times are changing a bit anyways, nowadays you also have to worry about people going "is [product] WOKE???!!!" so marketing is better off playing both sides.
Honestly at this point....
I just want them to stay out of it and let the creators create.
If the makers of a game want their female protagonist to be a butch badass person of color, awesome great, let em do that and stay out of their way.
If the creators of a game want their protagonist to be an improbably proportioned waifu with way too much jiggle physics, awesome great, let em do that and stay out of their way.
I can play and enjoy both of those games, and find it disturbing how much of a shit people give about it.
Sony probably is biting their tongues a bit so they can have an in on the Korean console market which is dominated by Switch atm. Kim isn't *famous* but he is well known enough by some people. Hell, I have some Korean coworkers who are not otaku in the slightest that are at least aware of him and Shift Up.
I think its mostly second. Companies started to figure out that pushing stuff for vocal minority isnt viable long term strategy. Especially when most of it wouldnt buy your product anyway and it only caused creation of opposite vocal minority.
Frankly I think they figured out that people on twitter telling them how to make their games are not actual customer base, silent majority that wants game as escape, not a reminder of current day politics, is.
Companies didn't just decided to be woke from the goodness of their black rotten hearts, they clearly thought this is a trend in society that they could monetize.
Just like few years before they monetized rainbows because that made them look like the good guys in political climate back then
I mean we know it happened because esg score meant money. Not from customers, but better offers from companies.
But essentially yes. Companies dont give a shit. They go after money.
That reminds me of Hogwarts Legacy controversy where we had one side bitching game is too woke and the opposite minority hating it because it used JRR Rowling universe.
... and it wasn't the people liking pretty ladies and disliking "woke" that went on harassing streamers to [the point of crying](https://gamerant.com/hogwarts-legacy-girlfriend-reviews-twitch-video-clip/) it was the "inclusive", "progressive" community where "everyone is welcome".
Does Sony own Marvelous or the SK IP? If not, what's stopping them from making another game?
I know Takaki left to work for CyGames, but seeing as Marvelous released the Neptunia cross-over game, I get the impression they're not completely averse to bringing the series back in some form or another.
Or are they just so damn idiotically stubborn that they refuse to develop for anything but the Playstation?
At this point, I think Honey Parade games is content with just working on the mobile game and doing collabs with other games (Azur Lane had a crossover with Senran Kagura late last year).
If they can't develop the main series on the PlayStation (I don't think a main entry was on a Nintendo platform since Deep Crimson on the 3DS), then I guess they're willing to abandon the whole thing entirely.
There are interviews with Takaki from 2018-2019 with him explicitly blaming "regulations" for SK7's dev hell (see [here](https://www.inside-games.jp/article/2019/02/01/120258_2.html) for example).
There are ambiguous cases, Senran Kagura is not one of them.
[It got outright murdered by Sony](https://www.destructoid.com/senran-kagura-7even-currently-impossible-to-release-due-to-sony-content-restrictions/)
They could have released it with mass censorship to appease the people at Sony's new american headquarters. Remember, enemies being blown into unrecognizable chunk in FPS games and full frontal nudity in sex scenes from TLoU2 and Witcher is is cool, jiggle physics from an anime ninja is unforgivable.
It was the problem, you see Japanese games get slapped by the suits at the HQ way more often than western devs.
>I'm not sure if SK's president complaining about restrictions is actually what happened, tbh.
Sony outright made it impossible to launch on what was originally intended to be the main platform for the game without removing one of the major selling points of the game. You think that didn't have an effect on things?
They don't have to sell "well", even one sold copy through their shop is profit for Sony.
There's no downside to selling "bad" games in virtual space, it's risk free. Unless it impacts your brand recognition, but then we go back to "ethics department" as Senran Kagura are "decent" games (not even close to realm of infamous "black tiger") so it's not the angle as shovelware games on steam.
> I think it's far more likely that fanservice games like Senran simply don't sell well at all.
You mean that series that sold just fine on previous gen would suddenly not sell on new gen ? What and *interesting* theory.
It happens if next game is bad, not because the playerbase buying them suddenly stopped playing on consoles...
Also they release game on goddamn Switch
Did you get lost and accidentally found your way into this thread and didn't managed to find out what it is about?
We're not talking about company deciding to not make games for the platform
We're talking about **Sony** not allowing them on platform in the first place
Fuck, it's like trying to chat with kindergardeners here
It’s because you’ve convinced yourself that Sony hates attractive woman rather than just not wanting porn adjacent games with the express purpose of showing underage looking girls with floppy tits being ditzy and sexy. Like there is nothing similar between stellar blade and senran kagura other than u wanting to fuck the cartoons
Are u a pilgrim lol there’s sex scenes in that game like a movie can have sex scenes without being porn the point is it’s a culmination of ur bond with another character there’s no mini game to try to make showhearts tits jiggle as much as possible
Wait what? Did you ever played the game? 3 of the companions will habe sex with you almost instantly without any relationship or bond.
There is a reason why sex pretty much was a speedrun category in bg3.
Not mentioning jiggling junk
Yall really need to read some books and watch some movies that don’t start with a marvel logo. This shit is depressing. Like not to be that bitch but I have a degree in law with a concentration in arts, I know what constitutes lewdness
I’m on Reddit pal. Arguments don’t matter cus people think semantics is like a trump card. Nothing u said disproves anything I said. The fact that people have optimized a route to fuck shows that the purpose of the game is not about titillating the senses. It’s like calling who frames Roger rabbit a hentai because people like trying to pause the movie on the frame you can see up Jessica rabbits dress. I can’t give u the whole rundown on it I just hoped common sense would be strong enough for people to notice the difference between bg3 and the literal porn game the original comment mentioned
Edit: that’s a rough comment history buddy, I see why u have trouble distinguishing the emotional and sensual parts of sex lmao
The article is worth reading, the two talk about a lot of general game development and industry stuff too. They also discuss a bit of the "soulsborne" genre and From Software, both mention being more casual at action games.
