No More Heroes is the follow-up to the stylish, cult classic of 2005 by Suda-51. Its not so much as sequel, as an entirely new game with a similar art-style and bizarro sense of humour.
For those unfamiliar with No More Heroes, its a hack and slash action game, following douchebag Travis Touchdown's ascent to the top of the United Assassin Association leaderboard. Armed with a trusty laser sword (read:lightsaber) which he won in an online competition, his lust for blood sees him tracking down the top10 assassins, killing each one on his quest to become number 1. Killer 7, while certainly a great game, is arguable 'style over substance', with a restrictive, rail-shooter mechanic. Can No More Heroes keep the style, and gain the substance?
Gameplay
Where Killer 7 was restricted to an on-rails mechanic which wasn't awfully fleshed out and didn't work too well, No More Heroes lets you run around, slashing at enemies with your sword. The combat here is great- over-the-top button mashing has never been done quite like this before, and the combat system is actually very refined. No More Heroes doesn't overuse the wii remote, but still employs it adequately. You lock onto an enemy using the Z button, pressing A to attack with your sword and B to use a 'beat-down' attack, whereby he punches or kicks his foe. The twist here is that all combat is divided into two types- high, and low. Hold your wii remote upright to attack and block high, hold it flat to attack low. Now, the enemies will either be blocking and attacking high or low too, so you want to attack low if they're blocking high and vica versa. Where it gets interesting is that a high-down attack performed on a high-blocking foe will stun him, while a low one will do nothing, and vica versa. So if the enemy is defending high, you want to attack low, but beat-down high. After stunning the enemy, press B to use a wrestling move, which is performed by following on screen prompts on where to swing your wii remote, while Travis's throw corresponds onscreen. If you attack at the same time as the enemy, you will enter a dual-mode where you must follow a prompt to beat the enemy back. The whole concept of high and low adds a level of depth to the combat which could have been lacking. When the enemy reaches no health, follow the onscreen prompt to perform a brutal killing move and summon forth fountains of blood.
In No More Heroes combat is king, and it is incredibly satisfying. It might not quite have the style of a Devil May Cry, God Of War or Ninja Gaiden, but it has its own unique brand of violence, and it works very well. The best part of the combat has to be the boss battles, though of which there are ten, of course. All of these are very unique, and offer thrilling, challenging fights. While each boss in killed simply by inflicting enough hits, there are different tactics for each, and the fights play out very differently. In fact, the boss fights are definitely the best part of No More Heroes, so its great that there are so many. There are several sticking points though. There is no effective way of cycling your lock-on from enemy to enemy, so the game really decides who you target, but only at the worst of times. Rolling backwards to evade an attack usually results in the camera going 180 degrees and you rolling towards the enemy, but usually the attack misses anyway. Finally, the game is hard for the wrong reasons- a single enemy can be beaten simply by button-mashing until they're dead, but if you're attack a large group of enemies, and one sneaks around the back of you, his attack will disrupt your combo, and will usually result in death, and its difficult to keep track of where all the enemies went. Also, dying often results in having to replay large chunks of the game again. But these are seldom seen blips on the proverbial radar, and can be avoided once the player realises what they are. When they come up, they do tend to come up all at once, leading to some frustration, though it definitely isn't as bad as Devil May Cry's glaring camera issues.
But combat isn't the only thing going on in No More Heroes. Between assassination missions, you will need to collect enough money to pay for entry into the next round. You earn money by completing side-missions, or 'part time jobs'. These are accessed by visiting the job center in the hub world. You can travel around Santa Destroy, much like in GTA, on your big-ass motorbike, though the world really isn't nearly as detailed as GTA. You can visit your apartment to save (by going to the toilet), visit shops to buy cosmetic and gameplay upgrades like new clothes, weapons, and training, and you can pick up new jobs and freefight missions to earn more money. Freefight jobs basically entail killing around 20 enemies before they kill you (though often with a twist, such as you only have life point left), while part time jobs are much more varied. They are simple, but fun distractions, which use the wiimote in interesting ways, such as steering a lawnmower and such. You are paid based on your performance, and only one or two jobs will be necessary to earn enough to advance. They missions are fairly fun, though simple, and break up the hack and slash enough to make the game feel more varied than most action games. While Devil May Cry breaks up the action with badly-implemented platforming and nonsensical puzzles, No More Heroes has its own unique and fun way of breaking up the game.
Graphics
Whether the like the graphics will depend entirely on whether you like the unique art-style, because you're not going to fall in love with the graphics from a technical standpoint. The town of Santa Destroy is filled with more pop-up issues, framerate problems and jagged edges than you can shake a not-a-lightsaber at. While these issues do hurt, I personally love the stylistic graphics of the game- the textures my be low-res, but they still look great. Lighting models are very impressive on Wii (the best so far) and the cel-shading works like a charm. With limited hardware, the only way to out-do 360/PS3 graphics is through art, and No More Heroes definitely pushes the envelope in this category. It's also worth mentioning that the bosses, as well as Mr Travis himself are a work of art- each one is unique, memorable and stylish.
Presentation
Right off the bat, No More Heroes showcases the same bizarre style as its predecessor, which comes off rather well. The references to geek/pop culture are there for you to pick out, the crazy art-style fits perfectly on the Wiis underpowered hardware and the humour, while unusual, is top-notch once you get used to it. Indeed, I began to look forward to the end of every mission, when the girl from the video rental store calls to ask for an overdue porn film ('The video you returned wasn't the right one... it seemed to be of a man humping a pillow').
The town of Santa Destroy itself, a hub world for buying items, statbuilding and receiving side missions, while pleasantly designed, is nothing compared to Liberty City, for example. The depth just isn't there, from the lack of anything to do which isn't a shop or side-job to the low level of detail. Its a shame too, because driving your bike around is really fun, despite the lack-luster driving mechanics. Cars can't be interacted with in any way, pedestrians can't be killed (what's up with that?) . If that's the way No More Heroes chooses to go, then that's Suda's choice. Indeed, there are a number of seemingly poor design decisions in No More Heroes. The most obvious is the awful level design, in fact, the deliberately awful level design. All of the assassination missions are full of often very barren hallways, populated by identical enemies simply waiting to kill you. In fact, the road to the number 7 assassin, Destroyman, features three identical, empty warehouse in a row, full of identically positioned enemies. Why? It seems we'll never know what goes on in the mind of Suda 51, and I, for one, would probably rather not find out.
Conclusion
At the end of the day, though, No More Heroes surprised me. Even when I first picked it up, while fun, I felt it would get repetitive fast and the art-style didn't really seem to add much. But the more I played the game, the more I liked it- the enjoyment crept up on me a little, and I'm thrilled that I kept going. No More Heroes is one of those games which is truly more than the sum of its parts- the afore-mentioned ridiculous level design and the bizarro theme don't add much alone, but the game comes together to be something else. It's difficult to put a finger on it, but somewhere, Suda has created something quite special. Everything which seems stupid and unnecessary alone, comes together to create one of the most satisfyingly unique experiences in years..... What can I say? The man's a genious....
Presentation : 9
Graphics : 9
Sound :9
Gameplay :9
Value :7
8.4/10
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