NEO: The World Ends with You Reviews
NEO: The World Ends With You is a great sequel that builds on the successful foundations of its predecessor. Fans of the original will relish this title, as it’s really worth the wait and helps to finally answer many questions left over for the last game. There is a great mix of combat and puzzles that will keep players on their toes. Saying that the overworld is very limited with next to no chances to explore Shibuya in its entirety.
All in all, NEO: The World Ends with You manages to escape the pitfall of being a period piece by taking the Heathers approach to youth culture and focusing more on capturing the feeling of youth than trying to accurately portray the ever-shifting trends. It has a fun cast, an interesting story, and a much more straightforward battle system with room to spend ages gathering collectibles and getting your pin load-out just right. Unfortunately, its cast is generally more well-adjusted than the original game’s traumatized teenagers, meaning that this game doesn’t hit quite as hard as the original The World Ends with You.
NEO: The World Ends With You remains in the mind of its elder. It offers an updated formula of the base game, new heroes and an even more exciting story. The system has been revised to be less frustrating.
Review in French | Read full review
NEO: The World Ends With You is the worthy sequel to one of the most unique JRPGs created by Square Enix, and takes the strengths of its predecessor reformulating them as needed. The result is a unique game in style, mechanics and setting intended to keep completists busy for over fifty hours within a story full of twists and turns.
Review in Italian | Read full review
All gripes aside, if you're a fan of JRPGs in general, particularly the urban sprawl and social checklists of Persona, you will absolutely love NEO: The World Ends With You. This property deserves a series as expansive as its Disney-sponsored big brother, and hopefully, this sequel and the connected anime series will justify a true current-gen instalment at some point in the future.
NEO: The World Ends With You is the excellent sequel of one of the most unique JRPG ever released, featuring a stylish setting, charming characters, engaging story, masterfully crafted action combat, and tons of content that are on par (if not better) with the original. While some of the novelty is lost, as the game does not innovate the series' mechanics in any significant way, NEO: The World Ends With You is truly the sequel that all fans of the franchise were waiting for.
Neo: The World Ends With You offers up something all its own while still keeping its roots in view. Some slow pacing and long-in-tooth writing doesn't keep Neo from being a delightful RPG. If the art style and music don't take you, then the combat and its mechanics will.
This is one of the most stylish and heartfelt games I’ve had the pleasure of playing in years. It gave me everything I was looking for, and so much more I didn’t even know I wanted.
Overall, NEO: The World Ends With You is a wonderful homage for fans of the series, in many ways it seems like a remake of The World Ends With You on a bigger screen and a fresh set of faces. However, if you were not a fan of the original game, NEO may come across as lacking in plot and game mechanics; perhaps it is worth a rewind to really appreciate the lore of this franchise.
The soundtrack is monotonous, the menus are a slog, and it often becomes too easy to button-mash to victory. But otherwise, NEO: The World Ends with You is a really cleverly designed game that packs a terrific amount of content into a small game world, and that even stays true continuing into the postgame. An engaging narrative that successfully expands upon the world of the original brings the entire experience together, and the final result is another inimitably unique action RPG from Square Enix.
Players coming in fresh to Neo: The World Ends with You might have a 14-year history to contend with, but that won't stop them from falling in love with Shibuya. Whether it's the complex and likable characters, the wickedly twisting storyline, or the frenetic yet strategic combat system, the long-awaited sequel has a lot to offer fans of action RPGs and the cult-classic series alike. Whether it was worth the wait depends on how long you've been waiting, but newcomers shouldn't shy away from this fantastic game.
NEO : The World Ends With You will keep you hooked with its pretty universe, charming characters, captivating story and its very nice manga/anime design. It has a lot of intersting RPG mechanics that connect you with its world, but in terms of battle system, it is still a bit limited and repetitive.
Review in French | Read full review
A great sequel for a very special action RPG. NEO: The Worlds Ends With You is exactly the kind of new game that the fans wanted.
Review in Spanish | Read full review
Longtime fans of The World Ends With You may not have an issue with this slow gameplay loop because of all the great callbacks to the first game, but it does end up feeling like the game could’ve been a shorter, more enjoyable package if some of the days didn’t feel so padded.
We had many concerns about NEO: The World Ends with You. Once we arrived near the test bench, however, the product silenced most of the doubts that have accompanied us for months, involving us with an intriguing story and a combat system based on customization and timing.
Review in Italian | Read full review
NEO: The World Ends With You effortlessly combines deep JRPG combat and systems with stylish accessibility, resulting in a memorable, excellent game.
NEO: The World Ends With You impresses in all the categories we were terrified it could fail in. The game boasts an energetic soundtrack that feeds off the energy of the original, a deep and rewarding combat system that makes a successful leap to 3D, an inspiring cast of characters that stand tall on their own, and importantly, a world that begs you to come back even after you've finished the 40+ hour campaign. After 13 long years, many fans lost hope we'd ever see a sequel to that first Reapers Game, but we're so pleased to see these talented developers never lost their calling.
NEO: The World Ends with You was absolutely worth the fourteen year wait. Its unique battle system, beautiful art, and accessibility for multiple audiences make it worthwhile. Beyond that, the lack of a grind and ability to play as you want make this JRPG worthy of being added to your collection. Although the menus can contribute to information overload and the game itself is fairly linear, NEO: TWEWY succeeds in telling a unique and engaging story without the slog of other games in the JRPG genre. In short: NEO: TWEWY is outstanding; be warned: you will become addicted.
In conclusion, Neo: The World Ends With You was a wonderful experience to play, and while it has a lot going on within the game, it teaches these different mechanics slowly and expertly. With the combination of a good story, great dialogue, complex puzzles, and flashy combat, Neo was a welcomed surprise and is a truly unique game. Comparisons would not be worthwhile for the most part. The closest comparison that could be made would be to Kingdom Hearts, but that might be an insult to Neo. It is an action RPG with many complex mechanics going on, but it won’t leave players confused and the combat isn’t as finicky. There are a lot of things that are packed into this long game, but they are done very well and are able to work in tandem with one another smoothly. This game is truly unique and would be worthwhile to buy to experience how this sticker bomb of a game manages to keep its punk aesthetic and be a game that is difficult to describe but not hard to recommend in any capacity.
Overall, NEO: The World Ends with You is a fantastic followup to 2007’s The World Ends with You, and both expands the universe and introduces different gameplay styles to keep even the most veteren of JRPG fans engaged. The exceptional visual style and musical flair work together to create a vibrant and stylish game that I just couldn’t get enough of. The narrative is satisfying and fits firmly in the hyper-stylised world of JRPGs, and will delight fans of Kingdom Hearts, Ni No Kuni, and Persona. Despite some minor critiques, NEO: The World Ends with You is a surprise hit, and has the potential to pave the way for another successful Square Enix franchise.