Making Sense of YoRHa: Dark Apocalypse - Final Fantasy XIV's NieR Raids

/ zuldim
YoRHa: Dark Apocalypse is a series of raids in Final Fantasy XIV, crossing over with the NieR franchise. These raids have a reputation for being incredibly confusing, and requiring an in-depth understanding of lore going back in a 20-year franchise. Is this raid series as hard to follow as its reputation suggest, and more to the point, is it good? Let's find out.
Table of contents:
Intro - 0:00:00
Part One: A (Very) Brief History of Drakengard - 0:08:02
Part Two: What Happens in YoRHa: Dark Apocalypse? - 0:18:52
Part Three: Final Fantasy XIV's Most Divisive Raid - 1:13:51
Conclusion - 1:58:21
References:
Tower at Paradigm's Breach (With details about epilepsy warning):
ffxiv.consolegameswiki.com/wi...
Dying Red Dragon
/ 51_spoiler_regarding_t...
na.finalfantasyxiv.com/lodest...
Portable Archive notes:
ffxiv.consolegameswiki.com/wi...
Seeds of Destruction:
drakengard.fandom.com/wiki/Se...
F66x:
nier.fandom.com/wiki/F66x
Drakengard 2 sources:
• Drakengard 2 Analysis ...
drakengard.fandom.com/wiki/Nowe
NieR Re[in]carnation crossover:
• [NieR Re[in]carnation]...
Thank you to @Pollymacho, check out his channel:
/ @pollymacho

[@AliceT3a]

just to not the main character of the first drakengard isn't in an incestuous relationship with his sister. The whole reason she 'unalives' herself is because the big bad reveals her secret feelings for him and he is visually disgusted by them. The writer of the games specifically did it because he hated the 'little sister loves big brother' trope.

[@garrettsweet9826]

I hate that I bumped the likes from 69 to 70, but based.

[@joshuayung5158]

Yep. Furiae only wants Caim. Caim only wants Murder.

[@God_is_a_High_School_Girl]

As a FFXIV player who's never even touched Automata, let alone the rest of the Drachengard franchise, I actually really appreciated this raid series because I was in the same boat as the Warrior of Light. Both of us had zero fucking clue who any of these people were or why they were fighting, just that two android chicks were trying to drag the star I loved into their war. And I was not about to stand for that.

[@trabunt7111]

It's the multiverse equivalent of a couple kids playing a game together that winds up moving into the neighbor's lawn, who then scares them off with a shotgun

[@GarlyleWilds]

Yeah. I think it's fascinating that whereas almost every other Crossover feels like it tries to justify itself to *not* clash with the FF14 lore, Nier isn't afraid to revel in being alien and invasive and *not* a part of it. It's a story we, as Warrior of Light, are never meant to fully understand and fully know, unlike every other tale we're a part of, and that's just so... weirdly enjoyable, to me.

[@TheToastwolf]

"hiding the true ending of a major character at the end of a several-hundred hours MMO experience" feels like the most on brand Yoko Taro fuckery the crossover event could ever hope for

[@svipulvalke9913]

Thought the exact same thing when I got to that part of the video xD true, pure Yoko Taro nonsense.

[@venabre]

The relevance of the blindfold coming off of 9S at the end of Copied Factory is not to represent him taking damage, but rather to show how he doesn't have red eyes and thus we should question our allegiance with 2P

[@Gloomdrake]

Yet another detail that requires prior knowledge to understand :(

[@venabre]

@@Gloomdrake I am personally of the opinion that having prior knowledge is irrelevant. I can guarantee you you will have no idea what is going on in the Ivalice raids nor the significance of any of it if you don't have any prior knowledge of Tactics and XII. Yet people aren't going around voicing their complaints about that.

[@Gloomdrake]

@@venabre its not a complaint, it's a lament that I missed important context. Docking points against myself, not the story

[@sansfangirl4life439]

that was the first thing i noticed during that scene! i thought 'he was attacking us, ok, but he also doesn't have the logic virus, meaning there HAS to be a misunderstanding or 2P can't be trusted.'

[@Prizzlesticks]

Yoko Taro has a history of making the canon endings of his games the joke ending, the ending told in secondary material, or both. Like, we literally got NieR Automata from a drama CD which mentions Emil mass cloning himself to fight off an alien invasion on July 4th, 5012. This, after NieR began as a spinoff from the funny ha-ha Drakengard joke ending where a giant naked lady gets transported to modern day Tokyo, which you defeat on your flying dragon in a rhythm and beat mini game from hell. Yoko Taro is a mad genius, and I'm here for it. Anyway. I would not be shocked if the FFXIV raids, which I've no doubt is an extension of ending D if 9S agrees to join the Ark, ends up being the canon route to some future installment. He's mad enough to do it, and frankly.... I'd respect it. It'd be no less bizarre than any other canon crack endings, and those raids are hella fun.

[@JarethS]

As someone who did actually play the Drakengard series, I still somehow never made the connection that Her Inflorescence was directly referencing Zero herself. The fight definitely made me think of the absolutely maddening music segment at the end of three with it's callbacks to the rings and the scenery, but I never actually made the connection until you pointed it out. Such a fantastic little detail. I will also second that not having Accord make a cameo was such a shame. Even something as simple as having her replace 2b in the cutscene where's she's watching the Orb Communion in progress would have been enough. All twelve of us who actually played Drakengard 3 could have at least appreciated it. :)

[@ZuldimYT]

Oh wow I hadn't thought of it but yeah replacing 2B with her in that cutscene that never pays off would have been PERFECT There is (I think) an oblique reference to her shop (though not by name) in one of the lore notes, which I didn't mention, but that almost makes it worse somehow.

