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NieR:Automata x TSUKUMO x GEMS COMPANY 2nd Mini Event

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Today was the 2nd NieR:Automata x TSUKUMO x GEMS COMPANY mini event in Akihabara, Tokyo. Saito Yosuke, Yoko Taro, Koda Kazuma (@Lownine), and Akaba Yukino from GEMS COMPANY were present and lead the talk event through two main segments.

TSUKUMO is a company specializing in computers and various computer parts. Their online shop can be found here.

GEMS COMPANY is an off-shoot of the DearStage idol company produced by Iwasaki Takuya, former member of Cavia and college friend of Yoko Taro. GEMS COMPANY, however, is produced by Saito Yosuke from Square Enix utilizing music composted by Okabe Keiichi and others at MONACA. There are several smaller groups within GEMS COMPANY.

The event was sold out within 5 minutes upon release, but I still managed to be the 24th person to order a ticket to the event…!!! YAYYY!!!

But, as it turns out, that didn’t matter in the slightest! xD

Arriving at the venue, you had to draw a lottery number, which would then be your admittance number. Before entering the actual hall, we were given special Guest stickers to slap on ourselves somewhere noticeable for people to know that we’re actual guests to the event!

The first segment comprised mostly of a question and answer session with questions already prepared by attendees ahead of time (I don’t recall them asking for questions, but it’s possible that I missed it entirely). The first couple questions were for Koda Kazuma, since he was mostly busy sketching the live drawing for the duration of the event. He was asked what sort of input he received to make the YoRHa:Dark Apocalypse key visual as seen below:

He said that Yoshida Naoki actually posed for him… and to this I can attest because he actually did this in photos he took with people at TGS this year!

Once Koda’s questions were finished, he continued working on a preliminary sketch that he started the day previous (to get ready for this event!) but he wasn’t able to finish it… So, while he continued sketching, Yoko was asked some very tasty things to feast your Yokoverse-loving hearts on!

Yoko was asked whether the “Dragon” weapons mentioned in the year 6230 have anything to do with Drakengard, and he said, “They are related.”
This would confirm my suspicions that something occurred during the war with the aliens in the Kingdom of Night to cause a temporal anomaly, thus creating a link to the year 856 and effectively causing the very Cataclysm that screwed everything over in the first place. But in usual Time-Space insane shenanigans, it’s nearly impossible to know which came first: the chicken or the egg.

I wrote about some of this in the past as to how SINoALICE fits into the overall Yokoverse, and there is some interesting “blending” of Drakengard and NieR going on with in it… You can read all about that here.

A “Singularity” also exists in NieR:Automata.
Singularity: A special person, place, or thing that triggers a shift within the [Multiverse]. This phenomenon is triggered when a certain amount of Maso is gathered in an area and all other conditions are met.

As you can recall, Zero in DOD3 was first dubbed a “Singularity” due to her connection with the Flower entity which spelled nothing but doom and gloom for the rest of the world. It’s because of this that caused the timeline to fracture, creating multiple other possible futures.

As far as Automata goes, there could be several candidates for “Singularity”:

  • A2 – Related to the different endings in C and D.
  • 9S – Choosing to stay or go on the Ark.
  • The Pods, specifically Pod042/Zinnia – It was Zinnia’s job to develop the YoRHa prototypes, and although he had more of a Teacher/Student sort of relationship with the other YoRHa, since Pod042 shares his personality data, I think it’s much more of a Father/Child sort of thing… and because of this, he went against his programming (as Pod) to help them, even if that choice would be detrimental to himself. Its his intervention that sort of gives us a happy ending.

Saito seemed interested in creating a NieR:Automata anime…!?
It’s been suggested before with Yoko’s “Thou Shalt Not Die” and considering his connection with Moriyama Daisuke, who has already had anime released for several of his manga series… We all know about the fake anime genga and layouts that were created for the DOD 10th Anniversary Inside World book by Yakou Hiroshi (矢向宏志)… It would be absolutely amazing if they could get him on board for a Yokoverse related anime project at some point!! But agreed, I would much rather see a TSND anime than a NieR:Automata one at this point.