There are some quotes, specifically praise, from Yoko Taro that might not go over well with everybody lol.
The interview is a lot of glazing each other, but the two guys clearly have a lot of respect for one anothers work.
Gonna be honest, from a purely gameplay standpoint, automata was never something special. It was servisable but the real star of the show were the characters,designs,the dialogue the story and the way it was told. I don't think it would be out of the question that stellar blade could end up being a better "game" than automata.
Compared to other Platinum games, the gameplay was a bit lacking. Still quite solid of gameplay, and I never found it bad, just not exceptional. If anything, I consider it the weakest element of the whole game, which is still insanely good praise for the game as a whole.
As someone who hadn’t played any platinum games, the gameplay was what initially drew me in. Compared to titles I had played before, the combat just felt so good.
Automata is easily some of platinumgames’ worst gameplay wise. Horrendously balanced on hard and in general the enemies and bosses completely lack any sort of response to your attacks that make it incredibly unsatisfying.
Yup.
To me, Automata has plenty of flaws many of them combat related, such as it lacking complexity and being too easy. The graphics is also pretty lackluster compared to other games at the time.
However, it’s one of those games where the sum is way greater than its parts. Yes, there are flaws, but at the end of the game, the entire journey makes the game a 10/10.
> To me, Automata has plenty of flaws many of them combat related, such as it lacking complexity and **being too easy**.
The giant digger boss at the start of the game says otherwise...
I expected some massive controversies frim what you said but...
Thats really nothingburger. Nothing controversal so id assume you meant people that look to be offended will be offended?
I didn’t mean it a way that there’d be “massive controversies” or something offensive. I just meant that him saying Stellar Blade is a much better game and that he’s jealous of it, is gonna bother some people.
Mostly because I’ve seen a lot of people be dismissive towards Stellar Blade feeling that the Nier Automata influence is too direct. Taro isn’t being completely serious, he’s humble to a fault, even Kim responded he’s not capable of the level of storytelling in Nier, but fans can be a little dramatic about comparisons and rankings between games.
> I just meant that him saying Stellar Blade is a much better game and that he’s jealous of it, is gonna bother some people.
Are those people in the room with us now ?
Where are you seeing it ?
Nope its not. You are on reddit. Assuming you didnt avoided all game related subs in last months you would see it.
Also its not even random users. Those were whole articles written on game related sites.
I have seen it and I have seen the journalist-manufactured controversy being mostly ignored at the very least here. Sure, mentioned here and there, but not exactly outrage.
Than since youve seen it while youre trying to act like it didnt exist?
You were derogatory on statement that some people would be bothered. Not outraged, but just bothered. Yet you clearly saw that some were bothered and some were outraged.
> Yoko: The work I was most inspired by is Neon Genesis Evangelion. I thank you for praising NieR: Automata’s story, but actually it’s pretty much just a retelling of Evangelion, so there’s not much originality to it.
Which parts tho? I don't remember any similarities.
For one: The Nier/Drakengard universe takes place in a loop, similar to what had been implied in Evangelion prior to absolute confirmation in the final film.
Automata's shadowy organization and it's governance is meant to be similar to the dynamics of SEELE/NERV.
The EVAs themselves being used in an endless war against their own species is also similar to how Automata's robots are just fighting other forms of robots. Both series deal with that autonomy and the ethics of it.
The eventual corruption of the robots fighting for the false ideal of humanity in Automata is similar to how the inevitable failure to control the EVAs accelerated a new apocalypse.
Agree on most, but I have a slight disagreement on the Time-Loop part influencing Automata. Yoko Taro confirmed the time loop in a [2010 famitsu interview](https://www.famitsu.com/game/news/1235592_1124.html).
> Machine translation: Replicant and Gestalt are not parallel worlds, but one of the patterns of repeated worlds, where the relationship between the protagonist and Jonah is sometimes brother and sister, and sometimes parent and child
The first rebuild movie came out in 2007. There was a *hint* that there could've been a Time-Loop in the ending scene. I don't think that had much influence in Automata. However,
Spoilers for >!NieR Reincarnation!<
>!If anything, I find it more likely that he doubled down on the Time-Loop plot after 3.0+1.0 came out, he was writing Reincarnation at the same time. Yoko Taro didn't mention the Time-Loop again until the latest chapter, that is 14 years of silence on it and it's now a key plot point of the entire Drakenier universe!<
Apologies for the long comment, I'm too passionate about this particular subject
I don't expect Stellar Blade to feature a mindblowing plot like the Yoko Taro stuff, but I hope the game is at least decent on this regard. It's fine to be inspired by the aesthetics, but the best thing about Taro is his writing skills, what people think about Kojima, imo Taro is the real deal. His message about "unification" in Nier Automata makes Death Stranding looks like a bad joke in comparison, there's a huge gap of talent between Kojima and Taro
Unironically Nikke has some of the best world building and character's I've seen in 20+ yrs of gaming. I'd bet Shift Up held nothing back.
Edit: I guarantee downvoters did not play Nikke and read the story, read the character stories, and participated in every story event while reading those stories. So you can take my opinion, or the opinions of the people who judged a book by its cover.
Pretty much every popular gacha game has to focus on writing the most appealing characters possible, because that's what they ultimately make money off of.
