I finished the PNC collab. It's painfully ordinary.
Same old standard GF2 writing and dialogues. Nothing impressive. The writers really love the theme of "upholding your idealism no matter what/muh right path" thing they've been putting since Reissi's event and decided that it should, once again, be SKK's conflict in this event instead of trying another stuff. They did it with Springfield, they did it with Orphina, and they did it with Orphelune. It gets stale. to quote Chiloveig,
>That guy's been repeating that same thing like it's some sort of a punchline!
I'd say 80% of the event is boring. Lewis as the co-MC isn't really doing it. Kot's character is also more lacking (for the lack of better words) than the Kot you see in PNC's endgame. The lack of interaction really hurts. The one interaction Groza's squad had with the Exiles are so unorganic. Eos just start reciting the Sanctifier oath mid-dialogue with Groza, and Nanaka just start singing IMR's song mid-dialogue with Vepley. Nemesis, Krolik, and Colphne are saved from it because they only spoke one-two sentence with their PNC partner. The villain is a joke. She's so retarded she took the most obvious bait kyojew puts out. She really loves spelling out le heckin referencerino for the troglodyte to catch.
The limited production budget just screams at your face. Forget about voiceover, forget about a single illustrated CG; They only gave Persica like two expressions. TWO. It's so limited 85% of the time you can't tell what she's thinking. Is she sad about SKK's not remembering her? Is she happy that she gets to spend time with her beloved? In PNC, at least, you can tell she when she's angry, when she's struggling, or when she's confused from her expressions alone. In the collab, you can't tell because her expressions are only comprised of a little smile and slightly burrowed frow. They could've atleast gave her Shining Edge outfit or make her not hold her cup all the time. Reading the battle scene while Persica's sprite just stood there holding her cup with one of her two not-really-expressive expression is really off-putting.
It was an... okay experience. But when you look back, you start noticing some questionable stuff.
They didn't explain how Groza's squad catch entropy aids in the middle of a yellow zone. Apparently, you can just get it in some bumfuck nowhere with no electricity.
Remember the long ass trip SKK needs to do to reach a Green Zone from the Yellow Zone? It took weeks and even months. And in this event, Persica just visits the Elmo in person in the timespan of hours after the initial infection of the Elmo (could arguably be days at most) while carrying all the deep dive equipment without anyone noticing that she's going to visit her international terrorist friend.
Dandelion is nowhere to be seen because obviously she'll just poof the villain and be done with it.
Lewis being a 42Lab researcher is so retarded. She's only above Jiangyu in intelligence. She can't even hack the villain during the climax.
>Lewis: The Professor and Persica… Right, I could try to hack in like Persica… but I don't know how!
Zucchero, Moonsoon, and 404 are away from the Elmo during the entire event. They only came back when the Entropy infection almost reached it's completion during the climax. If they're away, SKK could've atleast contact them the moment Elmo's power returned (which is also the same time Persica contacted the Elmo), but somehow, despite all the emergency, Persica's trip from the green zone to the Elmo took less time than the three doll squads'.
DEFY is also nowhere to be seen.
All in all, it's a far-cry from the quality of the Steins;Gate collab. It's clearly not written by PNC's writer. It's GF2 writers trying to write a connection to PNC. I'd love it more if it was more light-hearted like ZLS or Steins;Gate where the two titles' characters constantly interacts with each other as they also try to resolve their predicaments.