#shadowlord's castle/memory from nier replicant

[something-very-special]

“and it’s gonna be TONS OF FUN.”

Look, we all know Route B is the one where you ruin everything and suddenly everybody thinks they’ve been playing the villain the whole time but can we talk about

the other stuff?

I said it must be surreal for people coming in off Automata with all those references suddenly making sense but this is surreal for me coming off the original game to have these little extra scenes intercut through the game.

See, here’s the thing that I really grew to love about NIER-- it’s a fundamentally small story. Its ramifications are world-shattering, but the story itself is very small. It’s not about the conflict between Gestalts and Replicants, it’s about love, and the great and terrible things it can do. Love between brothers, between lovers, between fathers and daughters, brothers and sisters, a ragtag messed up family. The greater conflict is the backdrop and driving force, but the story isn’t about that so much as it’s about all the tiny tragedies that you bear witness to on the way to the end.

(And I realize now how powerful the Little Mermaid story would be if it could be contrasted to Papa Nier, there’s... oh there’s stuff to think about from that perspective, isn’t there? Not that the tragedy doesn’t exist with Brother, but it’s kind of how Gideon hits different between the two-- the story in isolation still makes sense, but it means more contrasted between one or the other.)

The Shades are easy to remember. But the tiny tragedy that I love most, of course, is Kaine and Emil. Two people ostracized as monsters forming their own little family unit, utterly happy to have found each other (and Nier’s there too, I guess). There was a lot implied by the little dialogue they really exchanged during the first run of the game (and the original game in its entirety) but it spoke volumes about the kind of relationship they had established. (It speaks even more to go into Automata and see that truck!Emil has been preserving Kaine’s house and the field of Lunar Tears even though he didn’t retain the memories of Kaine herself.)

The newly added scenes aren’t at all necessary, but they are such a welcome addition and corroborate a few different things that were hinted or implied rather than explicit (or were easy to miss-- later Kaine mentions they ‘don’t have Emil to hold [Tyrann] back’ and that seems like a really bizarre jump if you don’t notice that you can’t hit the finisher gauge against her in the Lost Shrine until Emil has her pinned with a spell; there’s a little cutscene post-Junk Heap that calls attention to it. And while we’re still in the parenthetical can I just say I still love the organic feel of so much of the writing? He says “If that happens, I’ll stop you again”, she says “You sure about that?” and there is no hesitation or response from him. Kaine gets the follow-up ellipses and her “Thank you” is genuine. There’s trust there. Even if she doesn’t necessarily believe her transformation can be stopped, she believes him, and that’s enough.)

But it’s also not too much. What got me all over again was the scene added after you finish the keystone; Nier contemplates going it alone against the Shadowlord, Kaine and Emil are right behind him and very huffy that he considers leaving them behind. And it becomes clear that apparently they have actually plotted out Emil’s suggestion to fix Kaine’s possessions and get his body back, and Nier’s gonna help them, and they’re gonna have to travel the world to do it and they’re gonna taste every local delicacy on the way and it’s gonna be TONS OF FUN.

And you expect that from Emil, who is literally a child and a ball of sunshine when the main story isn’t happening... and then Kaine joins in. “Yeah. And I’m gonna eat way more than my fair share, so you better be ready to pony up.”

You see that?

Kaine’s ready to be happy.

Tyann will later make mention of her heart being ‘full of light’ during the final stretch and this is interpreted as love-- usually love for the protagonist, as she goes on about how she’ll ‘be his sword one last time’. But it’s described as her rage and sorrow going away. Terrible things have happened on this trip and she’s privy to more of them than the rest of the party, but she’s entering the final battle with this also on her mind. Not that they’re necessarily going to actually travel the globe on a gastronomic adventure (but I would play that cooking game), but she’s glad to be here, with them.

(She is also the one who asks if Weiss is all right during the final battle. I might be misremembering but I swear this was Nier’s line in the original, I can hear Papa Nier yelling it in my head.)

In fact, with the added scenes, it becomes more explicitly clear that Kaine only gives up at the end of the castle because Emil isn’t there to bring her back and she knew she needed him to go on. She knew he would be able to let her go on, and would always be there so she could keep on going on. Kaine wants to die after her grandmother’s murder and her possession by Tyrann and only holds on because otherwise Tyrann would use her body to do terrible things, but it’s here that it becomes clear that you know what?

She’s up for an adventure. Might be fun.

[emyume]

Hello! Iam one of your subscribers from YouTube. I am really a fan of slowed/reverb soundtracks from Nier series, made by you. Lately i found that one of my favourites got copyrighted and deleted from your channel, or became unfindable via YouTube (Nier Automata/Replicant unreleased/arranged soundtrack, slowed&reverb(one with red girl background).

If it is not too hard for you, could you please reupload it to YouTube? I really loved to listen to that one.

Thank you, for your work and possible attention.

hello anon! the video that you mentioned (Nier Automata/Nier Replicant unreleased/arranged soundtrack - slowed & reverb) actually does not belong to me but to another youtuber that also does similar videos that I do. I'm sure you are aware that Square Enix and other big name companies have been removing/blocking more and more videos from youtube lately. In my case they blocked eight of my videos worldwide on April 6 and gave me 2 copyright strikes, and so because of this I had no choice but to delete the videos from my channel. This is not the first time this has happened and it most likely won't be the last.

Unfortunately, many of us can't really do much when it comes to the youtube copyright rules and I really wish I could re-upload my own videos without having to risk getting my entire channel deleted. However, I will try to upload them to my soundcloud very soon.

here is a list of my videos that were removed:

1. weight of the world - nier: automata

2. fleeting words/family - nier replicant ver.1.22

3. snow in summer - nier replicant ver.1.22 (uploaded to soundcloud)

4. grandma - nier replicant ver.1.22 (uploaded to soundcloud)

5. shadowlord's castle memory - nier replicant ver.1.22 (uploaded to soundcloud)

6. kainé salvation - nier replicant ver.1.22

7. shadowlord - nier replicant ver.1.22

8. shadowlord's castle memory instrumental - nier replicant ver.1.22