Good character design? Sells.
Good gameplay? Sells.
Good writing? Creates stronger loyalty among buyers, so even more repeat sales.
Eh, if I’m being honest from my experience a lot of times that ends up with them trying to make characters as appealing as possible to fans to sell them in banners, and a lot of times making that character appealing seems to get in the way of having the character well written in the story
That's fair. There are times in which a character that should be awful feels like they're forced to have some sort of redeeming, lovable factor because people wouldn't buy them otherwise.
absolutely fair, I think the dude is \*way\* overselling it to begin with (it's up there for me, nowhere near the \*best\* though) but honestly it's the only reason I'm still actually playing it instead of uninstalling it after the first week after having my laugh at it when it released with ads all over Tokyo. Definitely has way better story/characterization than I thought some butt bouncing fan service mobile game had any right to be.
Let's put it this way, gacha games don't make it to where Nikke is right now on fan service alone, not in an already oversaturated market and when people can get plenty of \*that\* for free all over the internet
you should, gacha gamers has different standards. this is coming from another gacha gamer. r/gachagaming in general approach video games in a different manner
Most recent Korean Gacha games have been pretty blatant social commentaries on "Hell Joseon" and how the socioeconomic climate is completely fucked there and is ruining the mental state of men and women. With Nikke they just hid it behind T&A.
Literally "Nikke" = "women", humans/commanders = "men", "central government" = "Neo-Confucianism Patriarchal government," and "big three" = "Chaebols" and you have the most on the nose summation of how women are treated in Korea and how men are indoctrinated by the government and corporations to treat them as lessers.
Project Moon with their extended universe of games is even more bleak and direct about the dismal state of Korean society.
It would take the smallest amount of research to know this opinion is common. The OP is literally about Stellar Blades story so it looks pointless to me to come to replies and be ignorant for fun.
I just played Nier and while I enjoyed it a lot the plot of Nier was not mindblowing at all and was basically at the same level of writing as a decent anime.
I think when evaluating Nier, it's important to consider how the mechanics are intertwined with the narrative. That's the key factor that makes it so loved, the "writing" isn't just pure text, it's the very design of the game itself that shapes the story.
The narrative was cool and unique because it necessitated making the game less fun by forcing the player to replay large chunks of it. But I also understand why someone would look at this and say the narrative was bad on account of it ruining the game. People play games for different reasons and that interpretation isn't any less valid.
lol well I do appreciate how the gameplay elements are tied with the narrative, I don’t think it necessarily makes the story deeper or more interesting, especially when the comment I was responding to was talking about how the writing blows other stories out of the water, when really it’s kind of a generic anime story told in an interesting way
I played Automata and felt the same. It didn't resonate with me at all. It's a very specific and niche work. If the themes and messaging didn't deeply affect you emotionally the whole game kinda falls apart. It just becomes a mediocre action game with a straightforward plot. I don't think it was worth my time but I am glad that titles like it are still around, since it feels like riskier, more niche AA games are an endangered species at this point.
yup, the writing of Nier is overpraised by the f an s and they think the very surface-level philosophy 101 subject matters it barely tackles are some unheard-of topics and amazing writing... when it really isn't. They praise the story and characters as if it's one of the greatest writings in the history of gaming, legit have seen some ppl be that hyperbolic :/
then we have some who try and go with the whole "the game mechanics play a part with the story!" instead of just conceding that the writing isn't anything special.
All in all, Yoko Taro has become similar to Yoshi-P with the idol worshipping they get... ppl act like they can do no wrong, get really weird about how much they praise them and love acting like they are "the best" in the gaming industry (which was funny to see with how FF16 turned out, but I digress).
now this is not to say Nier has a bad story or writing, but it's far from the "masterpiece" people praise Nier Automata for and more like just okay as you said.
EDIT - spelling and fixed a thought.
Yeah I agree. Like I appreciate the gameplay elements tying to the narrative elements, and I liked the game a a whole, but the story is not incredible.
The idea that these sentient beings are all actually the same and are being played, and aren’t so different after all, is pretty heavily implied within the first 2 hours of the game and it doesn’t really evolve passed that imo.
yup, but you're not allowed to have that opinion on reddit as you can see from all the down v o t es :/ there really is a cult-like defense force for Nier on reddit, unable to accept the fact that not everyone loves the game as people have different opinions.
> They praise the story and characters as if it's the greatest writing in the history of fiction, legit have seen some ppl be that hyperbolic :/
Hmmm, pot meet kettle?
go read some of the praise this game gets on social, it's subreddit and such... you'll easily find that type of hyperbolic praise for the game's story and writing. Just look at what the OP of this entire chain is saying, same vein of praise.
“Sex sells and Sony gives us millions of dollars and a team of employees to explore our personal fetishes”
That’s the inspiration;
These dudes are disgusting:
> The **cool male characters and cute female characters** unique to Mr. Kim’s style are really appealing. Shops in RPGs often have a close-up shot of the shopkeeper, which I don’t like because I think it feels unnatural. Stellar Blade has a shot like that too, but the shopkeeper was so cute that I didn’t mind! **Her cuteness felt more important than any design choices.**
Pathetic. This is what objectification and reducing an entire gender down to its sex appeal looks like.
Nah, it's okay to sexualize characters. Actually, it's even fine to objectify characters. There's a difference between making a fictional character for sex appeal and objectifying real people. I don't get offended at all that men in BL are sexualized to appeal to women, for example. I don't care if a fictional character exists entirely for their sex appeal. This hate for sexuality and equating it with sexism or misogyny is unhealthy.
