The Fragility of Purpose: Nier: Automata

The hollowness and powerlessness when purpose is given and destroyed.

I never quite realized how fragile purpose can be until I played Nier: Automata. In this blog, I want to discuss the fragility of imposed purpose and the significance of existence.

Spoiler alert.

Plot Overview

Nier: Automata is an action role-playing game released in 2017, developed by PlatinumGames and published by Square Enix. The game is set in a future where humans have fled to the moon after an invasion by alien machines. The YorHa project is launched to reclaim Earth, with androids like 2B, 9S, and A2 fighting for “the glory of mankind.” These androids undergo countless battles, sacrificing everything for their assigned purpose. However, they eventually learn that humanity is already extinct, rendering their mission—and their entire existence—a meaningless lie.

Lost Purpose, Broken Core

When the truth is revealed—that their purpose was fabricated to perpetuate a lie—the androids react in different ways, each struggling to cope.

A2 was the sole survivor of her unit in battle against the machines. According to her former partner Anemone, A2 was once hopeful despite the worsening reality. Upon learning the truth, A2 chose to betray YorHa, fighting the machines to fill her emptiness and hatred. She found some hope again after forming friendships in Pascal’s village, but when the village was destroyed by other machines, it broke her. From then on, her sole purpose was to destroy all machines.

9S, a scanning unit, accidentally discovered the truth in the Bunker’s server. His love for 2B helped him endure, but when he witnessed A2 kill 2B—who was infected by the logic virus—his purpose vanished completely. Consumed by agony, he unleashed relentless violence on the machines, showing no mercy. In the resource gathering unit, he executed an unarmed machine core without hesitation. His psychological state deteriorated through battle after battle, culminating in madness during endings C and D: “Hahahaha, we are just perpetuators of lies! You killed 2B, and that is enough for me to kill you!”

The loss of purpose ultimately led to the loss of self. All endings of the game lead to the death of the main characters (“No blackbox signal detected”), representing their physical and mental demise.

Resilience and Rebellion

Despite losing everything, the characters display resilience. Even as their physical bodies fail and their memories and logic fade, they bear the will to exist, even if it means defying the world.

After the deaths of A2 and 9S, their will resonates with the PODs, which decide to reject the mission to delete all YorHa data. This rejection represents a defiance against the entire system—a rebellion akin to a lone leaf against an ocean. The game symbolizes this by letting the player “hack” against the credit list (representing the world), making the rebellion gradually impossible by adding more barrages and mobs. This scene illustrates the ultimate struggle for existence.

The law of the world is creation and destruction, and the will to exist is a rebellion against that law. While the rebellion might seem futile, it gives life meaning.

In the end, the tower does not launch the missile to destroy the human data server on the moon. Instead, it sends an ark into space, carrying the memories of Adam, Eve, 2B, 9S, A2, and many machine lifeforms. It drifts slowly in the universe, with no known destination. “The ark will find a home for these souls, or just wander in eternity.” This launch is like a cry in the silent void: “We exist!” There is no echo, no destination, but the very act of existing is significant.

Existentialism: Jean-Paul Sartre

Jean-Paul Sartre believed that we are not born with an inherent purpose. Instead, meaning must be created through our actions, and the freedom to choose is both liberating and overwhelming. When people cling to false purposes to avoid the weight of this freedom, Sartre called it bad faith. The truth often forces us to confront life’s absurdity—the realization that meaning is not given, but made.

Nier: Automata captures this struggle vividly. Its androids start with a clear mission—“glory to mankind”—but when this purpose is exposed as a lie, they are left to face the void. Their responses to this existential crisis, from 9S’s agony to A2’s rebellion, reflect Sartre’s view of how individuals grapple with freedom and the need to create their own meaning.

Despite being defeated by the hollowness of purposelessness, A2 and 9S still manage to “carry the weight of the world.” Their final will results in the PODs’ rejection of their deletion mission, symbolizing existential defiance. Sartre’s philosophy resonates here: rebellion, no matter how futile, affirms the value of existence. Through their choices, the characters prove that life gains significance not through external validation, but through the will to continue despite the absurd.

Cyber Interview with Sartre

Prompt: If You Were Jean-Paul Sartre, How Would You Comment on the Game?

If I were Jean-Paul Sartre, I would view NieR: Automata as a profound manifestation of existential freedom, choice, and the absurdity of the human (or android) condition. At the heart of Sartre’s philosophy is the belief that “existence precedes essence”—the idea that we are not born with any inherent purpose or meaning, but instead must create our own. The YorHa androids, created with the singular mission to “glory to mankind,” are a perfect illustration of this existential void. They are given a purpose, a fabricated significance, but when that purpose is shattered, they are forced to confront the meaninglessness of their existence. Their suffering is not merely physical, but deeply psychological, as they grapple with the profound realization that their lives have been nothing more than tools in a lie perpetuated by their creators.

Reflection of Reality

In reality, although we are not androids tasked with the “glory of mankind,” we are often given purposes that we accept without question. Sometimes these purposes benefit us, but sometimes they lead to harm.

One example is how many children in modern China are given the purpose of achieving good grades. Due to societal and parental expectations, they are not always aware of it or able to resist it. This can lead to academic success for some, but also depression and anxiety for others. Parents, too, may be given the false purpose of ensuring their children get into prestigious universities (like 985 or 211 schools), which can lead to a narrow focus on academics and strain familial relationships. The absurdity of this pressure is explored in the game Chinese Parents, where one player noted: “You still have a chance of getting an offer from Tsinghua University if you don’t teach your child how to walk.”

Nier: Automata is dramatic, with its characters dealing with only a few purposes, unlike the complex goals people have in real life. However, it makes us reflect on our own lives:

What kinds of purposes do we have? How many are imposed upon us, and how many do we accept without judgment? What are the consequences of bearing these purposes?

Ultimately, the game reminds us that purpose should not be imposed upon us; it should be something we define for ourselves. Like the characters’ final defiance against a meaningless existence, we too can rebel against false purposes and strive to create meaning through our choices—however small they may seem.