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By 2009 the country had become a warzone between uninfected humans and a mad unstoppable horde called “Legion”. Most that contracted it were gradually turned into salt, whereas some turned violently insane.

The death of a titanic beast unleashed a killer virus worldwide that turned humans berzerkįrom its origin in downtown Shinjuku, the disease “White Chlorination Syndrome” spread with devastating effect. This turned out to be pretty poor move for us humans however, as the giant’s death unleashed a rather nasty disease on mankind. It was in this scenario that Drakengard’s giant ‘Queen Beast’ antagonist was teleported between realities to modern-day Tokyo – where she was promptly dispatched by the game’s fire-breathing hero. The game featured multiple different endings, and it’s the fifth of these which resulted in the timeline of Nier. Nier’s story began as an alternate ending to an entirely separate video gameįirst, let’s step back in time to the year 2003 (both in Nier’s universe and our own).Įven amongst series fans, it’s a little known fact that Nier’s world is a spin-off from PlayStation 2’s Drakengard.


But to save you the trouble, we’ve poured through guidebooks, light novellas and even a Yoko Taro-penned stage play (yes, really) to collect some of the most significant in-world events leading to Automata’s opening act.įair warning before we begin – spoilers for both the original Nier and Drakengard (we’ll explain in a moment) ahead. To answer these – and add some context to the game’s post-apocalypse – you’ll need to take a look at the wider timeline of Nier. Questions like: “Where have all the humans gone?”, “why is Earth ruled by machines?” and “who gave this blindfolded goth-loli a sword?” But players venturing into this weird and wonderful universe may find themselves asking a few questions. Today’s PS4 release of Nier: Automata introduces a wealth of lore for both newcomers and fans of the original to get acquainted with.Īs pointed out in yesterday’s tips guide, you don’t have to have played the series’ previous instalment to enjoy Automata’s bot-on-bot brawling. It’s not every day we get to explore a game world as rich as that of Nier’s.
