Hyperdimension Neptunia is to me, a genius idea that was never taken far enough. It’s the idea of personifying the Console Wars and a bunch of companies involved in it, and telling stories that kinda big picture the game industry and just make fun of it, satire it, or teach actual lessons about it. Kinda.

The main heroine is Neptune, or Purple heart. She’s a CPU/Goddess of Planeptune, and represents an unrealeased Sega console that never was. Then you have Noire/Black Heart who is the Goddess over Lastation aka Playstation. Blanc/White Heart is over Lowee or Nintendo and is the tank of the party as Nintnedo consoles are hard to break. Finally you have Vert/Green Heart who is over Leanbox, which is Microsoft and the Xbox. Vert is a busty, blue eyed blonde bombshell because she’s American.

The whole series runs off of 1 or 2 dimensional characters and references to game and gaming culture. As of this writing there are 11 games out(not counting remakes, which this is one of and it makes you aware of it), with the 12th coming out this year in Japan. I will eventually do them all. Even Shooter, though that might be more of a footnote then a post. Note that none of the games are really sequels or prequels. All of them are self contained, though a few of them are considered mainline versus the side games.

There was an interview with one of the series producers/developers who said they aimed to make a Neptunia game in every genre. So far there are turn based, beat’em ups, shooter, strategy RPG, and a raising sim. Got a lot left.

Storywise, Rebirth 1 is pretty simple. The Console War is on going with the Four Goddesses beating each other up in Celestia. At some point, three of them decide to turn on Purple Heart and “defeat” her. She crash lands in her country, Planeptune and is discovered by Compa(Compile Hearts girl). The next day the girl awakens with no memories of who she is, but does remember her name and a bunch of game references. The two set out to figure out who Neptunia is, and for whatever reason no one in this country can pronounce Neptune, despite it being in the countries name.

They soon find IF(Idea Factory) and team up only to be attacked by Arfoire(Piracy, the R4 card was a bootleg DS card that could play any game you downloaded onto it). Neptune goes into her Purple Heart form(the game calls this HDD form, and at this point there are to many acronyms) from the intro and wins just barely, saving the day and finding a special item that lets Histoire, the history fairy, give them next bit of plot. Saving Histoire is a way to get Netpune’s memories back, so the three set out to do that.

The three then venture to each other country and get involved with the local CPU/Goddess and the machinations of Arfoire in that country. After doing all that you get an idea of the villains real goal, kinda, and start fighting back instead of just being dragged along. Along the way you meet 5 more company girls who all join the party in the last chapter. This is before the series was just the 4 Goddesses and their little Sisters and it helps the writing so much.

Neptunia is generally a fairly ecchi light series, though some of the entries are definitely more skin focused then others. One of the most unique things of the ecchi in Neptunia is seen in the very first cg of the game, where a bandaged clothed Neptune and a Compa have their tits sway in the cg. A strange decision, a majority of the cgs have some kind of slight animation to them, and if they have any animation then the tits are going to jiggle. Even Blanc, who’s equipped with an A cup gets obvious movement in any cg she’s in.

Anyway, only 3 of the cgs are really sexy to me, and it’s hard to tell if those are really going for that. Those are the previous mentioned bandage cg, the cg at the top, and maybe tired Vert. Out of 16 cgs, that’s not horrible but its obvious sex appeal wasn’t the goal. On the other hand, some of the girls designs are very obviously for sex appeal, MarvelousAQL and Vert are the standouts. Marvelous, because she is a reference to Senran Kagura, has a tit window in her standard outfit made from a ribbon and one button in her shirt. She wears more in her swimsuit then she does in her standard outfit. Then Vert is just a bombshell. By far the most curvy character in the series until I think the 3rd game. For some odd reason, the 4 Goddesses do not get swimsuits in the standard game, instead having them in the dlc dungeons. All the company girls get swimsuits, except Compa and IF(the two in your party the most in the game) who get no outfits in the base game at all.

I said the 4 Goddesses don’t get swimsuits, but that’s not exactly right. The normal forms of them don’t. The HDD forms do though. All the gear the HDD forms have change their looks. Like most outfits, they are just recolors except for the unique set to each Goddess which turns the one piece swimsuit kind of look the HDD forms have into a two piece swimsuit look.

I will be honest, I like the models in this. They still look good to me, and playing some other anime games from more recent times it’s kind of amazing how well the models hold up here. I’d put them above the Senren models honestly, though that’s just me and I have a horrible eye for this kind of thing.

So I’m ending on gameplay related stuff because this game has way more to it then it really should. Not a lot of these systems I’m going to mention really matter, the actual gameplay is pretty simple and battles kind of end up playing out in one of two ways. Either you throw your strongest attack out and win pretty quick, or break their guard gauge and then beat them down while heal looping as needed and maybe walling with Blanc as your tank. There are skills and ultimates, but honestly you won’t use them too much unless you spend a lot of credits on healing item, since skills are way to expensive and your MP pools are pretty small for most of the game. You will need to grind to do either of these to bosses though, as the games power curve basically requires doing every available task to keep up with. Every quest, drop, and equipment made and bought just to keep up and not get one shot. Life Rings are your friend(basically required) near the beginning just to make the damage curve fair for the first half of the game.

Before I move on to a bunch of systems that make this game seem way more complex then it is, I want to mention I cheat engined a lot of the “tough enemies.” Basically every dungeon has a boss tier enemy that has health regen or is just way to strong for that area. These fights take way to long and while I get the idea of a constant challenging fight being available, I just wasn’t willing to constantly spend 5+ minutes on every fight, some of which need to be fought 4+ times for item drops.