[@HoneyDoll894]

yeah honestly no accord was a shame.. also i think for me what i loved about her inflorescence was that every time i played through it i found more references and it always made me giggle with excitement

[@hoorenglish5732]

I really do like that the dwarf twins are just the First’s version of Devola and Popola, who are always supposed to suffer due to their actions in Nier 1. Which is why agree with your interpretation of their ending being a more tragic one.

[@casual2694]

Honestly I feel kind of dumb for not seeing that they were meant to be like devola and popola.

[@MegaKaims]

If my memory serves right, I think Nier raid being canon was a off-hand comment made by Yoko Taro to YoshiP made while he and YoshiP were doing Puppets Bunker together during 14hour stream. Its all in japanese but it was a really fun stream section, Yoko Taro also mentioned that he wanted to do the Nier raids a lot more difficult where most attacks one shot you, but YoshiP had to politely decline that :D

[@highroller5335]

People also keep saying that he at one point said "all 2b appearances in outside media are canon" maybe even jokingly but no one then provides a link to a tweet or other some such interview soo what kinda psyop are people running.

[@MakeSureYouCleanUp]

​@highroller5335 If he had a hand in the outside media I'd believe it because there's so much material outside the draken/nier games that all connects together and even referenced in the mobile game ReIncarnation which is the next canon installment of the franchise.

[@highroller5335]

@MakeSureYouCleanUp thank you for proving my point there's a lot of "i believe" and "i think he said that" "remember when he said that" no one can point out when.

[@MakeSureYouCleanUp]

@@highroller5335 I didn't claim to know when and where, I just said I'd believe it because the most recent canon game proved a lot of outside media to be canon because it wasn't just Word of God, but *actually* in the game. 😂

[@BlackfangDragon]

This is why 2P from Nier Reincarnation is based on the version of her that appeared in FFXIV

[@SkySumisu]

A bit more context for the whole discussion of "canon", "not canon" and "all endings are canon": Japanese media tends to prefer the concept of "gaiden" to that of "canon". Gaiden (literally "side-story) is format (Very popular with multi-media franchises) where a story might have branching, concurrent, alternative or even mutually contradictory stories involving the same characters of concepts, and they're all "the right story" (While here in the west we tend to classify non-canon stuff as "wrong" or "worthless"). Here in the west we got used to using the concept of "multiverse" in order to fit gaiden stories in canon terms: Which is "canon", Tobey McGuire's Spiderman, Andrew Garfield's Spiderman or Tom Holland's Spiderman? We know that this question doesn't make sense, they're ALL canon, even if their storied are different and contradict one another.

[@thew00dsman79]

Because I’m a NieR nerd, in Grimoire NieR, on Jack it says this: Jack, The Knave of Hearts - “An amalgam of numerous Gestalts, Jack has lost any sense of self or individuality, and is now driven primarily by murderous impulses. The one thing it does remember is the mission given to it by the Shadowlord: “Bring Yonah to me.” Due to its unquenchable vitality-once slain it simply rises again and again- it was able to advance to the library where Yonah was hiding. It’s name comes from one of the Queen of Hearts’s card soldiers in Alice in Wonderland” That’s verbatim what the book says on it, if you were wondering, only about halfway through the video now, but wanted to throw that in

[@deohere7647]

Protip folks, if you wanna experience the entire Drakengaurd saga there is a Lets play you can read on the Internet LP Archive by the Dark ID that I would argue is better than playing most of the games. Give it a look, speaking as someone who has played ALL of the serires.

[@Madison-ur2qn]

I like the idea of Anogg being a non-evil replica. If this really is a cross-over between Nier and FFXIV, one big thing that happens in 14 is things being ensouled. Gaining better understanding and knowledge and wisdom and humanity through their struggles and trials- through understanding and kindness. Anogg being able to resist the Seed because she gained a soul from being in the 14 world feels right to me. Make Konogg more culpable and I think the mix would work well- could play a bit with nature vs nurture, choice vs destiny, resisting fate, loss and grief… I feel like if they went that route it could’ve coalesced! If a crossover is gonna happen, I want the story to feel like both games/narratives have a say in the outcome. Why not play with the twins in that way- each one gets one game’s version of an ending. Konogg’s actions lead him down a path of self destruction, while Anogg is able to rise above her own ‘nature’ to make choices based on what she believes is right, even if that does lead to her death… it also leads to salvation for those she loves.

[@viradiance8594]

Peak listening while grinding Viper in Zadnor. Bless

[@ZuldimYT]

Happy Dawntrail day :D

[@kaidorade1317]

When the world needed him most, he returned

[@emilyl.1745]

Clemps mentioned 👾

[@How_Do_I_Set_a_Username]

While I don't really know any Nier lore, this was lovely background noise for the agony of frontlines.

[@ZuldimYT]

I feel that, I got my rank 25 armor set just a few hours before the servers went down and now I've already got to start going for the Oppressor mount

[@lukoscreyden]

To expand on my previous comment, a correction; what I mean is the references, story and lore did nothing for me in the alliance raid. The raid itself, (bosses, loot, environment, music, mechanics) are all amazing in my opinion.

