Note: I wrote this for a 1up contest that asked users to explain what they liked best about the game, No More Heroes. I didn't win! But even so, the contest got me writing again, something that I haven't done in a long time. This is good! So, here I am, hopefully about to consistently write here for the months to come. About what, I don't know! Get excited, though, whoever might read this!
If nothing else, No More Heroes has unwavering pizazz, a flashy word that can only exist in the English language if italicized and preceded by an out-of-place adjective. And that maniacal pizazz is usually what people mention first when they talk about the game: the blood, the beam sabers, the wrestling moves, the ridiculous characters, the story -- No More Heroes is essentially a Tarantino flick in game-form without most of the film homages that anybody who isn't a film geek will give a shit about (Wilhelm scream? Who the fuck cares? Okay, I care a little...). Sanctimonious pizazz is good and all, but it only goes so far in the argument of style versus substance.
No, what's best about No More Heroes is how amazingly self-aware it is. Right from the start, it plays as a videogame and then remains a videogame throughout the course of Travis' blood-soaked journey. No matter what the situation, whether you're slicing through spleens or shooting aliens Galaga-style in that out-of-nowhere minigame, No More Heroes revels in its self-consciousness and fourth-wall humor. A couple noteworthy examples of some fourth-wall-breakers: Travis mentions the person "holding the remote out there" in the introductory cutscene, Sylvia's less-than-optimistic phonecalls play through the Wii remote's speaker (welcoming you to the "Garden of Madness"), and without giving too much away, a certain character speeds up their dialogue just to avoid a nastier ESRB rating. Really, when you boil it right down, No More Heroes is a game for people who like games, much like Tarantino movies are generally for people who like movies.
While we're being honest here, yes, No More Heroes is a little uneven, and yes, the overworld may or may not have been intended to be a satire on open-world games, but goddamn it -- if No More Heroes didn't have all the right pieces in exactly the right place, then it more than makes up for it in sheer love of the medium. And in an industry where remembering your roots is slowly becoming the hip, cool thing to do, No More Heroes is undeniably a game worthy of a place on the hip, cool pedestal of unrelentless pizazz.
