Tonight’s live stream with the creators of NieR Gestalt/Replicant and NieR:Automata for the first bit of fanfare for the 10th Anniversary, we’ve received a bunch of new, juicy news:
NieR:Theatrical Orchestra 12020
TOKYO: Tokyo International Forum Hall A
Saturday, March 28 Evening – Open: 5:00pm / Start: 6:00pm
＊ Please be aware that the above scheduled performers are subject to change.
S Seats: 10,780 yen
A Seats: 8,580 yen
>> GET TICKETS HERE <<
YoRHa Ver.1.3aᵃ/A2
This is a fan-made photo-manipulation pic that I made myself, aka it’s not official.
The all-boys cast from YoRHa Ver.1.3a will be making a comeback in this second rendition of the stage play that so effortlessly won our hearts this year!
TOKYO: Shibuya Cultural Center Owada, Sakura Hall – 4th Floor March 12-15, 7 performances
The YoRHa Ver.1.3a stage play will be coming back for a new version, bringing back the all-boy’s cast in the so-called YoRHa Ver.1.3aᵃ aka A2 stage play next March!
Tickets go on sale tomorrow!!!
The afternoon and evening performances on March 14 will be broadcast live on NicoNico, so stay tuned for the link to those pages in the future. You can purchase single tickets for 2500 points or 4000 points for both!
The entire cast from YoRHa Ver.1.3a will be returning, all except for Matsubara Rin, who played Anemone. Because of this, the entire character will be replaced with Jackass, as played by Kurotaka. Although the website hasn’t updated an image of him yet, you can view a couple shots of him on his agency’s page.
There will be recorded voices performed by:
Akiyama Kaoru: Voice of Pod153
Yasumoto Hiroki: Voice of Pod042/Zinnia
Like the previous Ver.1.3a stage play, the following talented musicians will be returning:
Guitar: Goto Takanori
Violin: Shirasu Kon
Percussion: Fukuoka Takashi
Along the same lines music, both Akaba Yukino and Nagaya Mikoto from GEMS COMPANY are listed in the credits for the “image songs”, so this is likely referring to their updated version of “Normandy” and “Gualdalcanal”.
This page will be updated in the event any additional informationon these events is released.
The above image is the cover of the Japanese novel. The English cover has yet to be released.
A couple days ago, it was announced that the 3rd NieR:Automata novel “YoRHa Boys” will be localized for a fall release in 2020. Since this news has come out, there have been several misinterpretations regarding this “new” novel, so allow me to explain a little further in depth on the topic.
This is not a “new” novel. As it stands now, there have been three separate, full-length novels released in the NieR:Automata series. The “YoRHa Boys” novel, originally released in July 2018, is actually a novelized version of the stage play by the same name, which ran from January 31 to February 4th, 2018.
Long Story Short (長イ話, lit. A Long Story) ーNovelization of the NieR:Automata game
The following is my own personal editorial regarding the announcement of this release.
Some mainstream media have inappropriately attributed inaccurate information about this novel, making it seem like this is the first NieR:Automata novel to ever be released in English, which certainly is not the case.
For those of you worried about the game’s vision not being captured properly, Square Enix did confirm that the auteur behind the NieR series, Yoko Taro, is supervising YoRHa Boys’ creation.
Since the novel is nearing a year old, and the stage play its based on is nearly 2 years old, those who follow the works of Yoko Taro already know to what degree Yoko participated on these projects. If it’s a game, he is likely the Director. Anything else, he is likely the Supervisor, which means it’s still generally his brain child and he gives various directions when necessary, but he is not completely in the driver’s seat for these items. This includes the various novels, stage plays, as well as the assortment of novellas as well. All of it is still the product of his unique mind… and that has never been an issue. I don’t understand why DualShockers went so far as to suggest that it was with this statement. There is no issue on the Japanese side of things. There is, however, when material leaves the shores of Japan and fall into the hands of folk who are unfamiliar with Yoko and his works.
Considering that NieR: Automata’s narrative structure may have been a bit too complicated to capture properly in a novel, going the prequel route is probably a good idea.
Considering the NieR:Automata story has already been produced in novel form, I think this is a massively inaccurate statement.
The story is not that complicated to comprehend, and it can only work better in novel form since you’re able to utilize many literary techniques such as internal dialogue, asides by an assortment of characters, as well as delving deeper into certain topics that could not be extrapolated within the game itself.
