No More Heroes review

No More Heroes is the next game by Suda 51 after the critically acclaimed Killer 7. For this writer, ‘critically acclaimed’ doesn’t necessarily translate into ‘good game’. I had serious issues with Killer 7 with its awkward loading times (PS2 version played) and the fact that it was on-rails, so it was with some trepidation that I delved into No More Heroes.

I’m pleased to say that No More Heroes is a far superior game, but with my less than stellar opinion of Killer 7, that is not difficult to achieve. You play Travis Touchdown, who obtains a ‘beam katana’ (A lightsaber just different enough for no legal action) and become ranked as the 11th best assassin in the world. So naturally, you have to battle to become the best for seemingly the sole reason that you are on a promise with well endowed Sophia if you achieve this. Battling is achieved not by swing the Wii-mote, but by merely pressing A or B (with the Z button for lock on effects), the motion sensitivity coming into play with your stance and finishing the enemies off. The animations are varied enough to keep you entertained, changing whenever you upgrade your weapons, and some old-school pattern watching required for the actual bosses. It works very well, and the bosses are all varied and interesting, making you want to watch the cut-scenes as opposed to just skipping them.

Of course, just 10 battles wouldn’t make much of a game would it? Each battle requires an increasing entry fee, for which you need to complete casual jobs and assassination missions to earn the cash. This is where the game loses a lot of its steam. On their own, the jobs and missions are fine. And would be a distraction and complement the battles nicely, but you are forced to travel around a city GTA style to perform the tasks. And they are very rarely close together. You have to drive your motorbike, which looks cool, has a cool wheelie move, but handles badly and seems rather slow to a Job Centre, then to the Job, perform the task, get assassination mission etc etc. It feels tacked on, and it seems pretty pointless to give the illusion of sandbox gaming when there is NOTHING, other than essential to progression missions to do in the city. This could have been better implemented with a simple map/location selection screen. Like Shadow of the Colossus before it, this feels like an attempt to add a few hours to the games’ lifespan with pointless travelling. The jobs themselves are not taxing, and it is easy enough to get a gold ranking (for which there seems to be no real reward) on your first attempt, and it makes sense that the mini-games are rather dull, to differentiate between the usual 9-5, for the much more exciting role of being an assassin. The assassination missions are much more fun, offering more of what any person would have bought the game for.

Suda 51 has been over-hyped. There I said it. It is clear that he is a great fan of gaming, and that comes across well in his work, but his plots make no real coherent sense, and more to the point seem aware of this. As a recent graduate, I know that being aware of your inattention to detail and lack of structure is no excuse for not actually putting the effort in, hell I’ve done it. Pretending mistakes are ‘intentional’ rather than fixing them is just laziness, and that is what this game ultimately feels like. A mish-mash of terrific ideas implemented either competently or badly, with the over-riding sense that if you don’t like that you somehow ‘aren’t cool’. It is mad, looks cool at times, but overall, this game won’t change your life and will inevitably be overshadowed by games with much better presentation overall.

Overall 7/10. Worth playing, but be ready to trade in quickly.

God Of War 2 Review

Greek mythology, as reviewers have no doubt mentioned in the past, lends itself to videogames and cinema perfectly. Granted, in the film sense, no-one has really bothered that much since Ray Harryhausen with his stop motion classic ‘Jason and the Argonauts’, or the 1981 box office hit, ‘Clash of the Titans’ (which is currently in pre-production for a 2010 remake). God of War on the Playstation 2 was a prefect example of how well this translated, and combined puzzle, platform and extreme violence very well, as well as taking the characters from Greek mythology, and creating a universe of its own.

Skip to now…the ‘next gen war’ is officially on. Xbox 360 has been out for roughly 18 months, Wii for 6 months and the PS3 debuted just under two months ago. I have played games on all formats, and I can honestly say the best game I have played in the past year is God of War 2 on the Playstation 2. For me it is a shining example to all the naysayers about Sony, that in the end, they have introduced the gaming world to some fantastic franchises, and continue to do so.

It is hard to review this game without descending into the hyperbole of an ADHD suffering 10 year old child…So I am going to give up now, and let my inner child explain the game to you…

“This fucking dead hard guy from god of war one, right, he is all pissed off ‘cos all the other gods have been gypping his tats, and he keeps like, starting on everyone for lolz, so one of the god dudes takes away his magic god powers, and he is all like “whatever, Zeus, outside now, y’cunt”. He does this cos even though he is a normal bloke again, he is still DEAD hard and could probably have all the gods in a fight with the right sword, which he doesn’t have, so he starts chinning EVERYONE, ripping off peoples arms and taking their eyes out and shit, and at one cool bit, slams someone’s face in the door like Vinnie Jones in that film my doctor said I should never have watched. Some bits get a bit boring, like when there is no-one to kill, but sometimes there are two chicks with their ta-tas out which you can totally pork and make a bald dude sandwich with!”

Back to reality…it really is that much fun. Kratos is the ultimate anti-hero, he is aggressive, violent and you want him to win for fear that he may possibly exist, a little like the mythical Chuck Norris. Except Kratos could easily beat him in a fight (see, even now, the hyperbole slips back in). The game is pure unadulterated cartoon style violence, many of the ‘special’ kills resembling some of the over the top parodies of video games you see in programmes such as the Simpsons and South Park.

Aside from the joy of killing, there are the very basic puzzle elements too, but none of it seems to outstay its welcome. The game is perfectly designed to leave you scratching your head at some points, but not to the point where the game becomes frustrating, you tend to figure out the problems quickly, and get back to more killing. It has been noted that the game is longer than the first, I couldn’t confirm or deny this, but it does seem to be over all too quickly, but again, that is a testament to how no particular part drags, and that the game designers have not implemented the ‘time honoured’ tradition of forcing the player to go backwards and forwards in the same locations to achieve goals (Spiderman 3, I am looking at you).

I never count graphics as much as a plus or negative in games, pop up doesn’t bother me, and neither does a game having to have the ‘next gen’ look. God of War 2 looks nice, has spot on collision detection, the only minor quibble being the fixed camera angles can sometimes be a tad frustrating, but nothing that can’t be fixed by simply moving further on.

Giving a game a 10/10 score is pretty redundant, it would suggest that it is the PERFECT game, with no little faults, and has a lot of long term appeal. And that is where this game slips up. I completed it twice, and while there are a couple of extra modes, and opportunities to do the game on an increased difficulty setting, The game held my attention for two days (granted, they were FULL days), but after that I had no real desire to go back…maybe in a few months time I will, but I will have invariably traded it in by then. With this in mind, I have to give the game a solid 9/10.