The idea of a NieR Gestalt/Replicant remake was brought up again, and Saito seemed very positive about such a prospect. I’m not sure anything like that would be possible for the 10th Anniversary… but it may still be possible at some point…?

The “Last Secret” in NieR:Automata has still not been discovered.
Yoko was very coy about discussing this, but he still seemed very shocked and relieved that this hasn’t been discovered by anyone yet.

How does the all-boys version of the YoRHa Ver.1.3a stage play fit into the timeline?
Yoko didn’t necessarily say that it’s NOT “canon” but that it’s more like a parallel world.

What does the “P” in 2P’s name mean?
Yoko mentioned that it has another meaning besides merely “2nd player”, which was first used for the SoulCalibur VI collaboration, but he’s not able to discuss it at this time because YoRHa:Dark Apocalypse hasn’t concluded yet. Apparently divulging this information would be pretty spoilerish…? That in itself is pretty interesting.

Why do the main trio in Automata all have white hair?
Yoko said it was purely a design choice. The white hair seemed balance the best with the black YoRHa outfits. Koda Kazuma also mentioned that he remembered 9S originally being blonde…

Since there’s been a musical version of the YoRHa stage play, could it be possible for the all-male cast to do something similar?
I don’t think anyone gave a straight answer for this, but I’m extremely intrigued. The all-boys casts have gotten a HUGE response from fans…

How are the Healer and Scanner types different?
Yoko said it’s much like changing the OS of your computer. It still basically does the same things, but it’s equipped better to handle specific tasks. The same is true for when Operators switch over to Battler type units.

During the 20 minute intermission, we were able to go up to the front panel where Yoko left his mask, and as you can see, this is actually the older version that unfortunately had a rough time at Tokyo Game Show 2016 when it dove head first into the ground…

It was after this incident at TGS 2016 that yoshi, the artist who created the mask, tried to fix it, giving it a nice scar sort of aesthetic with three bolts holding it together… but unfortunately, the middle bar is missing… 🙁

The second half of the event was mostly dedicated to a presentation by AMD, Ryzen, and Radeon followed by a lottery giveaway drawing. Since I’m not a PC gamer, I sort of zoned out during the presentation…

But the next bit was dedicated to a free giveaway, lottery drawing for the attendees of the event! Naturally, the first portion was determined by several rounds of ROCK SCISSORS PAPER! I was trying out a theory that most people leading these games *do not* continue with Rock. For example, the Japanese style first begins with Rock, then the next is different… but they almost NEVER continue with a second Rock thereafter… which is weird. haha Every time, I started with Rock, so every time, I sat down after the first bout. RIP

The prizes for the Rock Scissors Paper portion included a couple Pod/Machine keychains, a Hacking Space T-Shirt, and several other Gems Company related goods.

The next portion was entirely a lottery drawing using our seat numbers that we drew to enter the venue. There were about 20 free giveaways for signed autograph boards and other goods, and those who already won something were illegible to win again. Unfortunately, I both sucked at Rock Scissors Paper as well as random drawings.

But still, those who weren’t able to win anything were given a random mini-shikishi on the way out, so that was a lot of fun! I’m sorry to say that I originally got one signed by Saito Yosuke, but since I already have many things signed by him, I traded it for Koda Kazuma’s! I didn’t have anything signed by him thus far, so I was really excited to add that to the collection!! Thanks so much!!

Lastly, the official Gems Company Twitter account uploaded Koda’s illustration, so you can view that below!

Saito Yosuke also posted a couple photos from the event! From the left to right are:

  • Koda Kazuma (he doesn’t show his face in photos like Yoko, either!!)
  • Yoko Taro (he’s just holding the mask in front of his face!)
  • Saito Yosuke

There will be two more collaboration events like this held in Fukuoka and Osaka later in the year, and apparently Piroshi from CyberConnect2 will be joining the cast for the one in Fukuoka! Oh, boy!! I hope everyone has fun!!

