Parent's Guide: Hyperdimension Neptunia Re;Birth 2 - Age rating, mature content and difficulty

Hyperdimension Neptunia Re;Birth 2 is an enhanced, portable PS Vita remake of 2011's Hyperdimension Neptunia Mk2 for the PS3. The game takes place in the humorous and satirical world of Gamesindustri, a world ruled over by four goddesses, each of which represents one of the console giants - Xbox, Playstation, Nintendo and Sega. Chock-a-block with references to video games, anime tropes and innuendo, this second instalment tells the tale of a world where piracy has run rampant and the ruling goddesses have been captured - and it's up to their younger siblings to save the day.

Essentially a turn-based role-playing game, battles in Hyperdimension Neptunia are pretty easy to follow - you, your party and enemies can move freely around the battlefield and take it in turns to attack, unleash special skills or use items during combat. Each character has a few differing attacks dependant on which buttons you press, some of which focus on speed, others on power and finally, on breaking down your opponent's guard, which can all be combined into unique combos. Generally speaking, battles are pretty straight-forward, although some boss fights - in particular those in which it makes you fight two back to back without time to heal or save - can be rather challenging, to the point where you'll need to do a fair bit of backtracking and re-fighting weaker monsters to strengthen up your characters, which may be beyond the patience of some players.

In terms of accessibility, the only other obstacle here is one that's fairly common in role-playing games - that of reading. Being very text heavy, a confident reading ability is necessity to be able to play, understand, and enjoy Hyperdimension Neptunia. Some sections are fully voiced, but others rely entirely on subtitles, making the game a bit hit and miss.

Sample Sentences:

• "Woah, what's going on? L-let's keep it kool with a k, Neptune. Stay koolios..."
• "Well blow my cartridges and call me a 64-pin connector! Is this a game? It looks so retro!"
• "Pah! I'm their CPU, so why do I gotta go out and -ask- for work? That's the lamest sauce of all!"

Starting with the questionable things Hyperdimension Neptunia doesn't do - there's no blood or guts here at all, and enemies simply fade away when defeated in the cartoony, over-the-top battles. Swear words, like sh*t or b**ch appear in the dialogue from time to time too, but the biggie here is the sexual content.

The game's female protagonists are sometimes shown in potentially provocative situations, such as being able to see up their skirts during victory poses, or shown, partially covered with towels in a spa scene, with backsides and cleavage on show. Dialogue is often littered with innuendo and sexual references, in particular a robotic boss who seems to enjoy licking some of the party - "Mmmm the height of ecstasy, licking a nubile maiden's wounds!". Discussions about breast size also pop up fairly frequently too - and while most of what goes on is relatively harmless silliness, it's probably worth noting that Hyperdimension isn't as clean as it's bright, cute and colourful exterior may lead you to believe.

Age Ratings

Format Reviewed: PS Vita