Neptunia: Sisters VS Sisters

海王星系列剧情内涵最严肃的一作

This was honestly a wonderful experience. Granted, as a JRPG it's severely lacking – which can be said about many IF/CH titles, but it's twice as true here. SvS is the first Neptunia game to be made in Unity, as well as to feature this brand-new type of combat, and since both clearly meant significant extra effort for a relatively low-budget developer like them, most gameplay mechanics here are merely first iterations; a base to expand and polish up later on. They’re fine if you view it as part of the series and plan to play these "later on", but for a standalone product they feel painfully basic. The battles are flashy, well-paced, reasonably engaging, but also simplistic and repetitive. It appears the intent was to create a middle ground between turn-based and pure action systems, akin to the Tales Of series or other "fighting-game-lite" examples where you have to consider delays and plan a bit ahead rather than simply react in real time. There’s not nearly enough balance to realize this intent, though, so in 95% of cases you just press buttons and stunlock everything to death. You’re also forced to regularly switch between party members while doing so, since it’s the only way to avoid running out of AP; otherwise it becomes half-fighting, half-waiting. Combine this with a modest roster of 8 playable characters (two more are locked until NG+ for some strange reason, while another two are only available on Switch for reasons equally unknown) plus the fact that goddesses’ transformations and EXE drives can now only happen once in a blue moon, and you’re in danger of getting bored fast. The side quests are rudimentary as well: just go to the same dungeons and do the same stuff you already did there during the main story’s visit. The dungeons themselves got a tad more branching and spacious, but it’s an empty spaciousness, filled with either shallow puzzles or nothing at all. The best new addition is no doubt the appearance of Planeptune as an actual free-roam hub area, featuring multiple districts and a big Planeptower skyscraper to explore, yet there isn't much to do here either other than running around and admiring the views. However, it's not really a JRPG, it's a VN hybrid with some light gameplay on the side – which, again, can be said about many IF/CH titles, but this one seems to understand it twice as well. The game never offers more than a token amount of dungeon crawling or mechanical side activities at a time, implicitly inviting even the most dedicated completionists to fully focus on the dialogues, characters and story. And what a story it is! To call it a massive step-up compared to other spin-offs would be an understatement – this is easily the most ambitious, thoughtful, well-planned and well-written narrative in the entire series. It has humor, drama, mystery, stakes and good characterization. It's tight, fast-paced, concentrated, and always rewards your attention by saying something relevant. It has complexity, thematic variety, twists that just keep on coming, and a good dozen of plot points all converging at the end. That's not to say it's perfect, or even the kind of narrative you'd want to mention as a masterclass in storytelling. While most Neptunia entries are guilty of meaningless filler conversations, SvS exhibits the opposite problem: it crams so much stuff into a relatively short game, there’s no time to flesh out most of it. One might even say it often devolves into a sequence of quick handwaves: "A happened because B, now let’s move on, we have a lot to cover". Even so, logic- and worldbuilding-wise this story does better than many other examples out there, and its dedication to offering at least some reasonable explanation for everything from A to Z is impressive. I’ve seen JRPG/VN narratives 4x longer and 4x less complicated still fall apart the moment you start to think about them, while this one actually doesn’t, which is a serious achievement in its own right. There's a huge wall of Chekhov's guns here, and while some are loaded with duds, it keeps diligently firing every single one of them anyway. But even before the main story gets up to speed, there’s enough enjoyment to be had thanks to the game’s charming humor and character interactions, as the writing is again on par with the best parts of VII, as well as thanks to its thoughtful commentary on the gaming industry. This last meta layer and the way it allegorically incorporated real events (like the great crash of 1983 or the merger of Square and Enix) into its offbeat fantasy setting has always been Neptunia’s most fascinating aspect, but never before has it felt so relevant, confident and universal. It talks about the COVID-19 pandemic and the many changes it caused; about smartphone addiction and device wars; about influencers and the silly amount of effort it takes to "stay trendy"; about gacha and cloud gaming and Pokemon Go and Shenmue 3 and PS5 production shortages and… well, there’s just no limit to its references; the more gaming experience you have, the more relatable it becomes. It mentions both the good and the bad yet never judges or dismisses; on the contrary, it is a positive, hopeful outlook full of appreciation for all facets of modern digital entertainment, which is a refreshing perspective when "social commentary" is often equated with "social critique". Also, while I usually try to refrain from "gatekeeping" Japanese games simply because I happened to invest my time into learning the language and can now play the originals, with SvS in particular, I think a number of immersive subtleties might get lost in translation. The central character’s speech style is focused on funny Japanese internet slang, and the voice acting is as expressive as ever. I can only imagine that the English text + dub delivers a significantly different (though not necessarily inferior) experience. When writing a [url=https://steamcommunity.com/id/KisekiDrillTeam/recommended/282900]review for Re;Birth1[/url] last year, I lamented the franchise’s decline and wondered if the developers had stopped caring – or, conversely, cared so much they kept putting it off. After playing Sisters VS Sisters, and with the next mainline entry finally en route, I’m convinced it was the latter. They really do care about Neptunia a lot, in their own way. One might view many IF/CH activities as something done with this eventual return in mind: first improving the team’s skills on darker, more story-focused works (Fairy Fencer F, Death end re;Quest, Dragon Star Varnir, Dark Rose Valkyrie), then making two spin-offs instead of immediately jumping into a big main title to lay the groundwork and get used to the new engine. One might even say the delay was necessary, since, to keep commenting on the state of the industry, something new must happen to it first, and SvS certainly couldn’t have been made before smartphones or COVID. Even so, it’s hard to argue that Neptunia was creatively neglected for almost a decade. Ironically, this game has paid for it retroactively, as many fatigued fans were quick to [url=https://steamcommunity.com/app/1932160/discussions/0/3818531444653288506]write it off[/url] as yet another half-assed spin-off or lambaste [url=https://www.reddit.com/r/gamindustri/comments/12fspag/neptunia_sisters_vs_sisters_received_censorship]the presence of censorship[/url] (a very dangerous trigger word in these gaming circles, even when it barely affects anything). It’s entirely possible this was a fluke and we’ll soon be back to one-dimensional characters who have nothing new to say. It’s also possible the sales or ratings will stay low enough to scrap the series altogether. But for me SvS was enough to start feeling much more optimistic about Neptunia’s future, and I can wholeheartedly recommend it to anyone not completely allergic to JRPG tropes. Because, despite all its obvious shortcomings, this is a game with a whole lot of heart.

анимешники не люди

正当スピンオフということで、過去作との繋がりがあり感動しました。内容も面白かったです。 Deluxe Editionを購入したのですが、ルートディレクトリ内を探しても特典の入っているフォルダが見つかりませんでした。調べた結果、デフォルトでゲームのプロパティからDLCのチェックが外れており、そちらをチェックしたことでフォルダに特典が追加され自己解決しました。参考までに。

Its not great, its not terrible. Its, gerrible?

whoever made this game needs to learn how to properly animate characters going up a ladder/pushing a cube LOL characters keep glitching out from both of them and it just a joke i should say the game is fun and all overall but its annoying how i cant even climb a ladder right or push a cube without it spazzing my character out ethier way im enjoying the game

This battle system awful. I hate it. I played just only for the plot. There is a very good thing in this game: we can walk waround on the streets of natural Planeptune.

nep

比上代妹妹做主角的那部好. 劇情節奏流暢又舒服, 但後面有點虐新女神. 人物一樣可愛. 就是刷支線有點悶. 遊戲性? 閣下信仰不足了.

这作必须差评，操作稀烂，优化还差