Fox Plays Hyperdimension Neptunia

http://vignette1.wikia.nocookie.net/...20130717003319

Now playing: Hyperdimension Neptunia: ReBirth


For my first attempt at a 'Let's Play' article on EoFF, I decided to go with a series I have heard a lot about but know basically nothing about. So what is Hyperdimension Neptunia about? Well the story goes that in the land of Gamindustri, there are four nations each ruled by a video game console anthropomorphised into a cute girl. Honestly I'm not sure why I haven't played this yet THEY ARE ALL SO CUTE LOOK AT THEM MY HEART CAN'T TAK---

So the four console girls are fighting against each other for some reason in a 'Console War'. What is this war about? What is at stake? Which video game console is your waifu? These questions and more are what we shall endeavour to answer over the course of this series!

With my body ready, it's time to begin! Step 1: buy the first game in the series from Steam:

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Uh oh. ^^;

This is the first half of page 1.

It goes on for 4 pages.



...BRB GOOGLING

:love: :heart: :love: :heart:
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:love: :heart: :love: :heart:

Alright, we're back! Leaving out spin-offs for now, it looks like I have 4 games in the primary series to get through:

1. Hyperdimension Neptunia: ReBirth
2. Hyperdimension Neptunia: ReBirth 2
3. Hyperdimension Neptunia: ReBirth 3
4. Megadimension Neptunia VII

...Megadimension Neptunia VII? WHAT KIND OF NAMING CONVENTION IS THIS OHMIG- :crying:

But it looks like the first one is Hyperdimension Neptunia: Rebirth, which is a remake of the original Neptunia game from 2010. I'm in! Let's take a look at the Steam Store page:

http://i.imgur.com/JsGTwdb.jpg

Fast paced, turn based combat? 4th wall breaking? Trope demolishing? And just look at those beautiful assets! I'm practically salivating already!

TUNE IN NEXT TIME WHERE WE BEGIN THE GAME AND MEET OUT PROSPECTIVE CONSOLE WAIFU FOR THE VERY FIRST TIME!

I found the battle system to be incredibly slow when I played it, but I played the original 2010 PS3 release, so maybe they made improvements with ReBirth.

Other than that, I enjoyed it. It was ridiculous and stupid and the amount of weird little jRPG references made... yeah.

I haven't played the original, but I have played MK II, Victory, and now I'm playing Megadimension VII.

I like the series. It's funny and enjoyable, I think. The faults are the fanservice, the amounts of grinding, and the repeated dungeons. For me, anyway.

VERT :love:

Hope you enjoy it~

#1 - WELCOME TO GAMINDUSTRI

The adventure begins! We're in the world of Gamindustri (I GET IT!), where the four CPUs (aka console waifus) are battling for control as they have been for centuries. We have:

- Black Heart, CPU of Lastation (I get it!!!)
- White Heart, CPU of Lowee (Smaller than the others for a more casual market)
- Green Heart, CPU of Leanbox (Obviously compensating for a lack of exclusives)
- Purple Heart, CPU of Planeptune (I... don't get it! Is this a SEGA Saturn joke? If it is then Planeptune is about 3 generations behind the other nations. That's a pretty significant disadvantage. ...Still more powerful than Lowee though lololol)

Quick note on Green Heart - I don't understand how your costume works. ^^;

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No like... it's not just that it's overly sexy and impractical, I don't understand how it keeps anything in. :stare: There's no strap at the bottom to hold the pads in place. The smallest amount of jiggle here is going to cause some pretty serious exposure and most likely an increase in the age rating. Be very careful, my dear Green Heart, you are one backflip away from being banned in Australia.
:monster:

So anyway, an unknown voice said Neptune should be thrown out, so the others ganged up on her and threw her off the floating island they were all fighting on. Meanies. The good news is, it means we get to meet cute Neptune! The better news is, she has her priorities right.