By this time it’s really late, many hours after the event, so I may have forgotten some other interesting points. Should I remember anything more, I will further edit this post to reflect those additions!

Thanks to everybody who set up this event! I always have a ton of fun and I’ll be looking forward to the next one, although I can’t go to the next two TSUKUMO events! Here’s to hoping there will be something at the end of the year or… maybe later next year for the 10th Anniversary of NieR!!

8th Official Livestream – at STORIA (Part 2)

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[ Read Part 1 Here ]

NOTE: This post had been sitting in the queue, ready to be posted, but I never got around to finishing it. So, this is the list little recap of the NieR:Automata 2nd Anniversary event at STORIA from February.

It’s been a while since this event was held. I meant to finish up my recap of it a long time ago, but again other real life matters got in the way and I eventually forgot about it. Yup. It always happens, which is why I try to complete as much as I can, as soon as I can… orz

In the last post, we left off at the “Recollection” segment, where Yasumoto Hiroki lead the casual walkthrough of NieR’s past. Here you can see the aftermath of Yoko’s fall during the 2016 TGS event presentation.

But, don’t worry!! yoshi fixed him all up and he is feeling much better now!!

The next segment they talked about the huge-long 25 or so hour live broadcast they did for the 1st Anniversary. It was pretty insane.

The next segment took a look back at the YoRHa stage plays held in February 2018, the YoRHa Boys stage play and the YoRHa Musical Ver.1.2:

The last two images above you can also find in my press release about the musical here.

Then came Yoko’s announcement of the YoRHa 1.3a stage play:

  • YoRHa Ver.1.3a is an additional upgrade stemming from the YoRHa Musical Ver.1.2, a revisioning with an all-male cast, dubbed an “arranged version” (a). There will be new fights, new characters, and a new story…! This battle is somewhat separated from the events of NieR:Automata.

YoRHa Ver.1.3a
▶︎ Cast List
▶︎ Key Visual

Tokyo: July 4-7
Osaka: July 11-14

The next segment detailed about the Thou Shalt Not Die Zero -KAI- blu-ray release! There will be a standard and collector’s release, both of which are available on Amazon and the DearStage website!

Lost in Yokoisms

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With the release of the YoRHa:Dark Apocalypse alliance raid in Final Fantasy XIV the other day, the appearance of the white 2Pーas she is now canonically knownーhas stirred up continued conversation regarding what exactly that “P” in her name could possibly stand for.

First of all, when 2B was originally added as a playable character in SoulCalibur VI, she was merely called “2B”…including her 2nd player pallet swap white version. There was no specific or official name for the white version since, as we all know about fighting games, the 2nd player color swap is only to help differentiate between same characters on the screen, should both the 1st and 2nd player choose to play the same character. However, fans began calling the white version of 2B by “2P”, the name stuck and SQEX later released the white version Bring Arts figure as just that: 2P.

Yesterday, Twitter user Jason X (@envinyon) revived a snippet from an article by SRK that commented on an interview with Dengeki and NieR:Automata development team for the collaboration with Soul Callibur VI. More specifically, though, we’re talking about Yoko Taro’s comments in this interview.

On a general level, the writer for SRK did a decent job of conveying the message from the lengthy interview, but instead of using the original source from Dengeki, it seems like they used a 3rd party account of the matter originally in Japanese. Suffice it to say, there were a few bumps in the road.

▶︎ Yoko says! The P Stands for Panasonic!

Note: “Ryokutya” is an alternate romanization of “Ryokucha,” which commonly translates to “green tea.” Referring to the owner of this blog as a male individual named “Ryo” is done out of mere convenience and serves no other purpose.

Click to view the tweet!

There were a couple issues with the text attachment, which was an excerpt from the SRK article.

