Review: NO MORE HEROES on Steam is a Very Solid Port of Irreverent Fun
XSEED Games recently brought No More Heroes and No More Heroes 2: Desperate Struggle from Grasshopper Manufacture Inc. and Marvelous Inc. to the PC via Steam. The games follow the assassin Travis Touchdown as he tries to climb the ranks of the United Assassins Association. There’s more to it than that, but I’ll let you play the game. I will warn you though the games are rated M and they really lean into that rating. XSEED was kind enough to provide me a copy of the games, but you can purchase them now for $19.99 each.
In No More Heroes, Travis Touchdown starts off as the #11 ranked assassin in the United Assassins Association (UAA), and with his trusty beam katana must face off against the world’s top 10 assassins. He rides the streets of Santa Destroy on his signature motorbike, the Schpeltiger, and packs an arsenal of pro-wrestling moves honed from years of watching wrestlers power bomb and body slam each other. It’s a long way to the top, but the all-American otaku won’t stop until he’s the #1 assassin in the world, baby!
No More Heroes 2: Desperate Struggle takes place three years after Travis achieves his goal of being the #1 assassin in the UAA. However, time has not been kind to him, and he finds himself falling down the ranks to #51. Adding to his problems is Skelter Helter, another assassin who has sworn revenge on Travis for the death of his brother. With his trusty beam katanas in-hand for twice the hacking and slashing, and teamed up with his allies Shinobu and Henry Cooldown, Travis is on a mission to reclaim his #1 position and fend off new challengers. An otaku at heart though, there’s always time for retro 8-bit minigames to help him earn some money and power up!
I was really pumped to get these games since I didn’t get to play them on the Wii back in the day. I’ve heard really good things about the series and the third game is set to release later this year, so this is the perfect time to get into the franchise. One very important thing to note is that you must use a controller and cannot use the keyboard. Also, when you first launch the game, it gives you setting options for the graphics and such. This is the only place to adjust graphics, although the only things you can change are what type of anti-aliasing and whether you want the game to be fullscreen or not.
First, let’s tackle the graphics. Let’s remember that these games came out on the Wii over a decade ago. They’re not the prettiest games. I do wish that they had gone in and touched up the textures in the game, but it is presentable. It’s not the prettiest game out there, but the stylized art does add a charm to it. The controls work rather well, too. The only inconvenient control is to recharge your beam katana, but even then it quickly becomes very easy to do.
The actual gameplay itself certainly feels a little dated, but is playable. It’s a hack ‘n slash game with very little depth in terms of gameplay. I did enjoy the way the game handles throws though. Throughout the fights you can trigger throws where you have to match two arrow directions with the analog sticks and then you perform a wrestling move. This is really fun and helps break up the monotony of just mashing buttons. You also have finishing blows where you have to move your stick in the proper direction to murder your foes. This is fun, but feels a little overused in my opinion.
Outside of touching up the textures, the only real problem I have is that there’s a lot of decapitation and dismemberment which naturally leads to gratuitous amounts of blood. I just wish there was an option to tone down the blood.
Overall, if you’re fine with or even look for games that lean into the M rating, the No More Heroes series fits the bill. The stories are fun and irreverent with lots of nods to pop culture. The PC port now available on Steam works great and provides a new opportunity for people to enjoy the games before the third title releases.