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Good girl, you do NOT STEP ON MY NENDOROIDS ESPECIALLY NOT RYUUKO.

https://figureculture.files.wordpres...i_ryuko05s.jpg

And we've all had that moment of panic with our special hard drives. Remember for next time Nep-nep: CCleaner is free to download and works on all modern operating systems.

Here in Neptune's dream we meet a talking...book? Tome, she says, called 'Histoire'. Very mysterious! And then Nep-nep wakes up and we're introduced to Compa! She's sweet and helpful and is going to heal poor Neptune's wounds...

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SHE'S ONLY BANDAGING THE :heart::heart:SEXY PARTS :heart::heart:. I don't even see any wounds!!! This one is going to be trouble, I know it. But somehow we survive the ordeal and find out about Nep-nep's amnesia. Oh no! Time to head to Virtua Forest to the spot where Compa found our adorable heroine. Nep finds a sword for LARPing, and although she can't remember what 'pudding' is she's well aware that she needs to kill monsters for XP. And she's full of terrible dad-jokes! Is this true love?!

Time for some combat, and Compa retrieves a GIANT SMURFING SYRINGE from somewhere. Where were you keeping that, Compa?!

http://oapboap.org/img/mgs.210.png

Compa has an attack called 'Bonk' which, by its very name, is by definition the greatest attack of all time. GG. The combat mechanics are fairly basic for the time being, but the battle system is fine enough. The SP moves have some really wicked animations to them which I appreciate a lot. I seem to have a whole bunch of different kinds of attack (rush, power, guard break), but I don't yet understand the best places to use each. Guard break is pretty self explanatory, but beyond that power seems to be pretty much universally better than 'bonk'.

Can I just say at this point that after Final Fantasy XV it is SO. NICE. to be playing an RPG again where Y/Triangle is the 'open menu' button. Life just isn't the same when it's on the touch pad. Or R3. Or CIRCLE thank-you-very-much Final Fantasy VIII what the hell were you thinking!?

Nep and Compa reach Nep's crash site where a hole opens up in the forest and we fall through! Compa is taken by a monster where [CENSORED] may or may not be done to her, but luckily Nep is ready to come to the rescue. Histoire teaches us how to use Hard Drive Divinity, and Nep transforms into her Sailor Guardian form, Purple Heart, and kicks the monster's arachnid booty!

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For our victory we receive a key fragment of some kind. Very mysterious.... according to Histoire, she's sealed away somehow and only by collecting these fragments can we release her. As only good spirits are ever sealed away, I'm confident nothing bad will come of releasing her, so let's start hunting for some key fragments! There's one in each land, so we have some work to do. For now though, it's off to the questing guild!

NEXT TIME: FOX RIPS HIS EARS OFF BECAUSE EVEN THOUGH HE'S TURNED THE VOLUME DOWN, COMPA IS BOTH LOUDER AND MORE HIGH PITCHED THAN ANY OTHER CHARACTER OH GOD WHY. ALSO OUR GIRLS GO SHOPPING AND QUESTING!

P.S. Can any staffer types who read this get rid of the "#0 - WHAT GAME DO I PLAY!?" in the thread title please? I assumed I'd be able to update it as I went along but I can't edit that bit ^^;

Neptune's sense of humour is amazing. I also think her voice actress really nails the role.

This is the only one in the main series I haven't touched, so I am excite!

re sega neptune

Quote:

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Sega Neptune
The Sega Neptune was a two-in-one Genesis and 32X console which Sega planned to release in fall 1995, with the retail price planned to be something less than US$200. Sega cancelled the Neptune in October 1995, citing fears that it would dilute their marketing for the Saturn while being priced too close to the Saturn to be a viable competitor. Electronic Gaming Monthly used the Sega Neptune as an April Fools' Day prank in its April 2001 issue. The issue included a small article in which the writers announced that Sega had found a warehouse full of old Sega Neptunes, and were selling them on a website for only $50.

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Quote:

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Originally Posted by Pumpkin

Neptune's sense of humour is amazing. I also think her voice actress really nails the role.

This is the only one in the main series I haven't touched, so I am excite!

