Neptunia Virtual Stars Reviews
Neptunia Virtual Stars is a good game in the long-running series, but does fall short in terms of being a great gateway game.
If you can get past its confusing story, Neptunia Virtual Stars has a great setting and decent combat that fans of the series will enjoy.
Neptunia Virtual Stars is a great new direction for the series. It's weird and unexpected, but it's a breath of fresh-air compared to the familiar territory the last few games have been treading. There's a massive amount of love for vtuber culture in this game and it helps lift up the fun and refreshing story. It's a shame that the combat couldn't reach the same highs as the rest of the game, but while it's a major wrinkle, it doesn't ruin the entire experience. Any hardcore vtuber fan needs to play this game, and some clunky combat won't change that.
Neptunia Virtual Stars is best served to either VTuber fans, Neptunia fans, or both. There's little appeal here for other types of gamers. There are many, many better third-person shooters out there, and plenty of JRPGs worthy of a huge timesink. At least you'll get a full-length, fully-voiced adventure for your trouble with Neptunia Virtual Stars, but unless you've really got a thing for the VTube lifestyle mixed with hyper-cuteness, your time is probably better spent elsewhere.
Very little of Neptunia Virtual Stars makes it a franchise entry worth playing. Simplicity here lacks the success of other entries, instead offering something clunky and dull. Consider this a Neptunia title barely meant for die-hard fans and no one else.
While Neptune and her friends are just as enthusiastic and charming as ever, both the gameplay and story feels a little stale. It’s great that the developer has managed to seamlessly blend together real V-tubers with the ladies from Gamesindustri, but it’s a real shame that there’s nothing else that lifts this game above average.
Neptunia Virtual Stars serves up the same zany storytelling that you’ve come to expect from the series mixed with third-person shooting and hack-and-slash action. While the gameplay shows flashes of promise, the overall experience is stymied by the game’s basic level design, uneven difficulty and poor AI for whichever partner you are not controlling. While the game might be a pass for most, it might still be worth getting for hardcore Neptunia fans for the dialogue alone, which remains hilariously on point.
Neptune and her friends return for yet another spin-off in the Neptunia series; their dive into the world of Vtubers is a dull and unremarkable experience unfortunately.
Unsurprisingly, Neptunia Virtual Stars hinges on what exactly you're looking for. If that answer is a quirky RPG with tight and deep mechanics, you'll likely be disappointed. However, if you just want a fun RPG that has amusing interactions and cute characters, it will likely be fun. That isn't to say Neptunia Virtual Stars is a bad game, it just doesn't particularly stand out in any positive or negative way.
Neptunia Virtual Stars ends up coming on stage as one of the poorer entries in the Neptunia franchise.
Compile Heart still seems on the right track, but the Neptunia franchise needs to meet higher standards or it will be quickly left behind by the AA competition.
Should you play Neptunia Virtual Stars? Unless you’re a fan of the quirky Goddesses, I’d give this one a wide berth. Sure, shooting a range of weird and wonderful enemies is fun for a while, but if third person shooting or hacking-and-slashing is what you’re after, there are way better games to do that in. Ultimately, its annoyances far outweigh its pros, and there’s not much here worth sticking around for.
Neptunia Virtual Stars is a tough game to recommend even for the fans. The regular cast of characters remains as engaging as ever, while the newcomers fit in quite nicely. The story is a nice take on parodying the current state of the internet using the unique viewpoint that the series has carved for itself. Beyond the overly long cut scenes, the gameplay is dull despite the variety that the title and minigames try to provide. While this game won't attract any newcomers, hardcore fans might want to dabble with this after a very deep discount.
There is some fun to be had with the cast of girls here but just don’t expect to come away from it feeling like you experienced something that you haven’t seen before.
The inclusion of popular Vtubers' isn't enough to save Neptunia Virtual Stars, as it ends up being an underwhelming mess that fails to deliver.
Neptunia Virtual Stars is, in short, a title that tries to accomplish too many things and the result is disastrous in every aspect. Fans of the Neptunia series or V-Tubers may find some brief fun moments, but the gameplay has structural issues so serious that it is hard to recommend this title to anyone.
Review in Portuguese | Read full review
Neptunia Virtual Stars is an intelligent, relevant, topical and timely satire. It does represent a new direction for the series, and is clearly an effort to find a way to stay relevant now that the jokes that previously provided the foundation for the series have lost their relevance. In doing so Idea Factory decided to experiment with the gameplay, and while that wasn't executed to a particularly fine degree, the heavier focus on narrative and the sheer energy of the whole package means that I found it impossible to remain disappointed by the game's rough edges. The rest of it was too much of a laugh-out-loud delight.
There is no doubt that Neptunia Virtual Stars is a perfect match for the world of social media and Vtubers. The execution of this title may not be perfect in the peripheral elements, but overall it is a solid addition to the series. Returning fans and new ones alike will enjoy seeing their favourite Goddesses and getting to know the new characters. The fact that the Vtubers are real outside of the the experience is a big pull for Vtuber fans as they can get to know their favourite stars more deeply through this experience. Even when the main story is concluded, there is still plenty of V-Cubes to collect, new strong enemies to kill and Beatnik to master, making it a title that can't be missed for fans of the Neptunia universe.
Neptunia Virtual Stars is one of my favourite spin-offs in the delightful franchise as it contains a brilliant blend of gameplay elements, a wonderful cast of characters, and one of the funniest meta premises in gaming history.
I don’t think it’s a total swing and a miss like Super Neptunia RPG was, but that may have made the experience more disappointing considering all the parts I liked.