With “Neil: Mechanical Era” global cumulative sales of more than 5 million sets, in which 2B Miss also successfully out of the circle, so that the attention of the entire series of boats, as the first Neil series of authentic hand game “NieR Re[in]carnation”, last year once announced to attract a lot of “Neil” series of attention. The first handheld game of the Nier series, “NieR Re[in]carnation”, was announced last year and attracted the attention of many players of the series. As the tenth anniversary of the launch of Nier works, this game is completely different from the popular Japanese RPG games on the market now, exquisite 3D art overlay with sound effects, as early as in the closed beta let many players were really amazed.
With the high popularity accumulated by “Neil: Mechanicons”, according to the official statistics, the number of reservations for this handheld game before its launch exceeded 1 million. After its official release today, it ranked No.1 on the free list and No.6 on the best-seller list in Japan App Store, once again recreating the high success rate of the “Nier” series. As a 3D turn-based RPG developed by a Japanese manufacturer, and supporting automatic combat and pathfinding, it has saved some face of Japanese companies in the 3D RPG circuit dominated by Chinese and Korean game companies.
For players who like Miss 2B, “Nier hand game” in the opening day of the service with “Nier: Automata” to start a linkage, “2B, 9S, A2” and other classic characters on the scene. Players in this handheld game can still play their favorite characters from the previous game.
In fact, the work was not handed over to Platinum Studios, which produced “Neil: Mechanical Era” for development, but to Applibot, which has a wealth of handheld game production, but the production team still uses the luxury lineup of the Neil series, with Yosuke Saito as the producer, Taro Yokoo as the creative director, and Akihiko Yoshida as the character designer, and many players said they were relieved after seeing the production team. Since Applibot has little experience in making 3D games, the producers also brought in members of ILCA to assist with 3D design and help upgrade the game in terms of graphics.
Although Nier: The Handbook will share the same worldview as Nier: The Masquerade and Nier: Mechanicus, there is no connection between the plot and the previous game. The story takes place in an otherworldly stage called “Cage”, the overall impression is more full of unknown than ever, the protagonist is not the Kane in the previous game, but has become a “white girl” wearing a black dress, she will take She will take the ghost who calls herself “mother” through the ruins.
Currently there are 11 characters added to the game, including the “White Girl”, and according to the producer, the characters will be added in subsequent updates. The “White Girl” is not the only protagonist, creators Taro Yokoo and Yosuke Saito pointed out that there will be several protagonists, and the story will unfold through the different perspectives of several characters, and then deep into the game’s worldview and plot settings. The production team said: This is a work with a strong emphasis on narrative, so it may become Neal “the largest amount of text in the series” works.
The overall art style is also quite stunning, both the toned scenes and modeling, are full of fantasy atmosphere. Since the game takes a dual narrative style, players will also travel back and forth between the wasteland world and the future world. The main plot takes place in a huge, crumbling city, and some scenes are set in the Old West, with forests, churches and burning towns for players to explore.
The Nier Handbook uses a hybrid 2D plus 3D model, with 2D in the game’s plot and 3D effects in the running and battle graphics. The plot and battle styles are distinctly different, so players are able to distinguish between the two in the game to understand the story line. But the 2D screen 3D screen regular conversion is not as smooth as “Neil: Mechanical Era”, the screen will appear briefly in the loading tips, which to some extent also caused a sense of fragmentation of the screen.
In terms of music, Keiichi Okabe, who created the music for “Neil: Mechanicron”, continues to be in charge. The producer wanted to be different from the previous songs, so he prepared many different styles of songs while keeping the atmosphere of “Nier”. At the same time, the songs of “Nier” were requested to be composed like a vocal song with a solid melody, creating a “cage-like” mystery for the game and allowing players to feel a different atmosphere.
The performance of the music of “Nier Hands” has been well received by the players. The music during the battle uses a handsome bass to heat up the atmosphere, which makes people want to get the soundtrack as soon as possible. At the same time, most players also think that the unique atmosphere formed by its match with the plot and scenes is precisely the uniqueness of “Nier” music. Although this is a mobile game, but also to achieve the whole voice, if the player wears headphones to play, will bring a more immersive experience.
Turn-based gameplay is still full of the thrill of battle
The main plot of the game will be composed of chapters, each chapter of the world will be scattered around the cage through the black monster-like things triggered to enter, by unlocking each chapter of the four small story to advance, while the “memory” is also a string of two worlds and is an important entry point between running and fighting. All the weapons, fighting partners and memories will have a small story behind. Each weapon will initially unlock only the first section of the story, you need to enhance the weapon to continue to unlock the story after.
Unlike the single-player game “Nier: Mechanicons” ACT gameplay, in “Nier Handheld” is a card RPG plus turn-based combat gameplay, the production team on the one hand to consider the difficult operation can not be fully displayed on mobile devices, on the other hand, in the RPG gameplay, but also allows players to better appreciate the game plot.
In order to give players a certain operating experience, the work in the turn-based system to increase the relative freedom of real-time combat, players can freely move the character direction or choose to defend and attack. Although the battle scene for the ACT style “Nier: Mechanical Era” has been reduced, but through the exquisite game special effects, turn-based play “Nier hand game” can also achieve the console game quality battle combat sense and action effects.
Before the battle begins, players can make up their own team, the squad can choose three people on the battlefield, each character combat attack is divided into ordinary attacks, weapon skills and character skills. If the weapon is equipped with a follower, you can also release the follower skill once more in the round. Weapon skills will gradually accumulate over time, and character skills will grow by attacking the enemy or being attacked.
At the same time, in order to reduce the difficulty of operation, the game also added a mode similar to the “one-button move”, the player can set the skill command in advance, so that the character can automatically in the battle rounds to carry out combos, the damage multiplier will also increase with the number of combos, so that each player can experience the thrill of battle and a sense of immediacy.
The game not only includes cold weapons such as knives, swords and guns, but also a series of magic equipment such as firearms and staffs, and depending on the character’s occupation, the weapons he or she is good at will also change. With the appearance of new weapons, new professions will also be unlocked.
The game uses a free plus internal purchase business model, and the internal purchase is mainly paid for by drawing cards, both characters and weapons can be acquired. The game’s development interface is also rich, players can equip weapons, memories, followers, equipment, enhancements and so on, by completing side quests to obtain these followers, while other equipment must be obtained by card draw. The card draw is not only the fastest way to acquire characters and weapons, but also accelerates the development of characters.
There are also many players who are dissatisfied with the game’s free plus internal purchase payment model, worrying that the gap between kryptonite players and civilian players is too wide and leads to abandonment of the game. According to the producer, although “Nier Handbook” is not a single player game, there is no PvP element in the game, so players only need to focus on improving their abilities.
Summary
As early as two years ago, Activision Blizzard for a “do not you have a phone? ” and was ridiculed by players, the market at that time there is a serious polarization, single-player IP into the field of handheld games seems to be treated as an incomprehensible thing.
And with the rise of the handheld game market and the development of mobile devices, more and more manufacturers began to release multiple ends, and the trend of handheld game boutique is becoming more and more obvious. Players also evolved from the initial discontent to “I already have my phone, where are your games?” This cry. The single-player IP known for its plot, worldview, painting style, and gameplay is also gradually moving towards a new track of boutique handheld games.
With the careful polishing of the quality of the Nier series, I believe that in the hand game will also bring a different experience to the players.