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Do you have the audio in English or Japanese? I'm doing it in Japanese, the voice is definitely spot on. Compa is really driving me up the wall :D

English voices

What I will say before the next proper update is I had heard it was kinda 'grindy' and I was wondering when that was gonna kick in.

...It's kicked in xD

I warned you xD

Oh also, I don't know about the Steam versions, but the PS3/4 versions I have generally have free DLC. I got an outfit and you can get some beginner stuff like extra equipment and credits and stuff, if you wanted. I don't know if the same stuff is available for free on Steam, but it might be worth a look if you care

#2 - FATE/STAY NOIRE

In our first ever Hyperdimension shopping spree, Nep has a new sword and everyone has some super new accessories! These leather bracelets will keep us safe from the dragons! We've picked up a bunch of quests, so its off to the monster cave. As we wander about in the dark, we bump into someone new. It's a guild member here on a quest, and her name is IF. Iffy for short. She teams up with us so we can finish of that monster that was doing unspeakably CENSORED things to Compa earlier.

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We beat the big bad and find some kind of disc... and monsters seem to be materialising from it! Is this where all of the monsters come from? Discs like these? Well, we're calling them Enemy Discs from now on, and if we find any more you bet your adorable D-Pad hairclips we're gonna snap 'em good! As we're dealing with the Enemy Disc, a mysterious voice speaks to us. Is this the voice that spoke to the CPUs before Nep was cast out of Celestia? It might be! The voice belongs to a scary witch lady, and she wants to fight. Well, if you think you can take Purple Heart and her buddies you be my guest!

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UH OH! She's unexpectedly tsuyoi*!!! She smacks us good and takes our key fragment, but is she finished? Like heck is she finished! This greedy witch wants to copy Neptune's power! At the last minute though, Compa shoves Neptune aside, so her power gets copied instead. HAH. TAKE THAT. Now you speak funny desu! And she's been weakened, so it's time to fight back! This time we win, take back our key fragment and smashy smashy the Enemy Disc. Good times! Witch lady runs away and we head back to Planeptune.

*Editors note: "tsuyoi" = strong

You know, IF's attitude really reminds me of Tohsaka Rin from the Fate series...

https://myanimelist.cdn-dena.com/ima...s/8/272601.jpg

Wait a minute... *googling...googling...googling...* Ah!! They're both voiced by Ueda Kana in Japanese as well. This is awesome. Well, Iffy, next time we're in a pinch I hope you'll call Archer to come help us. I could use some of those Unlimited Blade Works in some of these optional monster fights which don't give me better EXP for some reason :stare:

BTW I also met a catgirl called Broccoli but she isn't very interesting at the moment.

Back to our fragment hunt; it's time to head across to the other lands! We head to the Basilicom which seems to be some kind of city hall to get permission to travel to Lastation: home of Black Heart and, presumably, stuff we need! As we travel there's a scene of witch lady talking to Histoire. The witch's name is 'Arfoire,' and she wants Histoire to help her with something. Which is odd because it's obvious from their names that the two aren't related or connected in any meaningful way. Histoire is reluctant, even though Arfoire claims to have all the CPUs under her control! She has WHAT!? T_T

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We get to Lastation which is all steampunky! We're heading to the Basilicom to see lady Black Heart, and along the way we meet a random adventurer called Falcom. With a name like that I'm looking forward to her eventually joining up. She doesn't yet though, and we're left frustrated in the Basilicom as Black Heart is out fighting varmints so that she can afford to pay for the repairs to her royal car or something.

We cut away to a scene of her lamenting how her powers have reduced since Neptune was cast out of Celestia; the CPU's get their power from the faith of the people, called 'Shares,' and those shares have been falling. There's a super evil company ("Avenir") that are throwing a spanner in the works by reducing people's faith in the goddess. How? By helping people being generally useful to society. The bastards.