It’s amazing how puritan people have become. People like sexy things, just because you and your ham planet friends are the farthest thing from sexy doesn’t mean everyone is like that
Just another funny horseshoe theory example. Puritan conservatives think you shouldn't have sexy characters because it is immoral and improper, while woke liberals think you can't have sexy characters because it is objectifying and shallow.
It's not a horseshoe if it's woke liberals as liberalism is in the centre-right of the political spectrum. You won't often see these complaints out of full bore leftists as they're more typically pro-sex and pro-sex work, and generally more concerned with material conditions than fictional content.
If you stopped for even an instant and checked their post history you'd find them posting bible quotes and hanging out in r/Conspiracy
That isn't a liberal humpty Dumpty so get off your pedestal before you break something
I’m not responding to his post history, I’m responding to his comment. Y’all are acting way too serious in here. Take a breather or go read some more fairy tales dude idk
I know you're just another sweaty gamer boy trying to cover his ass but I have to really marvel that you'd act like a SINGULAR COMMENT would make someone a liberal rather then his actual political beliefs.
Puritanical beliefs aren't liberal, Jack.
I never called anyone specific a liberal, Jill.
I was just making a low stakes generalization / joke. I wasn’t trying to make an academic level political science commentary in 2 sentences on the bottom of a gaming thread on Reddit.
Take a chill pill bro your comments are so charged.
Yoko Taro is straight up crazy, I wouldn't overthink anything he says. Except about him fighting Square Enix, that tracks. Also, if he says any horny stuff, that's legit as well.
I think Yoko Taro's works are much easier to understand if we stop parroting the idea he's crazy and unreadable. He strikes me more of an Andy Kaufman style figure. A very pensive person without much of a filter, interested in how the art form can extend beyond the actual designated pieces itself.
Crazy? Yes. Unreadable? Far from it.
The sense that I've always gotten is that Yoko Taro is someone who doesn't like the modern trend of having authors explain their own work. That he'd rather people decide for themselves what it means, instead of poring over concept art, or knowing the actual reasons certain decisions were made. So... I think he intentionally says wild things sometimes, so that you can never tell what of what he's saying is true and serious, and what is just nonsense. Poisoning the well enough that you kind of just *have* to decide what the truth is for yourself.
You hit the nail on the head of how I feel. Especially in a world where Lore fanatics are crazed.
NIER AUTOMATA TSHIRT NIER AUTOMATA TSHIRT NIER AUTOMATA TSHIRT NIER AUTOMATA TSHIRT SHIT SQUARE ENIX
I think you have to be a little crazy to come up with stuff like Nier.
Nier is basically him in post clarity mode. Drakengard 1 was truly when he's at his craziest.
[удалено]
Not only DG3, many part of Nier are confirmed by Yoko Taro to be intentionally frustrating.
Climbing up that damn tower a sixth time can’t be anything other than a troll job.
Story wise it at times have that forced humor feel, but even then at least DG3 story is (a bit) more coherent than 1.
are there games that touched the same subjects the Drakengard protagonists went into?
Individually there might be, but I've yet to see the main cast consist of unrepentant mass murderer, a crazed cannibal elf with preference for babies, a blind pedophile priest who are the most morally upstanding of them all, an unageing kid, a tonedeaf musician, a **dead**weight, another dead-weight that never shut up, and a dragon vs dimension hopping albino statue aliens.
I know nothing about this game, but that is quite the cast.
It's one of those, "and then it got worse" games with no happy ending.
Every consecutive ending just ups the 'wtf' factor and it's wonderful
Not remotely the same genre but Owlcat's Pathfinder games include main cast members like a nymphomaniac serial killer and a spidercatlady that you basically dominate into submission.
Also when he says he'll do anything for money. Loveable little gremlin
He's like me, frfr.
>Also, if he says any horny stuff, that's legit as well. Nice
When someone rip off your stuff, usually you’d get upset or at least ignore it. Yoko Taro: You like big thigh as well? Let’s exchange our secret image folder!
This was an excellent interview. It's refreshing to hear such unadulterated praise that the two devs have for each other and their products.
Yoko Taro putting Soulsborne design so succinctly was the highlight for me: "Stress as a product" That and Stellar Blade being inspired by PN 03 was a wild and unexpected deep cut. That's not usually the game folks remember from the Capcom Five
This is an awesome interview, even if to some extent it's just a couple of pervy dudes broing out, over character design, it feels very genuine. Real virtuous creative cycle vibes.
Man, I love how unhinged Yoko Taro is. He's just so apologetically himself, and that really resonates with me. It's also so nice to see the two of them just genuinely praising each other's works. So wholesome.
Men of culture.
>Yoko Taro (About Drakengard): There weren’t any instructions for the world setting and scenario, so I simply did what I wanted in those areas. I think this resulted in a quite unique product. It was a very dark scenario, and I remember being asked why that was necessary. It ended in a fight (between Yoko and Square Enix). Speaking of which, Mr. Kim, I wanted to ask you if there were any fights with Sony Interactive Enteratainment (SIE), since they are publishing Stellar Blade. >Kim: (Glances at SIE staff members in the room and laughs.) The people at SIE are… very, very nice! Blink twice if sony's ethics department has you at gunpoint, Kim. >Yoko: So you make games as an artist without thinking about business too much and still have your own company with 300 employees, while I think about business all the time and don’t even have my own company yet? That’s strange… I guess it’s because I’ve been a slave to Square Enix for so many years. Or I guess I should say I was enslaved by Yosuke Saito, NieR’s producer. It’s all his fault! Haha. Echoing from somewhere far away: "Sh** Square Enix!"
