Best Games of the Decade
9: NieR: Automata (2017)
Reviews Editor Zhiqing Wan: NieR: Automata is a weird game. You’d expect as much from a director and writer as eccentric as Yoko Taro, who made a name for himself with the Drakengard series and the original NieR. It wasn’t till Automata’s release, however, that he really began to steal the mainstream spotlight. And now, NieR’s everywhere.
Back in 2017, I tried (and failed) to convince my colleagues that NieR: Automata very much deserved to be Twinfinite’s Game of the Year. Sadly, the argument didn’t take, and it ended up being a mere honorable mention on the list, falling below other games like Persona 5 and Super Mario Odyssey.
I’d just like to take this opportunity to point out that the former ended up ranking lower than NieR: Automata on this list of the decade’s greatest and the latter didn’t even make the top 15. So, ha! Take that, fellow co-workers. You’ve finally seen the error of your ways.
Anyway, I argued that NieR: Automata was one of the most self-assured games we’d seen that year, and that statement still holds true. It’s unapologetic, visceral, and once again subverts our expectations of how stories can be told through the video game medium.
Indeed, what makes this game so special and captivating is that it tells a story that can only be told through this interactive medium; it simply wouldn’t work as a book or a movie.
Every little detail of the game, no matter how minute it may seem, serves the story in some way. It could be the way the music cross-fades in when you’re talking to a particular NPC, or even the way you adjust the UI and system settings –everything is done with the game’s story and themes in mind.
The gameplay, the music, the unorthodox structure of the story –it all comes together in a glorious package that ultimately leaves players with the most profound, existential question: what are we living for?
NieR: Automata never quite answers that question itself, but despite the immense pain and suffering it makes it characters (and players) go through, it still sends us off on a somewhat optimistic note that sticks with you long after the credits have rolled.
