Searching for Meaning in Nier Automata and Beautiful World, Where Are You

This piece contains spoilers for Nier Automata and Beautiful World, Where Are You.

How do we find meaning in the modern world? It’s probably a question that every conscious generation has grappled with going as far back as, well, who knows? But it seems like a more pertinent, gripping question now than it ever has been. Maybe that’s just my human brain and its inability to think broadly, but there’s something about the digital era we’re living in that makes this central question feel more depressing than I imagine it would if I were a farmer in 1800s Cyprus, frolicking in the sun and bathing on the shores.

My brain constantly flips between headlines that read “World War III imminent”, to “New Mouthful mode in Kirby”, all while my face reacts like nothing has happened. Scrolling through words that are at once world-ending, then hilarious renders all of it a little null. Finding true meaning, at this point in time, has never felt as essential as it does now when we’re faced with the meaningless black hole of a blue screen in one hand and the collapse of the Earth in the hands of, I don’t know, God?

In times of existential dread we turn to art, aka food for the soul, for answers to the question, where do we find meaning in a meaningless world? And what I found was that Platinum Games’ Nier Automata and Sally Rooney’s Beautiful World, Where Are You both have an answer to that question. The synapses in my brain were able to connect the two during a 3am overthink and what I found was, weirdly enough, that they have exactly the same answer.