No More Heroes
Developer: Grasshopper Manufacture
Publishers: Rising Star Games
Genre: Action
Platform: Nintendo Wii
Release Date: 14/03/2008
Rating: 16+
Developer: Grasshopper Manufacture
Publishers: Rising Star Games
Genre: Action
Platform: Nintendo Wii
Release Date: 14/03/2008
Rating: 16+
No More Heroes is a light-sabre-slashing (the game calls it a 'beam katana'; I sense a lawsuit) satire marathon from the troubled minds behind Killer7, the schizophrenic, manga shooter that received awards not only for it’s quality, but it’s strangeness. Goichi Suda (or Suda51) has once again returned with something you’re not going to understand, but you’re definitely going to enjoy.
Story
You play Travis Touchdown, egotistical moron and proud owner of a light-sabre won in an online auction. Travis then enters what appears to be a (bizarrely) legal Assassin ranking system. The game starts just after Travis Touchdown’s rise to Rank 11, and your mission is to take him all the way to the top. Along the way you’ll meet 10 of the most deranged individuals the world has ever known and battle them to the death in hyper-climactic boss battles, ranging from elderly women with giant death-ray’s to samurai schoolgirls. No More Heroes is always funny, constantly engaging, and incredibly well written. It’s difficult to talk more about the story without giving away one of the intentionally-typical and often hilarious plot twists, which are some of the most memorable moments of videogame stories to date. Not to mention weird.
Story: 8.5/10
Gameplay
Watch a couple of gameplay clips of No More Heroes and cynicism sets in; all too often a game developer will either play it safe and keep the Wii controls restricted to button mashing, or go all out in a blaze of stupid glory and turn a potentially good game into a waggle-festival. Thank the lord that No More Heroes has finally nailed a formula, then. The main stages of the game involve clearing hundred’s of weak minions before standing off against a ranked assassin. Travis swings his laser sword with the A button, with repeated presses chaining together massive and impressively agile combo attacks, while B will inject your sword combo with a quick punch or kick. Travis can lock on with Z, or slash wildly for more group-orientated destruction. It’s not quite as simple as that, though – when an enemies life bar is empty the screen will darken, enter slow-motion and a giant arrow will flash up. Slash the Wii-mote in the direction the arrow is pointing and the fun really begins. Travis executes an awesome deathblow attack, sending men, limbs and blood flying. The combat gets deeper still, with chargeable light-sabre strikes and wrestling moves (which also use the Wii’s motion controls) spicing up the action into something delightfully original, but most importantly, fun. Far too often gamers will accept something that simply isn’t fun just because it’s the next sequel in their favourite franchise, or is exceptionally good-looking. No More Heroes’ combat sections will make you cackle with sadistic glee, be it finally taking out a complex boss and reaping the cutscene-kill reward or cleaving through a swarm of lackeys.
Oh, and when Travis shouts something about a shortcake or a brownie or something, everyone else on the screen dies. Honestly.
Let me elaborate. After every killing blow, slot reels spin at the bottom of the screen. If they line up, Travis goes into Dark Side mode. Depending on the reel that lined up you'll get a number of different head-popping frenzy attacks, from throwing energy balls that literally disintegrate people to instant kill slices. It has to be seen to believed and then laughed at, so here's a quick video from Gametrailers.
Unfortunately, you have to take the good with the rough. Not content with just an action game, Suda51 decided to implement a free-roaming aspect. To justify this, each ranking battle has a pretty high price, and the only way to earn the money is to cut grass. No, I’m not joking. After an epic, tense boss battle, your thrown back into your motel room in the fictional town of Santa Destroy, where you inevitably find yourself catching kittens, picking up scorpions and filling up petrol tanks all for the love of money. Fortunately these part-time jobs only have to be finished once, and you can then move on to higher paying combat missions. However it still breaks up the atmosphere and provides a boring, grinding aspect to the game. It’s not that there isn’t much to do in the city; you can ride around on your motorcycle, do jobs, dig for coins or explore alleyways for clothing and Lovikov balls, which can be traded for new combat techniques. It’s just that none of this is all that fun, and seems like filler in the already short (10 hours, roughly) game. In the end the game has pretty major flaws, but it’s simply so likable and so fun that your memories of it will always be positive ones.
