1974: E3 is Bringin’ It

I’ve paid more attention to E3 this year than I have done in recent memory — even when I was actively covering it for publications I was writing for. When I was covering E3 and writing up news, I was often struck with how few of the “big announcements” were of interest to me personally, with the press conferences in particular being full of flashy but ultimately predictable and unsurprising bombast with very little in the way of genuine surprises.

This year it has all changed, though. After a wobbly start — Microsoft, EA and Ubi’s press conferences were all decent enough but rather forgettable — Sony pulled a corker out of the bag by revealing that all three of the totally implausible rumours that had been flying around were, in fact true. Yes, Square Enix is doing a complete remake of Final Fantasy VII, coming first to PlayStation 4. Yes, The Last Guardian still exists, and there’s gameplay footage to prove it. And yes, Shenmue III is on the way after a very long break — part-funded by Kickstarter (you’re damn right I pledged) and part-funded by Sony.

Then today was Square Enix’s presentation. In between the flashy but predictable games we all knew were coming — Just Cause 3 in particular is looking like it might be fun — there were some honest-to-goodness genuine surprises, chief among which was the fact that there’s a fucking new Nier game on the way, developed by Platinum Games.

This announcement was so out of the blue and unexpected that it genuinely blew people away. People were waiting for something unannounced to be revealed at Square Enix’s conference, but many had become convinced it was something to do with Chrono Trigger. Nope; it’s a new Nier game featuring a dream team of development talent, including the original producer, director and composer as well as art from the guy behind Bravely Default.

I adore Nier. It’s a wonderful, wonderful game that went sadly unappreciated in its own lifetime, ever-doomed to languish with a Metascore of 68 thanks to critics who were more wrapped up in its technical shortcomings than its ambitious and emotional story, wonderful use of the interactive entertainment medium to tell it, unconventional and fascinating characters and at times baffling fusion of game styles. It’s a beautiful experience with a narrative that sticks with you long after you’ve beaten it, and one of the most haunting musical scores I’ve ever heard in any medium. (I have the piano score for it; it’s a delight — and a challenge — to play.)

The news that a new Nier game is on the way is, in short, extremely welcome to me — and the fact that it looks like it will be focusing on the original game’s main heroine Kaine, a very angry intersex woman who has a somewhat troubled but oddly touching relationship with the protagonist Nier, is an absolute delight. I can’t wait to see what wonders the creative geniuses behind this absolute work of art come out with on new-generation hardware; I don’t doubt that it will be warped, full of jank and weird as fuck, but those things are what made the original Nier so utterly fascinating to play and to talk about.

So, in short, this has been the most exciting E3 for some time now. And then Final Fantasy XIV’s expansion Heavensward flings open its Early Access doors on Friday… man. What a time to be into video games.