Nier: Automata creator Yoko Taro says 'nearly half' of his autographs 'being resold are actually fake', since he puts 'small unknown features' in them

I already knew scalpers and the like probably weren't the most reputable people on the internet—but I've just had that assessment re-affirmed, because they're trying to grift game developer's autographs now.

That's per a post by Yoko Taro, director of the Nier games, to X. Taro was shown an image of a signed copy of the Nier Reincarnation OST being sold on Vinted, a site typically used for more noble purposes, like reselling clothes or old books. Mind, flogging a signed something-or-other isn't inherently scummy (times are tough!) but what isn't great is faking the signature entirely.

"This autograph is a fake. I include small unknown features in my real autographs to prevent reselling, so I can tell when one isn’t genuine," Taro says, before adding that "I've confirmed that nearly half of the autographs being resold are actually fake, so please don't buy them." Oof.

This has naturally led to a flurry of people asking whether or not their autographs are genuine, or sharing genuine ones—which sort of defeats the point, though I imagine ol' Taro switches it up from time to time.

The real moral of the story here is to not just trust any old listing saying they've got the genuine article online. Again, nothing wrong with selling your old stuff if you need the money, but I've been writing on this website for just two years and I'm already intimately familiar with the tactics scalpers use, including, but not limited to:

• Being so aggressive at an exhibit meant for children that they have to stop giving out Pikachu cards.
• Selling the promise of a handheld console before it's even out(???)
• Tricking checkout systems into letting them purchase 42,000 products.
• Making sure nobody can read a new Warhammer book.
• Flipping RTX 5090s they don't actually have.
• Trying to sell copies of Concord, which I guess did become a limited edition item by technicality, for like $25,000.

In other words, attending an event just to get a signature to sell later isn't beyond the pale. Nor is just deciding to fake that signature entirely, which I'd like to note is super illegal in a lot of countries. Especially when Yoko Taro's encrypted signature DRM has got your number.