[@satyasyasatyasya5746]

I kinda think maybe Konogg and Anogg are both replicas/both from the seed or whatever. Since they have the same redish color hair as many twins/siblings in Drak/Nier games who can't do without eachother and have extra purposes and such. Its another theme/visual from Taro games and the ending of the story kinda fits with the whole 'it all deletes itself from the world of XIV' where he leaves with her. Like I don't think she dies ina cave-in anymore than 2B or 9S die in Nier Automata, they just new versions or something? Also, yes white/bleach is a sign of bad things but also, what with other themes of philosphy, incompleteness, balance and such, I think the balck and white clothes they wear represents how they're 2 halves or the same things, or balance eachother out or whatever, not 'just' that the white clothes means 'bad.' Because even with Nier Automata, where there is the dark outfits, they have white hair. And the robot bosses in the tower being based on chinese philosophers merging its a pretty obvious hint and yingyang stuff... idk lol

[@stampede274]

I think that the resonance of the First is a very important part of what's going on in this story. The First is very strongly aspected towards Light Aether. There are startling similarities between White Chlorination Syndrome and the effects of excessive Light on people. The Ascians probably brought it to the First as a backup plan for destroying the First and creating a Calamity of Light on the Source, just like how they tried to create a Light-aspected disaster with Ultima, Thorden, and eventually the Black Rose on the Source.

[@deliaseymour5578]

I found that the unique thwarting of the Watchers and the assurance that the Song and the Seed do not condemn the First and thus the Source is more akin to the fact that in Final Fantasy XIV, the very fantasy, the very strength of this defiance to the cruel “endings”, is why we fight and change things. But with Yoko Taro’s gleeful madness, much as we want to ensure all is well. It won’t be. You saved the First from the Watchers, but the actions made is devastating enough that everything is ruined and defiled. And I love it.

[@eldor-ashdale]

"along with 23 of the players closest friends" lmao I don't even have 3 friends for a light party

[@HasegawaRayven]

Thats right up there with one of my favorite dialogues from Stormblood, where they lampshade that "Gee. Sure is convenient that 7 of your Echo-blessed friends were both in The Ruby Sea and ready to fight a primal when Susanoo happened to manifest out of nowhere"

[@sleepysera]

​@@HasegawaRayvenWhile I appreciate that they solved that "problem" once and for all with the Azem magic, I now live in eternal fear of one of the people I'm randomly summoning into battle showing up in a less battle-ready form, like, let's say, in the middle of taking a bath or during a radio play marathon in their pyjamas with a cup of hot cocoa 😂

[@TorManiak]

@@sleepysera Iirc it technically literally works like the Duty finder. Azem's magic to call upon their friends has a conditional for it to work being the acceptance of being called or not(and tbh why wouldn't it some people they want to teleport would just be too busy to answer the call lol), so _technically_ , the "accept" and "cancel" prompts from the Duty Finder are very literal representations of that, lol. Means that whoever you're calling upon, they will be ready.

[@gratuitouslurking8610]

@@TorManiak THEN EXPLAIN ALL THESE CATGIRLS SHOWING UP TO WAR IN CASUAL SWIMWEAR!

[@Paraphrase1234]

As an FFXIV player who had never touched Nier - and barely heard of it - prior its raid series, yeah, I will second that it's good. Mechanically and visually it was gripping. I enjoyed it so much. The weirdness (when compared to other content) and the challenge were a *draw*, not a repellent to me. And I tried playing Automata later as a result. I sucked at it, and I got frustrated somewhere in the second playthrough, but I tried! I would call the Nier raid series a success. Now go do it with a full BLU group!

[@TheMexRAGE]

I think the "the nier raid took a slot" is very misplaced, CBU3 team is very prone to make content by recycling assets from past games, one of the reasons ShB got so much content, was because they were able to us so many assets from NieR Gesthal, NieR Automata, Final Fantasy XII and Final Fantasy Type 0.

[@RockR277]

I think the sentiment comes from how disconnected NeIr feels to FFXIV in this story. Ivalice and Bozja use a lot from Tactics and XII, but they feel like a congruous part of the world because their storylines were told with connective tissue. Add to that that all of the previous raids added to the lore of the world. Dark Apocalypse feels almost completely untethered to anything else in the game lore wise. That's why I think it gets that criticism, or at least I remember people talking about that at the time.

[@gratuitouslurking8610]

@@RockR277 Between the disconnect of tone and storystuff, and being able to use the 'slot' on something like the Garlean offensive perhaps (especially with how cut back the Garlean plot wound up in Endwalker, despite both the Weapon Trials and Bozha Front), I can def see some of the lamentations that come with them putting it in the crossover, especially if it wound up messy.

[@Khilo_Oh]

I also love the little detail that the twins, where one falls down a spiral of despair when the other one is gone, are redheaded. We love some DevPopola references

[@qestir]

Just chiming in to show my support for the format and style of this video, and the idea of a series retrospective. (Also, as somebody who has never played and never intends to play the Hitman games, those videos scratch an itch I didn't know I had.) Thanks for the video, and happy Dawntrailing!

[@reccca]

Shame that this isn't more lore relevant to the series. It is true that "everything is cannon" but the lore found in other media (plays, books, manga, etc) very much expand existing lore in the games, or at least provide context or backstory. This being an unrelated timeline where things kinda just happen and then they leave leaves it feeling very separate. The DrakenNier wiki doesn't even mention Her Inflorescence which is a shame because, wow, I absolutely love that design and the potential ramifications it could have in the series. All that said, what I REALLY want to know: how long did it take you to beat the true final bosses of Drakengard 1 and 3, lmao

[@ZuldimYT]

Drakengard 1 final boss took me around 2 hours IIRC, but Drakengard 3's, despite I think being objectively harder, only took me around 30 minutes (I double checked my recording for that. That said, I had been warned to just use that one timing video guitar hero guide thing, and only did one attempt "normally" before using, and my wife helped me get the timing on the video right so I could hit play/be immediately playing exactly as she hit play on the video. It was an experience. I also noticed that Her Inflorescence doesn't even have a DrakenNier wiki article, which blew my mind considering the lore implications of it. It's such a wonderful boss design/ending in general visually!

