Reviews

NieR:Automata: Short Story Long by Jun Eishima, Yoko Taro

yokai_garden's review

challenging dark emotional inspiring reflective sad medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.5

naleagdeco's review

5.0

Hard for me to say how much of my enjoyment is because of my love of the source Nier: Automata. But perhaps that is a accolade as well; this book faithfully evokes the mood of the game's writing.

A series of short stories that flesh out the world of Nier: Automaton. The four most significant ones, perhaps, are the two that extend 2B and 9S' relationship, the one that fills in Emil's history, and the one that fills in A2's backstory.

None of them reveal close to the whole picture, of course; but what they do is extend the emotions and feelings these characters and situations evoke in slightly more revealing circumstances.

stormblessed4's review

adventurous dark hopeful sad tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

3.5

This improves on the translation/grammatical mistakes of its companion volume by a decent margin, though it isn't flawless.

ashleympeacock's review

4.0

Most of the stories were really great and expanded the Automata universe very lovingly. Many typos should have been caught by an editor.

My one hesitation is on the longest story YoRHa VER 1.05, which seemed like they tried to cram too much in a short period. They also introduced too many characters and tried to get you to sympathize with them and have each one have a distinct personality, which is just impossible to accomplish in such few pages. It would have been more effective with fewer characters. It's also the one hardest to read, perhaps due to translation issues?

My favorite is definitely A Much Too Silent Sea because it's the best written and features a different perspective not seen in the game!

kalanishimizu's review

adventurous medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.0

amuta's review

adventurous dark emotional reflective medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

3.5

The english translation is bad. I don't know if it was badly translated or badly written in the original as well. There a some really obvious mix up between characters some times. Nonetheless if you liked Nier Automata, you will like this. It has a lot of backstory in it and even stuff that isn't mentioned in the game (as far as I know as I didn't read every single document you can find in the game) 

blackwolf294's review

5.0

This book was an impulse buy at B&N. I saw it on the table and was captured by the unique description and liked the fact that it was a short story collection. I bought it having no idea whatsoever that it was based off a video game. I've never heard of or played the game, but I really enjoyed this book of short stories!

The stories in this book are so well crafted. They're emotional, intriguing, full of twists and turns, and always have "punchy" endings that leave you feeling amazed. I enjoyed the stories in this book so much that I wish the book was longer! Definitely worth a read, even if you have no knowledge of the video game or the universe in it. The stories in the book told me everything I needed to know about the world to enjoy the stories, just like good stories should!

Very highly reccomend!

siannon_'s review

adventurous dark emotional inspiring reflective tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

2.5

mairio's review

3.0

god Yoko Taro knows how to make one suffer.
I liked all the short stories about the androids... they gave you another look in how f*cked up command and the whole system was...
I felt very sad for 2B9S, A2 and 10H (her pod was a pain in the butt)
and having Emil retelling events you could also play in the last story... omg :( (Ending Y could be considered canon I guess)

smilemachine's review

challenging medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character

2.0