Hop Step Sing! Astral Piece Reviews

It is start of the age of vr mv.

Makes my degenerate heart all fuzzy inside.

So I've paid money to an anime girl to dance in school and sing me a great (I suppose) song that I don't understand because I don't know Japanese and it only lasted around 5 minutes. 10/10

Ok, I'm sorry, but if you don't find this totes supes adorbs, then I don't see how we can be friends. I'm sorry, but I don't make the rules... (WARNING: For those of you who may have a soul: I have determined it is not physically possible to view this without playing along in role-play and trying to mirror every last dance move. Every single time. YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED!!!)

The asset quality, interactivity, and art design in this experience is lower than Naked Heart, but better than all others. Its performance is one of the worst. You may need to use lower than native scaling.

Niina has the cutest voice and actions, I love singing and dancing with her multiple times uwu....

Continues to be the gold standard for AMVR (Anime Music Virtual Reality). I like how each new song they push VR further each time. What's new in this song is non-linear movement. As I get sick very easily in VR. I'm glad to say they nailed this down perfectly. Mostly it's not rotating the camera and allowing you to follow along yourself. The directing for this VR experience is perfect and natural for following along the character. There was several points where I was worried that it might make me sick as I get sick VERY easily. But with a good use of cuts and linear movement there was no issues what so ever. It's not the most advance VR experience, but directing a VR Show is an entirely new field and the director for these did a fantastic job. I highly recommended it for Anime Music fans and VR lovers. But if you're new to the Hop Step Sing! Franchise I would suggest one of the earlier works first as I like those songs better for it's more fantasy feel and greater use of special effects.

I'm a fan of HSS! and would recommend any of their songs. It's great having music videos like this in VR and I would love to see more artists/groups utilizing the medium. The songs might only be a few minutes of content each but I rewatch them a lot. I find music videos are a good way to wind down after playing a VR game but before taking off the headset. All of their songs are good but since you might not want to just buy all of them right off the bat (there is a bundle available), how about I rate them from personal favorite to least favorite? 1) Kimamani Summer Vacation - Good high energy song with great visuals. A vacation to remember. 2) kissxkissxkiss - A bit down-beat compared to their other stuff but still a great song and very surreal visuals. 3) Nozokanaide Naked Heart - One of their newer songs and very polished. Has interactive elements. 4) Astral Piece - Great song and visuals but this one's a solo featuring only Niina (Shikiri #1!, lol). 5) Kisekiteki Shining! - Their first song and it's visuals are a lot weaker compared to their later songs. It's just a plain stage with a lot of effects going on. There is also a live concert recording available that includes all of the above songs which is a great starter pack but it does lack all of the unique visuals of the music videos. It does have a lot of unique things of its own, though, like a 3-person version of Astral Piece and romaji karaoke. Overall, I would recommend everything they make but if you don't want to take the full plunge, at least give a song or two of theirs a try!

Another good addition to the Hop Step Sing line up. Song and choreography are again very well done and this time you have the option for free walking through the music video! If you aren't a fan of anime idol music videos this may not convert you, but any Hop Step Sing fan should grab it. 2 slight annoyances though - there's no way to turn off the comfort vignettes at all and the Niina model from music vid 4 seems here to stay, of all the Niina models used I preferred any of the others to 4 and this one. At the end of the day the, if you're a hop step sing fan it's a no brainer!

I hate to be the first negative review for something, but there just wasn't enough here to justify the price or the high ratings. 10 dollars for a music video that lasts something like 6 minutes, and as a standalone VR experience, just didn't provide anything unique or interesting. There are far better VR experiences that cost no money, and even had this been free, I still don't think I would have been impressed or satisfied with how I spent my time. I am probably not the target audience for this in any regard.