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Back with the party, and we've found a person called Chian. She wants us to take care of a monster around the trade route. We're gonna be on the lookout for the Enemy Disc and possible key fragments! We could have a problem though; Black Heart has found out that Neptune is here with amnesia. Could she take advantage to beat Nep-nep once and for all? While on the trade route we encountered enemies that are cardboard box birds wearing crowns. They all have crowns. This is a rubbish monarchy.

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SIDE NOTE: Neptune occasionally sings a just-different-enough-to-avoid-a-lawsuit version of the FF victory theme when she levels up. Also one of her jump shouts is "Like a kangaroo!" :heart:

We beat the monster we've been sent to killify and then get attacked by Black Heart before we can recover! How dishonourable of her, but we defeat her anyway at the low low cost of basically all of my healing items. Time to beat some information out of her... but she runs away! When her Divinity Drive runs out of power, she turns back into goth lolita "Noire," and Nep doesn't realise she's actually Black Heart. :facepalm: She may have gotten out of telling us her secrets for now, but now that Noire's been coerced into joining the party for a while, we'll discover the truth eventually!

NEXT TIME: FOX RECOUNTS EVERY MINUTE DETAIL OF GRINDING 15 LEVELS IN RUBBISH DUNGEONS

#3 - IN-NEP-TITUDE

When the grind in this game hits, it hits hard. I found a good spot online (give me that precious EXP you whale monsters!) and settled in for the long haul while watching season 7 of Star Trek: Deep Space 9 on the second monitor. On the plus side, I gained over 20 levels! That should keep me going for a while. On the downside the final season of DS9 is pretty terrible. Anyway, I think I came out the other side without any side effects whatsoever.

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Grinding done, it's back to Lastation with Noire in tow! She's bought some eyeglasses, thus making her completely unrecognisable as Black Heart to all the locals! A cunning and flawless plan to be sure, and gosh darn I do love her red eyes.

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Time to start killing monsters for those Avenir guys in Thelad Sanctuary while we test the weapon prototype for Chian. We meet their top dudes: Ganache and Singe. They seem to have seen through Noire's flawless disguise somehow though. This could be trouble down the line... But for now, an even more serious problem is hampering my progress...

HOW AM I EXPECTED TO FIGHT A CUTE VN IMOUTO!? Look at her! She's even saying:「お兄ちゃん大好きよ」(Onii-chan daisuki yo - I love you Big Brother!)

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Somehow we persevere and get through the battle, whereupon we run into MAGES. Her name has a period in it which I take as a sign of danger. She came from another dimension and she wants some... Doc Tear Popper. Oh god. I assume this character is a reference I don't get :lol:. I get the Dr. Pepper joke.

We beat the big monster for Avenir and it's back to Chian with the weapon data. We discover that these new facilities that Avenir are building are destroying the surrounding nature. Reminds me of a certain city with a plate... Anyway, Ganache overhears our conversation and intentions to spy on his company but I'm sure there will be no negative consequences to this.

Woo-hoo! Pudding event! Noire and Neptune seem to be getting on better now. Girls who snack together, stick together, that's what I always say.

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More weapons testing and work for Avenir today at their storage facility. Apparently there's an item which can power game consoles for 10,000 years that we have to retrieve. I have one of those. It's called a plug. Anyway, Ganache will give us some out this awesome stuff of the goodness of his heart! That doesn't sound suspicious at - Oh no! He locked us in! No option but to surrender to the monsters I guess. :shrug:

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We find not one but TWO enemy discs in this place. No wonder there are so many monsters around! We escape, but Ganache knew we were helping Chian. She's in danger! We arrive at the city to find it in ruins, but Chian is OK. This is it, the climax of Chapter 2! Noire transforms into Black Heart to help defeat Ganache's death machine. Neptune is finally told that Noire is the CPU of Lastation... and our beloved Nep-Nep is the CPU of Planeptune. Knowledge is power!

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After the climax, and with no sign of the Key Fragment, it's time to head back to Planeptune. Noire's staying behind to help rebuild Lastation (whatever happened to snacking together and sticking together?? :cry:), so we say goodbye for now. And that's the end of Chapter 2!