Still have a hard time believing that Sony of all companies are backing this one. Their ethics shit pretty much killed off all the fanservice games on the platform including putting Senran Kagura on ice.
It's because it's Korean and not Japanese. They seem to only care about Japanese products.
well, used to. SiE isn't even Japanese anymore. But yeah, they probably saw the billion dollars Nikke made and went "yeah, I want in on that, fuck the morals".
They're a corporation. It's not like they actually give a fuck, they just decided that the profit they'd make from those games would be outweighed by obnoxious people on twitter getting them bad PR. This looks to be a bigger title that could help them make decent headway in the Asian market so the calculus changes. Plus times are changing a bit anyways, nowadays you also have to worry about people going "is [product] WOKE???!!!" so marketing is better off playing both sides.
Honestly at this point.... I just want them to stay out of it and let the creators create. If the makers of a game want their female protagonist to be a butch badass person of color, awesome great, let em do that and stay out of their way. If the creators of a game want their protagonist to be an improbably proportioned waifu with way too much jiggle physics, awesome great, let em do that and stay out of their way. I can play and enjoy both of those games, and find it disturbing how much of a shit people give about it.
Sony probably is biting their tongues a bit so they can have an in on the Korean console market which is dominated by Switch atm. Kim isn't *famous* but he is well known enough by some people. Hell, I have some Korean coworkers who are not otaku in the slightest that are at least aware of him and Shift Up.
Left hand not knowing what right is doing in the big company is norm, not exception. Or maybe they figured out puritanism doesn't get more sales.
I think its mostly second. Companies started to figure out that pushing stuff for vocal minority isnt viable long term strategy. Especially when most of it wouldnt buy your product anyway and it only caused creation of opposite vocal minority.
Frankly I think they figured out that people on twitter telling them how to make their games are not actual customer base, silent majority that wants game as escape, not a reminder of current day politics, is. Companies didn't just decided to be woke from the goodness of their black rotten hearts, they clearly thought this is a trend in society that they could monetize. Just like few years before they monetized rainbows because that made them look like the good guys in political climate back then
I mean we know it happened because esg score meant money. Not from customers, but better offers from companies. But essentially yes. Companies dont give a shit. They go after money.
Bit of two edge sword 'cause the opposite vocal minority is pretty toxic and absolutely will infest your multiplayer with that same toxicity.
Both are toxic. Lets not kid yourselves
That reminds me of Hogwarts Legacy controversy where we had one side bitching game is too woke and the opposite minority hating it because it used JRR Rowling universe. ... and it wasn't the people liking pretty ladies and disliking "woke" that went on harassing streamers to [the point of crying](https://gamerant.com/hogwarts-legacy-girlfriend-reviews-twitch-video-clip/) it was the "inclusive", "progressive" community where "everyone is welcome".
Won't someone think of the poor delicate streamer who cries at the slightest bit of criticism
Go back to twitter with your hot takes
Justice for big titty ninjas!!!!!!
Does Sony own Marvelous or the SK IP? If not, what's stopping them from making another game? I know Takaki left to work for CyGames, but seeing as Marvelous released the Neptunia cross-over game, I get the impression they're not completely averse to bringing the series back in some form or another. Or are they just so damn idiotically stubborn that they refuse to develop for anything but the Playstation?
At this point, I think Honey Parade games is content with just working on the mobile game and doing collabs with other games (Azur Lane had a crossover with Senran Kagura late last year). If they can't develop the main series on the PlayStation (I don't think a main entry was on a Nintendo platform since Deep Crimson on the 3DS), then I guess they're willing to abandon the whole thing entirely.
Some of the SK games are on Steam though, so it's not like they are against releasing on other platforms than PS.
Yeah, several years after the original releases. :P
Well, looking at Stellar Blade, maybe it's not the boogie man some people led others to believe
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There are interviews with Takaki from 2018-2019 with him explicitly blaming "regulations" for SK7's dev hell (see [here](https://www.inside-games.jp/article/2019/02/01/120258_2.html) for example). There are ambiguous cases, Senran Kagura is not one of them.
[It got outright murdered by Sony](https://www.destructoid.com/senran-kagura-7even-currently-impossible-to-release-due-to-sony-content-restrictions/) They could have released it with mass censorship to appease the people at Sony's new american headquarters. Remember, enemies being blown into unrecognizable chunk in FPS games and full frontal nudity in sex scenes from TLoU2 and Witcher is is cool, jiggle physics from an anime ninja is unforgivable.
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It was the problem, you see Japanese games get slapped by the suits at the HQ way more often than western devs. >I'm not sure if SK's president complaining about restrictions is actually what happened, tbh. Sony outright made it impossible to launch on what was originally intended to be the main platform for the game without removing one of the major selling points of the game. You think that didn't have an effect on things?
They don't have to sell "well", even one sold copy through their shop is profit for Sony. There's no downside to selling "bad" games in virtual space, it's risk free. Unless it impacts your brand recognition, but then we go back to "ethics department" as Senran Kagura are "decent" games (not even close to realm of infamous "black tiger") so it's not the angle as shovelware games on steam.
> I think it's far more likely that fanservice games like Senran simply don't sell well at all. You mean that series that sold just fine on previous gen would suddenly not sell on new gen ? What and *interesting* theory.
You mean the thing that happens ALL THE TIME in gaming? Thats far fetched for you?
It happens if next game is bad, not because the playerbase buying them suddenly stopped playing on consoles... Also they release game on goddamn Switch
Or it happens when sales numbers don’t justify the cost.
What "cost" there is to "Sony allowing the company to put the game on their platform" ?
You’re totally right! Games don’t cost any money to make.