Okay, so the actual combat system uses a field where you can move within a circle and attack enemies you can reach, and positioning does matter as it affects damage. Weapons can have different ranges and AOE’s, so often you will hit multiple enemies with basic attacks. One you hit an enemy once you get the option of using 3 different move types up to 3 times before your turn ends. You have rush, a hit more times attack. Power which just focuses on damage, and break that lowers the guard gauge the most. Once an enemies guard gauge is empty you do way more damage to it, though it gets back 1/7 to 1/5 of the gauge when it gets a turn and the gauge is empty. These three moves each have multiple attack options you can set in the main menu based on the character and their level. Some options are just stronger, others do status effects or elements.

The two other mechanics in combat that matter are the EXE gauge and HDD forms. The EXE gauge, gained from attacking and keeps between fights but not dungeons, is what allows you to use characters ultimates, and also use EXE combos, basically combo enders for a fifth hit with a unit. Each combo ender has an amount of EXE gauge needed to be used, but costs nothing. Ultimates cost gauge, so you balance the two. HDD forms are why the best units in the game are the Goddesses. They are basically stat up forms that cost a bit of MP to enter, and make the CPU’s and the Candidates do more damage almost all the time then the rest of the cast. These forms even have their own cosmetic equipment that also affects the girls stats at all times, meaning the CPU’s have 6 extra equipment slots to work with then the other characters.

So that’s it for in combat stuff that matters, lets move on to the Remake system. It is essentially an alchemy system. You use monster drops and maybe some items to “create” an item. Once created the plan comes into affect. So if you made an item, it is added to the shop. Some plans change dungeon monsters(usually switching tough monsters for different ones), and others change functions of the game like difficulty and turning off back attacks. Along with the items, you also need memory space, basically a currency that bosses/events drop, to afford the plan. This limits how much you can make, mostly the system ones and dungeon ones that are more expensive and aren’t needed versus items and weapons. Thankfully the game has a good bestiary to find what drops what to make stuff, though I wish when you changed monsters in a dungeon that monster that got switched out was still listed for that dungeon. This is probably the most important none combat mechanic to the game. It also rarely uses things other then items, like I think 2 recipes use monster kills and some items require share levels to be at specific point.

Shares are an interesting idea. Being Goddesses, faith is something that should have some effect on something, and it does. Shares are a Goddesses faith or how believed in their country/they are, and it does influence the damage formula a bit. Something the game never hints at. How do shares work though? The guild quests and coliseum fights, which are all kill x enemies or return x items, switch shares between the five countries/groups. The four Goddesses and the enemy company. Beyond that, shares are needed for the true ending, recruiting the CPU candidates that are the main characters of the sequel, and to make about 20~ recipes. You basically want each share to hit around 50% of the total once in the final chapter to unlock everything.

Next weird side mechanic is lily ranks. These are basically how much the girls like each other, and do two things. Each party member is combat can be linked to a second character that they can switch with in combat. Depending on the lily rank, the girl in the back will give the front member some buffs and some EXE combo finishers. These depend on the girl in question and are nice, though the amount of grinding fights with the girls paired up to raise that rank can get annoying. Some girls even have EXE finishers with other girls and you need certain lily ranks to use those moves. The other use for lily ranks is you need Neptune and Nepgear to get 1 rank up to craft one item, which is the only lily rank required item in the game.

The final mechanic of note is the game crafting thing. You get game cartridges and such from turning in Medals, key items you get from big enemies and quests throughout the game. These all come with 1-3 slots of 3 different colors and levels ranging from 1-5. You put idea chips into them, which are items you find all over the place. It’s basically accessory crafting. The color of the chip is what kind of effect it has and the level is how effective that effect is. I’m sure if I hadn’t cheated tough enemies this mechanic is basically essential to survive some of the fights using the lower enemy damage from x type of enemies. A lot of the bonuses from these are actually also offered via lily ranks, and I think they stack? Item drop definitely felt like it stacked with the plan that made items drop more often.

Verdict- Not as bad as I expected. Definitely grindy and the boss scaling makes it so that you have to do almost all the grind to keep up. Beyond that, has some charm and a character design for everyone. Completion definitely makes the game worse, a single playthrough is really all this is worth. As for fanservice, not worth it. Later games do that way better, and sicne none of the game are actually sequel stories you can just play what appeals to you.

PC Save for Hyperdimension Neptunia Re;Birth 1

100% of the normal game aka no dlc. For me that meant all enemy drops recorded, all cgs(get both endings basically) all girls to max level(99), all plans other then change item for dungeons done, and all cosmetic related items gotten. Accessories, outfits, weapons and processors(outfits for CPU mode of the Goddesses). Should have them all. I have this nagging feeling I’m missing some processors but the only place that is possible is it got used as an ingredient or came from a quest that I somehow missed. I was very throughout.

Gameplay: 4/10 Eroticness: 4/10 Story: 5/10

Completion: What it took-

4 playthroughs just for 2 accessories, one from a chest and one from a boss that you need 3 of each to forge recolors of them and another run to have your own of those accessories.

Lots of grinding. Enemies that had stuff other then monster item drop tended to need 10+ kills to drop the other item they had. Lots of boss fighting as I made sure to get each drop from each enemy. All quests completed once along with Coliseum.

The biggest pain in finishing this was the hidden treasures, which I explained the pain of above. RNG+ slow run speed+ once shot per dungeon run is not fun.

Did not bother with dlc.

This is definitely something where a lot of the flaws only show up when going for 100%.