{"id":49137,"date":"2025-06-18T09:30:03","date_gmt":"2025-06-18T00:30:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/?p=49137"},"modified":"2025-06-18T09:30:07","modified_gmt":"2025-06-18T00:30:07","slug":"nier-automata-creator-yoko-taro-says-there-are-less-weird-people-in-the-gaming-industry-nowadays","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/news\/nier-automata-creator-yoko-taro-says-there-are-less-weird-people-in-the-gaming-industry-nowadays\/","title":{"rendered":"NieR: Automata creator Yoko Taro says there are less \u201cweird\u201d people in the gaming industry nowadays"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>Drakengard and NieR series creator Yoko Taro is known for being fairly unconventional \u2013 both in the sense of his self-presentation and the stories he tells through his games. However, hiding behind the creepy mask and enigmatic persona is <a href=\"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/news\/yokotaro-gets-told-to-do-less-ramen-posting-and-work-more-on-games-by-savage-roastbot\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">an avid X user.<\/a> Recently, he has opened a Q&amp;A box for fans, answering questions on various topics \u2013 ranging from restaurant recommendations and life advice to industry insight. One fan asked a question about whether the gaming industry has a lot of weird people, to which Yoko Taro responded \u2013 not as many as there used to be. But how important are the actual \u201cweirdos\u201d of the industry, and what does it even mean to be a weirdo nowadays?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cI was reading <em>The True Biography of Game Creators <\/em>and laughing like \u2018lmao, there sure are a lot of people with strange personalities.\u2019 Is it true that there\u2019s actually a lot of weirdos in the game industry? If it is, which sectors have the most of them?\u201d the fan asked in their message.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-rich is-provider-twitter wp-block-embed-twitter\"><div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"550\" data-dnt=\"true\"><p lang=\"ja\" dir=\"ltr\">\u30b2\u30fc\u30e0\u696d\u754c\u306b\uff13\uff10\u5e74\u3044\u308b\u3093\u3067\u3059\u304c\u3001\u300c\u5909\u306a\u4eba\u300d\u306f\u6e1b\u3063\u305f\u6c17\u304c\u3057\u307e\u3059\u306d\u3002<br><br>\u5358\u306b\u50d5\u306e\u898b\u3066\u3044\u308b\u7bc4\u56f2\u306e\u73fe\u8c61\u306a\u306e\u304b\u3001\u30b2\u30fc\u30e0\u696d\u754c\u304c\u305d\u3046\u306a\u3063\u305f\u306e\u304b\u3001\u4e16\u306e\u4e2d\u5168\u4f53\u304c\u305d\u3046\u306a\u306e\u304b\u306f\u3088\u304f\u308f\u304b\u308a\u307e\u305b\u3093\u304c\u3002 <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/xkueiPlrtB\">pic.twitter.com\/xkueiPlrtB<\/a><\/p>&mdash; yokotaro (@yokotaro) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/yokotaro\/status\/1934554096494879088?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">June 16, 2025<\/a><\/blockquote><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script>\n<\/div><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>Yoko replied on his X account: \u201cI\u2019ve been a part of the game industry for 30 years, but I feel there\u2019s less \u2018weird people\u2019 now. I don\u2019t know if this is something simply happening in my field of view, if the game industry ended up like this, or if the whole world is like this now.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>To be weird is to be free, and it\u2019s no exaggeration to say that Yoko Taro himself is a weird guy. He has even called his own games \u201cWeird Games for Weird People\u201d in his past talks. This emphasis on weirdness seems to be the foundation he builds his games on, focusing more on the niche tastes of the author rather than having elements that could be considered marketable. In an amalgamation of talent, luck and rebellious spirit, this seems to have ended up being a recipe for success. <a href=\"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/news\/nier-series-producer-declined-to-work-on-super-famous-existing-series-to-make-the-first-nier-game\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">According to Yoko<\/a>, the first NieR games were treated as experimental projects, and nobody expected the series to become a hit.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1535\" height=\"863\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1535px) 100vw, 1535px\" src=\"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/06\/20250617-491370001.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-49138\" srcset=\"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/06\/20250617-491370001.jpg 1535w, https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/06\/20250617-491370001-380x214.jpg 380w, https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/06\/20250617-491370001-768x432.jpg 768w\" \/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>Yoko Taro has also <a href=\"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/news\/nier-automata-creator-yoko-taro-talks-about-icos-epoch-making-impact-on-video-games\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">previously suggested<\/a> that creators who go against the mainstream, like ICO\u2019s Fumito Ueda, are the ones who make new epochs \u2013 and he always emphasizes the importance of being different and going against what everyone else in the industry is doing. In <a href=\"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/news\/nier-automata-creators-deny-rumors-of-square-enix-imposing-character-design-restrictions-on-them-its-a-huge-mistranslation\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">a joint discussion<\/a> with directors of Stellar Blade and Goddess of Victory: NIKKE, Yoko explained his process of creating characters for the Nier series. \u201cOur concept is always to do something that\u2019s \u2018not like anything else\u2019 [\u2026] If Western sci-fi is filled with marine-like soldiers, we might go in the opposite direction and use Gothic Lolita outfits, for example. We tend to take the contrarian route.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>If what Yoko said in his X post is true, and there are actually less \u201cweird\u201d people who would challenge the norms and create games which go against the expectations and demands of the market, what does that mean for the gaming industry? Yoko has already <a href=\"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/news\/yoko-taro-thinks-game-creators-wont-be-able-to-make-a-living-when-ai-takes-over-but-advises-fans-not-to-trust-his-predictions\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">shared some of his predictions<\/a> on the future of the gaming industry \u2013 saying that game developers probably won\u2019t be able to make a living in the future if AI takes over, and that, in around 50 years, they will be<a href=\"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/news\/yoko-taro-fears-game-developers-will-lose-their-jobs-to-ai-in-50-years-we-may-be-treated-like-bards\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\"> treated like bards<\/a>. However, he advises his fans to take all his predictions with a grain of salt.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>NieR creator Yoko Taro says there seem to be less and less weirdos in gaming &#8211; but what does that mean for the future of the industry?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":79,"featured_media":47494,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_gspb_post_css":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[17],"class_list":["post-49137","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-japan-related-news"],"blocksy_meta":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.2 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>NieR: Automata creator Yoko Taro says there are less \u201cweird\u201d people in the gaming industry nowadays - AUTOMATON WEST<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"NieR creator Yoko Taro says there seem to be less and less weirdos in gaming - 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