Gameplay: 8.9/10
Presentation
A Wii game is never going to be too incredible on the visual side of things, considering it’s beefy competition in the Xbox360 and PS3. Or so we thought, until games such as Metroid Prime Corruption and Super Mario Galaxy came out. While the Wii doesn’t have the graphical power of it’s expensive peers, Wii games can still look great if the art is good. Metroid Prime was fantastically realised despite not having the processor power behind it, and No More Heroes is another one of those gob-smackingly stylish games. Blood is a bright scarlet, spurting out generously if you so much as tap someone on the shoulder, and death animations are some of the most brutal around. All this violence could make a game a bit too morbid, but No More Heroes carries it all off with a manga/cel-shaded feel making sure that the violence never becomes disturbing. In fact, it plays out with an Ichi The Killer or Kill Bill style, with the massive amounts of blood and light-hearted violence becoming humorous. Bizarrely, Suda51 decided to censor all the blood in the European and Australian copies of the game. Now correct me if I’m wrong but Goichi Suda was reported to have said he was trying to ‘make the game more violent than Manhunt 2’. This probably got a lot of peoples attention; to then censor it only in Europe and Australia (It was Suda’s choice, not any rating organisation) is, lets be honest, incredibly bloody stupid. If you’re lucky enough to live in North America or Japan then No More Heroes is one of the best-looking games on the Wii. If not, it’s still original, but not nearly as memorable.
The audio of the game is done well with top class voice acting for all the characters, and battle grunts are a particularly entertaining highlight. Dialogue is pretty well written with some sidesplitting lines later in the game, but it won’t win any awards. Neither will the music, which is never prominent enough to interrupt the visual spectacle in combat but will definitely annoy you in places. The samey J-pop fits in well with the games aesthetic, but it isn’t necessarily pleasing.
Overall presentation in No More Heroes is about as entertaining, exciting and original as it comes and currently a great eye-opener to the Wii’s potential.
Presentation: 8.0/10
Conclusion
No More Heroes has some absolute genius sides to it, mastering the control scheme of the Wii-mote and delivering visual splendor on a cinematic standard. Unfortunately some incredibly frustrating flaws mar what could have been an absolute classic. Suda51 has announced his desire to create a sequel, but nothing's concrete yet. All I can say is if Suda can straighten out some of the creases, he’ll have a masterpiece on his hands.
Gameplay: 8.9/10
Presentation
A Wii game is never going to be too incredible on the visual side of things, considering it’s beefy competition in the Xbox360 and PS3. Or so we thought, until games such as Metroid Prime Corruption and Super Mario Galaxy came out. While the Wii doesn’t have the graphical power of it’s expensive peers, Wii games can still look great if the art is good. Metroid Prime was fantastically realised despite not having the processor power behind it, and No More Heroes is another one of those gob-smackingly stylish games. Blood is a bright scarlet, spurting out generously if you so much as tap someone on the shoulder, and death animations are some of the most brutal around. All this violence could make a game a bit too morbid, but No More Heroes carries it all off with a manga/cel-shaded feel making sure that the violence never becomes disturbing. In fact, it plays out with an Ichi The Killer or Kill Bill style, with the massive amounts of blood and light-hearted violence becoming humorous. Bizarrely, Suda51 decided to censor all the blood in the European and Australian copies of the game. Now correct me if I’m wrong but Goichi Suda was reported to have said he was trying to ‘make the game more violent than Manhunt 2’. This probably got a lot of peoples attention; to then censor it only in Europe and Australia (It was Suda’s choice, not any rating organisation) is, lets be honest, incredibly bloody stupid. If you’re lucky enough to live in North America or Japan then No More Heroes is one of the best-looking games on the Wii. If not, it’s still original, but not nearly as memorable.
The audio of the game is done well with top class voice acting for all the characters, and battle grunts are a particularly entertaining highlight. Dialogue is pretty well written with some sidesplitting lines later in the game, but it won’t win any awards. Neither will the music, which is never prominent enough to interrupt the visual spectacle in combat but will definitely annoy you in places. The samey J-pop fits in well with the games aesthetic, but it isn’t necessarily pleasing.
Overall presentation in No More Heroes is about as entertaining, exciting and original as it comes and currently a great eye-opener to the Wii’s potential.
Presentation: 8.0/10
Conclusion
No More Heroes has some absolute genius sides to it, mastering the control scheme of the Wii-mote and delivering visual splendor on a cinematic standard. Unfortunately some incredibly frustrating flaws mar what could have been an absolute classic. Suda51 has announced his desire to create a sequel, but nothing's concrete yet. All I can say is if Suda can straighten out some of the creases, he’ll have a masterpiece on his hands.
Overall rating: 8.5/10
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