Megadimension Neptunia VIIR is an odd duck, being sold heavily on the VR features, even though they are so overtly tacked-on, but whatever the development story behind that, Compile Heart has gone back and substantially improved the gameplay engine, to the point that this is genuinely one of the better JRPGs out there. Making it all the more pity that a lot of people won’t see past the low budget these games are made on, and their love of underwear.
Don’t let the odd marketing fool you — there is far more to Megadimension Neptunia VIIR than just its VR. Between its quality of life updates, reworked mechanics and enhanced combat, this game represents the series at its best.
The best and most ambitious Neptunia story yet and the best way to experience it. Megadimension Neptunia VIIR builds on the acclaimed story of Megadimension Neptunia VII, adding virtual reality visits from the main characters that bring their personalities to life in the Virtual Dimension. With three phases to the main quest (and four routes through the second), Compile Heart and Idea Factory do not rest on their laurels here but deliver a novel dimension-hopping adventure with our favorite characters from Gamindustri. PS VR hardware is optional, and you can experience all the Virtual Dimension visits and customize the Player Room without it, but if you're a Nep fan on the fence about PS VR, Megadimension Neptunia VIIR is as good a reason as any to pick one up.
Megadimension Neptunia VIIR is recommended for fans of the original. But tacked-on VR scenes won’t do much for those looking for new and exciting experiences.
Megadimension Neptunia VIIR offers the same story as the non-VR release from two years ago, but does make some gameplay changes on top of the addition of virtual reality segments. Only the biggest fans should double dip but this is still a good game for those who have yet to experience it.
As tends to be the case with the franchise, Megadimension Neptunia VIIR makes for a solid entry in the series for pre-existing fans, but may alienate newcomers expecting a more engaging battle system or plot. The script's humour certainly does a good job at keeping the cast mostly likeable, and the references directed at the games industry is charming enough, yet nothing ever truly comes together to deliver a gripping narrative, satirical or not.
The weak plot, thin characters and lackadaisical approach to combat added up to a final product that was inconsequential best and a disrespectful waste of my time at worst. I can’t recommend it to JRPG fans, people who want more VR experiences, or really, to anyone at all.
Hmm. There's a lot to like and a lot not to like:
Likes:
The revamped revisit to Mk2's system
The awesome post story boss battles.
The visual revamps
The game feels like a high framerate game
New OSTs specifically for VIIR
No Like:
Lack of DLC characters. I liked what I got with Milli, Nitro and God Eater. A shame no character DLCs are around.
The weeb room (I.E. the only time VR is actually used)
The lack of thrilling boss fights in VR (again, only the dumb weeb room where you meet the goddesses)
A game with massive positives, but pretty damning negatives to me. Coin flip on whether or not you want to buy it.
Technically better than V (although not much better), but missing the console war references that made V great from a writing standpoint.
Hyperdimension Neptunia V (on PS3) is simply the best homage to the console wars I've experienced, turning companies into cute anime girls and having them constantly fighting each other for dominance. Each of their fights are based on real-world console war events (typically from a comedic standpoint).
You get only a tiny fraction of that in VIIR (and VII), with the game covering mostly the Dreamcast console. And since the Dreamcast didn't last long and didn't really compete with anything, there's not much interesting here console-wars wise.
So the game mostly relies on random (and far-in-between) video games references and character interactions. The interactions aren't bad, as long as you're okay with typical anime comedy. At least Neptune keeps things interesting. Her writing and Japanese voice actor are excellent, If you're into constant 4th-wall breaking comedy. And of course, if you like the characters from the past games or anime series, and didn't appreciate the abundance of real-world references, then you'll likely think this game is great.
The main plot is generic and full of holes, but it presents itself in a comedic fashion, which I find to be acceptable. Thankfully, It did cause me to laugh out loud about once an hour, primarily due to the rare video game reference here and there. To compare it to another IF game, Fairy Fencer F Advent Dark Force, VIIR's plot isn't nearly as interesting, and I consider Fairy Fencer F to be above average at best.
