Half-Minute Hero: Super Mega Neo Climax Ultimate Boy is the third version of Half-Minute Hero, following the 2009 PSP title and the 2011 Xbox 360 version Half-Minute Hero: Super Mega Neo Climax. This version is exclusive to the PC and the first release of the game for the platform. As a whole it bundles all the content from the previous titles with the exception of the Goddess Room, Valhalla Knights stages and the music player. The Another Goddess quest is replaced by seven new levels from Super Mega Neo Climax. It carries over the two graphical modes from the 360 version. With the revamped graphics only the Hero 30 mode is available from the start with Evil Lord 30 and Princess 30 at a later time, while in the retro mode those three modes are available right away. The three additional modes Knight 30, Hero 3000 and Hero 3 with variations in gameplay also become available at a later time. The game contains localization for English, French, German, Italian, Japanese and Spanish.
As in the original titles, the game is structured roughly like a Japanese RPG, tasking the player with fighting enemies to earn experience and gold, finding information and buying items in towns, completing quests to further the story, joining up with NPCs, and finally defeating the boss. The key difference is that there is a strict 30-second time limit before the world is destroyed. Time can be turned back for a price by praying to a goddess, but it gets increasingly expensive. Most fast-paced battles are played out automatically, the player only chooses to activate items or to flee.
Like the 360’s local mode, this version supports online multiplayer for up to four players. It is similar to the Hero 30 mode with a selection of ten maps where the objective is to defeat the evil lord before the opponents do. The hosting player can determine a time limit, item limit, countdown and toggle challenges. Different to the Hero 30 mode, time does not stop in towns or villages (as in the Hero 30’s hard mode), each random encounter will take 18 steps to trigger, players start with no equipment (not carried over from Hero 30) and herbs only recover a portion of a player’s HP instead of granting full recovery.
