Ok… so now I finished up NieR Automata (I think) for reals this time.

Let me get two major criticisms out of the way:

• The game should not make it seem like you beat it way before you actually do.  I get the feeling that there are a bunch of players who have missed critical narrative and gameplay simply because the credits rolled about ten hours in.
• The PC version of the game needs some patches.  This thing crashed on me multiple times and while I definitely should have been saving more often, I should not have to have been constantly living in fear of getting booted back to my desktop.

With that said… NieR Automata is my favorite new game of the last five years.  It’s amazing, it’s really that good.  I don’t think I’ve ever seen a game marry gameplay elements to the narrative as seamlessly as this one.  Every single executable action makes complete sense based on the “rules” of the world, and every easter egg esque moment doesn’t take place outside of that world.

This game is an absolute masterclass of interactive storytelling.

Get it.  It’s super fun, super heavy, and super fun.

I said fun twice.  That’s how fun it is.

It’s double fun.