Is Nier Reincarnation free to play?

Nier Reincarnation Battle
Nier Reincarnation Battle (Image credit: Square Enix)

Best answer: Yes, but it does have microtransactions. It's a gacha game, meaning any items you obtain via these microtransactions are randomized.

What is Nier: Reincarnation?

Nier Reincarnation is a mobile title in the Nier series, and was released in Japan last February. It's coming to Western countries on July 28. This gacha puzzler RPG follows the adventures of the Girl of Light and her companion Mama as they wander the empty castle called The Cage. They will encounter statues called Scarecrows and a Dark Monster that also roams The Cage.

Along the way, they must battle enemies within memories called Weapon Stories, with a three-person party of memory characters fighting an enemy on an auto-battle system. Each character who can battle has skill gauges that you can use when they're full, and you can also string different characters attacks together in combos. It works with touch controls, but it will most likely support Bluetooth gaming controllers.

What kind of microtransactions does it have?

Like other gacha games, Nier Reincarnation offers multiple different kinds of characters of varying levels of competence and usefulness you can add to your party. Some of them will be granted to the player outright, but to get others, you'll have to roll for them using the gacha mechanics. Each character or item is assigned a star value, with four-star characters and weapons being the most potent in battle.

Each roll of the gacha gives the player either weapons or characters, and the player can purchase more of the in-game currency, gems, in order to get more rolls. This can be useful if, for example, the player wants a specific character. Since the game was released in Japan, there have been special events where players can obtain characters from other Nier titles, like Kaine or 2B. Players are given a number of free rolls in each of the events, but can purchase more if they don't obtain the characters they want. Hopefully it'll even join our list of the best free Android games.

Rachel Kaser

Rachel Kaser is an Android Central gaming contributor, who's been writing since 2013 and gaming since the age of five. She's covered everything from gaming news, reviews, and analysis -- if it exists in gaming, she knows about it. She also contributes to Future's other sites, iMore and Windows Central. If you want to hear her opinions on games, pop culture, tech, and everything in between, follow her on Twitter @rachelkaser