Another Wednesday arrives with a brilliant video review by Yahtzee of ZeroPunctuation fame. This week, he takes a look at No More Heroes, Suda 51's hack n slash masterpiece. Well,.. maybe masterpiece is too strong a word.
If you're like the majority of those playing No More Heroes, you're absolutely PAINED by the terrible driving sequences that mar this otherwise great game. To save you all a little frustration, and a LOT of driving, we offer this easy shortcut:
Drive off a cliff.
No, seriously! There are many spots on the map where you can drive off a cliff into water. Doing so will respawn Travis at the hotel. This is great for a quick gamesave, or to get from one side of the map to the other.. for example.. to get from Destroy Stadium to K-Entertainment.. it's far quicker to let Travis respawn at the hotel.
For the most part, the reviews trickling out across the 'net for No More Heroes are glowingly positive. That is, except for one. Yes, Insomniac, a site we're not familiar with, despises No More Heroes.
Digging a little deeper, we understand the reviewers concerns, and believe he got his review completely wrong. You see, Mr. Kierkegaard is under the impression that NMH is part of the Grand Theft Auto genre, whose solitary requirement is, apparantly, an open world map that you can drive on.
What Alex misses completely is that with NMH, there simply ARE no valid comparisons. To anything. Yes, I realize the game has an open world, and you do indeed traverse it through means of a motor vehicle. This world however, is little more than a glorified level select screen, and it should be given the focus that any other select screen would. I will give him this.. as a select screen.. it's terrible. There's too much delay between action, AI traffic has invisible hitboxes, and the bike is very hard to steer. It's frustrating.
However.. let's forget that. For all I care it could have been thrown out the window completely. The meat of the experience is in the odd jobs and assassin missions you'll perform throughout the game.
Yes, the "3rd rate" jobs won't be everyone's cup of tea, and that's personal preference. Personally.. they have me fondly remembering Shenmue. Never a bad thing. They only last a couple minutes at a time anyway.. not a huge deal.
Where this game really shines is the combat. The system used here is simple, but complex enough to pull off plenty of good blocks, dodges, powered up swings, kicks, suplexes, and guard breaks. Perhaps most importantly.. the sense of power it gives you is FUN and it's keen style adds to that tenfold. I don't want it to be hard to kill a baseball bat wielding thug with a lightsaber. That guy is there for one reason alone.. to be sliced and diced. It's no different than the Bride vs. the Crazy 88's in Kill Bill.. they never stood a chance, and albeit unrealistic,.. as viewers we loved every moment of it.
So,.. to the folks at Insomniac, we're sorry you didn't like the game, but perhaps next time you won't hold a title up to the standards set by a AAA game in a completely different genre. We're not saying that everone has to like this game.. but at least be fair in your criticism.
Still on the fence about No More Heroes? If you've been listening to our podcast lately, you know we're more than excited for this game, and we want you to be as well.
However.. let's forget that. For all I care it could have been thrown out the window completely. The meat of the experience is in the odd jobs and assassin missions you'll perform throughout the game.