Nier Automata’s Yoko Taro speaks out on crises in Gaza and Ukraine: “Looking back at 2023, the world was too cruel”
Dec. 31, 2023In a sincere year-end letter
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Nier Automatais a game about existential despair and searching for a reason to live in a meaningless world. But in the end, it’s also about finding that meaning and that humanity in each other. And in line with that message, director Yoko Taro has shared a sincere end-of-year letter to call for change in Russia’s ongoing invasion of Ukraine and Israel’s escalating attacks in Gaza.
According to Gosokkyu’s more complete translation onco-host, the famed director mentioned feeling utterly useless when thinking back on these statistics, but in those dreary moments, he recalls a story from his youth when his friend would share advice about wooing girls. Essentially, his friend would say it’s a numbers game. If the success rate of asking someone out is 1% - you simply need to do it 100 times.
In a pragmatic turn, Taro then tries to reframe those feelings of powerlessness into a similar probability game, calling on all readers to think about ways to address the ongoing crises - at least for a minute. Should thousands of people all commit some effort to ending the senseless violence, then Taro hopes these conflicts could come to an end. “If there are 100 people, that’s 100 minutes. If there are 1,000 people, that’s 1,000 minutes,” Taro says. “Someone might come up with an idea. That’s what I was thinking about today.”
Elsewhere, we recently learned that the Nier series will continue as long as Yoko Taro is alive.
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Kaan freelances for various websites including Rock Paper Shotgun, Eurogamer, and this one, Gamesradar. He particularly enjoys writing about spooky indies, throwback RPGs, and anything that’s vaguely silly. Also has an English Literature and Film Studies degree that he’ll soon forget.
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