  1. “While seemingly a joke” — This implies that it sounded like a joke but was actually a masked truth.
  2. “Taro later concludes that the P does stand for that.” — This affirms the previous statement that even though it sounded like a joke, it’s actually true.
  3. “…he mentions how “Panasonic” means…” — This is using an undefined pronoun. The previous time the pronoun “he” was used it referred to Taro, as shown above in point 2; however, assuming this “he” also refers to Taro would be inaccurate. This portion was actually part of Ryokutya’s personal editorial on his own blog.

Without citing the source of the article clipping, it wasn’t readily known what they were referring. After a quick Google search, there appeared to be only a single hit for this excerpt, which turned out to be an article written by Franz “d3v” Co for shoryuken.com on November 29, 2018, roughly a day after the initial release of the Dengeki article.

Click to view the article on Shoryuken.com!

So then, what’s the hang up?

The problem arrises from the mischaracterization of Ryokutya’s original blog post, which was essentially a second-hand account after reading the article. Without directly utilizing the original article and instead using a 3rd party’s personal account as fact, SRK’s telephone game clearly went awry somewhere along the line.

Click to view Ryokutya's page!
Click to enlarge.

So, by now, I think it’s clear that SRK took Ryo’s article as a complete review of the original article even though it also included editorial comments spliced in. Without any regard to this, we’re left with misleading information that the “P” in 2P stands for “Panasonic” as stated by Yoko.

But anyone who knows Yoko on a personal, professional, or even fan level should know how tongue-in-cheek he tends to be. He is a master troll. He loves sarcasm and this can easily be confused with a straight truth. His word is massively important to us fans, but we need to view his comments with a grain of salt.

He, himself, told us not to believe anything he says. A world of contradictions exists within a single man.

▶︎ The Word of Yoko Says…

For a closer look at the segment of the interview where Yoko mentions Panasonic as a joke, here is the actual passage directly from the page on Dengeki Online.

Click to view the article on Dengeki Online (Japanese)

At this point in time, there is no official YoRHa Type P designation; however, I seem to recall Yoko stating that there is a type for every letter of the alphabet even if he hasn’t thought of them all yet (this needs a citation!! I can’t remember where I heard this and I can’t seem to find anything about it, so I may have dreamt it up from this tweet).

Whether this memory is accurate or not, it’s absolutely within the realm of possibility for Yoko to create a new P Type model in retrospect specifically for the YoRHa:Dark Apocalypse story. If that is the case, then what P possibilities can you think of?

▶︎ What do you think the P in “2P” stands for?

If we’re going off of the already known YoRHa model types, it will likely begin with a P and end in an R, no more than 8 letters.

  • Pacifier
  • Paladin
  • Panzer
  • Paradox
  • Passenger
  • Preceptor
  • Power <—- Saito mentioned this one!
  • Prancer
  • Prayer
  • Predator
  • Programmer
  • Protector
  • Punisher

So, long story short, there’s a ton of hype whenever Yoko or NieR is involved. There are going to be jokes thrown around from time to time, but we need to be a little careful not to mistake a reported joke for the truth and then spread that misinformation to others, who likewise perceive it as fact.

Maybe in the end, it doesn’t matter either way. As long as there is HYPE, who cares, hm?

YoRHa:Dark Apocalypse is Live!

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Earlier this evening (JST), the Final Fantasy XIV collaboration with NieR:Automata went live and everyone that I’ve talked with seems to be rather pleased, saying that this raid genuinely feels a lot like NieR:Automata! Excellent news!

This page is currently a work in progress and will be continually updated with additional updates.

Dwarf Triplets…? Twins?

Anogg – White – Elder Sister
Konogg – Black – Younger Brother
Keeper of the Mine – Red – Brother (?)

The following section is undergoing further additions. “T” merely designates my text placeholder until I’m able to retranslate the displayed Japanese text. These will be replaced when I’m able to make more updates.

