Part 2: In which The Cutest Idol in the Universe gracefully endures a Chuntorial
Update 2: In which The Cutest Idol in the Universe gracefully endures a ChuntorialGreetings and Salutations, everyone! Let’s see what a New Game gets us, shall we?
MUSIC: BIRDS CHIRPING
………chan!……chan, wake up.Nico-chan.Nico-chan!
……mgh……
Give a girl a break, won’t you? We might have just been stabbed probably!
………Kotori…?The girl greeting us is Kotori Minami, a fellow member of µ's. She’s a second year at Otonokizaka High School, so a junior to Nico by a year. Nico’s not actually 40 years old, but a third year; I threw in ‘25 years running’ as 25 can be read as Ni Co in japanese. Sorry.
MUSIC: CHUNTORIAL
Where’s this…?Wait, wasn’t I with Honoka just now……?
Jeez! This isn’t the time to be half asleep!
Let’s get going! Everyone’s waiting for you!
…………
I really don’t understand what’s going on.…...Haah………...What?
THE SONG USUALLY SEGUES INTO THIS BUT AUDACITY IS HARD
Nico doesn’t seem to command much respect from her juniors. Maybe it’s because she’s the shortest one in µ's?
Anyway, Let’s
We found a Chunslime! We’ll be seeing lots of these. The eagle(heh)-eyed viewers might have picked up it has the same hair tuft as Kotori. She’s associated with birds in general, since her name can be read as little bird. Why Chun instead of like, chirp? I dunno, they’re weird like that. (・８・)
Huh?? This is supposed to be an enemy?Are you kidding me?That’s a lost lamb.Not an enemy?A lost lamb.A lost lamb.
Haah……
Alright, let’s get into how combat works in this game. You press [Z] after pressing “Fight!” to… fight, I suppose. The yellow boxes show how many successes you need to completely fill the white bar next to it with red, ending the encounter. Got all that? No? Great! Because Nico didn’t either.
MEATY THWACK; MUSIC SWELLS
Just smack ‘em.
Wh-What are you doing, Nico-chan?!
Huh?
Why would you ever punch him?!?!?!What do you mean, why?
It turns out violence ISN'T the solution. Bummer.
Ah, Um…Err…
Use THAT to bring a smile to his face and it’ll be alright!Come on, now!Don’t call it THAT.
Our attack has been replaced with Nico Nico Nii!, Nico’s signature catchphrase. The japanese word for ‘Smile’ can also be read nico, so the catchphrase is a cross between that, Nico’s name, and an appeal to diehard fans of the number 25252.
MUSIC STOPS
Beat.
MUSIC STARTS AGAIN
Hey, he’s not smiling.Hm… Well, yeah…If you do it out of nowhere, it’s not going to work...
...And such.It’s not something to smile about.Huh? Hey, w—That’s why! You first need to do a live to open up his heart!What did y—Now! Hurry up and try performing, Nico-chan!………So, let’s actually get to how combat works in this game. The yellow squares signify how many times we need to sing to their heart in a Live (attack string), and fill the right bar with red. Once it’s full, we’ll have brought a smile to their face and the encounter is over. Note that we don’t actually know how hard it’ll be to put that smile on their face until we convey our feelings at least once, just like real life. Luckily, we don’t need to worry about that just yet...
As we’re the #1 Cutest Idol in the Universe.
When you defeat enemies, you receive experience points like just now!………Enemies?
When you get enough experience points, your level and HP will go up.
………It’s nothing…Hm?Ahem.When you level up, you’ll also get a thing called NP!
You press X while exploring to open up a window where you can assign NP… And you can spend them to increase your stats or get consumables, so use them!!
………Nico-chan? Are you listening?…Hm? Ah. Yeah yeah, I’m listening.
Come on! Let’s begin our fun adventure! Let’s gooo!
And so our grand journey begins! Our two options are Search, which searches for enemies, and Stairs, which is crossed out. Presumably we must Search for the Stairs, but first…
Let’s check our menu!
