Interested in Neptunia, but which game should I start with?

[Ryltair]

I'm a sucker for RPGs and the cheerful sexyness of Japanese games. Not a fan of JRPGs per se as I generally don't like their storylines of kids saving the universe from evil.

I noticed Neptunia popping up on the Steam store and it got me intrigued, especially the custom difficulty aspect (I love that in Diablo 3 I can crank up the difficulty for more loot at any time). I also noticed that there's a ton of Neptunia games, with this one being the most recent.

Is this also the most fleshed out version? Should I start with it or are there other games that I should play first?

[AkaiRam]

Rebirth 1 is a different Dimension than Rebirth 2 and 3 they share the same dimension as in candidates and cpus, in 3 they go to a different dimension but they belong together, megadimension is then after those 2, neptunia action unleashed is a spin off but probably is same dimension as rebirth 2 and 3, noire is a different game with chibis and such.

so i'd say

Rebirth 1, Rebirth 2, Rebirth 3, Action U, Noire, Megadimension

Action U is a hack and slash game, noire is like differently in turned base battle compared to the other 4 games, but may strike your interest if you have an interest in a tsundere character that is Noire.

[spigot]

Start with rebirth 3, it is uniquely relaxed, but be warned at disappointments, only about 50% of the text in the dialog box is voiced, (except in neptunia U where it's 100%), roughly 60% combat, 40% dialog (of which 50% is voiced).

[Nep Elodie]

Megadimension actually doesn't have any difficulty settings sadly.

The Neptunia games are mostly for the story and character interactions. I'd say the strongest point with the Nep series is that it is one of the few RPG series that actually continues with the same characters across various stories. So if you want to get invested in a cheerful series with the same set of characters just for story and/or interactions, Neptunia series is that.

Megadimension Neptunia VII is probably the most fleshed out (story, gameplay, etc). IMO, you don't really need to play the other games to get the story.

Rebirth 1 is a good intro the series. Although technically Rebirth 1 is a standalone game, it does setup most of the characters and also reveal a bit of background regarding the CPUs and a bit of the candidates as well (although a small scene).

Rebirth 2 is the one of the few games that is nearly fully dubbed in English (if you prefer English, this may be a selling point of the game but otherwise all games have nearly full Japanese dub) but storywise, the plot (and gameplay) is probably the most padded (the story in Rebirth 2 is basically a series of fetch quests for most of the game where you can't even use most of the CPUs or even candidates until over the half way point). There are some tech issues with Rebirth 2 though (there are crashes sometimes that still haven't been fixed).

Rebirth 3 has a lot in terms of content but in terms of story, is probably the least serious (the characters joke more often in Rebirth 3 than other games). It is kind of eventful (more so than Rebirth 2) though.

Anyway, I'd say Megadimension isn't bad start. I'd say the story is probably the strongest in Megadimension (the game does a good job of giving each character individual story points), and there's lots of eventful things that happen (the scenes are interesting enough to make you wonder what is going to happen next).

A few other things to note:

1. Most of the scenes are done in visual novel format (mostly just characters talking).

2. Most of the Neptunia games aren't fully English voiced (a lot of scenes have no voices in English) but the Japanese are mostly fully voiced usually.

3. Games are turn based RPG. In terms of mechanics, the series is kind of simple in terms of combat. It's mostly a "do strongest attacks, heal if needed, and repeat" type of turn based RPG (not too complicated) in terms of the actual combat. It's more of an RPG that is enjoyed for leveling up or trying to get the next items rather than the combat system itself. There can be a bit of planning needed and a few tries before some battles though but for the most part, the combat isn't too complicated.

You should look up some videos first and see if you enjoy the format.

[Ifrit's ShadowA41™]

Do you have a PS3?
Get the original and Mk.2.
If not, get Re;Birth 1 and Victory II. They're the only ones worth getting on Steam. I think the original game was the only one that had difficulty settings. I don't remember if Mk.2 does.

[RiO]

Originally posted by spigot:

Start with rebirth 3, it is uniquely relaxed, but be warned at disappointments, only about 50% of the text in the dialog box is voiced, (except in neptunia U where it's 100%), roughly 60% combat, 40% dialog (of which 50% is voiced).