[@reccca]

@@ZuldimYT Ah yeah that's the smart way to go about it. I've been bashing me head against the Drak3 boss off and on for a good while now. I'd be curious about a drakengard/nier video if only to see another perspective. I love Nier and Automata for how genuinely wonderful they are, and I love Drakengard 3 for how batshit insane it is (I only watched Drak1 and the gameplay looks fucking miserable, but I also love the WILD cutscenes and the audacity of everything about it). Though I would wait on doing a video until seeing where the anime goes. First season already made some interesting changes, and who knows what they'll do in this second one.

[@ZuldimYT]

@@reccca I was actually expecting D1 to be much more miserable than it is from what I'd seen of it. It's painfully basic, but it isn't like, aggressively bad imo. Honestly Drakengard 3 was the one that came closest to breaking me because of the performance issues.

[@reccca]

@@ZuldimYT Yeah that's why I'm glad I emulated it. While I enjoyed the clunky combat (not so much some of the side missions...), if I was playing with PS3 performance I would be far less forgiving

[@ZuldimYT]

@@reccca I've never messed with PS3 emulation, I hear it's gotten to be in a pretty good state though, it's good to know there's at least a version of Drakengard 3 that performs well lmao

[@Pollymacho]

Way to go with this one Zuldim! As someone who's only played Neir Gestalt/Replicant and Automata, this was really cool to see a bunch of details that went over my head going back to the Drakenguard series. I played through the questline recently and with the weekly quests, my current guess for why it functions like that is to show the player the progression of time from the events and their outcomes. Both of highlight how the Dwarf village is slowly building itself back up, contrasted with Konoggs degrading madness at his quest bearing no fruit. I also think you made some fair crisisms with the raid series story as well. Thank you for the chance to be apart of the project!

[@ZuldimYT]

Thank you again for your contribution, man!

[@zeroanonymity9736]

This is a fantastic video and a great breakdown of the Raid and its connections with the DrakeNieR series, though I want to put forward another way of interpreting the events in the Raid. Yoko Taro rarely answers questions directly about the backend of the series, what things are and what's happening in areas not focused on by the characters involved with the plot. Most of the major bits of worldbuilding we have for Drakengard's Midgard especially is based on inference stemming from details within 1, 3, the manga, and the novelizations. This applies here as well. The direct story involves Seeds of Destruction, the Machine Hivemind, and interdimensional travel but it's about the ways people can be isolated from their communities. How people handle tragedies and the ways in which those without a support network become victimized in the wake of them. So it doesn't answer the questions it poses concerning the nature of those concepts directly, however it DOES make it possible to infer some potential details by using things we already know! The Gods did indeed send out the Seeds of Destruction in Drakengard, however both Angelus's remark of "Is this the land of the Gods?" in Ending E as well as the "Cathedral City" in Drakengard 3 hints that the "Gods" are just... us. Mankind. Cathedral City is just a ruined Tokyo that's somehow been transported to Midgard, and from side material we know that with it came monsters and other "Magic" concepts for the setting. The Drakengard and NieR universes are essentially stuck in an endless mutual feedback loop of magic being sent to NieR's through the conflict with the Queen Beast and then it gets sent right back to Drakengard's world in the distant past through the transportation of Cathedral City at some point in NieR's timeline. So if the Seeds are indeed made by the "Gods" then it was always possible that they were always made by Man. I believe the Raid gives a similar answer that all but confirms it. In NieR Automata, the aliens are described as being akin to sentient plants and their Machine proxies thus have cores that are similar in nature to them. They're like plant cells, a hard outer wall that protects the cube within. Ending C for Automata has the possibility of the Tower shooting an arc into space containing the sum total of knowledge of both the Machine Lifeforms and the human database on the moon, launched in an attempt at finding another world. You could say they were attempting to send out a "Seed" to accomplish this. I believe that the "Gods" of the DrakeNieR universe are the Machine Lifeforms that have been so disconnected from time and from constant evolution that they barely resemble what they once were. Perhaps in some timeline we aren't shown from Automata the machines launched their Arc into space while both 2B and 9S were alive and able to interfere through uploading their own personalities into it. It seeded a world successfully or else it found ways of replicating itself while in space, and over the course of countless millennia they were able to develop means of sending arcs to other dimensions and times. Each of the various manifestations the "Watchers" have taken throughout the series are different methods that this evolved Machine Consciousness has attempted to propagate within the worlds and times they arrive in. I truly think that this Raid hints at that, that each of the manifestations of the "Gods" are methods of this Consciousness attempting to propagate itself and evolve. One of the earliest attempts we witness being a parasitic Flower that would blossom and end the world once fully grown, sealed in a pocket dimension by Mikail along with its host body. Perhaps being linked with Zero in that way affected how it manifested from then on, eroding each others' consciousnesses and melding into something new over time. Maybe the Seeds were the only things it could send out of the pocket dimension, spreading them to as many universes as possible in an attempt to further grow while the main body of the Consciousness remained trapped in that sealed world. The Raid shows potentially an early version of this, one where it replicates things nearly 1 to 1 with how they were in Automata. As time went on it's possible those attempts became more and more abstracted and strange, like Ending B of Drakengard. Zero clearly seemed to deteriorate while trapped if The Queen Beast really is her, maybe the Consciousness also decayed in a similar way over time? Sorry for the long, rambling comment with assumptions rather than facts. Part of why I love this series is how interpretable everything is. It seems to have a core logic to everything happening in the background, but because it's so secondary to the very Human drama it invites the viewer to explore. The exploration gives context to the tragedy, making what's otherwise very simple stories punch far above their weight class at times. These raids were what spurred me into finally subbing to FFXIV in the first place so they hold a big place in my heart haha

[@unixtreme]

<a href="#" class="seekto" data-time="210">3:30</a> everyone I know hates Crystal Tower but I think it's because of the roulettes

[@tenebris9182]

<a href="#" class="seekto" data-time="1660">27:40</a> we actually see something similar In the Plato 1728 dlc, after getting far enough in each arena a section opens up where you play as Plato 1728 and experience the tests they do from his perspective

[@proxy6330]

i cannot understate how narratively satisfying it is for the nier series and the constant references to mimicing humanity, for 9s to be the one inflicted with madness doing the same thing inuart did causing the entire raid series AND the true death of zero????

