NieR, originally designed to be a spin-off of the Drakengard series, was an action RPG developed by Cavia and published by Square Enix, released for the PS3 and Xbox 360 in 2010.
Square Enix main staff members - director Taro Yokoo, producer Yousuke Saitou, and composer Keiichi Okabe - returned from the previous NieR game to work with Platinum Games character designer Akihiko Yoshida and game designer Takashi Taura.
Below is a translation of select parts of the NieR New Project game development team interview from E3 2015.
Q: 5 years have passed since the launch of the preceding work NieR. Can you first tell us what led to the start of this project?
Q: Taura-san and Yoshida-san, what impressions did you have of NieR?
Actually, right after the previous work was launched I told the at-the-time assistant producer Yuuki Yokoyama “I want to make a sequel to NieR,” but I was told “It’s not really selling well so a sequel would be tough, wouldn’t it?” and so I gave up on it at the time, but looking back still made me nostalgic.
Q: Will there be a connection to the world view from the previous work?
Now that that wish has come true, the tension has been raised incredibly high for me. There are many NieR fans within the company, and as Platinum Games we have never tried our hand at this kind of game until now… For example, a story that has divergences, subquests, or components where you talk with NPC characters. It gives me such a feeling of excitement.
Q: When looking at the image board, we see a world of devastated forests and cities.
Q: There appears to be a robot drawn, this is…
Q: Aah, so if one deciphers the angel letters at the end of the PV, one might understand the meaning a little more, I take it… Well then, let’s move on to discussing characters. The character that appears in the PV, may we consider her the protagonist, or heroine of the story?
Q: There seems to be some hidden meaning to that statement… In the image board there is the back of a boy drawn that looks a lot like Nier.
Q: Will any characters from the previous game appear?
Q: And the character mask you are wearing will appear as well?
Yokoo very purposefuly refrains from saying anything more here.
Q: The weapon the female character in the PV is holding is a Japanese sword, yes?
Q: I have heard that there will be various types of weapons available.
As of E3 2015, NieR New Project was described as being only about 10% complete and thus has no projected release date.
Hopefully the developers will be more forthcoming with information about the game further down the line.
