Well I've played probably 6+ hours (chapter 3), and there's a few impressions coming from the game so far...

First, it has lots of puns and references. LeanBox has MS Mountain for example. 'Gotta Catch them all' when Black heart is tackled. It takes place with the console war in Gameindustri. etc.

The dating sim/character graphics is not only high quality, but they are moving. More specifically it uses the 3D models that are used with breathing added in (at least i think it is). Keeps it from feeling so static.

Voice acting sounds good, not read off of a page blandly but instead with plenty of enthusiasm and emotion. Keeps reminding me of the one character in .Hack...

Music is good overall... Don't know how I'd describe it. Upbeat usually.

Next i suppose to say, the game is a bit grindy. I had to grind and level up and build my characters from level 7 to 15 before i could beat CPU Black Heart. After getting past that grinding I've seen less needed (or maybe that's due to having the 'weaken enemies' plan always on...)

Plot is very RPG-ish, leading you from one section to the next as expected. But you can revisit dungeons and modify them to make them harder or change in subtle ways so grinding them is less samey.

Graphically and movement feels a lot like an MMO, not a well developed and fleshed out MMO so be mindful of that.

Some of the monsters are weird. One's a screen capture of a girl with text in front of her. Another's a sewer pipe (but no plumbers nearby). There's some radishes and cats in suits, and all kinds of very curious creatures. Some are good models and monsters, but most of them are sorta WTF. Not badly done, but just sorta you want to get past them to something more interesting.

Lots and lots of references to pudding and eating pudding... So I'd say buy a tub of pudding, and have it saved. Sooner or later you'll start craving pudding :P

Oh and as a recommendation, if you like making the dungeons and going into them before going to the main quest, make note of the map sometimes. If a monster is orange, don't attack it... You'll need to be level 15+ before you can survive any of those. (And the tutorial doesn't cover them until you're about to fight Black Heart, so..)

So that's my first impressions of the game (without much for spoilers).

The girl with caption is a reference to Visual Novels, the pipe as you guessed is from Super Mario. I've no idea what some of the weirder ones like radishes are about either, but I'm guessing it's some kind of pun/wordplay that only works in japanese.

Also noone caught the following reference (not even in Wiki reference list): that when Neptunia levels up and sings, she sings the same melody you can hear when Sonic gets bonus life (Sonic 1 on SEGA Genesis, I think melody was changed later on in the series). I liked playing Sonic :)))

Some enemies are quite... distrubing. But I enjoy battle system in this game.

I've never played anything quite like this at all. I saw it pop up new and on sale and decided to take a crack at it.

It's enjoyable and is interesting enough to keep me going. This stuff is wack, but I can't stop. Music is killer.

Gardening pudding! I can't stand this gardening pudding! Everything is turning into pudding! Gardening hell...

Now let's see if anyone here can associate this with any game. ;)

I did notice that sometimes when she levels she sings a little and it sounds like the Final Fantasy victory song... except the last couple notes are off... Course we have seen SquareEnix claim footage of their games much like Nintendo so it's not really a surprise... Antidote pudding...

I also thought that it is FF Victory Fanfare song at first. But then, Neptune leveled up a few times now, and she sang different songs on some :))

That's actually a nice comment done here on GOG because what I'm on about relates to censorship. :)

So beat the game, ended up finishing it with the true ending which the main difference is arfoire was saved rather than destroyed...

Running through the game first thing i notice is some of the boss battles where you lost the first time, you can beat, however you don't get experience and the storyline continues where you have to fight them again after they were weakened... Quite curious :P

Not sure if i'll go that far on the second playthrough though.

Final impressions. Some of the UI could use changes, namely ways to figure out which monsters you haven't seen, or haven't fought, or mapped out; Or if you need a specific item to unlock something having it give you a hint to tell you 'this area with enemies on' so you don't have to go out of your way to figure it out or using a FAQ/Walkthrough like i did.

Lastly getting the extra content (swimsuits) requires so much grinding it's practically useless; Although Nepgear's and extra characters's gear starts costing absurd amounts. We're talking 5 million per gear...

That's reward for one battle in Colosseum. (see attach).
Attach is without disks with gold drop bonus.

I have to wonder which battle you did. I've done battles I was even or maybe a little stronger than, and got 4k experience in the colosseum, while money was closer to 25k; While fighting monsters in the field where I built up my EXE I could take out which give me 1.8mil experience and probably a hundred thousand credits...

I can only assume your rewards are lessened due to that if you die you don't lose progress, so no risk other than seeing a red 'lose' screen rather than 'game over' and being taunted by dagoos :P

DLC battle - recommended level 600.

Bonus of Colosseum is that it refills SP after each battle.
So, you can use AOE skills Uni's "Battle cannon" + MAGES. "Mechanical paradox" to one-shot group of enemies.
two skills - victory - start fight again - repeat until level cap.
That's much faster than building up EXE bar and waiting for boss respawn.
Drop reward after each battle is a bonus - some healing items are sellable for 2-3k and you get 5.

Considering I'm right at level 100, that seems a little far...I notice there's several battles ranging from 45 to 90'th level, then it jumps drastically by 100 at a time, which seems highly impractical to actually level to to play.

Maybe I haven't optimized the discs I'm suppose to use, or use the skills as much as I should, or know which bosses to concentrate on, or have the optional dungeons needed to progress with equipment, or using the wrong set of core characters for fighting; But it seems very much a heavy grind, one I'm not willing to play at this moment. Certainly I have strong characters, but there's been a few battles that I should be about right for, and they stomp me to the ground with 1-hit-kills, sometimes right off the bat, while other times they love to attack characters I resurrect as soon as I resurrect them.

Best way - DENGEKI fight with polytans. Needs some lightning resist. I did it at level 60 (albeit hard, used a lot of resurrects and potions). Each gives ~2M exp.
At level 200-250 you can farm best weapon/armor for CPU candidates from dungeons with "added super enemies"
After that you can switch to Super Iron knight (5 fights would be enough)
and finish with Super Brawling characters until level cap - they give 40-50 level ups.

Best characters for farm polytans - Uni+MAGES. Cannon + Paradox. Third one can be anything, doesn't matter. IF has AOE too, worth a shot. At some point it would twoshot them at your turn. (at level ~370Mages oneshot them)