Cyberdimension Neptunia: 4 Goddesses Online is a 2017 role-playing game developed by Compile Heart and Tamsoft and published by Idea Factory International. It came out on PlayStation 4 and PC. The title suggests an online world. The game is single-player, with an online cooperative multiplayer option attached.
Trailer, via Idea Factory International.
Alsgard, Bouquet, and the Demon King Jester
The four CPUs — Neptune, Noire, Blanc and Vert — were able to receive an early access code for the newest installment of “4 Goddesses Online,” a game that uses their real forms as official models. Each logs in for her own reasons. Inside, the guardian spirit Bouquet, one of the game’s non-playable characters equipped with the game’s advanced artificial intelligence, tells them they are the Chosen Ones. Their task is to save Alsgard, a fantasy land ringed by ocean, from the Demon King Jester by waking four legendary goddesses.
They were told that they are the Chosen Ones that are tasked to save Alsgard from the Demon King Jester by awakening the four divine Goddesses of legend.
The source also notes there will be an enemy similar to Arfoire. That is a standard chosen-one setup, and the game leans on recognition rather than building a new villain from scratch.
The Roster Is the Point
Tamsoft’s earlier action games for this series spread the playable cast wide. This one does not. Only the four CPUs and their sisters are playable:
- Neptune
- Noire
- Blanc
- Vert
- Nepgear
- Uni
- Ram
- Rom
The four divine goddesses are playable in the later parts of the story. Unlike the previous Tamsoft-made action games for the series, the roster here stays with that group.
Unreal Engine 4, and the PlayStation 4
This is the first Neptunia game built on Unreal Engine 4. It is also the first spin-off in the series to arrive on the PlayStation 4 instead of the PlayStation Vita. The source lists the genre as role-playing, with themes of action and science fiction, and modes for single player and multiplayer.
What the Score Reflects
Cyberdimension Neptunia: 4 Goddesses Online scores 7.3 out of 10, the published critic aggregate across five outlets. The source gives no breakdown of that figure and no assessment of combat, cast or multiplayer.
What the source establishes is narrower than the title suggests. A game named for an online world ships as a single-player game with a cooperative option. The firsts are real: Unreal Engine 4, and a spin-off on the PlayStation 4 rather than the Vita. The roster is the four CPUs and their sisters, with the divine goddesses playable later. The story runs on a chosen-one frame inside a game inside a game, and an enemy similar to Arfoire appears.
The score is the one number worth carrying forward, and it is an aggregate of five outlets, not a verdict on any single part of the package. Everything else here is premise. The frame — goddesses playing a game about goddesses — is the idea the game is built on, and the source confirms it without ranking it against anything else in the series.
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