The Automata Collective: Negation of Endings and Collective Formation in Nier: Automata

This paper explores the radical re-functionalization of endings and its relationship to the imagination of alternative forms of collectives in the video game Nier: Automata (2017). I argue that by radically negating the finite nature of endings, the game contributes to the conceptualization and practice of a new form of collective I refer to as Automata Collective. The Automata Collective has little concern for traditional unity and revels in multiplicity, in the loose relationship between the “whole” and its “parts,” and more importantly, it reinterprets our individual temporal relationship with the collective through ongoing unguided participation. The first section of the paper establishes an intermedial understanding of videogames and the interplay of “reality” and “fiction” at its core, as well as the theoretical foundations for the relationship between time and collectives fundamental to the present analysis. The second section is dedicated to an in-depth examination of Nier: Automata’s radical reconfiguration of the notion of endings and the Automata Collective that emerges on the other side of this intervention.