nier: automata update (3)
[spoiler world]
i beat “nier: automata” a week ago today, and if you follow my miserable twitterfeed you knew the moment i did because, in a a fit of passion, after being moved by the game's narrative and tricky post-game Q&A, i.. deleted every save file for the game on my ps4.
i hardly need to remind you we're in [spoiler world], but, again, i will remind you: we are in [spoiler world] for end-game events in “nier: automata”.
shortly after finishing “route e”, which is the final narrative-ending for the game (the other letters of the alphabet are reserved for more comical alternative endings, amongst them: eating mackerel), the game presents you with a nearly immovable object to overcome. at first you are unable to overcome this bulwark on your own, but after a while you can enlist in help from other entities of seemingly nonsensical usernames to help you past. after you accomplish this (still very difficult) feat, you are asked if you wouldn't mind helping others in the way that these little entities helped you through the trial. “sure,” you think. “why not, that was rough as hell.” then a series of questions prod you, until eventually it asks, “you will need to delete all your saved content in order to do you... still wish to help?” i sat there for a minute, utterly in my feelings about the whole thing, and thought,
“i would like to think yes, i would do this even if i lost all my saved content...”
what's weird to me, a week later, is how this has stuck to me. i was well on my way to getting the platinum achievement for this game (something i've only done for “undertale”, one of my favorite games and, coincidentally, one of the easiest games to get a platinum achievement for), and yet in the heat of that moment i was not concerned about my 40+ hours of progress evaporating into thin air, because my action would lead to others having to ask these questions of themselves. would they do the “right” thing for someone else, a stranger, even if that stranger would not do so in return for them, or if they were “someone [they] intensely disliked”?
i was a bit distraught in the aftermath of my decision—my main save file and the back-ups were deleted as the game went through a debilitatingly drawn-out process of eliminating my accomplishments, one-by-one, in the menus i had become so familiar with. my platinum achievement stretched another 30+ hours ahead of me, should i ever hope to work my way back up to that superficial accomplishment. and then a day passed, and another, and another. and eventually i came out of that fog and realized (along with many who'd come before me, i'm sure) that the platinum was worthless and that what “nier” had allowed me to do was something much more powerful.
it gave me an opportunity to reach out, grab someone by the collar, and demand,
“do you have any interest in helping the weak?”
this devastating series of questions (that could be put off, indefinitely) could wedge themselves into the lobes of the gamer, slack-jawed (and hopefully emotional) in front of their monitor, and compel some sort of empathetic reaction from them. or if not, sit there, bitterly, or unheeded, to smoulder in their engine a while longer.
it may seem a bit grandiose or ham-fisted, and perhaps it is. but in a medium like video games, i welcome the occasional subterfuge, especially if it pushes those who engage with it towards empathy.
