How Nier Replicant’s Different Routes Change What the Game is About

Nier Replicant is an interesting game because beating it is just the beginning. You need to beat it several more times to see the full story and get the true ending. And the new remastered ver.1.22474487139... adds an additional ending that adds yet another layer—though not in the way you might expect.

When Nier Replicant was originally released back in 2010, the game had four endings. Each time you beat it, you were dropped back into the game at around its halfway point and needed to clear the game again—though with some major differences each time around.

*Note this article contains major spoilers for Nier Replicant ver.1.22474487139…

Your first time through the game, the story appears to be a post-apocolyptic retelling of a classic fantasy tale. A young Nier becomes a hero as he sets off to rescue his sister from the clutches of the evil Shadowlord and his evil minions.

However, as you play through the second time, you become able to understand the voices of the Shades—the enemies you are fighting against. Hearing the Shades completely changes how you view the game. Not only are the boss monsters revealed to be just as human as Nier and all the people he interacts with but it is made painfully clear that Nier is actually the bad guy in this story.

The Shadowlord is the key to saving humanity. Only he can keep the separated human souls sane so that they can eventually be recombined with their replicant bodies. Without him, all Shades will become mindless monsters and the sterile replicants will eventually die off. When Nier kills the Shadowlord to save his sister, he guarantees the extinction of the human race.

The third and fourth time through the game are largely identical to the second time through—though the remaster has added some new content to keep things interesting. This includes a few extra scenes with the puppet masters working behind the scenes and a new, bittersweet ending to one of the most tragic side stories within the game.

However, the big difference between these two playthroughs is the choice at the end that leads to either the C ending or D ending. With the C ending, Nier kills Kainé to free her from her curse, likely going on to live the rest of his days alongside his sister.

The D ending, on the other hand, has Nier use a spell to erase himself from existence—and in doing so save Kainé, the girl he has come to love over the course of their adventures together. However, this choice has a real world effect as well. If you choose to save Kainé, the game erases your save data—the proof of your existence in the game world—as well.

It’s a groundbreaking piece of gameplay design that reforms the whole game in a new light. The final choice is: “Which do you care about more? All the work you’ve put into this game or the fictional character you’ve spent those dozens upon dozens of hours with.” It’s a question that turns the game into a tool that forces the player to look inside themselves and question their own values. And honestly, it’s something that can’t be pulled off in any other kind of visual media other than games.

Which brings us to the new ending: Ending E.

With your saves deleted, you might think that is all the game has to offer. However, the game includes a meta reason to keep you playing: the Lightspeed Fighter trophy/achievement. It requires you to beat the game from scratch in under 15 hours. While in no means a tight deadline, you’re unlikely to get it your first time through—nor even want to try as it would mean skipping out on large swaths of the game. And with your data gone due to Ending D, what better opportunity to start a new game.

The first few hours of the game are identical to a fresh playthrough. However, when you reach the point where Hook has been defeated—the scene where Nier gives Kainé a new reason to live—the game jumps to three years after ending D. At this point you take control of Kainé and venture out into a world that’s gotten predictably worse since the death of the Shadowlord before doing a final extra dungeon.

At the end of it, you can resurrect Nier but there is a price. Kainé in the epilogue exists without knowing who Nier was. If she is to remember, then the lonely life she’s been living would go away. Therefore, if you resurrect Nier, you get your previously deleted save data back but your new Kainé save data is deleted. To put it another way, you can only play in the world where Nier existed or the one where he never did—but not both at the same time.

Here’s the thing though, playing as Kainé is a ton of fun. She controls differently from Nier and her combat feels truly fresh—especially after the massive amount of time playing as Neir to reach the epilogue in the first place. And while you’re not able to travel across the whole world, there is still some exploration to be found.

And in truth, you don’t even get all your save data back. You get one of your three slots back—the one you last saved on before getting Ending D. The rest are lost forever. (This makes sense as the Nier that Kainé resurrects is based on his memories when he first encountered the tree in the Forest of Myth as a boy. Thus, many of his experiences have been lost.)

Of course, you might think you can sidestep the dilemma by simply reloading your pre-Hook boss battle save, redoing the fight and re-entering the epilogue. However, that doesn’t work. Should you try to do so after seeing Ending E, the game continues on as it would in a fresh playthrough. The only way to re-enter the epilogue is to get the D ending again, delete your save, and redo the first few hours of the game yet again.

Once again, it’s a choice for the player with a tangible, real-world cost. Are you willing to give up this new way to play the game in order to get your save data back?

While it doesn’t have quite the impact of Ending D—especially in the time before the remaster—or the astounding choice at the end of Nier: Automata, it is another solid bit showing how the interactive aspect of games sets them apart from other visual arts. And that alone gives it a massive amount of value in my eyes.

The fact that it gives our heroes a happy ending—at least as happy of an ending as you can get in a doomed world—that’s just a bonus.

Nier Replicant ver.1.22474487139… is now available for PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and PC.