Only if you play with English voices. The Japanese voice work covers about 95% of the game. (There were a few scenes that came as last-moment additions to the original Japanese release, after the voice recording work had already been done.)

[horizonnine]

Megadimension by far is the best of them all but it will spoil you, not that the other games are bad but this one is amazing. That said rebirth 1-3 are great too can't go wrong with any of them in my opinion. Oh and if happy is what your playing these games for beware the conquest ending in mk 2 haha.
edit: Oh and there is some crazy people on the internet that say Blanc is best cpu but they are crazy you'll see Vert is best.

[UnLuckyCat]

Originally posted by Bollock Chowtime™:

Do you have a PS3?
Get the original and Mk.2.
If not, get Re;Birth 1 and Victory II. They're the only ones worth getting on Steam. I think the original game was the only one that had difficulty settings. I don't remember if Mk.2 does.

First time I've ever seen anyone recommend the original PS3 game. Re;Birth 1 is entirely different, so unless you read a plot summary or watch a playthrough you'll need a PS3 to get the full experience, but I wouldn't wish that on anybody.

mk2's my favorite so far, but I don't like the changes in Re;Birth 2, so I'm torn.

Re;Birth 3 is pretty much the same as Victory, so either's fine there. Reason being is all the R;B games borrowed the combat system from V, so they're all rather samey. Original, mk2, and V-II all have different gameplay than Victory and the remakes.

Thing is all the games borrow heavily from each other, so playing R;B1 afterwards can get old since you've seen it all before, especially if you get all the DLC characters. But it works as a starting point, especially since it's cheaper than the others having been release so long ago. If you hate it then there's no point in getting the other two Re;Births.

V-II follows after V, so if you care about what little continuity the series has then you shouldn't start here. Generally it doesn't matter too much since the stories are rather self contained, but the mechanics are so different that I'd advise against beginning with V-II unless you're sure it'll be the only Neptunia game you ever play.

But yeah, if you've got a PS3 you could try to find the games for cheap. There's even that Hypercollection with all three on one disc. You can quit the first game within the first hour, appreciate everything that was fixed in mk2, notice all the new changes in V, get major deja vu with Re;Birth 1, and then unlearn everything when you get to V-II.

[darth.crevette]

I'd stay clear of the original PS3 game if I were you.
Among the ones on Steam, I'd start with Rebirth1; it's not the best one, but you can usually get it for very cheap during sales, so you can try it out and see if you enjoy it.

[Ifrit's ShadowA41™]

Originally posted by UnLuckyCat:

Originally posted by Bollock Chowtime™:

Do you have a PS3?
Get the original and Mk.2.
If not, get Re;Birth 1 and Victory II. They're the only ones worth getting on Steam. I think the original game was the only one that had difficulty settings. I don't remember if Mk.2 does.

First time I've ever seen anyone recommend the original PS3 game. Re;Birth 1 is entirely different, so unless you read a plot summary or watch a playthrough you'll need a PS3 to get the full experience, but I wouldn't wish that on anybody.

mk2's my favorite so far, but I don't like the changes in Re;Birth 2, so I'm torn.

Re;Birth 3 is pretty much the same as Victory, so either's fine there. Reason being is all the R;B games borrowed the combat system from V, so they're all rather samey. Original, mk2, and V-II all have different gameplay than Victory and the remakes.

Thing is all the games borrow heavily from each other, so playing R;B1 afterwards can get old since you've seen it all before, especially if you get all the DLC characters. But it works as a starting point, especially since it's cheaper than the others having been release so long ago. If you hate it then there's no point in getting the other two Re;Births.

V-II follows after V, so if you care about what little continuity the series has then you shouldn't start here. Generally it doesn't matter too much since the stories are rather self contained, but the mechanics are so different that I'd advise against beginning with V-II unless you're sure it'll be the only Neptunia game you ever play.

But yeah, if you've got a PS3 you could try to find the games for cheap. There's even that Hypercollection with all three on one disc. You can quit the first game within the first hour, appreciate everything that was fixed in mk2, notice all the new changes in V, get major deja vu with Re;Birth 1, and then unlearn everything when you get to V-II.

If your main Nep area is Steam, then that's not surprising.
Most people treat it like ♥♥♥♥, but excluding the healing system I'd say it's the best overall. I didn't play Mk.2 a lot, but it's better than everything after it.