You will start Infinity Nikki in a pretty simple story, but at its core it's a gacha mobile game. That means Infinity Nikki comes with all the expected systems: roles for outfits, stamina that refills over time but has a cap, and some sort of upgrade system. As you play, you may be wondering what it's all about.
If you are familiar with similar open world gacha games like… Storm waves, Genshin Impactor Tower of Fantasyyou'll know that once you get into the story, you'll find yourself in the same gameplay loop. You use your stamina to farm materials that you can use to upgrade your characters and weapons. After you've really spiced things up, you start farming individual pieces of gear, which gain random stats as they're upgraded – creating a pretty infinite grind. Is that the same? Infinity Nikki? Well, sort of.
(Note that this information comes from a closed beta that we played shortly before the game's release, so there may be slightly different information in the live version of the game.)
How is the combat in Infinity Nikki?
The fight in Infinity Nikki is extremely simple. Nikki can shoot bullets at enemies. Most enemies you find around the world can be hit with a single shot, with some requiring two hits. There are boss fights where you have to dodge attacks, wait for an opening, and then attack at the right time – but there's no way to get through these fights faster by dealing more damage. Nikki's attacks appear to have a fixed value and you don't upgrade her equipment to do more damage.
Image: Infold Games/Papergames via Polygon
So why do I upgrade my outfits in Infinity Nikki?
They need to spice up Nikki's clothes for another reason. Instead of adding offensive stats to clothing, you need to improve its visual stats to overcome more difficult styling duels.
As you play through the story, you'll have to complete a few styling duels at lower levels, but there are several optional factions around the world that you can compete against. You'll be presented with challenges, and after completing enough of them, you'll be able to take on a big boss for rewards like diamonds (the premium currency) and even recipes for crafting more clothing. Some of the early styling duels can be completed with low-level standard clothing, but you'll need to upgrade your stuff to fully complete some of the later duels.
This is where the gameplay loop comes into play. You can only upgrade your clothing to a certain level and must increase your Mira level (your player level) to raise this upgrade cap. As you spend stamina (“vital energy”) and complete quests, you'll get lots of EXP to increase your Mira level.
Are there random stats and gear that I need to “farm” in Infinity Nikki?
Not Really. There is additional equipment called “Eureka” that you will want to collect to increase your Styling Duel points. These are collected by spending stamina at warp towers and can be leveled up to give them more stats.
While their color changes randomly when they reach the maximum, it didn't appear that the values are randomly “rolled” like the values in the aforementioned gacha games do. So you can confidently grab one of each (or several if you want a specific color) without having to spend forever growing them. No, there are no random stats, but yes, there are pieces of equipment you'll want to collect.
In a way, you go through the gameplay loop mentioned above, which is consistent with the other open world gacha games. You Are Improving equipment and so on, although the method, reason and approach is just completely different.
That means you don't actually do it have to do any of that. You can spend your time collecting Whimstars, catching bugs and completing side quests, while largely ignoring this component of the game if you don't care about grinding or min-maxing – but the styling duels are an important part of the Nikki series and you won't be able to craft the iconic Marvel outfit without facing the faction leaders. You must craft the Miracle Outfit to reach the final points of the game (as of release). However, you can also enjoy your time in Mira Land with other things if you wish.
If you are looking for more information about Infinity Nikkiwe have a beginner's guide, a list of codes, and a guide on where to unlock more clothing items.
