Nier: Automata Ver.1.1a Ending Explained: What Happens to 2B and 9S? (2024)

Warning: Contains spoilers for Nier: Automata Ver1.1a's finale.After two seasons spread across one year and many delays, Nier: Automata Ver1.1a has finally ended. The series ultimately didn’t change as much about the original story or the overarching Drakengard franchise as people thought it would, but thanks to its stellar execution, it was still the best sort of adaptation a game like Nier: Automata could have asked for.

Nier: Automata Ver1.1a season 2 kicked off on a somber note with YoRHa’s destruction by the machine lifeforms and 2B being killed by A2 before she could be corrupted by the Logic Virus, with 9S seeing that as 2B being killed in cold blood. 9S and A2 spent the next few episodes being further broken by one more loss after another, and it all built up to a climactic final battle between the two. The anime tried to incorporate the multiple endings that are a trademark of the videogame franchise, so there is a lot to explain.

How Nier: Automata Ver1.1a’s Final Battle Started

The Beginning Of The End Of Nier: Automata

Following the deaths of Devola, Popola, Pascal, and the Resistance, 9S and A2 both made their way to the Tower to put an end to the machine lifeforms once and for all. The Tower’s defense system attacked 9S with an army of 2B replicas, and with 9S having just learned that 2B was secretly an Executioner model who had killed him countless times in the past, his sanity was broken even further, to the point that 9S became infected with the Logic Virus after replacing one of his arms with one the 2Bs’ arms.

A2, meanwhile, ended up in a facsimile of the library from Nier’s village which housed more information about the Tower. There, A2 learned that the Tower functioned as a cannon the machine lifeforms would use to destroy humanity’s data on the moon, which would spell the complete destruction of what remained of humanity. A2, after the growth she had gone through, wanted to prevent that, but when she met up with 9S at the top of the Tower, he was too far gone to want anything but to see her dead, and a fight inevitably broke out.

Who Won 9S & A2’s Final Battle In Nier: Automata Ver1.1a?

The End Of YoRHa

While the battle between the two YoRHa models went on, the two main personalities of the Machine Network also started fighting each other, after being "infected" by one of the YoRHa Pods. They had conflicting views about the best course of action for the Machine Lifeforms: either fire the cannon at the moon to destroy humanity's servers, or use the weapon to launch their digital consciousness into the stars, looking for a new planet to inhabit.

Meanwhile, 9S and A2 kept fighting. A2 initially had the advantage using her Berserker mode until 9S hacked into her and tried to break her by reminding her of all the pain and loss she’s been through. Doing so only made A2 remember how important her family was to her, though, and with that heightened resolve, A2 fought back against 9S’ manipulations, reversed his hacking, and ended the fight.

After defeating 9S, the surviving personality of the Machine Network appeared before A2 and explained that they decided to launch the collective AI of the machine lifeforms into space to try and find a new home on another planet. Refusing to join them, A2’s last remaining mission was to protect 9S, and to do so, A2 sacrificed her remaining power to purge the Logic Virus from 9S’ system and thus couldn’t escape the Tower before it collapsed after launching the Machine Lifeforms into space.

How Nier: Automata Ver1.1a Handled The Game’s Iconic Ending

Nier: Automata Ver1.1a Finally Comes To A Close

With the departure of the Machine Lifeforms, all the surviving Pods announced the completion of the YoRHa Project and moved to delete every proof of its existence, including the data of 2B, 9S, and A2 that Pod 042 and Pod 153 managed to save. Wanting the three of them to survive, Pod 042 and Pod 153 defied their orders and fought against the other Pods to preserve their data, at the cost of their lives. In this way, 2B, 9S, and A2 were revived and given a chance to live their lives free of their past suffering.

This is a version of Nier: Automata’s "good" ending, ending E, which was built around game mechanics. The player had to clear a hard shoot-em-up minigame to unlock this ending (after completing endings C and D), which plays out exactly as in the anime. After that, the player has a chance to delete their save data to help other players in the future (making the final minigame easier). The anime’s equivalent is the action sequence with Pod 042 and Pod 153 fighting all other pods. Nier: Automata Ver1.1a ’s ending very much lacks the emotional impact of the original game’s ending, but considering the constraints of the medium, it could have been far worse.

Nier: Automata Ver1.1a Teases More From The Franchise In The Works

More Drakengard Might Be Coming Soon

One notable element of Nier: Automata Ver1.1a’s ending is that it teases that more of the Drakengard franchise might be in the works via the character Accord from Drakengard 3. While Accord was briefly alluded to in the original Nier: Automata game, the anime had characters speak about her far more explicitly in season 2, and the finale even gave Accord a cameo as the one who salvaged A2 from the wreckage of the Tower. This could hint at a new Drakengard project being in development.

This also makes sense with other things happening in the franchise lately. The season 2 ending, for example, directly referenced Zero from Drakengard 3 through some of 2B’s imagery, and the recent Nier Replicant ver.1.22474487139… further invoked Drakengard 3 with the content of its new ending, so the Nier franchise is definitely putting a lot of effort into reminding people about the larger Drakengard franchise. Whether that will amount to anything is unclear.

Nier: Automata Ver1.1a Was A Wonderful Take On The Classic Game From Start To Finish

A Great Adaptation For Old & New Fans Alike

As divisive as video game adaptations in any medium tend to get, Nier: Automata Ver1.1a succeeded on all fronts. From a purely visual standpoint, Nier: Automata Ver1.1a is one of the best-looking and best-animated A-1 Pictures anime in recent years, with every episode having great visuals accompanied by even greater animation and overall direction. Nier: Automata has always been known for its stellar action and inventive gameplay, and overall, the anime did a great job of translating that into animation.

The writing, of course, was the biggest driving force behind the anime’s quality. Not only did it have all the same great dramatic writing that made the game such a hit, but the way Nier: Automata Ver1.1a changed or expanded on certain points of the game fleshed out the cast to an incredible degree to be even stronger characters than they were before. A2 benefited the most from this, as the extra focus given to her backstory and the Resistance turned A2 from a largely one-note character to one of the most engaging characters in the entire story.

While the anime might have cut out a few important or popular elements of the game and also lost a lot of steam due to various delays, between the visual presentation and how well it handled both old and new writing, Nier: Automata Ver1.1a was a great series from start to finish and ended on as strong a note as one could hope for. It might not be a perfect substitute for playing the game, but overall, Nier: Automata Ver1.1a more than justified its existence as an adaptation, and that was great to watch play out.

NieR:Automata Ver1.1a

TV-14

Animation

Action

Adventure

In a distant future where humanity has fled to the Moon, androids 2B and 9S are deployed to Earth to battle the alien-created Machine Lifeforms threatening to eradicate the remnants of civilization. As they fight for survival, the truth about the world and their purpose begins to unravel, revealing deep existential mysteries​.

Cast

Yui Ishikawa , Natsuki Hanae , Kaoru Akiyama , Hiroki Yasumoto , Chiaki Kano , Keiko Isobe , Hina Natsume , Atsumi Tanezaki

Character(s)

2B , 9S , Pod 153 , Pod 042 , Commander , Operator 6O , Little Sister Machine , Lily

Release Date

January 7, 2023

Seasons

2

Main Genre

Animation