It took barely more than a full day for Japanese role-playing game remaster Nier Replicant ver.1.22474487139... to not only reach the Top 10 best sellers list on Steam, but to shoot straight to the number one position. The game is a remake of 2010 PlayStation 3 title Nier Replicant, which was previously remade for the Xbox 360 as Nier Gestalt. It debuted globally on Steam on April 23, 2021, and had become the top selling game on the platform by April 25 when the weekly Top Seller report was announced.
Nier Replicant unseats the previous week's winner, co-op action-adventure platformer It Takes Two, which this week sits in the number two spot. It Takes Two was released at the end of March, and has sold over one million units in the month since its launch. Other titles appearing on the Top Seller list are multiplayer shooters Battlefield 5 and Titanfall 2, survival adventures The Forest and Valheim, and action-adventure title Outriders.
The remake of Nier was not just Steam's number one top seller, but appeared twice on the list. It was also listed as the ninth best seller, just above Outriders. This is due to alternative purchase options available on Steam. It also reported a concurrent player peak of 28.5 thousand players, beating sequel Nier Automata which peaked at 23.8 thousand concurrent players in 2019.
Nier Replicant tells the story of the titular Nier, who travels alongside the talking book Grimoire Weiss in order to save a sick woman named Yona. Nier is Yona's brother in Nier Replicant, but was re-imagined as her father when the game was re-released as Nier Gestalt. This remake is the first time that the "brother" version of Nier appears in the West, as the original Replicant was not officially translated into English.
Nier series creator Yoko Taro was surprised by the game's success, as he saw the series as a "cult classic" and did not expect the remake of Replicant to perform well. In a recent interview, Taro admitted that he felt the success of Nier Automata, which had sold over 5 million units by the end of 2020, was "a fluke."
Nier Replicant ver.1.22474487139...has received generally positive feedback, with fans feeling that it captures the spirit of the series. However, it has been the source of controversy due to an achievement that requires protagonist Nier to look up another character's skirt.
Nier Replicant ver.1.22474487139... is currently available for PC, PlayStation 4, and Xbox One.
Source: Steam Database