This statement also suggest that no other prequel exists, which is again inaccurate. The initial YoRHa ideas were formalized as early as 2012, during the end stages of Drakengard 3’s development, while the YoRHa stage play was the basis for NieR:Automata. For more information on the beginnings of YoRHa, please read this.
When one considers that NieR: Automata has found massive success and that Square Enix Manga & Books is releasing an official tie-in novel, it becomes clear that NieR is a very important series to Square Enix right now. Hopefully, this means we haven’t seen the end of it in the gaming medium.
Again, this is not the first NieR:Automata novel to be released. It is not even the first prequel story to be released either. There have been plenty of supplemental stories released up until this point, although, granted, not everything has been given an official English release. Still, the information is out there if you only take the time to look.
I have a couple issues with the official SQEX announcement of this news as well, so please allow me to vent a little.
Based on the stage drama “Project YoRHa,” YoRHA Boys recounts events that occurred before the time frame of Nier:Automata.
The “YoRHa Boys” novel is not based on “Project YoRHa”.
“Project YoRHa” was one of five recitation dramas performed live at the NieR:Automata Memory of Puppets Concert in 2017. It’s likely someone was confused with the term roudokugeki (朗読劇) which basically translates to a stage recitation drama, where actors stand stationary on stage and read their likes from a script. This should not be confused with any other stage performance such as a stage play or musical.
…the previously untold tale of the formation of YoRHa Experimental Unit M…
There are a couple points I have an issue with by this statement, first of which lies with the “YoRHa Experimental Unit M” statement. This is clearly referencing the M部隊 aka the M Squadron/Squad.
What I am arguing is the implementation and consistency with ease of understanding. Although a large battalion or squadron can be referred to as “unit”, it gets confusing when you’re dealing with the particular terms in the story (ie. individual androids). It may be my own personal preference since I’ve been translating this stuff since 2014, but I think it’s easier and more constructive to use terms that make sense within the narrative, terms that are not so ambiguous.
The term “unit” can be both plural and singular.
The term “squadron” is a plural singular noun.
The term “Unit” generally refers to an individual android. There are multiple different Types of YoRHa androids, but each individual android UNIT is unique. This is why I feel it’s vital to reserve this terminology for when you’re referring to an individual android rather than an entire squadron or battalion.
…the beginning of both “curse” and “punishment,” of androids dreaming of the glory of mankind.
This portion is an awkward translation of the subtext that is included on the obi around the actual book when purchased in Japan. An obi is basically a small strip of paper that wraps around the outside of a book which is mostly used to spotlight a main theme or topic from the book. You’ll often find quotes from other famous authors giving their personal comments here as well.
For reference, this is what the obi looks like for the initial Japanese release of Long Story Short:
“When androids dream of the glory of mankind, do machine lifeforms dream of humanity?”
The subtext on the obi is likely an allusion to the novel “Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?“ by Philip K. Dick, but exactly what context it could have on the overall narrative is up for debate. It’s nice if they tried to incorporate this with the official English announcement of the novel, but still… I feel like it could use a little more polishing.
All that being said, it’s extremely relieving to hear that SQEX is taking the next novel in-house. I have no grounds to judge the work that VIZ Media does as a whole, but merely from the work that was done on the previous two novels, as a writer, I was utterly applauded. There is a very big difference between translation and localization, and I’ve discussed this matter many times before, so if you’re interested in the matter, please look for those earlier posts. They shouldn’t be all that hard to find.
In the meantime, we of the English-speaking world, can only hope that THIS TIME we will get a decent localization of Yoko’s work, and I seriously hope that SOMEONE at least bothers to do their due diligence and do the necessary homework in order to translate things accurately, given what has already come before; hence contacting 8-4 for their input on how they originally translated things. Translation is not always about being as accurate as possible, but consistency is also extremely important. Here’s to hoping SQEX is able to get competent folks to work on this novel to make it really shine above all the rest!
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:
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.
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!
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.
There were a couple issues with the text attachment, which was an excerpt from the SRK article.
“While seemingly a joke” — This implies that it sounded like a joke but was actually a masked truth.
“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.
“…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.
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.
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…
3rd, Remember. You know that Yoko Taro is one of the terrible videogame director. Do not bleive me. Thank you.
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.
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?
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.
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.