[@DonaldTurner]

Really really enjoyed this, man. thank you!

[@Jehudy7]

Thank you for this video. Your videos always give me a new level of appreciation for anything you cover.

[@jmrwacko]

Tower at paradigm’s breach isn’t mechanically any harder than the other alliance raids. It’s only harder because it’s the last alliance raid of the series, so the level sync makes it so that the players aren’t overgeared for it

[@RockR277]

I don't think it's quite that simple. I think that's a part of it, but it's also just tuned higher than a lot of other raids. We go back to WoD or Dun Scaithe and more or less obliterate those fights. On rare occassions, I've even seen Ultma's maze running section get skipped, and if not she'll be at .01% after. Those are all final tiers. Tower bosses do have a good chunk of health and a fair amount of insta-gib mechanics.

[@oreonask7090]

all the talks of memories and advanced technology here sure does carry new meaning at the end of DT

[@reccca]

Incredible timing, I was digging back into the DrakenNier lore hole and this was always a blindspot for me since I can't get into MMOs. I'm so happy that my Patreon money went to you playing the Drakengard games lmfao

[@mrbubbles6468]

‘Do you know what I had to get that Trophy’ Yes. You poor bastard. Lmao.

[@f.09h]

thank you so much for this video!

[@blackbird4852]

I am late but here is the comment for the algorithm. Thank you for another good one! And I said it before but I will say it again: As someone who never played FF14, Hitman, or any of the Nier/Drakenheim games, thank you for consistently making your videos easy to follow and very interesting to watch even for the uninitiated xD Looking forward to the next one!

[@squeethemog213]

This was an absolutely fascinating watch. Now i really want to see a Drakenguard retrospective at some point but only if you're up for it. Thank you so much for making this vid and for all your efforts. You're awesome 🙏😃

[@satyasyasatyasya5746]

<a href="#" class="seekto" data-time="63">1:03</a>:20 Its something to do with the Japanese names for Chinese philosophers. I forget the nuances but something something: So-Shi (Zhuang Zhou/Zhuangzi) Ro-Shi (Laozhi/Lao Zi/Tzu) Ko-Shi (Kǒngzǐ/Confucius)

[@elixwhitetail]

Ro-Shi is the Japanese reading for the name of Laozi, the Chinese philosopher who authored the Tao Te Ching (the core text of Taoism), and Ko-shi is the Japanese reading of Kǒngzǐ. And the names were changed in the Nier raid because we fight Meng-Zi and Xun-Zi. Meng-Zi's name is another reading of the characters for the Confucian philosopher Mencius who is considered second only to Confucius himself, and Xun-zi is Xunzi, third of the three great classical Confucians (after Confucius and Mencius). In a way, you could look at it as Ro-Shi and Ko-Shi and the others were destroyed in Nier Automata, so the Nier raids get the next generation of Chinese philosophers instead (but we still get Engels soooo)

[@Bluelyre]

I like the raid series, if anything my opinion mirrors yours. This might be speculation but dark apocalypse was being developed actively during covid. I have no doubt the story was limited in scope when Japan went into lockdown.

[@Bluelyre]

Also the seed probably isn't an actual seed sent to the first. The machine network is so involved with it that they probably made it, since they are ultimately corrupted by the red eyes. It's probably not a 1:1 replica since a seeds are specific to the drakengard setting and never are shown in Nier. Then again this is probably just me existing plot contrivances.

[@ZuldimYT]

I thought about mentioning that in the video, yeah I think it'sINCREDIBLY likely that covid had an impact on how the quest played out.

[@colebadguy]

I really enjoyed this video! I'm glad you did play through the Drakengard games and I would love to hear your takes on the games and lore in a retrospective video like you asked at the end. As someone who hasn't read the mangas or anything a lot of the lore is still confusing to me and I think you'd do a good job at talking about it.

[@raehex9092]

The themes of Shadowbringers being that of grief and seeing the story of Anogg and Konogg… they’re much more closely aligned than people want to give credit to. There’s also a lot of themes and imagery in Shadowbringers (and Endwalker!) that are very similar to imagery in the Drakenier franchise. So thematically it definitely fits.

[@LysFlowerful]

This was a wonderfull video ! I only played Drakengard 1 as a child and watched cutscene of the 3 on youtube. I'm fascinated by the Drakengard universe, but never really got into Nier. I liked the raid but had much trouble piecing out the story. Thanks for the video !! ♥♥

[@Charlie99993]

My favorite part about the Drakengard party is that the PDF file is one of the least morally ambiguous because he at least has the integrity to hate himself for it

[@Vikumax]

I always theorized the ending was always meant to be the same and the overall vote was just to determine which of the twins would become part of the twist. Since the twins were basically the game's version of Poppola and Devola, killing one of them and making the other sufger has basically become a tradition in the NieR franchise.

