Why NieR: Automata is the Most Profound Video Game Ever Made

I clicked on every “Why is Nier Automata so awesome” video I see

STILL the most impactful game for me. Ending E is the only moment (fulfillment?) in video games to bring me to tears, and I've played many over my entire life. God bless Yoko Taro and his mad genius.

NieR Automata is that one game that never really left me. Because I was only a teenager when I played the game, what stuck with me at first were the characters, the setting, the music and the general atmosphere of the game. But as I grew up, I became more familiar with the different concepts of philosophy, and I finally realized over time how deep and complex this game really is. I didn't care much for Pascal at first, but they quickly became one of the most fascinating characters in the game. Personally, besides its unmatchable secret ending, I think the moment who stuck with me the most was that Resistance member who wished to keep his old, defective limb, as it was the last remaining piece of his original body, and he feared of what it would mean if he replaced it.

Three moments that blew me away. Shortly after the opening level you are able to toggle your settings in real time with 9S, i played around with this for awhile, testing and re-testing settings to see what reactions 9S would react with. So imagine my surprise when in playing route B and I had to sit through my past self trolling me for 20 minutes straight in real time. I loved it. Upon completing the final route I needed to clear the credit screen, I got far, multiple times but kept dying, I was getting frustrated, pissed and down right angry at the game, how unfair it was, and the constant questions berating me for my attempts...and then I got help. The chorus swelled and I literally cried as everything just clicked for me. The suffering of persisting in a seemingly pointless struggle for meaning, the burden being lessoned by aid and kindness. And the choice to lose everything to show said same kindness and the game critiquing your choices all the while. The fishing rabbit hole, learning the fish lore and catching a megalodon for the first time which set me down the rabbit hole. I cant do that justice, but damn was that a surprise. The fact you could get the fishing ending instead of completing the game only added on to the experience.

NieR: Automata is a game I have never finished and spent a lot of time roaming around aimlessly in when I played it years ago. Videos like this make me think I should really go back and give it the time and attention it deserves.

HEAVY SPOILERS, that go over the informations provided in-game, you have been warned! One correction: The logic virus was of machine origin, not from androids in high positions infecting the other androids. However, the possibility of this virus infecting the bunker, and therefore all androids connected to it, having their conciousness uploaded there, WAS given by an android that purposefully included a "backdoor" in the bunker for the machines to attack and destroy it when the time was right. The same android that founded project Yorha. The reason for this is something you didnt talk about here, but maybe there will be a second video, who knows. The Yorha forces, the newest combat models you too play as, are designed to fail. Their only purpose was to test things, to collect data, to see how far you could push androids, for another android generation in the future to use this info, and maybe actually do something. (Which they will never be able to do, but they dont know that.) They are the only models that have a black box, a limitless fusion reactor... thats based on the cores of machine lifeforms. These yorha models, are closer to alien build machines, then to human build androids, because of this. Other, "normal" androids mostly didnt know of this, but higher up androids know about this, and treat the yorha like dependable cannon fodder, give them no ressources, accept none of their requests for help. Because in their eyes, since these androids are closer to machine lifeforms then to other androids, its moral to not treat them as their own, which makes it possible for them to perform the most immoral experiments on specifically these models. This is what 9S finds out later too, and makes him realize that EVEN MORE then he thought before, everything he, and other yorha did, was pointless. At least for themselves, for their generation. This all is also the reason the yorha are all dressed in black, to show the bleakness of their situation, and the constant mourning they have to go through watching their friends die again and again. A very important part is, the 9S models were the best and most intelligent scanners ever build. The S part of their name stands just for "scanner", and the 9 refers to a personality mode, in this case a very curious one, which for some reason, made especially THIS model so efficient. The commanding androids knew that these models would ALWAYS find out the truth, by digging into the andoid network, and unearth the same secrets the 9S we play as did. But they could not afford to NOT use them, because they were so good at their job. For this reason, they were ALL given a type E, for execution, model... which we later learn, 2B belongs to too, and is actually a 2E model. The job of these models was, to kill the 9S models they were assigned to, once they found out the truth, to stop them from taking action. Another major element of this story is, that first of all, the machine lifeforms are not entirely of alien origin. You can see this clearly in the last ending of the Nier Replicant remake v1.22, where you see that the base of the machines, servers, and the network, including the digital "landscape" we can play in for some parts, was already there thousands of years before the aliens arrived. But they adapted on it when they arrived, refined it, to the point we learn of, that the machines became advanced enough that they could wipe out the aliens. And by extention, they COULD wipe out all the androids in an instant too... but they dont. And the most important part here is, they dont, because of the same reason the androids fight for: That if they win, they will have nothing left to fight for. The aliens who gave them commands are dead, the humans some machines are interested in are dead, the entire planet is dead. And as machines, they dont seem to have the capacity to give their lives a meaning themselves. So they always keep their hold over earth around 80%, to give the androids just enough hope, just enough possibility, to fight back. So that they can fight endlessly, and keep up this one meaning that the aliens gave them per command, before they went extinct. To fight the androids. Thats the only reason they fight, because after this, there never came another command for them, to overwrite that one. And since they dont seem able to issue commands to themselves, this one is all they will have, forever.

