Nier: Automata. A beautiful story about life, love, betrayal, unjustified persecution, tenacity, and the struggle between hope for the future and utter despair. Truly a remarkable experience that doesn't pull a single punch and keeps swinging away at you until after the credits end. There is so much I could say about this game; so much I want to say about this game... But doing so would just ruin the experience.

This is one of those rare gems in gaming that you can truly only experience once. The story twists, turns, misdirects, and misleads you constantly. Not "you" the protagonist, "you" the player. This game speaks directly to you during the whole experience if you just have the eyes to see it. Some of it is blatantly on the nose and will make you roll your eyes at the obvious message behind it. Yet some of it is much more subtle. The game only lightly hinting at what it wants you to realize. If there is ever a trial on the question of "are video games art," this should be our primary example.

All that said, the messaging and story do get quite confusing. This game falls into the anime trope of overwhelming the audience with information and confusion to the point that I don't think even the creator fully understands it. I have read every audio log, watched the anime, played the game numerous times and I still don't truly understand it. However, at the base of all that, it's just a fun game.

The gameplay is that late 2000s/early 2010s era Platinum Games style the likes of Bayonetta. It's a hack and slash that cranks the difficulty towards the end but is never too hard that casual gamers can't complete it. Yes, you do need to technically beat the game multiple times to get to the ending but each "ending" is rather quick to reach. After the first two, the story continues into its finale before giving you a choice of how you want things to end. After the credits roll, you're given the opportunity to send a message to your fellow players. Tossing it into the void to be read by someone you've never met, someone you will never speak to, and I think that's truly beautiful. Certainly much more so than I can describe it.

TL;DR: If you haven't played this game, please please please do so. It's so much more than the sum of its parts and will leave you pondering the nature of existence and whether you're a good person or not.

10/10