[@mowossh]

such a well made video!!! amazing!!! also <a href="#" class="seekto" data-time="2190">36:30</a> dammit zodiark it could've been a home run 69% across the board you were SO close

[@avanxity]

this was so so interesting to watch omg

[@The_Catman]

I felt it was a great story about powerlessness. Videogame players, in general, always hate stories about powerlessness. Players feel their actions always must lead to something meaningful and succesful. "I succeded in the gameplay, so I deserve to succeed in the story" Players present this distaste in many ways. The "Win in the game, lose in the cutscene" meme is a very common sign of that distaste. But that restrains videogames from talking about half of the cake of life: failure. In life, you more often than not, fail. Total victories are rare, usually we gain something and lose something else. We call them victories when we gain a little more. In games, maybe for the escapist nature of the medium, we often refuse that inescapable notion. I loved Dark Apocalypse for 2 reasons: 1-I played when it was already entirely out (in general, the patch by patch approach always seemed to me as an abysmal way to enjoy FFXIV's content) 2-It was a story about the Warrior of Light being totally powerless to obtain the best ending possible for everyone. Until Shadowbringers, the Warrior of Light was unbeatable and unstoppable, except for a couple of inconsequential fights with Zenos in Stormblood (when it really mattered, you washed the floor with his face). An absolute hero, incredibly powerful. The only people who died in the story at that point were the people who were so crazy they thought to do your job and protect you just once from threats you disintegrate at the first occasion. You, for the sole reason of being exceptionally good at murdering things, get everything right. People always listen to your wise, monosillabic advice, or die under the weight of your unimaginable power (the motherfucking Pope in Heavensward dies asking you "Who...What are you?!"). And everything always fixes itself afterwards. Dark Apocalypse asks one question: what about times when killing is not remotely enough? To be clear...you save the world in this story. The machine life forms would have become a threat so great, Meteion would have been a nuisance by comparison, if they had the time to develop before meeting you. But you can't save Konogg, let alone Anogg. You can't erase the trauma and conflicts between the dwarfs of the village. For once, you're an outsider: nobody trusts you on the level to entrust their entire stance on the situation on your judgement. You prevented far worse, and that's it. You were not there to save Anogg when she truly died. You could not mend the pain Konogg felt for her death. You did not know the necessary details to even act upon Konogg's acceptance for most of the time. It was not meant for you to heal the village like nothing ever happened. For once, you just killed the bad guys...and that's it. That's what you're really good at and this time you meet the very real limits of that. Konogg falls into a desperate struggle to gain back what has been lost for ages and can't be retrieved and dies painfully, alone, crying, either allucinating, or transported by some sick game into a place we know for sure will kill him atrociously. Or neither of that...and nobody ever sees him again. You're not allowed to know what became of him. This was never your story. This was his. And he took his decisions. You're just left there, alone, uncertain of what really happened, with the clear sensation that you could not really save this village. You know they will have to find a way to go on, rebuild, accept their losses, and become something new... Maybe not a better place. Maybe not better people. But, maybe, functional enough to have a chance to be happy once more, one day. You? You have your life. The source needs saving. Fandaniel is about to go crazy. You have to be somewhere else. Your time is up. For once...you could not do enough. I loved this story. Maybe because my job IS helping people. Try to save them. And I had to learn, at some point, that you can't save everyone. More often than not, you should be happy you even had really a chance. Things go terribly wrong the majority of the times. You did not act as fast as you could. They called for help when it was already too late. You met your limits and failed. They didn't listen...and destroyed themselves, or died. And you now have to live with it. Accept that you can be as piwerful as a single human can be, and still not be enough. It was a story about that. And I loved it. Because if a Warrior of Light really existed...that would be the weight of their mission. I'm happy there's a part of FFXIV that spoke about that.

[@Sin606]

I was on the edge with Neir Automata, the raids made me tired of 2B and her shit. Thanks for explaining what was missed.

[@neogirl159]

Another wonderful video

[@datboi04]

Considering they added the new game+ option to replay story in FFXIV literally with the patch the first raid came in, and the first raid had a branching story with a choice, it would have been the PERFECT time to play around with the secret endings that the NieR/Drakengard series loves.

[@bingo784]

Do a DrakenNier retrospective. Yes, please.

[@gratuitouslurking8610]

I think my favorite offhand observation made by people is that in any other reality, Her Inflorescence would have likely succeeded in creating another apocalypse, but due to the Warrior of Light being so goddamn OP (8/14th Ancient, most skilled harnesser of Dynamis, literally calling conveniently just as overpowered adventurer allies every time they need to get serious) that this one of the few realities where the ultimate big bad of a series as bleak as Drakengard could get their arse beat. We literally smack apart the final boss thanks to Tone Armor.

[@tazepsmg]

this is an amazing breakdown and analysis. Specially the points you made about what the story "could have been". like with Accord. Thanks so much for making this video! you're a fucking legend!

[@JackCross3]

I really enjoyed the Nier games when I played them. They take huge swings. I appreciate the recap ! I've always wondered what was going on with this. Would love to see a nier/drakengard retrospective series.

[@kylegosa4209]

Hey loved the video, your work always makes me think. This one was funny to me, because by the time we hit your conclusion of why it doesn't live up to the story telling we should expect from a good crossover, you had literally just convinced me as to why it was awesome actually, lol. Tldw, I kinda like that that the world of Drakengaurd and Neir was so full of spite that just a little bit of it touched this other multiverse and created some needless tragedy. I think those gods just hate twins with red hair.

[@coloxrme]

I honestly thought that the story was fine, and I cried at a certain part. The logs that you collect kinda tell you what you need to know, and this is coming from someone who still hasn't played any Nier or Drakengard games, which actually sparked my interest in these titles, so I then watched 6 hour long videos about how it all ties together.

[@ehwick8175]

This is my favorite raid series. At first just because of the fights/mechanics themselves, music and aesthetic. Then its my favorite because it sent me on the drakennier rabbit hole and exposed me to one of the craziest world building in gaming.

