NieR: Automata opens on a war that has already been lost. Invaders from another world attacked without warning, unleashing weapons called machine lifeforms. Mankind fled Earth for the Moon. The Council of Humanity built an android army, YoRHa, to take the planet back.
What PlatinumGames made of that premise is a game about androids who are not supposed to feel anything, and do. It earns an 8.8 out of 10.
Trailer, via IGDBcom.
The Bunker, 2B and 9S
NieR: Automata is an action role-playing game directed by Yoko Taro, produced by Yosuke Saito, with Keiichi Okabe returning as lead composer and Akihiko Yoshida leading character design. Square Enix published it. The story, written by Yoko, explores finding value in life and the reasons people kill.
The setting is the year 11945 AD, thousands of years after Nier. The YoRHa forces are commanded from the Bunker, a reconnaissance base orbiting Earth, and they fight beside the older Earth androids known as the Resistance. The initial protagonist is 2B, a combat android whose main trait is calm composure. She is paired with 9S, a scanner who shows more emotion than other YoRHa units. Later the game hands the player A2, an obsolete attack android who often works alone.
None of them are allowed emotions or true names. Each has a distinct personality anyway. That gap is the whole game.
Combat, Pods and Chips
Combat is real-time hack and slash. Light and heavy attacks combine into different chains, and evading at the right moment grants invulnerability or a counterattack bonus. A flying Pod robot supplies customizable ranged attacks, from simple gunfire to heavy hammer strikes.
The three leads do not play the same. 2B alternates between two weapons. 9S pairs light attacks with hacking into enemies. A2 can sacrifice health to briefly boost her attack power.
Four weapon classes exist: short swords, long swords, bracers and spears. Attacks can be charged and launched for more damage. Experience from combat raises health, defense and attack power. Customization runs on chips that alter the HUD, add abilities and grant buffs, limited by a character’s slots. Chips come from shops or from defeated enemies.
| Character | Role | Combat specialty |
|---|---|---|
| 2B | YoRHa combat android | Alternates between two weapons |
| 9S | Scanner android | Light attacks plus hacking |
| A2 | Obsolete attack android | Sacrifices health for attack power |
Adam, Eve and the Machine Network
The plot is told across multiple playthroughs and alternating perspectives, and it does not repeat itself. The first two runs follow 2B and 9S through the latest android strikes. They open a route for future missions, then clear machine threats for Anemone’s Resistance. Along the way they find the Machines replicating human societies and concepts, work with a pacifist machine group led by Pascal, and fight Adam and Eve, twin controllers of the Machine Network who reveal their creators were destroyed centuries ago. They also meet A2.
The structure could have been a stunt. It is the point. Each run adds story the previous one withheld, which makes the second and third playthroughs mandatory rather than optional, and makes the ending land with weight the first run could not carry.
What Actually Decides It
The open world is the weak part. PlatinumGames staff faced multiple challenges developing the gameplay and open-world environment, and it shows in stretches that feel thin next to the combat. The flying mech sections and the rideable animals are diversions, not the spine.
The spine is the fighting, and the fighting is excellent.
Ranked against what the game does well:
- Hack-and-slash combat, with timing-based evasion and three distinct leads.
- The chip system, which turns difficulty and interface into player choices.
- The multi-playthrough story, which withholds and then pays out.
- The open world, which too often just connects the good parts.
Ports followed the original PlayStation 4 and Windows release: Xbox One in June 2018, Nintendo Switch in October 2022. The 2017 version is the one that matters, and it holds up.
NieR: Automata asks why people kill and whether a made thing can be worth anything. It answers with combat that rewards precision and a story that refuses to hand over its truth on the first run. That is rare, and it is worth the second and third.
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