Special thanks to Linda Vonree for helping me get screenshots of these pieces of dialogue!

Dialogue Comparison

Quick explanation on how I’m displaying these images:

  • Left: English Localization
  • Right: Original Japanese
  • Below: Alternate Translation

Konogg: You suddenly collapsed as soon as we got back from the ruins.

Knogg: Even so……after such a horrific battle like that, you showed no fear and continued defeating enemy after enemy……
Perhaps we shouldn’t consider the “foreigner” as merely a simple “envoy”…

Knogg: Yes, from now on, I will treat you with respect.

Anogg: Are you okay? There are so many things I want to ask you.

Anogg: First of all, who was that controlling all of those machines back there? Please explain.

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NieR:Orchestra Concert Goes International!

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I get it, I’m a bit late discussing this topic, but it can’t be helped!

It was recently announced that the NieR:Orchestra re:12018 Concert will be going to three separate locations for four separate concerts!

Here’s the line-up:

Chicago, USA

  • Rosemont Theatre
  • January 24, 2020 – 8:00pm
  • January 25, 2020 – 8:00pm

Los Angeles, USA

London, UK

  • Royal Festival Hall
  • February 2, 2020 – 3:00pm, 8:00pm

Bangkok, Thailand

  • Prince Mahidol Hall
  • February 15, 2020 – 4:00pm
  • February 16, 2020 – 4:00pm
  • Conductor: Arnie Roth
  • Vocalist: Emi Evans
  • Special Guest: Composer Keiichi Okabe
  • Special Guest: Director Yoko Taro

Long-time NieR veteran vocalist and lyricist Emi Evans will finally be able to express her love and musical prowess in her home country of England (and her family!!) on this tour! What an absolute dream come true!

Also worth nothing is that both J’Nique Nicole and Nakagawa Nami will not be in attendance for these concerts. Nakagawa-san hasn’t been involved in any official NieR concert since her initial performance during the NieR:Automata Memory of Dolls concert in 2017, but at least to J’Nique, this news seemed to be a bit of a shock.

As anyone involved in the music business, we all know how difficult it is to schedule big events like this, not to mention multiple international performances, but as a NieR fan, it would have been nice for SQEX to have worked a little harder to get the main performers (Emi -and- J’Nique) involved on this tour. I’m both upset for J’Nique as well as all the international NieR fans that won’t be able to experience her amazing musical talent on stage for themselves, but I realize that there are a lot of moving parts involved in this decision. At the end of the day, it’s very unfortunate.

Regarding tickets, I’m not all that knowledgeable about how to get tickets to these venues– It seems as though some people have been able to reserve tickets already although the “GET TICKETS” link from the official site doesn’t seem to like to anything specific yet. I will continue to update this page with additional information to help people get tickets!

For anyone interested in the original run of the concert in Japan, I went to half of the performances in Yokohama and wrote about it here.

This event is especially important to me because it was the last time to hang out with my buddy Allyn before he was relocated. It’s been about a year and I still miss his company. It was beyond liberating to be able to express my geekiness with a fellow fan. I will always be thankful for getting the chance to meet such a great friend.

This series is special. It has a way of connecting people beyond national and cultural borders. I have met so many amazing people through it and the other related works by Yoko Taro. It’s this authentic, creative passion that keeps me engaged and excited for any and everything new to come.

Here’s to all the amazing people involved with this series, as there are many integral folk that tend to shy away from the spotlight! Without all of these people and circumstances lining up just right, we wouldn’t have such opportunities as this!

Thanks to Square Enix, MOMACA, ILCA, and anyone else involved that I’ve failed to mention here for their continued support for Yoko Taro and NieR in general. Especially, thank you to Saito Yosuke!! Without you, I honestly doubt NieR would have made such a comeback as it did through NieR:Automata in 2017.

To all the international fans who will be able to attend the concert: ENJOY!! It will definitely be a night to remember!!