[@TaeruAlethea]

This feels very surface level, but by <a href="#" class="seekto" data-time="93">1:33</a>:40 I didn't remember it getting mentioned: The Nier world being destroyed by the white dust and white symbolic of bad is also reflected in The First being bathed in Light ether.

[@reallightfield5314]

Your commitment to not doing gibbet or gallows is almost as great or the vid

[@Metroid13]

great video as always - i can only agree that the story for these raids was a real missed opportunity, though i'd never considered that it was probably due to rewrites. i also agree that the two series seem to be like oil and water, not really meant to mesh well outside of really particularly nuanced writing. great raids mechanically, probably my favorite when it comes to the act of playing through - my favorite of the raids stories is void ark by far, since i'm a sucker for that kind of swashbuckling storyline (and also it's one of the only alliance raids that feels like a mostly, wholly unique thing to 14's setting). i'd be curious to see your take on the Ivalice raids, which i also kinda hated story-wise.

[@VervaraRozthan]

Well done!

[@Avrahffxiv]

i just played automata and so getting all of this info in reverse is very interesting lol. Now i understand. and i also understand how much i don't understand.

[@TheKhronos]

It’s interesting to hear the other opinions on this raid. I’m a newer player and a big nier fan- and ending on this raid solidified shadowbringers as my favorite expansion. I am super happy to have experienced them

[@Silvershadowfire]

I stayed up far too late listening to this and I am glad that I did. I never liked the Nier raids, and it was 50% because I had no idea what the heck was going on or why the Warrior of Light/Darkness should care (I mean yes, after the village is destroyed, they would have a good reason to.) It might have been better to actually start with that, then unveil the story of the twins as we're busy cleaning out the machine life forms or whatever. I also think you hit the nail exactly on the head when it comes to narrative dissonance. When you boil everything down, the protagonist of FF14 *fixes* things to make, if not a perfect outcome, then at least a better one. My theory is that their actual superpower is to inspire hope in those around them. It sounds like the Drakengard (I haven't played any of it except the first part of Automata) series is more like Greek tragedy - hope just makes it hurt more in the end. Finally, yes. That hallway is my vision of hell where the devil will make me avoid lasers and balls for my sins.

[@Kwstr42]

im glad i came across this. i have all the drakenguard games and neir 1. i was super confused with this story so i bought automata in hopes it would help, and finished it. super fantastic game, but did not help me understand anything lol. we're talking about games going back to PS2 that im not going to remember

[@idminister]

A good and interesting follow up. Would be to compare/contrast the points and issues shown here with how the prior Expacs alliance raid series (ivalice) was handled

[@1-2-rkcubed3]

Wonderfully put together dive into one of my favorite pieces of ff14 content! Watching you ignore (almost) every time Gallows and Gibbet became available caused me pain though XD

[@mrbubbles6468]

In fairness, expecting you to have 100% every game, including the alt endings to understanding anything in a game completely unrelated to them is very on brand.

[@Varizen87]

In response to about 37 minutes in, keep in mind, if you re-watch cutscenes, it tracks your progress of other side story completions. Like Zero has different Dialog if you're a Reaper, Albreric, the DRG quest giver has unique lines if you've done the DRG story, in Heavensward, you're often referred to by the Azure Dragoon title if you play Dragoon, Endwalker had NPCs either show up or not depending on if you did their side quests... It had everything it needs for a branching story. Case in Point, Legacy 1.0 characters have an entirely different opening cutscene than newly created ones.

[@proxy6330]

to add on to this, shadowbringers was the first expansion (that i know of) to give the player an option of which branch to go down first for the msq, locking you out of the other temporarily. given it goes back to the same spot in the end, i definitely think the tools are there for the alternative endings

[@DICEBOY22]

This sounds super evangelion twisty and honestly very interesting!! I would have taken a deeper dive into the story as its own expansion over what we got in Dawn trail.

[@SpacedogD]

I'd love to see an essay going through the ivalice raid series. Out of everything in the game, that raid series is the one I have no idea what head or tail is going on and didn't even get any bit of story information by the time i finished it.

[@The4thSnake]

I'd like that retrospective. And more Hitman.

[@TheKhronos]

You aren’t wrong about the story critiques though. Thank you for the video it gave me more to think on

[@HoneyDoll894]

when i first played dark apocalypse, i had only played Nier:automata and watched a playthrough of dod3, as well as read a large part of the supplemental material from nier. honestly i think its a great raid series. i didn't understand all of the story, but the raids themselves were incredible

[@sansfangirl4life439]

i personally love this series, from the gear to the music and the bosses. this raid FITS Shadowbringers because of that bleak outlook. and the fact the ending outcome was based off of which dwarf everyone ultimately chose to side with was so yoko taro xD

[@ArtificialVik]

I mean, I get being confused by the story, but the actual fights themselves were really fun & challenging. I didn’t even realize that there was any hate towards this series!

[@GimmeTOKYO]

that "I don't make the news, I just report on it" about DoD make me nearly spit my drink out.

[@clanky112]

Great video, I didnt't know anything about Drakengard/Nier before this, and now the raid kinda makes sense. I feel like people often make the mistake of trying to explain everything in this raid series within the magic system of ffxiv, which doesn't quite work since we are dealing with entities from another universe where magic work in different ways. But I think that you kinda went in the opposite direction with Anogg. You tried to explain why she isn't evil in the context of Drakengard lore, but the events take place in the ffxiv universe, where different magical forces are at play. Thr fact that souls are very real things in ffxiv might have an effect on what the seed of destruction can do to her (like it can affect her body and mind, but can't alter her soul).

[@RockR277]

Huh, ya know I always figured the key just woke the other androids up and the bunker was incidental. Or maybe they were trapped inside the bunker somehow. I dunno.

