Nier: Automata’s Yoko Taro and Takahisa Taura on sentencing characters and turning 2B into a bug

Nier: Automata was one of the most-talked about games of 2017. The action role-playing game sold over 2.5 million copies after its February 2017 debut and has attracted a following that’s fallen in love with its unique, postapocalyptic world (and, to be honest, sexy androids). This is a surprising feat for a sequel for a 2010 game, Nier, that only sold about 500,000 copies.

At the Game Developer’s Conference in San Francisco earlier this month, I interviewed Nier: Automata’s director, Yoko Taro, and designer, Takahisa Taura. Taro has been the series’ shepherd. The franchise started in 2003 with Drakengard, a more fantasy-based action role-playing game for the PlayStation 2. The first Nier is a spinoff of that series. Taura is from Platinum Games, a studio known for flashy action games like Bayonetta and Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance. Automata was Platinum’s first project in the Nier franchise.