Hyperdimension Neptunia...........:)
Killzone 3 is about to come out and some say im mad for choosing to buy a niche title like this over killzone 3. But there is method to the madness. At the end of the day i buy games in the UK all the time, Littlebigplanet being one of them, so im happy to support the british games industy but i feel that to keeps niche games like this coming into our small island we must buy them. NIS AMERICA have realeased some great titles such as CROSS EDGE and the DISGAEA series.
So my pledge to you all is this. Killzone (and games like it) will stay in cerculation so help the niche market stay in business. Lets face it the best RPG,s come from America and Japan.
RIGHT!!!! thats the rant over time to talk about the game. The games story is one i find very unique in the fact that its based on the current gereration of console wars. The world is called gamindustri (GAME INDUSTRY) and is surrounded by 4 smaller continents called loststation (PLAYSTATION), leenbox (XBOX), LOWEE (WII) and planeptune ( which is names after the unrealeased SEGA NEPTUNE). These places are each protected by four godesses who have been at war for many years ( REFERENCE TO THE CONSOLE WAR). As these characters fight your character is flung out of the world and wakes up somewhere with no recolection of what happend.
You play as a character called Neptune (again a reference to the unreleased sega neptune) who is to save the world from the evil goddess Arfoire (named after the R4 nintendo DS illeagle storage device).
To do this you have to seek out the Historie Book which holds the seacrets to the worlds.
There is loads of Nerdy references in this game which gamers will enjoy. Having not played the game myself you may think me unrealiable but ive herd many positive reviews from the community and they are not easily pleased when it comes to great RPG's! The combat system is turned based which is a blast to the past and for most a welcome change to the usual RPG style. This is mind the battles are based on speed, your character being able to perform hundreds of combo's, their turn being up when you have no AP left. Its possible to gain AP bonus' depending on speed and other factors.
This brings me to the really fun part. Neptune has the ability to transform into a CPU ( basically a better version of herself ) which gives her more health, better stats and even a new personality. This CPU can be customised completely from how it looks, weapons, stats etc. At this point im not sure but i believe that there are other characters that have CPU im not sure.
By now this should have your RPG juices flowing. It gets better, each dungeon is randomly generated, so you never get the same dungeon (at least for a while) which keeps things fresh. the quicker you complete a dungeon the better the rewards at the end. Dungeons usually have side quests in them and take place away from the main story and are ofeten used to grind up those levels.
The only bad thing ive seen in this game is the healing system which is random. You have a percentage that your characters will heal ( this is only made better as the levels go up and the percentage increases ), this means you have to have the right ingrediants in your inventory for you to heal. Some people find it really hard at the biginning of the game because the percentage chance of healing is low and has you dont recover helf in dungeons makes them really hard to start with. After normal story battles etc you gain full health etc after battles.
Anime graphics make this game authentic (think eternal sonata as an idea) and the combo' and CPU's get very flashy. everything you expect. The fing that may put you off is that its very moe anime (these girls are underage and wearing next to nothing). i didnt find this a problem (no im not a pervert) but to some people is can put them off. Dont be put off because underneath some of the sillyness and moe anime moments is a serious game telling a great story of the game industry against illegal copyrighting and the war between the main players in the console war....obviously with is being a playstation 3 exclusive the winner is clear ha ha ha ha joke i dont know the story ends but i really recommend you buy this product. Its git Japan hooked, america hooked and hopefully the Britch RPG community hooked. i for one carnt wait for this!!!!!
Also i forgot to mention that you can customise your own special attacks using pictures from your playstation XMB. For example ive seen videos of people summing their Nissan skyline from GT5.........
http://www.facebook.com/home.php#!/pages/Hyperdimension-Neptunia-UK/132705846802614 check this out for all UK fans (EU)