Hyperdimension Neptunia Re;Birth1

Humour? 8.5/10 Story? 5/10 Gameplay? 5.5/10 Cuteness? 10/10 It was fun, that is true. Ridiculous jokes (Noire? Nice name, you must not have any friends), funny characters and nice premise. Sounds & effects are nice, and it became my most favourite dress-up game so far. However, the gameplay felt somewhat lacking - takes too long to get your ExeDrive spells, and the amount of spells & various attacks is limited, and the game usually ends up as "clicking one auto attack over for 3 minutes". On top of that, my characters leaving and joining team meant everyone had different levels, and i finished the game with lvl 90 Neppa just soloing the final boss & everyone else dead. Also, the story is the weak part, as its usually "cliche villian HAHAHA I WILL DESTROY YOU ALL, OH NO HOW COULD YOUVE BEATEN ME?", but it is true this is not a game you buy for deep thrilling story. All in all, i loved this game, but i hope later versions improve the combat & level/item scaling.

Unpopular opinion but this game is my favorite of the series. Its is a JRPG, and if you are looking at this game that most likely means you like anime and stuff. There is alot of reading, but this game is basically a meme. There are lots of easter eggs, refrences, and memes in the dialogue. I have 80+ hours (On steam) and thats just for the main story. And I didnt even 100% it. You can finish it in like 20 hours or less if you really wanted to, but this game I recomend you kick back, relax, and enjoy it!

If you like grinding for hours in JRPGs, feel free to pick this one up. Otherwise, keep reading. Within the first few minutes of the game, I had to open the options menu to change the voice overs because of how (intentionally?) bad the english voice acting was. That was when I noticed how bare-bones the options menu is. At least this port runs fine for me with no issues to speak of. It was made apparent very early that this game was supposed to be a satire of JRPGs, and would constantly poke fun at some of the tropes inherent of the genre. This is mostly done through the writing, character design, and level design. The writing is sort of a mixed bag. There is some great side dialogue that is just the right amount of silly. I would occasionally find myself chuckling during the cutscenes. The main storyline is mostly ignorable and uninteresting. The level design leaves a lot to be desired. It doesn't take long to notice that a lot of areas are reused, sometimes doing so little as to reskin enemies and flip the entrance and exit around. Almost all of the dungeons are linear, with a few branching off to provide some extra pickups and monster encounters. Combat is turn-based with 3D movement. It is probably the greatest thing this game has to offer, but there are still some issues with it. Namely, the level scaling. It is impossible to finish this game without grinding a few levels. The game features quests, but none of them are interesting. Kill X monsters # times. Find # of X item. That is literally the only types of quests available. Aside from quests, most pickups are used for "Plans", which alter the player or dungeons, or add items to the shop. An interesting mechanic, but I feel it could've been expanded with more variety. I don't have any issues with the art style, music, or graphics, but there really should be more graphical options. As it stands now, there is only resolution. If you have trouble running modern games, I would probably skip this one.

Neptunia feels like an identity parade of the worst offenses of old school JRPG design. From the artificial difficulty designed to pad the game by adding a horrifying, repetitive grinding slog. To the ineptly told story and the way it keeps recycling its assets to a point that should be unacceptable. This is a low budget game and it shows. It tells its narrative via a visual novel interface, it lacks an overworld, and there are less than a dozen dungeons that you will see over and over until you are sick of them. As for the story, one could argue that the humour was lost in translation, but to be honest, I don't think there was any to being with. The jokes rely on japanese memes, steeped in local gaming culture, that I doubt were ever funny . The worst by far is the horrible grind, a pointless masochistic slog through the same six or seven scenarios with palette-swapped enemies. Designed that way exclusively to pad this train-wreck's "playing" time. Proceed through the story normally, and you will find yourself under-leveled and insta-killed by normal mob enemies. You'll need to go back and spend 3 to 4 hours grinding the same enemy in order to advance. You will have to repeat this a dozen times. And the only reason it is designed like this, is because others did it before. In short, to accurately represent my current feelings on this game would require very objectionable language. If I could give it zero stars, I would.

First off, this is yet another poorly done console port that explains everything as if you're using a game controller, even though the game and settings UI support keyboard and mouse configurations. You're left having to figure out and remember which key maps to which controller button or using an inferior controller. If you get past that, the dialogue is kind of cute and funny, but the constant fourth wall breaking gets old very fast and ruins any fun or immersion.