Part 159: Episode CLIII: Emil's Determination

Episode CLIII: Emil’s Determination



Let’s embark on the final sidequest of NieR: Automata. Emil has driven off to points unknown in the desert. 9S, being a busybody as always, decides he needs to investigate. This quest can actually be done with any of the three androids and there’s slightly different dialogue for each. But we’re going to be going with 9S since he’s the one that has interacted the most with Emil. A2 like stopped by his shop once and thought he was weird. And 2B is kinda dead, so that’d be weird...




Music: Memories of Dust



On we go to a final trek to the Desert Zone. Indeed, this is the last time we’ll ever be using an Access Point to fast travel. Thanks for cutting on all the travel time, least inconspicuous transportation device since the TARDIS.





Emil’s signal for this quest is coming in the northwestern corner of the Desert Zone. I feel like we’ve been there once before but it’s slipping my mind... Oh well, let’s take one last boar drift for old time’s sake and head on out to the far reaches of the wastes.


VIDEO: CLICK HERE TO WATCH THE UPCOMING EVENTS (You should probably just do this.)



Are these... Emil?

Oh that’s right... The creepy as hell giant Emil head graveyard. That’s a touch worrying our Emil headed out here all the sudden. He seems to be having some issue. It’s hard enough walking around here, Emil. Driving is a big mistake.



Watch... out... They’re still... alive...




Music: Emil [Despair] (Hey go listen to this right now!)



So welcome to the secondary super boss of the base game of NieR: Automata – Emil! No... not our silly shop keeper top boy. This is something slightly different...



RRRRAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRAAAHHH!!!



Alert: Magical weapons from the old world detected. Magical elements have a high probability of penetrating all defense systems. Proposal: Evade.
I know that!



Meet the Emil Clones. This is technically a Level 99 reskin of Hegel. But it’s infinitely less annoying for a few reasons. Firstly, that stupid aerial attack where it bombards the ground with energy orbs is only performed right at the start of the battle for a few seconds to introduce the boss.



After a moment or two, the Emil heads split apart, shed their creepy skeleton spider legs and fall to the ground below. The real fight begins now. They also become quite chatty. They sound like a chorus of booming Emil voices that sound extremely pissed/upset.



Why just us... Why do we have to... We... We must... kill them all! We don’t need it! We don’t need this world!





Now independent of one another, the giant Emil heads proceed to roll around and blast laser beam eyes in 9S’s general direction. Much like the Hegel fight, more than one can fire a beam at a time and they don’t give the first crap whether the blast is coming from off screen or through their compatriots. It cannot be dodged by normal means at all, so it must be avoided by just booking as soon as it gets near our android.



Unlike the Hegel fight, while the Emil heads will roll around all willy-nilly, they don’t seem to do any damage if they collide with 9S. So that’s another really annoying part about the similar boss battle nixed. Maybe it’s just me put they also seem way less likely to all attack at once or attempt to surround our android. It’s like they nerfed the obnoxious parts of its AI and that was just enough to make it an alright boss battle instead of complete trash like Hegel.



I don’t know how much more of this I can take!

Emil (the nice boy) contacts 9S...



Years of multiplying... Years of fighting in wars... Their sense of self just... deteriorated. I need to settle things with them. On my own.
Stop it! You have to stand down!





At this point, in addition to the eye lasers, the Emils start emitting energy orbs more Emil clone heads. Now this fight turns into a proper clusterfuck like Hegel. This can be a really rough fight... were we not also at Level 99. I think I did this at around Level 80ish my first playthrough and that was a taxing time. 9S can hack Emil heads and that’s about the only way I managed to beat it then.





All of the Emil clones possess their own health bars and we need to defeat them all to trigger the final phase of this battle. The problem is, when an Emil’s health is depleted its HP meter just vanishes unceremoniously. It doesn’t stop attacking. And given how massive and rapidly moving the lot of ‘em tend to be... it’s kinda easy not to notice an Emil is defeated and we’re wasting our time attacking it further. So that’s rather annoying. It’s best just to break off attack regularly when crowded and scouting out which Emil still possesses a health meter before refocusing the attack.



This stops being an issue once about two-thirds of the Emils have their health depleted. At his point, they gain shields to indicate they’re out of the fight. Mind you, they’ll still happily attack 9S with eye beams which disabled. But attacking them any further is useless. Also, they start uhh...



La la la la la la la la la la la...

I. Hear. A. Sound.



We tried our best! In the rain. In the wind. In the storm. Even when our companions died, we kept fighting. But the eternal war... Our eternal pain... Hahaha... The eternal pain! It screamed at us! It told us there was nothing of value to protect in this world... The world had no meaning! Hahaha! It SCREAMED at us!



<maniacal laughter slowly turning to anguished sobbing>
STOP!


Music: Emil ~ Sacrifice



This pain! This sadness! This DESPERATION! YOU KNOW NOTHING ABOUT IT!

Emil Prime chimes in again. All the Emil clones stop fighting now.



No matter how hard or how painful... They never gave up. They kept fighting because they believed they could overcome someday! Isn’t that right, Kainé!? Even if it’s pointless, you still have to do it! BECAUSE THIS IS THE WORLD MY FRIEND TRIED TO SAVE!
Guh...



At this point, all of the Emil clones, save one, blow themselves up. Also a worrying “Time Until Emil Self-Destructs” 10 second countdown timer appears...



A randomly selected one of the Emil clones now charges up a blast and there is a ten second window to take it down before it detonates.



Not to undercut the drama or anything but... you know how way back when I said there was exactly one thing in the entire game that could actually be permanently missed? It’s this right here. We’re just going to let that timer countdown to zero...



Music: ENDS







Ending Y is the only thing in the entire game that can be missed since it’s an ending that is only present in a sidequest and once this sidequest is done, like every sidequest, it’s done for good. Once this sidequest is completed, the game will immediately ask you to save. So if you didn't know that an ending resulted here and saved over your old file? Tough shit! It's gone forever. That said, this bad ending does indeed mean redoing that entire boss fight. But through the magic of editing we can just jump back to where we left off. Like so!


Music: Emil ~ Sacrifice





The final Emil clone has extremely low HP and just about any attack will take it down. Though I almost did end up getting Ending Y again because the final clone is randomly selected and it can be a decent clip away from our position and the ten seconds allotted to stop it from destroying the entire planet. Once it too is destroyed, then we get one final scene...





I can’t believe I remembered something so important... right at the end.
Emil...
I was running... from the memories of losing those close to me... It was so hard... So painful... At the end... I did a lot of bad things to you, 9S. But now I get to see them again... Really soon...
Hold on, Emil. We’ll repair you and get you back to normal.
Oh... hey! There you are... I’m so glad... I got to see you all again...
<flatlines>
Emil...







And there you have it. The final sidequest of NieR: Automata – Killing off Emil. We’re dumped back to the title screen, appropriately enough. Since all that is left to do is to load up the final battle and side with 9S this time to get Ending D and whatever may come after that... No, it is not a post-credits thing where Emil actually lived. He's 100% dead. Full stop. Spoilers.

The end of Yoko Taro’s wild ride is in sight. Stay tuned...






Video: Episode 153 Highlight Reel (Hey go watch this!)