Neo: The World Ends With Youhas a lot in common with the originalDSgame. It’s still an action RPG involving Pins to use moves in battle. What’s new in thisNintendo SwitchandPS4sequel is the fact that Pins are no longer executed through motion controls. They are now used by a simple tap of the button.

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The equipment menu from Neo: The World Ends With You

The same goes for party members, which have been expanded from one to two partners. There is a lot of differences inNeo: The World Ends With Youbut many of the same leveling-up strategies can be applied here. As a refresher for those that forgot about theSquare Enixclassic or never played it, it’s review time. What exactly is the easiest way to level up early on inNeo: The World Ends With You?

6Play The Demo

Now thatNeo: The World Ends With Youis out this may sound like a weird piece of advice. However, one doesn’t need to spend much time in the demo in order to reap its benefits. Unlike thegame’s full length, this setup won’t take long. Download the demo and get to the first save point. The game will automatically save once players can control Rindo, which should only take a few minutes. That’s it.

Shut the demo off and then start up the full game. Once booted up, the game should detect the demo save file. Agree to import the data and then Neku’s gear, the hero fromThe World Ends With You, will be unlocked. Its stats are way overpowered for the early parts ofNeo: The World Ends With You. The better the gear then the easier it will be to win battles quickly and level up in a flash.

Chaining Noise in Neo: The World Ends With You

It should also be mentioned that clothes should be examined beyond stats. Most items, from hats to pants, will have a skill attached. One skill can increase experience gained a little later inNeo: The World Ends With You. These skills aren’t automatic upon equipping them though. Just be aware that they need to be unlocked through certain conditions.

5Noise Grouping

One ofNeo: The World Ends With You’sbest default tipsis that gathering multiple Noise marks will increase the drop rate of items in battle. That much is obvious. What isn’t exactly explained is that once a Noise mark is touched, a countdown timer will begin. This means players only have a set amount of time to gather as much Noise as possible before battles will begin automatically.

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It’s best to look at a map before starting anything. Look at where the red dots are and plan a route. Make sure to go from Noise to Noise on the best route possible to maximize potential. Sometimes players may even be able to have Noise follow them without even touching them, closing the gap between marks.

4Unlock Hard Difficulty

Gathering Noise will mostly only help with having a better drop rate for items. Sometimes this will be good for experience boosting too but it depends on battle performance. The most guaranteed way to earn more experience in battle is by increasing the game’s difficulty. Unlike most titles that have difficulty levels available whenever,Neo: The World Ends With Youlocks them in a skill tree.

This skill tree is known as the social network and revolves around Rindo’s contacts inNeo: The World Ends With You. Once it unlocks, Minamimoto should be the first purchase. He’s the one that can unlock the Hard difficulty. More experience will be gained depending on the difficulty. There is oneharder difficultyto unlock after this but that can’t be acquired until later in the campaign.

The level adjust menu from Neo: The World Ends With You

3Don’t Be Afraid Of Lowering Levels

Besides lowering or raising the difficulty, players can also tweak their own levels. If the player is at level sixteen then they can go below any number before that, even to level one. All this does is lower the player’s HP. It doesn’t affect any other stat.Neo: The World Ends With Youis different than most RPGs wherein most stats increase upon leveling up.Others stats, like attack power, are instead increasedby eating foodinNeo: The World Ends With You.

Lowering a level shouldn’t be that scary then especially since battles can be redone upon death.The nice thing about lowering a level is that this also increases the item drop rate. Gathering Noise, lowering levels, and increasing the difficulty is a killer combo to level up fast and to get items quickly too.

Fighting enemies in Neo: The World Ends With You

2Maximizing Pin Collecting

Besides characters leveling up, Pins level up as well. For some background, Pins are the way in which players interact with enemies in battle. Each character is equipped with one Pin. The abilities these Pins bestow can range from shooting out neon fireballs to summoning the earth below to erupt. The vast array of abilities is one of thegame’s best qualities.

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The pin menu from Neo: The World Ends With You

They level up fast so always switch out Pins once they are mastered. This may seem counterintuitive as one might be equipping and leveling up the same Pin over and over again. There is a reason for this. Money can only be acquired by selling Pins. A mastered Pin is worth more than a non-mastered Pin. The more cash someone has, the more they can level up something else. Simple.

1Don’t Forget To Eat

As mentioned earlier, leveling up characters only increases their HP. Players must eat out to increase stats. There is a trick to this. Certain items will be enjoyed more by certain characters. For example, if someone places a food item on Fret and his animation is switched to him crying, that means he likes it.

Rindo looks happy, Nagi shoots a beam out of her face, and Minamimoto gets a small smirk. Those are the max outputs for each character animation. These food items might bestow extra stats if the character really likes them. A good strategy to follow is to fill up on food before entering into a long chain of Noise marks. This is amuch-improved systemfrom the first game.

A food shop from Neo: The World Ends With You

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