No More Heroes - Review
No More Heroes is a difficult game to pin down, especially when trying to figure out how to balance the sum of its parts. On first impression, the game borrows from so many different sources, games, and eras that it’s hard to explain how all the different elements come together to “work” so well. It’s part dark comedy, part cheesy B-movie, and part mindless sandbox beat-’em-up, all tossed together with a hefty helping of 80’s retro kitsch, making No More Heroes feel unlike any other game out there. Even though the game stumbles in some of its larger areas, No More Heroes’ amalgamation works surprisingly well for making so little sense, making it a game that every Wii owner should consider adding to their collection.
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The overall story of No More Heroes is one of the most ridiculous to come around in a while, as you take control of videogame-enthusiast-turned-assassin Travis Touchdown throughout his quest to become the #1 rated assassin in all of Santa Destroy. As you make your ascent to the top, a bevy of missions await you ranging from lawnmowing and picking up trash, to massacring countless Pizza Butt employees (who are completely unable to do much more than die in a bloody explosion, more on that later) and eliminating rival assassins. To this you add one cat, a love interest, a few minor characters and a Grand Theft Auto-esque “sandbox” environment, and No More Heroes is born.
By and far, the bulk of No More Heroes revolves around tracking down and eliminating the ten higher-ranking assassins who would otherwise have little to do with you. With a few exceptions, the assassin battles are tense and drawn out, giving you the feeling that you’re really fighting for your life against a cold-blooded killer. Even though the AI can be a bit mindless and cheap, most of the bosses put forth a solid challenge that can be surmounted through a bit of time and work. With a relatively simple fighting system that can be picked up by practically anyone who can stand a little chaos and blood, the battle segments of No More Heroes present a well-struck balance for the Wii’s diverse crowd.
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Aside from the battle system and story, No More Heroes also succeeds in taking director Suda 51’s trademark cell-shaded style to another level. The dark and dirty style, which admittedly looks a lot better in motion, works wonders for painting a picture of the grimy reality of life in Santa Destroy. Fans of Killer 7 or other cell-shaded games should certainly look into No More Heroes, as it’s one of the few titles with a decidedly “Mature” theme that doesn’t leave you with a saccharin aftertaste.
Even though it shines in so many areas, No More Heroes is not without a few sizable flaws that make picking up the Wiimote more of a chore than it should probably be. Firstly, the poor excuse for a sandbox known as Santa Destroy is little more than a “glorified level select” that is ultimately a complete waste of time. The controls are sloppy, the design is buggy, the physics are terrible, and you never really interact with your surroundings (aside from mowing down palm trees and “moving” struck people with your motorcycle). When you’re not trying to figure out the counter-intuitive sliding controls or getting stuck in invisible walls, you’re launching over cars and going from 90 MPH to zero in about two seconds. It’s so poorly designed and vacant that it’s hardly believable, making every minute spent trekking throughout the buggy, enormous city especially tedious and bothersome.
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As the game progresses you begin to get a feel for Santa Destroy and how to get from one place to the other relatively painlessly, but it’s hard not to feel like the giant city had so much unrealized potential. Santa Destroy doesn’t distract from No More Heroes’ overall experience so much that the game is unplayable, but it will probably take you a little while to get used to it. There are things to discover and places to see throughout Santa Destroy to give it a tiny bit of pizazz, but it’s difficult to shake the feeling that you’re the poor sap stuck playing in a half-empty sandbox without a single toy in sight.
Meanwhile, some of the challenges could have been modified to be more entertaining or challenging for experienced players. Slowly carrying coconuts, killing the same 25 Pizza Butt employees over and over, and what is undeniably the dullest lawnmower simulator known to man await all who brave No More Heroes. While they aren’t usually too difficult or require much mental effort on the behalf of the player, a handful of the mini-games could have been a little more enjoyable and less repetitive. Thankfully the humorous outweigh the mind-numbingly bad in the long run, and the missions help to provide a worthwhile diversion between the assassin matches that make up the meat of the game.
(Click screens to enlarge)
Luckily, when you actually get down to kicking ass, the game shines like no other. The comedic blood squirting (reminiscent of battle scenes in Kill Bill) makes massacring legions of identical twins a surprisingly colorful and jubilant experience The combat is rather straightforward, yet deceptively tricky — when fighting bosses, there seems to be a large element of chance coming into the timing of the unspeakably damaging suplex grabs. You can usually widdle the assassins down and make everything work to your advantage, but a little less blind luck would have been appreciated
Likewise, even though it can be a little annoying making your way through Santa Destroy to do so, upgrading your gear and going on side missions is a fun experience on a whole. The brainless minions that offer their lives throughout each mission present a fun amount of challenge with the coupled restrictions (no hits, no death, kill a certain person, etc.), and if a certain challenge is too tough at the moment, plenty others are up for the taking. The more time you spend completing missions and maneuvering around Santa Destroy the better, as it takes a few hours to really get a feel for how No More Heroes plays and progresses.
I… uh …I don’t have anything to say.
On a whole, No More Heroes is a worthwhile, if flawed, blood-soaked adventure that is nothing if not fresh and original. Fans of dark humor, cell shading, retro nuances, and complete randomness will find a lot more to enjoy in No More Heroes than they might expect, but with that said it’s certainly not a game for everyone. It takes a little bit of time to get used to Santa Destroy’s eccentricities and many people might be so put off by it (or the excessive blood and coarse language) that they might not get to fully appreciate the game for what it is: a dark and gritty gem of a game that Nintendo needs far more than it knows. Regardless of whether or not you can look past its flaws, No More Heroes is a game that deserves (at least) a rental for taking new concepts and ideas and making something original and fresh for the Wii. Now if only there were a way to turn off Santa Destroy…
Uncategorized | 
Ilchymis | March 10, 2008
