New Nier Trailer Stronger Than A Cup Of Coffee

Nier, Square Enix’s unapologetically mature action-RPG, is already positioning itself to break the mold of what the publisher is known for. Developer Cavia (behind Square’s M-rated Drakengard series) has remained tight-lipped about game details till this point. What we do know is that the game is titled after the main character, who is searching for a way to cure his daughter of a black disease that is plaguing the world.

Square proved two things through the new trailer they released early this morning. The first is that a string of expletives is better for waking one up than a cup of coffee. The second is that Nier boasts one or more very volatile characters. The character in question is Nier’s lingerie-clad partner Kaine, speaking to Grimiore Weiss – the magical tome that Nier draws power from throughout his journey.

You can listen to her outburst below.

[View:http://media1.gameinformer.com/media/video/2009/nier/m-nierkaine/m-nierkaine.smil:610:343]

Playing off the game’s “Nothing is as it seems” motto, Kaine turned heads this fall when scans from a Japanese magazine referred to her as a hermaphrodite, due to possession by a male demon during a fight. Kaine was obviously designed with a female aesthetic in mind, but the crass language and violent behavior showcased in the video above is attributed to her masculine side.

Square Enix is obviously attempting to push boundaries here. Because the facts come from a scanned and translated magazine, it is still unclear if Kaine is physically intersexed, or if they simply refer to her as a hermaphrodite because of the demonic possession that has taken over the left side of her body. Either way, we can at least hope that they handle the subject in a mature manner and that Kaine’s character development isn’t limited to the scope of her ambiguous gender identity.

Nier is not yet rated and is set to release for The PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 in spring of 2010