I’m a huge fan of the first No More Heroes. The stylish, cel-shaded look of the game; amazing soundtrack; incredible dialogue between the characters; the assassins themselves; the satire on American culture, video games, and anime; and the ultra-violence of it all make for a memorable gaming experience. The main character, Travis, is a very likeable character from the get-go – he’s a prototype of what a lot of gamers are in the real world: an otaku, a moe, a porn-lover. But the huge factor that differentiates Travis from the rest of them is that he can kick ass. A lot. With a beam katana (a lightsaber, practically) and his pro wrestling moves, he aims to climb to the top of the United Assassins Association, an organization that organizes matches between the ranked assassins to be number one. With that said, how does NMH2 fares, in comparison to the first one?

Graphics

The graphics has certainly been improved in the game. The textures are smoother this time around, the movements are more fluid, and everything looks prettier this time around. The game has a slightly darker atmosphere compared to the first game, and that might be due to Travis’ mission to get his revenge on a certain killed character. Lighting in the game has been done really well to enhance the game’s atmosphere, as well as the positioning of camera angles. There is no noticeable slowdown when I played the game, so this is another step up from the first game, which slows down when you’re fighting a huge number of enemies at the same time. The game is still as gory as the first one, and since there are more assassins this time around, all of you gore-loving freaks will enjoy the death scenes of the assassins. Oh, and did I mention that Sylvia (the UAA agent) is freaking hot?

Sound

The first NMH has a great soundtrack (Pleather of Breakfast is one of the best boss themes ever) and in NMH2, Grasshopper Manufacture kept the quality up. There are some amazing tracks in this game, such as Philistine, Dynamite Rocket and We Are Finally Cowboys (Golden Brown Mix). Rumor has it that Akira Yamaoka (of Silent Hill fame) help composed some of the songs in this game. The 8-bit sounds used in the mini-games bring you back to the good ol’ days of the NES era.

The voice-acting is superbly performed by the voice actors, since they were  directed by Kris Zimmerman of Metal Gear Solid fame. Sylvia’s sexy, seductive voice, enthusing Travis to rise back to the top in return for a lesson in yoga makes you wish you are in his shoes. Travis’ laid-back banter with the assassins shows a man confident in his abilities and one who wouldn’t take crap spewed by others. The rest of the assassins played their role well, but the minimal lines they have gives them a rather empty personality, which brings me to my next point.

Story

The obvious, main highlights of the NMH games are the assassins, just as the colossi are for Shadow of the Colossus. Who could ever forget the sweet-lolita, sadistic-loving, bat-wielding girl in the form of Bad Girl in the first game? Or the detective with the soprano voice who sings to Travis in an empty stadium, and laments about his failing relationship with his daughter in his last moments?

However, in NMH2, most of the assassins’ personalities are killed by the limited dialogue they have in the game, thus ending whatever potential attachment you might have feel for them. Personally, there are only five assassins whom I like in this game, and there are 15 of them in total. This is a huge blow to me, because I was looking forward to more bizarre and interesting characters like Bad Girl or Dr. Peace.

The story of the game starts off with Travis fighting a Cloud Strife look-alike at a place many NMH1 fans would recognize. Travis finds out that due to his killing spree in the first game, one of his close pals was killed as a result. The rest of the game focuses on Travis’ climb to the top of the rankings to kill the top-ranked assassin, who is responsible for the murder of his friend. The return of some surviving characters from the first game would definitely make NMH1 fans go mental with joy. Breaking the fourth-wall moments are aplenty in this game as well, and provides gamers with a huge grin each time they occur.

Overall, though, I find the game’s story to be pretty lacking in comparison to the first one. The ending is a bit abrupt, and it’s up to you to decide what it is all about. Personally, I think it’s a fitting ending, even though it’s a bit too abrupt for my tastes.

Gameplay

NMH2 is a hack-n-slash game, and you’ll be doing plenty of that in this game. You press the A button to attack with your beam katana(s) and you swing the Wiimote to do a running attack. At certain times, after doing a certain amount of damage to an enemy, you’ll be able to do a deathblow by swinging the Wiimote according to the motion displayed on the screen. This time, you’ll be able to switch your beam katanas anytime you want by pressing the 2 button, instead of having to go back to your motel room everytime you want to do so just like in NMH1. You’ll get a total of 4 different beam katanas in the game, and each has their own pros and cons. It’s up to you to switch to one that suits the situation the best.  The B button is used to do melee attacks, and perform wrestling moves when the enemy is in a daze. Meanwhile, the C-button is used to centralize the camera angle, and the Z-button is used to target an enemy. To perform dodge rolls, just use the D-pad.

Just like in the previous game, a slot reel will appear each time Travis kills an enemy with a deathblow, and he will gain special powers depending on the set he gets. An added bonus added to this game is Travis’ ability to transform into a tiger (yes, a friggin’ tiger) by pressing the + button when the tiger icon at the bottom right of the screen goes red after killing a number of enemies and not getting hit too often. This enables him to kill every enemy with a single strike.

The open-world setting from the previous game has been removed as well, so you can’t do crazy drifts with the Schpeltiger (Travis’ bike) anymore. Instead, you’ll be traveling through Santa Destroy via a 2D map. Choose the destination you want to go, and you’ll automatically arrive there. You can buy new clothes, buy new katanas, go to the gym to extend your health bar and strengthen your attacks, and do part-time jobs in the form of 2D mini-games.

The mini-games are shaped to look like NES games on purpose. In one mini-game, you are supposed to collect coconuts from the trees, and the game is played in a way similar to Mario. You’ll be moving from the left of the screen to the right, kicking the coconut trees to make them drop the coconuts, and making sure it drops into Travis’ basket, all this while avoiding enemies. Another mini-game requires Travis to send pizza to different houses under a time limit, and you’ll be driving the bike in a Hang-On style. There are a total of 12 mini-games altogether, and some will make you throw the Wiimote towards the TV screen if you don’t have the patience to calmly finish them (muscle training in the gym comes to mind). In retrospect (pun not intended), the mini-games are better than the ones in NMH1.

There are also side assassination missions for you to take, and although these missions are not essential to the storyline, you’ll be able to find items to decorate your motel room with. Throughout the game, there are treasure boxes which contain decorative items to be added to your room, and you’ll know how far from completion you are at the moment by checking the menu screen with the – button. More importantly, money isn’t as important in this game as the previous one, because there are no entrance fees for you to pay in order to face the ranked assassins! This gives you the freedom to just spend your money on the katanas, gym, and clothes.

Replayability

After finishing the game, you’ll unlock a harder difficulty mode called Bitter, as well as Deathmatch mode, which allows you to fight against the ranked assassins without going through the storyline again. There’s a catch to this though: you can only fight them in Bitter mode. You’ll also be able to load up your save file again and play through the storyline again with everything that you have unlocked in your previous playthrough.

Overall

All in all, No More Heroes 2: Desperate Struggle is a better game in every aspect compared to its predecessor except in the storyline. If the ranked assassins are more fleshed out, I would have enjoyed the game a lot more. That being said, NMH2 is a fantastic game to play. It’s certainly a worthy addition to your Wii collection.

9/10