No More Waiting: The Great Wii Action Game Has Arrived! (Page 3 of 6)

By Dave Rudden
January 22, 2008 12:41 PM PST
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Reason number 12 that the beam katana is awesome: it can cut your opponents in half like a lightsaber

The Path of Enfightenment

No More Heroes basically lives and dies by its level design. You're going to be slashing your way through eleven stages to reach each assassin, and even fun combat can get repetitive if you're doing the same thing over and over again. Thankfully, the stages are just unique enough to keep you going. Without spoiling the crazy ways the combat changes, I can assure you that the game integrates sports and public transportation with ruthless sword fighting perfectly.

And then there are the bosses. Keeping in accordance with the game's great story, the assassins you have to make your way through are memorably designed, and their fighting styles are fun to contend with. There are a few occasions, however, where you become painfully aware of the game's over-reliance on pattern-based fighting and the A.I. could be a bit tighter, but these issues are minor and don't ruin the fun all that much.

No More Side Missions

The one area where No More Heroes falters is the open-ended world Travis inhabits between levels. The stages and bosses are by far the game's meat and potatoes, so the tacked-on side-missions, stores, and lots of driving feel like the biggest serving of fluffy filler I've ever encountered. Case in point: the boring "third-rate" jobs that have you performing janitorial tasks with the Wii Remote.

Wait until you have to recharge the beam katana. The motion's hilariously inappropriate.

It's actually a lot more fun than it has any right to be, but any diversion from the game's great combat is unwelcome. As it is, you'll probably take 10-12 hours to play through No More Heroes, but I would have settled for an experience that was half as long if it meant I could have just played through each of the main stages in succession.

Kill With Your Eyes Closed

Also disappointing was the fact that the game's graphics aren't really that good. The only saving grace is that the visual style is excellent, with a sweet pulp-comic/anime-inspired look that really stands out. Still, the repetitive enemy models, the sparsely-populated open world, and the raw look of the game proves that while the Wii represents the wave of the future in terms of a gaming experience, it's yesterday's news when it comes to the visual element. I couldn't help but think about how awesome this game would be if it also featured Xbox 360 or PS3 level graphics.

The sound, however, fares much better. The voice acting is very well done, and while there's not a whole lot of songs being played over the course of the game, the few that do play are memorable without being repetitive. The Wii Remote's speakers are also put to great use, with the lightsaber-esque Beam Katana's unsheathing and sword clanging providing a nice aural touch to the action. I won't spoil the game's greatest use of the Wii Remote's tiny speakers, but I will say that it made for one of the greatest Wii moments I've encountered yet. You'll know it when you hear it.

More No More Heroes Plz

No More Heroes easily ranks among the Wii's finest titles, busting a bunch of myths along the way. You say sword-based combat peaked with Twilight Princess? Wait until you slice a suit-wearing crony in half. The Wii can't do mature games? This game does it without the dark dreariness of just about every other violence-laden M-rated title. It could use a bit less filler, but No More Heroes is still a fine fight from the first blow to the last strike. Sorry LucasArts, but the bar for the next Wii Star Wars game has just been raised through the roof.