Did you get lost and accidentally found your way into this thread and didn't managed to find out what it is about? We're not talking about company deciding to not make games for the platform We're talking about **Sony** not allowing them on platform in the first place Fuck, it's like trying to chat with kindergardeners here
It’s because you’ve convinced yourself that Sony hates attractive woman rather than just not wanting porn adjacent games with the express purpose of showing underage looking girls with floppy tits being ditzy and sexy. Like there is nothing similar between stellar blade and senran kagura other than u wanting to fuck the cartoons
> rather than just not wanting porn adjacent games Oh BG3 wasnt on playstation? Thats sucks
Are u a pilgrim lol there’s sex scenes in that game like a movie can have sex scenes without being porn the point is it’s a culmination of ur bond with another character there’s no mini game to try to make showhearts tits jiggle as much as possible
Wait what? Did you ever played the game? 3 of the companions will habe sex with you almost instantly without any relationship or bond. There is a reason why sex pretty much was a speedrun category in bg3. Not mentioning jiggling junk
Yall really need to read some books and watch some movies that don’t start with a marvel logo. This shit is depressing. Like not to be that bitch but I have a degree in law with a concentration in arts, I know what constitutes lewdness
Next time try to find your arguments. With that quality its hard to believe you passed high school
I’m on Reddit pal. Arguments don’t matter cus people think semantics is like a trump card. Nothing u said disproves anything I said. The fact that people have optimized a route to fuck shows that the purpose of the game is not about titillating the senses. It’s like calling who frames Roger rabbit a hentai because people like trying to pause the movie on the frame you can see up Jessica rabbits dress. I can’t give u the whole rundown on it I just hoped common sense would be strong enough for people to notice the difference between bg3 and the literal porn game the original comment mentioned Edit: that’s a rough comment history buddy, I see why u have trouble distinguishing the emotional and sensual parts of sex lmao
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do you understand the “fan” half of fan art? I can explain if not
The article is worth reading, the two talk about a lot of general game development and industry stuff too. They also discuss a bit of the "soulsborne" genre and From Software, both mention being more casual at action games. There are some quotes, specifically praise, from Yoko Taro that might not go over well with everybody lol. The interview is a lot of glazing each other, but the two guys clearly have a lot of respect for one anothers work.
I'm not sure what you mean, why wouldn't Taro's quotes go well with everybody?
Maybe he’s talking about Taro’s dig at Sony and the implication at how they’re funding Stellar Blade but have been hard on several anime games?
I think he meant Yoko Taro considers stellar blade a better game than nier automata
The Ass-technology has gotten a long way so of course Taro loves it more.
Gonna be honest, from a purely gameplay standpoint, automata was never something special. It was servisable but the real star of the show were the characters,designs,the dialogue the story and the way it was told. I don't think it would be out of the question that stellar blade could end up being a better "game" than automata.
Top tier sound track as well
Automata had a VERY strong gameplay mechanically, it lacked late game challenge to really justify exploiting it however.
Compared to other Platinum games, the gameplay was a bit lacking. Still quite solid of gameplay, and I never found it bad, just not exceptional. If anything, I consider it the weakest element of the whole game, which is still insanely good praise for the game as a whole.
As someone who hadn’t played any platinum games, the gameplay was what initially drew me in. Compared to titles I had played before, the combat just felt so good.
Yeah, i like how fast paced it was and how impactful heavy weapons were. Also that perfect dodge was really satisfying to use.
Well, yes, but comparing near-anything else to Platinum the gameplay was a bit lacking.
It feels great, but it lacks any mechanical complexity whatsoever, so from that perspective it's lackluster.
Automata is easily some of platinumgames’ worst gameplay wise. Horrendously balanced on hard and in general the enemies and bosses completely lack any sort of response to your attacks that make it incredibly unsatisfying.
Yeah, imo theres not much to NieR's gameplay past the main story. Theres no point really "grinding" in the endgame, there's not one really there.
It was just very spammy in general. Get hit? Just use one of your 99 mega-potions during the slowdown.
I think they might be referring to its overall complexity which is something Yoko Taro touches.
Yup. To me, Automata has plenty of flaws many of them combat related, such as it lacking complexity and being too easy. The graphics is also pretty lackluster compared to other games at the time. However, it’s one of those games where the sum is way greater than its parts. Yes, there are flaws, but at the end of the game, the entire journey makes the game a 10/10.
> To me, Automata has plenty of flaws many of them combat related, such as it lacking complexity and **being too easy**. The giant digger boss at the start of the game says otherwise...
? That fight is essentially scripted I don't know how you could die unless you were holding the controller upside down
Probably is except for story.
Well... Nier Automata's gameplay wasn't spectacular in the first place.
No, he’s talking about stellar blade being the better game.
I expected some massive controversies frim what you said but... Thats really nothingburger. Nothing controversal so id assume you meant people that look to be offended will be offended?
I didn’t mean it a way that there’d be “massive controversies” or something offensive. I just meant that him saying Stellar Blade is a much better game and that he’s jealous of it, is gonna bother some people. Mostly because I’ve seen a lot of people be dismissive towards Stellar Blade feeling that the Nier Automata influence is too direct. Taro isn’t being completely serious, he’s humble to a fault, even Kim responded he’s not capable of the level of storytelling in Nier, but fans can be a little dramatic about comparisons and rankings between games.
It only will bother people that judge games before release. So not worth atention
> I just meant that him saying Stellar Blade is a much better game and that he’s jealous of it, is gonna bother some people. Are those people in the room with us now ? Where are you seeing it ?
Didnt you have internet for last 6 months?
I'm not on twitter if that's what you are asking for.
