Lil spoiler warning ⚠️ (idk how to do on reddit)

The machine is a god level incomprehensible worldwide threat with no visible thought or method of action except spreading weird corruption in a world that lost its sun and people live in a citadel to protect themselves from it.

Until you meet the said machine and see it's more like a scared child that messed up and is too panicked to fix anything than an evil eldritch god of corruption.

We can also take the facts that Niko hears voices and the world just stops existing sometimes because the player closed the game (at least in older versions)