NieR:Automata

NieR:Automata is a 2017 action role-playing game developed by PlatinumGames and published by Square Enix. Directed by Yoko Taro, it follows the 2010 game NieR, itself connected to the Drakengard series. Its story takes place thousands of years after the earlier game, on an Earth where machine lifeforms fight android soldiers. Humanity is said to have retreated to the Moon, and the android organization YoRHa fights in its name.

The first playable protagonist is 2B, a YoRHa combat android sent to Earth alongside 9S, a reconnaissance android skilled at hacking. Their missions bring them into contact with a resistance camp, the machines’ leader Pascal, and A2, a fugitive YoRHa android. The machines they encounter do not all behave alike: some gather in a peaceful village, while others imitate human rituals in an abandoned amusement park. As the story advances, the characters discover that the war’s official account conceals the extinction of humanity.

The game combines close-range sword combat with ranged attacks from floating support units called Pods. Players can equip plug-in chips to alter abilities and even basic interface functions. Hacking sequences replace ordinary combat with a small shooting game, while other sections shift the camera to side-scrolling or overhead perspectives. These changes are part of the game’s design, not separate modes selected from a menu.

Finishing the first story route does not reveal the whole narrative. Later routes revisit events from 9S’s perspective and continue beyond them, eventually making A2 playable. Endings A through E form the central progression. At the end of route E, players can accept help from other players during a difficult credits sequence; afterward, they are offered the choice to delete their own save data to help someone else. That choice makes the game’s ideas about sacrifice and connection something the player can enact.

Keiichi Okabe composed the score, which includes “City Ruins,” “Amusement Park,” and versions of “Weight of the World.” The soundtrack won Best Score/Music at The Game Awards 2017. NieR:Automata first launched on PlayStation 4 in Japan in February 2017, followed by releases on Windows, Xbox One, and Nintendo Switch. The Switch edition, titled *The End of YoRHa Edition*, arrived in 2022. Across those releases, the game retained its unusual structure: major plot revelations depend on continuing after what initially looks like an ending.