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17 of 20 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
No More Button Bashing, 1 Sep 2008
Fun:3.0 out of 5 stars
The spiritual sequel to Killer 7, No More Heroes shares a striking visual style, but is also very hit and miss.
The game is essentially a free roamer, starring an impressively named Travis Touchdown who aims to be the best hitman in the town.
He does this by earning enough cash to arrange the next 'meet'. This can be done by completing side jobs, or assassination missions in Santa Destroy.
These side jobs are impressively varied mini-games.
Litter picking, lawn mowing, pest control, motorbike daredevil and graffiti remover are some of the jobs available as the game progresses.
Sadly the game gets into a groove, that; excluding a few quirky moments (the game turns into a scrolling side shooter at one point), becomes repetitive far too quickly. Like Assassins Creed, the game soon feels like meeting criteria in order to advance to the next target. All work and no fun for the most part. Yet all the boss battles are memorable, imaginative and well animated.
The combat is essentially a button basher. The 'beam katana' makes some imaginative use of the Wii Remote, and can be upgraded in power. But constantly presing A ruins a potentially deep and rewarding combat system.
Some side missions involve wiping out every enemy without taking a single hit. Frustrating, as the combat isnt as sophisticated as the developers seem to think.
Travis' motorbike is also pretty weak. It can be jumped by shaking the Wii Remote but reacts incredibly slowly. The game loses a lot of its shine when moving quickly on the bike, jagged edges are everywhere, and can look messy. As the bike is the quickest way to get around, expect to see this a lot.
Obviously No More Heroes was never aiming for GTA or even Crackdown levels of detail, but it is disappointing there isnt more to do in Santa Destroy.
There are hardly any pedestrians, or traffic, and no random moments as a result. Dumpsters hide cash or extra clothes to wear. And an alcohoilc will teach Travis extra moves by finding him balls throughout the map! But thats about it. Lots of originality, but not always successful.
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26 of 32 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
Enjoyable in short bursts, but pretentious and repetitive, 16 April 2008
Fun:3.0 out of 5 stars
I'm one of the people who anticipated No More Heroes' release because of it being a pseudo-sequel to the excellent Killer7 more than anything else. The bags of hype and strong critical reception helped, of course. Having played the game through, though, it's disappointing both as a follow up to Killer7 and as a game in its own right...
Comparisons to Killer7 only really extend as far as the graphical style and the offbeat nature of its story. The game is more of a hack 'n' slash type than anything, so it's just as well that the combat is satisfying and entertaining; wisely controlled mostly by button presses, finishing moves are performed by slicing the remote in a given direction, and wrestling moves can be performed with similar gestures. The fighting is fun and new tricks and tactics open up the more you play it. Unfortunately even then it becomes tiresome after a while, thanks to the endless strings of identical enemies and the fact that you do very little else in between.
To say No More Heroes lacks variety would be a bit off-base; there are things to do besides fighting, such as the jobs comprised of basic mini-games - it's just that few of them are particularly interesting, and most are simple to the point of being tedious. Regardless of what you're doing, the game feels shallow and repetitive. The cycle of gameplay is highlighted (probably deliberately) by the plot, which sees you dispatching the top 10 assassins to get to number ones - wade through enemies down identical corridors for about 10 minutes (sometimes less), kill a boss to rank higher, perform mundane minigames to make the money needed to access the next boss, rinse and repeat.
One of No More Heroes' biggest problems, in my opinion, is that it thinks it's a lot cooler than it is. The references to gaming and anime cultures feel forced and the cut-scenes are as baffling as they were in Killer7, but without being clever, funny or having any real point to them. By the end of the game the cut-scenes were so stupid and pretentious it was actually getting on my nerves; it doesn't help that lead character Travis Touchdown is possibly the most unlikeable in any game ever. We're supposed to find his perverted nerdiness endearing, but every time he started spouting his moronic dialogue I found myself wishing I could play as the other assassin and murder the little twerp.
No More Heroes isn't a terrible game, or even a bad game, but it's something I could only recommend if it was cheap, and even then it's something that can only be played in limited doses before it gets boring. Every effort made by the developers to flesh it out into something more than a hack 'n' slash seems to have failed - the bonus missions you unlock are all identical (kill all the enemies without receiving damage, which is incredibly frustrating, especially when you fail and aren't given the option to retry). The town the game is based in is so dull and lifeless that exploring it for cash and t-shirts with which to customise Travis feels like a chore. All in all it just feels like Grasshopper spent so much time trying to make the game cool that they forgot to make it fun.
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31 of 40 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
A stylish and original Wii exclusive, 14 Mar 2008
Fun:5.0 out of 5 stars
One of the Wii's most stylish games and one of the console's best titles has arrived courtesy of Suda 51. Don't be put off by other reviews that berate the UK version (which is the same as the Japanese original) just because it lacks the blood of the US version, this doesn't affect the overall quality of what is a superb game. In fact many reviews, and Suda 51, prefer the bloodless version as it improves the games pace and doesn't distract from the games overall look.
No More Heroes is the gaming equivalent of Kill Bill. You play the uber-cool Travis Touchdown, as you work your way through the 3D city of Santa Destroy, using your Wii remote to take out tons of enemies and work your way up the ranks to be the city's top assassin. Think PS2 classic Devil May Cry but with extra bits thrown in, including a variety of brilliant jobs/tasks to help fund your carnage. How many other games see you pumping gas, collecting coconuts, eradicating scorpions and catching lost kittens in order to earn cash? How many other games see you sitting on the loo in order to save the games progress? Humour is a big part of what makes No More Heroes so great and whilst it might sound like a gamer's game, casual gamers shouldn't be put off, the introductory training mode will have you up and running in minutes.
And should you need further convincing, NGamer, GamesRadar, Edge, The Official Nintendo magazine, nRevolution and IGN have given No More Heroes scores of between 88% and 94%, describing it as "...by far one of the best looking and most distinctive Wii games to date". It's hard to disagree.
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