What are pins and how to collect them in NEO: The World Ends With You

While shopping at Hot Topic or Spencer’s, you might be willing to buy a pin for your bag or hat, but in NEO: The World Ends With You, they have a far bigger purpose. They’re important as they give Rindo and his friends the ability to use powerful abilities and spells that can overcome their opponents. This is how to collect them and what they can do.

Let’s pin this down

NEO: The World Ends With You’s combat system is fairly unique in the Japanese RPG sphere. Throughout the game, you collect pins that each have their own abilities to offer to the player. They can be mixed and matched in a player’s arsenal, sold, and can be levelled up to form stronger, more powerful moves. There are different types of attacks on offer.

• Rapid-tap has you repeatedly pressing a button for a quick string of attacks.
• Charge has you holding a button. You can either wait for a long time to increase its damage or let loose a quick, but less powerful area of effect move.
• Hold keeps foes at bay in one particular position, setting another character for a perfect follow up attack.

If there are any other types of pins, we will update the above list as we get further into the game.

Something else to keep in mind is each pin’s affinity. While a lot have no affinity whatsoever, other pins can have fire, ice, poison and other elements attached to it. Like the Pokemon games, certain enemies can be weak or resistant to types of affinities, so watch out for that.

Evolving your pin can also change the ability completely, but there is a maximum level some can get up to. You may want to evolve the pin, so you get a better move from it. It’s a risk/reward type of scenario.

Fantastic Pins and Where To Find Them

Part of the fun of NEO: The World Ends With You is finding as many pins as possible. Most notably, you can find pins by beating enemies over and over again. You can also increase the pin rate by taking on multiple waves at once or accessing a unique menu; on PS4, you can boot it up with the touch pad. Unique pins can be found within the spoils of battle. You can also scour each area for pins on the ground. They can be collected in specific areas of the map. In addition, pins can be bought at stores like Joli Bécot at the 104 Branch, which has the Cherry Bomb pin for 1,500 Yen.