The combat has unfortunately been made more complex and easier that the previous games. For the entire game, standard battles posed no challenge to me. I simply had a character with an AOE skill attack and one-shot all enemies every time. And I could do that over and over since magic points automatically refill each turn. As for its complexity, this is mostly due to the menu system. Combos are gone and you now need to manually select each of your normal attacks as well as your defense options, every turn. So instead of pressing possibly 2-3 buttons in previous games to initiate an attack and move to your next turn, you now need to press 4-10, all while going through multiple menus. This can be somewhat mitigated by having your first character AOE attack everything with a single skill, which unfortunately also makes your normal skills completely worthless.
Another bad thing about the combat system is that all enemies in a dungeon, while being different sizes and having different attributes are essentially identical from a combat perspective. They all seem to have the same amount of hit points and the exact same strategy can be applied to them all. Gone is the time where random large enemies will be in a map that require wildly different strategies. Those have been replaced by bosses and bounties, all of which can be killed by a single strategy (at least it's different from the normal monster strategy).
Even though the combat bored me, a few things gameplay-wise kept me going. There's loads of dungeons, hidden monsters, costumes, weapons, accessories, and plans (which you use to create items) to find/unlock. This game has lots to keep people who love loot looking for more, including a post-game section where loot power/quality seems to increase forever. Costume variety is good compared to other games. You don't have to pay for DLC to get an acceptable number of costumes. There's about three primary costumes for the main characters and you also get swimsuits and special costumes (which I got randomly from the game's arena battles).
I recently played Cyberdimension Neptunia 4 Goddesses Online and the character models seem to be almost identical to that game: Strange high-poly faces (that don't look like their character portraits) and low-poly bottom-halves. IF's character models are improving, but they're not quite up to par to other games on the PS4 yet.
The VR sections are not very good. They consist almost entirely of the girls fawning over you per their pre-recorded script in a way that doesn't tie into the game's story or your actions within the game (besides calling you the "player"). If you're looking for meaningful interactivity in the same way that games like Ar No Surge did, you won't find that here. And if you're interested in motion controls, you won't get that either (at least not with the standard controller). Your viewpoint for looking at the girls is mostly fixed, and is never from low angles.
So it's not a bad game, but is far from great (unless you simply love these characters). I suspected IF would run out of things to write about after V covered the console wars almost entirely, and I was right. Here's hoping they come up with something interesting for the next in the series.
I have only recently been getting into this franchise on the Vita and was expecting them to really pick up their game for the new consoles. But No , its a bare bones, minimum effort throw together bore. A lot of the problem here were not so prevalent on the small screen, but on a TV with a new console, the long drawn out dialogue sections where you listen to picture, (not animated character, PICTURES) talk to each other about the long winded story are frustrating. The game play is just walking around a bland lifeless world occasionally getting into turn based style battle that are boring after ten minutes because there no strategy or evolution. The difficulty is,, get stuck!!! go back and replay the same missions over & over & over until your a high enough level. There no weapon or Armour that make a big difference to you damages.
Perhaps worst off all...sigh.....They re released a better looking more streamlined version of the same game a few months later!!!wtf!!. Ripping of the people who bought this game and expecting another $80 for the new version. I am done with the franchise and its publisher for pulling this. Their games are not that much to miss anyway, but getting scammed stings for a while. Even worse is there is VR content in the new version and I have a PSVR, but there no way i am spend over $120 to get a bit of VR content in a game that is utter crap.
SummaryMegadimension Neptunia VIIR (pronounced "V-two-R") is an enhanced version of 2016's Megadimension Neptunia VII featuring smoother graphics courtesy of a new engine, a revamped battle system, and a whole new VR experience. Now, their dimensions and yours are connected. Hang out one-on-one with each of the Gamindustri Goddesses, listen to ...