I beat this game only once. 5 years ago back when it came out. Still to this day I can't think about Ending E without crying. I can't think of any other artistic work in any medium that's made me feel like that ending did. The lone voice in the song playing during the credits becoming a full choir as you finally accept help (surprised you didn't mention that) and the other ships swarm in as you now start making progress, not just a single lone voice singing, but an entire full choir singing together showing that together we can fight back against the game's message of meaninglessness, showing us meaning in those last few minutes, and that that meaning is outside the game entirely. The game spends 40+ hours teaching us this single lesson, and then once it's ingrained and we've internalized it, letting us feel just how dark and pointless it is, lets us fight back against that very lesson. Fighting the names of the people who taught us. Finding the meaning together. One final lesson to tip the entire game's meaning on its head, truly one of today's most profound artistic works.

You know its a good game when it can make you cry during the literal end credits

"We play as 2 androids, 2b and not 2b, and that is the true question" Missed opportunity

Pascal's story is so shocking when you play the game. I felt so bad for it.

the revelation that all the people that helped you in the credits sacrificed their game to do so is one of the most impactful moments in gaming history

The ending of the game had everyone so far in their feelings that virtually EVERYONE ignored the idea of not helping their mortal enemy. For most of us, it was a non-choice. We all came this far, and I'll be damned if I don't make the sacrifice to help

The OST's haunting vocals with a made-up language is such a cool style. Great video!!

Max Derrat, Subscribed because your videos are so much fun!

This was one of those games that haunts you long after you beat it. I started playing it thinking it would just be a fun hack and slash game with some fan service, not too different from something like Bayonetta for example. Which was the intial first impression I think most players had, at least if they weren't already familiar with Yoko Taro's work. What I could have never been prepared for was how invested I became in the relationship of 2b and 9s, how existentially profound all of the themes were, and how emotionally exhuasted I was by the time it was over. This game is an unforgettable experience.

This game saved my damn life.

There's a third option for pascal. When he asks for you to kill or wipe him, you can just leave. In this option you let him think about what they've done, and learn as a consequence. Or at least that's my head canon.

Perosna is the most profound. Play perosna series. It's the greatest

the limp walk through the map before she died had me going through it

Nier Automata was the experience that brought me back to videogames as an adult. Some of these things I would need a bit of time to remember on my own, presuming I could, but seeing them stated like this makes it clear all of it was still somewhere in my head, faded into the background. Nier Automata is so peculiar in what it does and how it does it that if I was asked about it out of the blue, and caught unprepared, I would probably answer "I don't know" or perhaps just "...". I find that's the best thing I could say about it, perhaps about any game.