NieR: Automata Anime Reveals Staff, Cast & Premiering On January 2023

 2 character videos, 8-minute staff interview video streamed

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The Aniplex Online Fest 2022 revealed on Saturday that the television anime adaptation of Square Enix and Platinum Games' NieR:Automata action role-playing game will premiere in January 2023. The event also revealed two character videos for the anime. The anime's official title is NieR:Automata Ver1.1a.

Aniplex also revealed an eight-minute video with English subtitles that features interviews with the cast and staff.

The anime will star Yui Ishikawa as 2B, Natsuki Hanae as 9S, Hiroki Yasumoto as Pod 042, and Kaoru Akiyama as Pod 153.

Ryouji Masuyama (Blend S, Hello WeGo!) is directing the anime at A-1 Pictures, and Masuyama is also in charge of series composition alongside the original game's Yokō Tarō. Jun Nakai is designing the characters and serving as chief animation director. MONACA is composing the music.

Square Enix describes the game's story:

NieR:Automata tells the story of androids 2B, 9S and A2 and their battle to reclaim the machine-driven dystopia overrun by powerful machines.

Humanity has been driven from the Earth by mechanical beings from another world. In a final effort to take back the planet, the human resistance sends a force of android soldiers to destroy the invaders. Now, a war between machines and androids rages on... A war that could soon unveil a long-forgotten truth of the world.

The now-defunct Japanese game developer Cavia (Drakengard, Resident Evil: The Darkside Chronicles) developed the original NieR game as a spinoff of the Drakengard series in 2010. Square Enix released versions of the game for two different consoles: NieR Gestalt for the Xbox 360, and NieR Replicant for the PlayStation 3. NieR Replicant featured a different character design for the protagonist, and minor differences in the plot. NieR was the last game Cavia developed before being disbanded and absorbed into AQ Interactive Inc. in July 2010.

NieR Replicant ver.1.22474487139..., a remastered edition of NieR Replicant, launched for the PS4, Xbox One, and PC via Steam in April 2021 worldwide.

The NieR:Automata sequel shipped for the PS4 in Japan in February 2017, followed by North America and Europe in March 2017. Square Enix also released the game on PC via Steam in March 2017, and on Xbox One in June 2018. The game will release on Nintendo Switch on October 6. The game has a combined shipments and digital download sales number of over 6 million.

NieR Re[in]carnation, the first smartphone game in the NieR video game franchise, launched for iOS and Android devices in Japan in February 2021 and in the West in July 2021.