(this is a repost of my Steam review for this game with some slight modifications. you can read the original review here: https://steamcommunity.com/id/huuishuu/recommended/353270/)
Honestly...compared to the original game on the PS3 - Hyperdimension Neptunia Victory - I consider Re;Birth3 to be a step backwards. I'm truly not a big fan of Re;Birth3, despite how much it actually attempts to remix and improve upon what Victory did bad.
Here are areas where Re;Birth3 improves upon Victory:
- Reduced difficulty.
Victory was sort of infamous for being insanely tough and very grindy. I've counted many times on Victory where I was thrown into a boss battle, only to realize I was incredibly under-leveled and underprepared for it. A perfect example would be the first Blanc boss battle where I had to grind nearly 15 levels to actually stand a chance against her. Re;Birth3 solves this problem by not only reducing the difficulty overall, but also by essentially shoving overpowered characters into your party that make grinding pretty much a non-issue.
- Additional story content.
Re;Birth3 attempts to remix the story from Victory by adding additional supplementary material. You get to experience it as soon as you start the game as you are thrown into a VR-esque world as Neptune and navigate a mini-dungeon to escape it. Stuff like that is peppered throughout the game and it's a welcome addition.
- More maker characters.
Victory as a whole was only played with CPU characters. IF and Compa were not playable and it didn't have any other maker characters, at least not without DLC to my understanding. Re;Birth3 solves that problem by giving you more maker characters to use in battle and actually incorporates them into the story without drastically altering everything.
- Framerate.
Victory on PS3 is also infamous for running like absolute crap. The game can't even hold a steady 30 FPS most of the time and dips into the teens very frequently. For some - that makes the game absolutely unplayable and I can understand that. Thankfully, Re;Birth3 solves that issue with a silky smooth, uncapped framerate, or you can choose to manually cap it to 60 with VSync or something.
Here are areas where Re;Birth3 falls short compared to Victory:
- The PC port.
I had a lot of trouble with the PC port of Re;Birth3 in particular. From random softlocks, game crashes, black screens, etc., it was genuinely frustrating at times to deal with this poor port of the game. There are tons of community made patches for these issues, but unless you know where to look - the experience out of the box is not going to be a pleasant one.
- The gameplay.
Re;Birth1 and Re;Birth2 were heavily based upon Victory's gameplay. Heck, I'd argue those games are just reskins of Victory slapped onto Steam, which wouldn't exactly be inaccurate, but those games are superior because Victory's gameplay formula works. Re;Birth3 attempts to mix things up from the other Re;Birth games by changing one small yet crucial mechanic - the EXE drive. Short and to the point - it's annoying and cumbersome in this game, making it way less useful than it was in the previous games.
- No scouting system.
The scouting system in the original, while a bit annoying since it was required for the True Ending, was overall a fun side-mechanic to unlock optional dungeons you can use for grinding or getting useful items early on if you get lucky. That system is gone from Re;Birth3 and instead replaced with the much slower, much less useful Stella's Dungeon mechanic.
I'm sorry to say but I don't really recommend Re;Birth3. The additions and improvements are nice and all, but with a crappy PC port, inferior gameplay due to the gimped EXE system and the removal of the scouting system makes me prefer the original version of the game by a longshot. It sucks too because I think that Victory's story, despite being incredibly long and the cutscenes feeling like they take 60 years to complete, is the best in the series, considering it's the perfect chance to get to know a set of CPUs from a different dimension right down from their humble beginnings.
Victory/Re;Birth3 takes place in what's canonically known as the Ultradimension, and you begin the game in a very primitive version of Gamindustri with 2 nations, eventually expanding into 5 as you go on through the game. You get to see each CPU's humble beginnings and how they deal with hardships running their nations and all that stuff - it goes through a very Neptunia-esque story about competition, co-operation and then defeating some bigger villain in the picture. In Victory/Re;Birth3 - you get to experience every waking moment and, to me - that makes the story engaging and a lot more personal. I seriously prefer the Ultradimension CPUs to the Hyperdimension ones.
It's just a shame that Re;Birth3 is just not very good in my opinion. If you have a PS3 and don't mind the flaws I pointed out about Victory here - that version is the one you should get, should you want to experience it. But if you don't and are considering Re;Birth3 - at least consider looking into fixing the awful PC port yourself via community patches so the game doesn't freeze or softlock constantly for you.