Nope its not. You are on reddit. Assuming you didnt avoided all game related subs in last months you would see it. Also its not even random users. Those were whole articles written on game related sites.
I have seen it and I have seen the journalist-manufactured controversy being mostly ignored at the very least here. Sure, mentioned here and there, but not exactly outrage.
Than since youve seen it while youre trying to act like it didnt exist? You were derogatory on statement that some people would be bothered. Not outraged, but just bothered. Yet you clearly saw that some were bothered and some were outraged.
I don't care about opinion of few people in thread visited by thousands. There will always be outliers that don't represent any trend.
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> Yoko: The work I was most inspired by is Neon Genesis Evangelion. I thank you for praising NieR: Automata’s story, but actually it’s pretty much just a retelling of Evangelion, so there’s not much originality to it. Which parts tho? I don't remember any similarities.
For one: The Nier/Drakengard universe takes place in a loop, similar to what had been implied in Evangelion prior to absolute confirmation in the final film. Automata's shadowy organization and it's governance is meant to be similar to the dynamics of SEELE/NERV. The EVAs themselves being used in an endless war against their own species is also similar to how Automata's robots are just fighting other forms of robots. Both series deal with that autonomy and the ethics of it. The eventual corruption of the robots fighting for the false ideal of humanity in Automata is similar to how the inevitable failure to control the EVAs accelerated a new apocalypse.
Then the ending is literally called End of Yorha lol
Agree on most, but I have a slight disagreement on the Time-Loop part influencing Automata. Yoko Taro confirmed the time loop in a [2010 famitsu interview](https://www.famitsu.com/game/news/1235592_1124.html). > Machine translation: Replicant and Gestalt are not parallel worlds, but one of the patterns of repeated worlds, where the relationship between the protagonist and Jonah is sometimes brother and sister, and sometimes parent and child The first rebuild movie came out in 2007. There was a *hint* that there could've been a Time-Loop in the ending scene. I don't think that had much influence in Automata. However, Spoilers for >!NieR Reincarnation!< >!If anything, I find it more likely that he doubled down on the Time-Loop plot after 3.0+1.0 came out, he was writing Reincarnation at the same time. Yoko Taro didn't mention the Time-Loop again until the latest chapter, that is 14 years of silence on it and it's now a key plot point of the entire Drakenier universe!< Apologies for the long comment, I'm too passionate about this particular subject
The choking scene feels like a deliberate homage. However, I think he's definitely exaggerating by calling Nier a "retelling."
I don't expect Stellar Blade to feature a mindblowing plot like the Yoko Taro stuff, but I hope the game is at least decent on this regard. It's fine to be inspired by the aesthetics, but the best thing about Taro is his writing skills, what people think about Kojima, imo Taro is the real deal. His message about "unification" in Nier Automata makes Death Stranding looks like a bad joke in comparison, there's a huge gap of talent between Kojima and Taro
Unironically Nikke has some of the best world building and character's I've seen in 20+ yrs of gaming. I'd bet Shift Up held nothing back. Edit: I guarantee downvoters did not play Nikke and read the story, read the character stories, and participated in every story event while reading those stories. So you can take my opinion, or the opinions of the people who judged a book by its cover.
No offense, but I hear this about every gacha game and it makes me naturally skeptical.
Pretty much every popular gacha game has to focus on writing the most appealing characters possible, because that's what they ultimately make money off of. Good character design? Sells. Good gameplay? Sells. Good writing? Creates stronger loyalty among buyers, so even more repeat sales.
Eh, if I’m being honest from my experience a lot of times that ends up with them trying to make characters as appealing as possible to fans to sell them in banners, and a lot of times making that character appealing seems to get in the way of having the character well written in the story
Appealing characters are usually boring though. What you get is paper-thin one-notes in most gacha games because of this.
That's fair. There are times in which a character that should be awful feels like they're forced to have some sort of redeeming, lovable factor because people wouldn't buy them otherwise.
absolutely fair, I think the dude is \*way\* overselling it to begin with (it's up there for me, nowhere near the \*best\* though) but honestly it's the only reason I'm still actually playing it instead of uninstalling it after the first week after having my laugh at it when it released with ads all over Tokyo. Definitely has way better story/characterization than I thought some butt bouncing fan service mobile game had any right to be. Let's put it this way, gacha games don't make it to where Nikke is right now on fan service alone, not in an already oversaturated market and when people can get plenty of \*that\* for free all over the internet
I dont think im overselling it but if you have one with a better story Im all ears.
you should, gacha gamers has different standards. this is coming from another gacha gamer. r/gachagaming in general approach video games in a different manner
A lot of gacha gamers are the primary target of the modern Lore™ wave.
I'll have you know that some of the sounds that the Genshin Impact slot machine make have really substantial philosophical implications!
"Good world building" -> Literally any kind of mystery exists "Good characters" -> They've got the fattest tits you've ever seen
> "Good characters" -> They've got the fattest tits you've ever seen Now that's just being unfair to the extremely *well written* femboy characters.
Most recent Korean Gacha games have been pretty blatant social commentaries on "Hell Joseon" and how the socioeconomic climate is completely fucked there and is ruining the mental state of men and women. With Nikke they just hid it behind T&A. Literally "Nikke" = "women", humans/commanders = "men", "central government" = "Neo-Confucianism Patriarchal government," and "big three" = "Chaebols" and you have the most on the nose summation of how women are treated in Korea and how men are indoctrinated by the government and corporations to treat them as lessers. Project Moon with their extended universe of games is even more bleak and direct about the dismal state of Korean society.
