Hyperdimension Neptunia Member Review for the PS3

Hyperdimension Neptunia is a JRPG that was developed and published by NIS.  The game is rated T for ages 13 and up.

The game starts you off in a huge fight above the world called Gameindustri in Celestia with the Goddesses White Heart, Green Heart, Purple Heart, and Black Heart.  After a long argument Green, Black, and White Heart gang up on Purple Heart and is banished to the world below Celestia and here our story begins.
 

The game places you in the control of Neptune, who is the Goddess of Planeptune.  She has amnesia after the fight and the fall to the world below and she is found by a nurse in training named Compa. 

As the story progresses you meet up with other characters and help out other land masses other than Planeptune.  They are Lowee (a pun on the Wii), Lastation (a pun on Playstation), and Leanbox (a pun on Xbox).  The overall story is to save Historie and Gameindustri from the evil Goddess Arforie.

Battle System:

It is turn based and can be quite slow.  You can however skip animation sequences by pressing the L2 button to speed up the process of the battle if you do not want to watch a very long sequence of attacks.  The first few times is very nice but it was a nice addition that NIS placed in the game so you are not forced to watch the attack sequences all the time.  It is also based on AP points and depending on how many you have you can do a lot of damage to the opponent.  If you have another member partnered with your character in the backrow, you can bring out your second character through switching to cause maximum damage.

Outside of battle abilites:

Every character has a certain ability they can perform.  Neptune and White Heart have Hammer Smash to get certain objects out of the way; Green Heart, IF, and 5pb have treasure search; and Compa and Black Heart have monster call, in which you can call monsters and fight up to 5 waves of monsters but when finished you do not have encounters for a set amount of time.

Item System:
The Item system is rather unique in this game.  Instead of collecting a potion and using it when you need it, your characters use item synthesis which combine certain potions and elixers you picked up to make you gain health, heal status alignments, or give your characters a boost in strength.  These options are done by using CP points you aquire as you level up throughout the game and you set the prioity of how the the potions activate, this makes you make careful choices so you do not waste items and really puts your skills to the test if you can keep your items savy when you need them the most.  It is not as effective as a simpler system for just going into a menu and using a potion or magic spell but it does try to do something new.

Overall of the game:

The game follows the RPG formula.  Do side quests and normal quests to get more powerful in the game to take on the next boss and move on to the next challenge.  That has and will always be the apparent in all RPG's.  There could stand to be a bit more variety in the levels instead of most of the dungeons being the same layout.  The game loves to make fun of itself and other cliches.  It references games like Gears of War, Halo Reach, Resident Evil, and many more. 

This game is not for everyone, this game is mainly for the JRPG veteran who can take a joke once in a while.  It also tries to be a brand new experience by placing you in control of a "not so there" protagonist instead of the cookie cutter "hero or anti-hero" of now..  If you like what you see, then give it a rent.