It's the start of Chapter 3 and Iffy is checking Lady Green Heart's blog; the CPU for Leanbox hasn't got the memo that everything is vlogging these days. To top things off we find her secret diary and discover she's some kind of Otaku gamer who plays video games about cute anime godesses. What a loser.

NEXT TIME: LET'S GO TO LEANBOX TO FIND OUT IF LADY GREEN HEART IS HOARDING BL DOUJINS

#4 VERT THERE'S A WILL, VERT'S A WAY

Off to Leanbox! First we meet Lady Green Heart's attendant, a lovely man called Yvoire. The girls mispronounce it as "Evil". Those pesky kids, eh? I'm sure it doesn't mean anything! Why are we here again...? Oh yes! Find the key fragments! Evil-san is no help in this regard. As we leave, we pass an evangelist from Lowee - "Conversation" - who claims to Evil-san that we're heretics, followers of the Overlord, Monmus! This is outrageous! Although might be true, who knows, Nep's lost her memories after all.

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As we do some dungeoning, Conversation fabricates evidence that we're summoning dangerous monsters. She persuades Evil-san to poison Nep! Evil-san pushes that responsibility onto IF. He says she's not from any of the 4 lands, but if she kills Nep, she'll be accepted a citizen of Leanbox. Troubled, IF takes the poison, but as she's leaving...


AHA! It's Lady Green Heart!

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"Sub-cultural past times" indeed. I must marry her!!!*
* Judging from the posters in her room... she is indeed hoarding BL Doujins.


After being invited by Mr. Evil-san to dinner, Nep digs in and... collapses!? She's been poisoned!!! We're thrown in jail briefly, but fortunately Vert comes along and saves the day. We need to find an antidote, but we're gonna have to fight some darn monster to get it. Typical! Luckily, Vert is tagging along, so this should be a piece of yummy, sweet, delicious cake. Mmm...cake...

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Monster: Dead. Antitode: Get. Nep: Back in business!

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Vert asks for our help restoring her lost goddess power. She can't do her awesome HDD transformation without it. So we head to Halo Mountain where the enemy has been tracked down.


Authors note: This lazy dungeon design, wow! This is a masterclass in making a game on a budget. And by masterclass, I mean it's pretty disgusting xD


Oho, Conversation reveals her true form. It's Arfoire!

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We defeat her, but she's stolen Vert's power, so she transforms to a fake Lady Green Heart and pretty much wipes the floor with us. Vert's weird... pig-person-girl...friend... thing jumps in and copies Arfoire's power! She gives it to Vert and it's an even fight.


Victory! And as Arfoire flees, we find a Key Fragment that she left behind. Unfortunately now though, it's time to say goodbye to Vert as, much like Noire, she has too much to take care off in her own land to come adventuring with-EEH? IF'S JUST TOO ADORABLE!? Oh well, I guess she's coming along after all!

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That's Chapter 3 complete! There are still Key Fragments to be found, and Iffy has some intel where these strange people are coming from; it's the land we haven't explored yet, so I guess we better get going! Only thing though: it's freezing cold up there. Freezing cold.

I SAID IT'S FREEZING COLD VERT PUT ON A SWEATER FOR THE LOVE OF-

NEXT TIME: VERT TRIES TO SEDUCE IFFY BUT THROUGH A SERIES OF UNFORTUNATE EVENTS HER TONGUE GETS STUCK ON A FROZEN LAMPPOST

Hyperdimension is an odd series in that, from the get go, half of the jokes are there for the sake of making fun of their own fan base. It's glorious. XD

I love these games so much, they're a howl and their characters are just, superb! Nep-masterrace

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Originally Posted by Shoden

I love these games so much, they're a howl and their characters are just, superb! Nep-masterrace

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I wanna just turn up to work one day with Nep's hairclips on.

I realised that I remember very little about this game. xD I enjoyed it and it was a great time, but none of the things you are doing ring any bells at all.