It’s with a heavy heart we report the closure of Japanese developer Cavia. Probably best known for the sometimes infuriating but often poignant and beautiful Nier, Siliconera have picked up on a recent interview with director Trao Yokoo who has confirmed the developer are no more. Staff will be absorbed into parent company AQ Interactive, a publisher who have been focusing their attention on browser-based games of late.
Nier was a complex animal to wrangle, paradoxically managing to marry wonderful storytelling and big action set-pieces with mundane grinding and a disappointingly austere presentation.
With the chances of a Nier 2 now extremely remote, we suggest picking up the first title and witnessing one of gaming’s great enigmas for yourself. We assure you it will be the best 6/10 game you will ever play. If that makes any sense whatsoever.
Source: 4Gamer.net via Siliconera
Mikiyaru
Wow, thats quite an unfortunate turnaround. Its not so often you have a really hyped up game and an almost immediate self-implosion of affairs. Sorry to see another developer go. :(
project84music
That’s a shame, despite its many flaws I did enjoy Nier.
hairfreax
I wanted to enjoy the game but it was just to slow to start with all its flaws
UsernameHere
I’m I mean for not being surprised by this?
TSBonyman
It’s a shame , i still mean to pick this up as it sounds interesting despite the flaws.
bunimomike
Looking at their back catalogue, there’s barely a game I recognise which leads to the question “why not make something a bit more friendly for western shored”. I’m ambivalent about their demise as it appears that everyone will be absorbed accordingly.
To wrap up, their efforts on the 360 and PS3 have been extremely average (dangerously close to “piss poor” some might say).
*reads everything back* I’m really not trying to sound so cold-hearted! :-)
Kovacs
No, no. That’s fair. They never really had a monster hit. I think the point here is that they might be absorbed, but they’re unlikely to be making games of this ilk again. Who knows. Maybe all the staff are down in Ikebukuro right now getting lap-dances from girls dressed as kittens, singing Aerosmith songs (badly) and celebrating into the wee hours of the morning.
We’ll never know. (OK, I’ll know – but I’ll never tell!)
:)
bunimomike
But they’d been going for a fair few years and had never risen above mediocre. Surely, the writing’s on the wall when a company performs so averagely in an industry where the top few make the megabucks. Hell, even if they’d averaged 70 or 80% they’d be still going, I reckon.
Danza Di Fuoco
If Square had not decided to release replicant here I would’ve been playing Nier but…. its made with fear of confusing X360 mothers and it wasn’t the best version…
I’m now sad…..
Bladesteel
Sad.
I’m glad I played Nier. The story was good, not the usual predictable nonsense. The music was absolutely beautiful.
In my opinion the flaws have been exaggerated; The grind was no worse than I expected from any game in the genre. And the only big problem with the graphics was that they took the HDR too far.
Hopefully the creative elements will be hired into other companies, it would be a shame if the talent gets wasted coding the next “farmville”
Elliot
I thought the game had many fewer flaws than reviewers made out, in fact! It felt unfinished, but not far off perfect in its story, presentation and longevity. The gameplay had one or two quirks, but nothing that took anything away from, in all, a very engaging battle system.