Yoko Taro, the iconic game director behind NieR, Drakengard and more, has not been sitting on their hands for the past few years. While fans have been itching for a new project from the game director, the developer has revealed that most of their work has been cancelled.
Speaking during G-Con 2025, Taro explained that he’s had a number of games in development over the years, but everything has “been discontinued lately”. The NieR creator didn’t reveal the names of any cancelled projects, or even whether they were in the works at Square Enix, but explained that he has still been paid for his work on those games.
“People often ask me why I don’t make a sequel to Nier, or why I’m not working, but that’s because I’ve had so many projects that have been discontinued lately,” they said (thanks, Automaton). “Even though I was working, it wasn’t released to the public. I’m getting paid, so it’s not a problem for me personally, but because my output isn’t being released to the public, people see me as not working.”
The game director also explained that some of these projects may have been cancelled for a reason, teasing that they may have been too out there for a wide audience. “I think it’s better not to release something than to release something weird, so I don’t have any negative feelings about that,” he said.
Nevertheless, Yoko Taro has still released projects since the launch of NieR Automata in 2017. Since that games release, the game director has released a number of additional YoRHa stage plays as well as the stage play Bakuken as well as a NieR anime and the TV show KamiErabi God.app and multiple books. Additionally, Yoko Taro released multiple games in the Voice of Cards RPG series between 2021 and 2023.
Despite this, many fans are still waiting for a new game in the NieR franchise, and have been ever since the releases of NieR Reincarnation and the Replicant remake in 2021. With Automata being a huge success for Square Enix—and the first major success of the Drakenier universe—it’s very surprising that no new console game has been made, but there’s still hope.