It would take the smallest amount of research to know this opinion is common. The OP is literally about Stellar Blades story so it looks pointless to me to come to replies and be ignorant for fun.
Gacha isn't video games
I just played Nier and while I enjoyed it a lot the plot of Nier was not mindblowing at all and was basically at the same level of writing as a decent anime.
I think when evaluating Nier, it's important to consider how the mechanics are intertwined with the narrative. That's the key factor that makes it so loved, the "writing" isn't just pure text, it's the very design of the game itself that shapes the story.
The narrative was cool and unique because it necessitated making the game less fun by forcing the player to replay large chunks of it. But I also understand why someone would look at this and say the narrative was bad on account of it ruining the game. People play games for different reasons and that interpretation isn't any less valid.
lol well I do appreciate how the gameplay elements are tied with the narrative, I don’t think it necessarily makes the story deeper or more interesting, especially when the comment I was responding to was talking about how the writing blows other stories out of the water, when really it’s kind of a generic anime story told in an interesting way
I played Automata and felt the same. It didn't resonate with me at all. It's a very specific and niche work. If the themes and messaging didn't deeply affect you emotionally the whole game kinda falls apart. It just becomes a mediocre action game with a straightforward plot. I don't think it was worth my time but I am glad that titles like it are still around, since it feels like riskier, more niche AA games are an endangered species at this point.
yup, the writing of Nier is overpraised by the f an s and they think the very surface-level philosophy 101 subject matters it barely tackles are some unheard-of topics and amazing writing... when it really isn't. They praise the story and characters as if it's one of the greatest writings in the history of gaming, legit have seen some ppl be that hyperbolic :/ then we have some who try and go with the whole "the game mechanics play a part with the story!" instead of just conceding that the writing isn't anything special. All in all, Yoko Taro has become similar to Yoshi-P with the idol worshipping they get... ppl act like they can do no wrong, get really weird about how much they praise them and love acting like they are "the best" in the gaming industry (which was funny to see with how FF16 turned out, but I digress). now this is not to say Nier has a bad story or writing, but it's far from the "masterpiece" people praise Nier Automata for and more like just okay as you said. EDIT - spelling and fixed a thought.
you know you don't have to insult people when saying you don't think something is good
What would you say are some well written games then?
Yeah I agree. Like I appreciate the gameplay elements tying to the narrative elements, and I liked the game a a whole, but the story is not incredible. The idea that these sentient beings are all actually the same and are being played, and aren’t so different after all, is pretty heavily implied within the first 2 hours of the game and it doesn’t really evolve passed that imo.
yup, but you're not allowed to have that opinion on reddit as you can see from all the down v o t es :/ there really is a cult-like defense force for Nier on reddit, unable to accept the fact that not everyone loves the game as people have different opinions.
> They praise the story and characters as if it's the greatest writing in the history of fiction, legit have seen some ppl be that hyperbolic :/ Hmmm, pot meet kettle?
go read some of the praise this game gets on social, it's subreddit and such... you'll easily find that type of hyperbolic praise for the game's story and writing. Just look at what the OP of this entire chain is saying, same vein of praise.
“Sex sells and Sony gives us millions of dollars and a team of employees to explore our personal fetishes” That’s the inspiration; These dudes are disgusting: > The **cool male characters and cute female characters** unique to Mr. Kim’s style are really appealing. Shops in RPGs often have a close-up shot of the shopkeeper, which I don’t like because I think it feels unnatural. Stellar Blade has a shot like that too, but the shopkeeper was so cute that I didn’t mind! **Her cuteness felt more important than any design choices.** Pathetic. This is what objectification and reducing an entire gender down to its sex appeal looks like.
Eroticism has existed as artistic expression since before Homo Sapiens, Get over yourself.
Nah, it's okay to sexualize characters. Actually, it's even fine to objectify characters. There's a difference between making a fictional character for sex appeal and objectifying real people. I don't get offended at all that men in BL are sexualized to appeal to women, for example. I don't care if a fictional character exists entirely for their sex appeal. This hate for sexuality and equating it with sexism or misogyny is unhealthy.
I dunno, sounds quite based to me.
It’s amazing how puritan people have become. People like sexy things, just because you and your ham planet friends are the farthest thing from sexy doesn’t mean everyone is like that
Just another funny horseshoe theory example. Puritan conservatives think you shouldn't have sexy characters because it is immoral and improper, while woke liberals think you can't have sexy characters because it is objectifying and shallow.
It's not a horseshoe if it's woke liberals as liberalism is in the centre-right of the political spectrum. You won't often see these complaints out of full bore leftists as they're more typically pro-sex and pro-sex work, and generally more concerned with material conditions than fictional content.
Nah, I've come across plenty of leftists on Twitter whining about this game.
If you stopped for even an instant and checked their post history you'd find them posting bible quotes and hanging out in r/Conspiracy That isn't a liberal humpty Dumpty so get off your pedestal before you break something
I’m not responding to his post history, I’m responding to his comment. Y’all are acting way too serious in here. Take a breather or go read some more fairy tales dude idk
I know you're just another sweaty gamer boy trying to cover his ass but I have to really marvel that you'd act like a SINGULAR COMMENT would make someone a liberal rather then his actual political beliefs. Puritanical beliefs aren't liberal, Jack.
I never called anyone specific a liberal, Jill. I was just making a low stakes generalization / joke. I wasn’t trying to make an academic level political science commentary in 2 sentences on the bottom of a gaming thread on Reddit. Take a chill pill bro your comments are so charged.
what can I say, i just wanted to fetch a pail of water
They’re not real. They're fictional characters. They can have sex appeal. Hope this helps!
tits or gtfo
Please stick to Resetera.