No More Heroes 2 review
With the first game staring an anime loving, beam katana swinging Otaku, in a world filled with assassins that he needs to kill in order to reach his goal of scoring with the UAA's secretary is there any way this sequal can get any lower? Apparently, yes.
The story takes off right away with a ranked assassin battle easing you into the games controls, with the end of the fight you learned that it's been a few years since Travis Touchdown has left his #1 ranked position as best assassin in Santa Destroy, and completely breaking all aspects of the the 4th wall they decide not to tell you what exactly has happened in that amount of time. From there Travis learns that his best friend Bishop, who played a small role of selling you videos in the first game, was killed by thugs hired by the now highest ranking assassin in the city, thus Travis vows revenge to him and all those who stand in his way. After that the rest of the games structure follows that of the same the first game did, get what you need to kick some ass, then go and kill the ones above you, easy, simple, and works very well apparently.
They decided to change a lot that didn't go well with the players from the first game, some being the over world map, while being an okay idea it was more of a time consuming thing, so they took that out for an easy select menu, they decided to get rid of obtaining large amounts of money so you can fight the next rank, so now you can play the game at your pace, whether you go right from battle to battle or decided to increase your stats and get better weapons you had little holding you back. In the first game you were given a few different weapons, they'd usually be the same with a different look and strength but now you are given more distinct weapons, while they do play a little alike they each have their ups and downs. Also they decided to go for a old school approach in this game and you can't get much older than 8-bit, the mini games and little extras are usually in an old school 8-bit style giving off the exact feel as they did way back when, from the controls to the sounds it is amazing in fact some of the best things about this game are the small 8-bit mini games.
While the main hero of this game is without a doubt Travis what is a hero without a few idiots to do some of his bidding, whether he wants them to do it or not is beside the point. In certain parts of the game you take over two other characters, Shinobu and Henry, while Henry is a simpler Travis with a dash attack he isn't in the game for very long, but you get to play as the returning Shinobu as a assassin running under the name of Touchdown, she is far weaker than Travis taking a while to kill the slightly stronger guys and because she can jump they decided to give her platform areas while it's not bad I kind of wish they didn't put them in, the seemed more of an enemy then the actual guys with weapons at times.
This game has an intriguing style to it, and it never stops being interesting, the colors, sounds and enemies all give off an anime feel to it making it seem like talking severed heads and giant Mecha's could be real in this world. In that sense though the game never takes itself seriously, always making fun of itself or the things that it's obviously getting ideas from, but the weirdest thing in the entire game wouldn't be the enemies, new or old fan favourites, or how the beam katana is the exact opposite of the light saber instead of sealing the wounds it makes the blood and money gushes out of your opponents, it's Travis himself. With his strange fighting combination of samurai sword style and Mexican wrestling suplexes, or when his ecstasy gauge gets high enough he randomly gets special abilities suck as slowing down time for endless combo attacks, throwing projectile energy sphere, or soon to be everyone's favorite, transforming into a tiger for a one hit kill, he never ceases to stop amazing or dumbfound you.
This game is a funny and compelling game to play the sad thing is that it doesn't last very long, and other than the mini games there really isn't much to go back to play at a later date. Travis Touchdown is pretty much the exact opposite of who we play in video games, he isn't the mysterious guy trapped in a fight he can't avoid or the pretty boy who wants top save the princess and change the world he's an over the top Otaku with an apartment filled with anime, posters, Luchador masks, and a fat cat named Jeane. He has no shame, and no sense for that matter but at the end you want him to be your friend because outside of killing the most dangerous of assassins all he wants to do is have fun, and if you were ever killed by thugs he wouldn't stop until vengeance has been had. now that's what I call a pal.
I give it a 7.5/10
