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A lot of classics follow the same story: a brilliant artist creates a piece of work, critics don't think much of it, it's a commercial failure, then, many years later, it takes on a cult following. This was the case with Moby Dick. It was the case with Blade Runner. It was the case with Abbey Road. But we don't see this so often in games. If something comes out and gets mediocre reviews then sells poorly, it all but disappears and is relegated to clearance bins, destined to quickly fade from memory. Nier is an exception.I'll never forget my first time playing Nier. I was reviewing it for another outlet back in my freelance days, and came late to developer Cavia's action RPG, after the first round of reviews had hit. I knew Chris Schilling had given it a 6/10 here at Eurogamer, and I knew its Metacritic score was wavering in the high 60s or low 70s. I was expecting a moderately enjoyable, but ultimately forgettable action-RPG romp that Square Enix had left to die with dated graphics belying its diminutive budget, and a negligible marketing campaign following in the ashes of Final Fantasy 13.
Nier is much more than that, though. It may well be one of my favourite games of the last console generation, and at the time I found myself bewildered and quite frankly unsettled that Nier had come in for such a rough critical ride. Was it the graphics? The somewhat simplistic combat? The ugly main character? I've since made a point to recommend it to my friends - and so strong was my passion for Nier that I inadvertently started a Twitter meme; whenever anyone I followed mentioned Nier, I had to chime in "Did someone say Nier?" I still get tagged in these posts years later by people I don't even know. (I eventually deleted Twitter from my phone partially due to this.)
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