[@satyasyasatyasya5746]

Loved your FFXIV videos about the villains and stuff, really great stuff :) Although I played XIV for like 10 years (on and off) restart-itis meant I never got farther than 3.X hahaha So it was nice to see what happens and stuff. Although I kinda knew already. But all in all, MMOs just aren't for me.

[@sleepysera]

At around <a href="#" class="seekto" data-time="64">1:04</a>:58 you say you can't confirm that this is the Square Enix building, but the company name is literally IN the shot in the background as you say it, on the right side of the building 😂

[@ArchonZach]

Im glad I got into nier and drakengard when the games were like 10 dollars at gamestop instead of costing more used than when they were new 😭

[@CallN0w]

Thank you for your video I enjoyed it very much. I did occasionally furrow my brow at lore errors though 😤

[@ZuldimYT]

Ok, I'm genuinely curious which lore errors you're referring to, and whether they're actually things I misunderstood, or things I deliberately simplified for time.

[@CallN0w]

@@ZuldimYT ...it might be the latter!

[@ZuldimYT]

​@@CallN0wCondensing a 20 year franchise into a ten minute recap requires some sacrifices haha

[@CallN0w]

@@ZuldimYT yeah i just get stupid about ny favorite franchise lmao. Sorry! Between this and the Zenos vid you got a subscriber out of me

[@ZuldimYT]

​@@CallN0wOh, it's ok, I didn't think you were being rude at all. I've dealt with people getting rude over lore errors before and this wasn't that. :P Glad to have you on board, I hope you enjoy my future videos!

[@fedrikrose2277]

Honestly, the glam and the fights are what redeem the raid series for me.

[@Catspirit123]

Well now I understand why my one friend who played all these games was freaking out at the final boss back when it came out…

[@nataliet4293]

Im gonna be real, i played the raid so much. So many times. I can't tell you how many people just screamed in chat at certain reveals lol. No idea what was going on but i was happy for them.

[@idminister]

It also felt off because at the end of copied factory when you realize you are dealing with androids, machine lifeforms and they are potentially extraterrestrial..... the player character DID NOT contact their scholastic scion friends. Their presence wouldve provided a natural way to reveal the lore. And it does not need to be all of them, some of them can even be rotating about. Aside from the threat level which the scions would see as reason to meddle, there is also how did the machines get to the first and thus can the scions use that to get from the first back to the source.

[@BranBal]

I never played Nier or Drakengard. I love Nier raids It has some of the best fights and glamours

[@nataliet4293]

Yes, why is the orb both crunchy and sticky. Please tell us

[@nexmeles8023]

I can't wait for Neir 3 and have these two come into it somehow.. haha

[@nailed999]

love Nier drakengard story, even if i dislike the story of nier raids. i like that it introduced me to FF14 and the raid itself are fun

[@fluffdafire157]

Saddening thought is what if the Anogg at the end of the story wasnt the Anogg we knew but just another clone from a different seed trying to do everything again

[@CommSchuKadaj]

FFXIV is considering Extreme/Savage Alliance Raids, so maybe that would allow for a different result

[@sen8368]

9s using the seed would have been completely in character for him in that point in the story, i almost feel cheated now

[@VoisKaniress]

Hello! I actually have the answer to "Yoko Taro says the raid series is canon" for you. He never said that. What he said was "Everything is canon to NieR". Essentially saying everything Nier shows up in, or is connected to the DrakenNier universe is canon to the franchise. This means that Soul Calibur is canon to DrakenNier. Additionally for people asking this question, it's incredibly telling they ask it. We do not ask if crossover events are canon if they're from Final Fantasy, we do not question Dragon Quest crossovers being canon, nor do we question if the other alliance raids are canon. The question, in and of itself, is telling that the individual asking it *does not WANT* the raid series to be canon, but it is. Until we're given reason to believe it's not, and we've been given nothing to tell us so.

[@Otacanthus]

Playing it through release I was definitely confused but it wasn't a bad experience overall. I have some surface level drakengard knowledge seeing some videos before talking about the story and my wife being a big fan showing me stuff especially like the ending of 3 and 1, so seeing stuff I recognised was really fun. But hearing more context makes me appriciate the raid series more honestly. When it comes to the alliance raids in general I appriciate more the context than the story itself. I really didn't care that much for the crystal tower story, having played since ARR and only unlocking it when it became required, realising who the exarch was became a big surprise for me and a better way to reveale it and do the story than someone who'd done it in the past. Which is the only good thing I have to say about the story alone, together with some lore stuff pointing back to it. The void arc is just kinda cool demon stuff, seeing people relate it to Mhach and just being a part of a bigger story is realistically all I got from it together with the world (Which is EXACTLY how I feel about the nier raids). The stormblood one that I don't even know the name of and can only connect red chocobo and sniper dude to, not exactly groundbreaking story engagement, it's just fun fight stuff. And the endwalker raid tier which is just fanservice but for ffxiv fans with a story I genuinely disliked the ending of. That green motherf*cker should either have moved on with the others or I should have been able to hang out with Halone, Nophica, and Azemya more, just like talk to them a bit, have a coffee with them. But nah mr green is the only one who gets to do that, like one or the other, make it make sense. Alliance raid stories have never been good, passable and being able to point to other history at most. So as an alliance raid it's literally like all the other ones. If it wasn't crossover themed, the story would probably had been as underwhelming to people, but this time tangentually related to something in the ffxiv world. But instead acting like an final ending for Zero, ending her suffering, which might genuinely never have happened otherwise by how vague that franchise is. The raid series did it's job.

[@Gloomdrake]

There is, to my knowledge, only one branching path in FFXIV, at the culmination of the Eureka storyline

[@Luferife]

Please do the videos about Drakengard series, i really want to know what happens but i don't want to play it xD