Spend Some NP, Nico! posted:
Singing - Increases Live accuracy.
Dancing - More moves during Lives.
Charisma - More effective Nico Nico Niis.
Buy a Hand Mirror! - Recover health by looking at cuteness.
Increase Cuteness! - Makes Nico even cuter.
Hm? How much does Increasing Cuteness cost? Nothing? That’s a steal!
It’s also moot, as Nico is already the cutest. Duh.
The enemies on this floor are all Chunslimes: only need to be sung to once, no chance to fail, only one Nico Nico Nii to smile.
You can beat them by accident while mashing Search, honestly.
Finding the stairs is random in a predetermined range, so assuming that you’re playing optimally you can’t get screwed by RNG. Probably.
Hm? What’s this? Stairs?Yep! They’re stairs! With these we can go even deeper into the dream!Dream…? Are we inside a dream?
Hey, have you been listening to me at all?But you gotta be careful, Nico-chan!On my left, you can see the Alpaca Gauge, right?
This alpaca is waiting for you to return with its neck held out.Huh? That’s nonsense.But if you make it wait too long, its neck will go back and then…!And then…?
……
!!!!!!!!!………
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!………………
…Might as well, right?
A new floor! There’s more enemies to encounter in the tutorial, but I didn’t see them in-game so here they are now: Our Angle and uor Devil.
Good Chunslime and Bad Chunslime posted:
On the way, I
Chunslime Instructor is actually cut content re-added by the translator. They’re there to tell you that in this game you can run away since you only take damage after your Live.
It’s got more than four times the boxes as the boss here, and is unperturbed by our Nico Nico Niis. The first comment they got back after this addition was that they were dying to strong enemies. You can take a horse to water, but you can’t make it read?
Your HP slowly recovers by Searching, or quickly recovers by using a Hand Mirror. I did neither, which I’ll soon regret...
Be careful, Nico-chan! I’m feeling a VERY strong Cute Power around here!Cute Power…?
Since Floor 4 is the boss of the tutorial.
Gaze upon my pecs, and Despair.
MUSIC: HOW CLOSE IS TOO CLOSE TO PUNCH OUT, LEGALLY SPEAKING?
Why would you say something so rude?!Huh? Well, it’s just…
I-, I kinda feel bad now…
Alright, alright.I just need to battle him, right? That’s all… 
This isn’t like some of the Fire Emblem games, where they average two numbers to get the actual hit range. 5% sounds negligible until it isn’t, and if you needed it not to die, them’s the breaks.
This was in fact my fault however. If I just went to Level 4, I could have had an extra dance to make up for the miss or just perfect accuracy in general. I also would’ve had a full heal from the level itself and maybe even some mirrors for healing. Note that a Nico Nico Nii cuts the Live short regardless, so we’ll have “wasted” 2 sings either way.
Turns out we needed those. Generally, if we’ve found the stairs on the penultimate floor, we can afford to grind until the Alpaca’s neck almost gives out.
MUSIC STOPS
The reason this is a SSLP instead of a VLP is so that I can cover up my numerous, numerous mistakes.
Nico-chaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaan!!!
Nico Yazawa Has Died, Again. Well, see you all next Update!
MUSIC RESTARTS
Just kidding. The alpaca’s neck grows back when depleted as well, so if you really really wanted to for some reason you could grind here forever.
I actually missed again after the death, but letting things like “facts” get in the way of my narrative is for people who know what they’re doing.
A nice tutorial! I cleared this first try on my first playthrough. Oh god, am I getting worse!?
Isn’t it wonderful making people smile?People…?
What?Hm?We’re just going back like that? After everything that happened?
………Eh, whatever…
Oh, wow! A certificate! That’s not even a reward in-universe!
But we got an idol’s signature so actually it’s okay in the end really
And a hearty cheer welcomes us back to…
MUSIC: CLUBROOM
The clubroom! Here’s our hub world, where we can interact with the rest of µ's. Next update, we’ll see who’s conspicuously missing from there!