Honestly...compared to the original game on the PS3 - Hyperdimension Neptunia Victory - I consider Re;Birth3 to be a step backwards. I'm truly not a big fan of Re;Birth3, despite how much it actually attempts to remix and improve upon what Victory did bad.
Here are areas where Re;Birth3 improves upon Victory:
- Reduced difficulty.
Victory was sort of infamous for being insanely tough and very grindy. I've counted many times on Victory where I was thrown into a boss battle, only to realize I was incredibly under-leveled and underprepared for it. A perfect example would be the first Blanc boss battle where I had to grind nearly 15 levels to actually stand a chance against her. Re;Birth3 solves this problem by not only reducing the difficulty overall, but also by essentially shoving overpowered characters into your party that make grinding pretty much a non-issue.
- Additional story content.
Re;Birth3 attempts to remix the story from Victory by adding additional supplementary material. You get to experience it as soon as you start the game as you are thrown into a VR-esque world as Neptune and navigate a mini-dungeon to escape it. Stuff like that is peppered throughout the game and it's a welcome addition.
- More maker characters.
Victory as a whole was only played with CPU characters. IF and Compa were not playable and it didn't have any other maker characters, at least not without DLC to my understanding. Re;Birth3 solves that problem by giving you more maker characters to use in battle and actually incorporates them into the story without drastically altering everything.
- Framerate.
Victory on PS3 is also infamous for running like absolute crap. The game can't even hold a steady 30 FPS most of the time and dips into the teens very frequently. For some - that makes the game absolutely unplayable and I can understand that. Thankfully, Re;Birth3 solves that issue with a silky smooth, uncapped framerate, or you can choose to manually cap it to 60 with VSync or something.
Here are areas where Re;Birth3 falls short compared to Victory:
- The PC port.
I had a lot of trouble with the PC port of Re;Birth3 in particular. From random softlocks, game crashes, black screens, etc., it was genuinely frustrating at times to deal with this poor port of the game. There are tons of community made patches for these issues, but unless you know where to look - the experience out of the box is not going to be a pleasant one.
- The gameplay.
Re;Birth1 and Re;Birth2 were heavily based upon Victory's gameplay. Heck, I'd argue those games are just reskins of Victory slapped onto Steam, which wouldn't exactly be inaccurate, but those games are superior because Victory's gameplay formula works. Re;Birth3 attempts to mix things up from the other Re;Birth games by changing one small yet crucial mechanic - the EXE drive. Short and to the point - it's annoying and cumbersome in this game, making it way less useful than it was in the previous games.
- No scouting system.
The scouting system in the original, while a bit annoying since it was required for the True Ending, was overall a fun side-mechanic to unlock optional dungeons you can use for grinding or getting useful items early on if you get lucky. That system is gone from Re;Birth3 and instead replaced with the much slower, much less useful Stella's Dungeon mechanic.
I'm sorry to say but I don't really recommend Re;Birth3. The additions and improvements are nice and all, but with a crappy PC port, inferior gameplay due to the gimped EXE system and the removal of the scouting system makes me prefer the original version of the game by a longshot. It sucks too because I think that Victory's story, despite being incredibly long and the cutscenes feeling like they take 60 years to complete, is the best in the series, considering it's the perfect chance to get to know a set of CPUs from a different dimension right down from their humble beginnings.
Victory/Re;Birth3 takes place in what's canonically known as the Ultradimension, and you begin the game in a very primitive version of Gamindustri with 2 nations, eventually expanding into 5 as you go on through the game. You get to see each CPU's humble beginnings and how they deal with hardships running their nations and all that stuff - it goes through a very Neptunia-esque story about competition, co-operation and then defeating some bigger villain in the picture. In Victory/Re;Birth3 - you get to experience every waking moment and, to me - that makes the story engaging and a lot more personal. I seriously prefer the Ultradimension CPUs to the Hyperdimension ones.
It's just a shame that Re;Birth3 is just not very good in my opinion. If you have a PS3 and don't mind the flaws I pointed out about Victory here - that version is the one you should get, should you want to experience it. But if you don't and are considering Re;Birth3 - at least consider looking into fixing the awful PC port yourself via community patches so the game doesn't freeze or softlock constantly for you.