What do different pin colors mean?
If you check the Noisepedia, you will see that enemies drop different Pins at different difficulties (and the percentage chance of each). These Pins are colour-coded when they drop.
"Easy" pins are Green, "Normal" pins are Purple, "Hard" pins are Yellow, and "Ultimate" pins are Red. These match the colours of each Difficulty on the Difficulty/Level menu. (The first game also had small Black Pins for Dark Matter, but Neo treats Dark Matter as a normal Pin)
At higher difficulties, "failing" to drop a pin means that it will roll for the next difficulty down, to give you a chance at dropping that instead. For example, here are example drop rates shown in the Noisepedia, and from battling at each difficulty level (assuming single battle, with no Chain nor Final Remix attack):
| Difficulty | Easy | Normal | Hard | Ultimate | No Reward | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Noisepedia | 60% | 30% | 50% | 100% | N/A | Base Rates |
| Easy | 60% | 0% | 0% | 0% | 40% | Easy Pin or Nothing |
| Normal | 42% | 30% | 0% | 0% | 28% | Easy Drop is 60% (Base Drop Rate) of 70% (chance to not get Normal Pin) |
| Hard | 21% | 15% | 50% | 0% | 12% | Easy Drop is 60% (Base Drop Rate) of 35% (chance of getting neither Normal nor Hard Pin) |
| Ultimate | 0% | 0% | 0% | 100% | 0% | There is a 0% chance to not get an Ultimate pin |
There is one significant exception: Pig Noise do not show a Drop Table in the Noisepedia. Instead, they have a 100% chance for the battle to drop a single pin (no matter how many Noise are in the battle), the Pin varies based on the specific battle (i.e. the same type of Pig can drop different Pins on Different days), it is the same Pin at every difficulty (no reason not to fight them on Easy — the battles are often closer to Puzzles), and the Pin they drop shows in-battle as a pink Pig's Head, rather than the normal circle. Also, each Pig can only be fought once per Save-File; even if you replay the day, it will not reappear.