Modder brings Father Nier back to the PC remaster, original voice acting included

A modder called Elevna has released Nier Gestalt ver.1.22474487139…, a full conversion for the 2022 PC remaster Nier Replicant ver.1.22474487139… that swaps out the young Brother Nier protagonist for the older, grizzled Father Nier from the 2010 original — complete with Jamieson Price's original voiceover work.

The mod goes well beyond a simple model swap. Elevna dug out all of Price's audio files from the original game and ported them into the remaster, then created Papa Nier versions of the alternate character skins. The remaster's bonus chapter — which wasn't in the 2010 release — gets repurposed Price voice lines to cover Nier's comments and combat barks, and Elevna even restored dialogue from other characters that references Nier's age. The dream arena sequence, which in the original Gestalt had you fighting as Brother Nier, now correctly swaps Brother back in for those fights when you're running the mod.

Some background helps explain why this matters. Nier originally shipped in two versions in Japan in 2010: Replicant on PS3 featured the younger Brother Nier that director Yoko Taro preferred, while Gestalt on Xbox 360 aged the protagonist up to his forties and made him Yonah's father rather than her brother — a concession to Square Enix executives who wanted a more conventionally Western-market action hero. Western players only ever got the Gestalt version regardless of platform. When the remaster launched in 2021 and 2022, it was built around Brother Nier, bringing that version to Western audiences for the first time. Square Enix reportedly considered an official Father Nier DLC at some point, but nothing ever came of it.

Father Nier's appeal — a middle-aged man worn down by a dying world, voiced with real weight by Jamieson Price — has a dedicated fanbase that never stopped wanting him back in the definitive version of the game. Elevna's mod is available now on Nexus Mods for anyone running the PC remaster.