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So... I've been playing No More Heroes 2 since Friday (no it's not out in Europe yet, don't ask*  :whome:) and because I don't feel like writing cohesively at the moment, here's a list of my impressions:

• Core gameplay is much the same as the first one, with a few subtle improvements
  
• Characters and bosses are even whackier (I don't wanna spoil anything here)
• Bosses are also more diverse in terms of gameplay
• Half-assed "open world" bullshit of the first game has been replaced with location selection menu in the style of recent JRPGs
• Boring minigames have been replaced with mostly awesome 8-bit minigames
• Gym is now both more challenging and more homoerotic
• Story is slightly more serious, but only slightly
• Sexual innuendo bar has been raised a few notches and made its way to the HUD
• Different weapons that handle differently
• Minigame probably paying hommage to Touhou
• Mecha battle
• Improvment over the already awesome first game but not much different

Conclusion: It's awesome, get it! 666/10

*I have it ordered from an import store but couldn't wait so I "pirated" it. That probably makes me a bad person, but at least I paid (more than) the full price for it.

If it's awesome, then why are you sad? :-\

The title is an actual line of dialog from the game. I couldn't be happier.  :lol:

I've wanted to buy the first for a while but never got around to it, but since everyone says this is an improvement, I'm wondering if I should skip it and just get this. Will I be too lost?

Nope. They even make a fourth-wall-breaking reference to it in the intro cutscene.  ;)

Yeah I was pretty darn confused with that cutscene.

I have been playing it as well; it is, indeed, awesome. In the Biblical sense, in parts.

I would also recommend the first game, if you haven't played it. It has flaws, like the "open-world bullshit" and "boring minigames," although I didn't think the latter were that boring, but here's the thing: they're completely deliberate and justified. This is why I love Suda51.

I could write pages and pages about it, but what it boils down to is this: The main character, Travis, is a nerd/otaku of the highest order. He is, as far as I can tell, supposed to represent John Q. Anygamer. The first game has an "open city" to "explore," but there's nothing to actually DO except the half-dozen or so things Travis is interested in: stop by the video store, look for upgraded weapons, train at the gym. Other than that, he has his jobs - which are a bit boring, because jobs are what you have to do when you're not doing fun stuff, just like Travis. You can say that putting something in a game that's not fun is bad design; I can see both points of view. But playing a Suda51 game is like playing an ascended, slightly more focused Vasily Zotov game. A lot of it all MEANS something, and that takes precedence. Yet it's all enjoyable in itself.


Also NMH2 has a big floppy dong that stands proudly when you have full power, but looks sadly at you when you need to charge up your weapon. Just sayin'.

This year is already better than last year for games.  Bayonetta, NMH2, Mass Effect 2, Tatsunoko vs Capcom ... fun times.  Hoping Aliens vs Predator doesn't suck.

Not to mention it has a smiley face.

I really want to play this, but I've got to take a short break after finishing Bayonetta first. Human mind can only handle so much over-the-top stylized action games with crazy stories before it explodes*.

*unless you're Japanese

See i watched a friend play the first, and i don't get this. Parts of it looked awesome, but the open world stuff and mini games looked just awful. You say that they were deliberate and justified? How are the justified? Crappy gameplay is crappy gameplay. I have watched a preview of 2 and the minigames look better, although apparently they have "intentionally bad controls". Why the hell?! The rest of the game looks so awesome but this is what's putting me off getting it. I don't have that much time to play games these days, and the idea that i'd have to grind for cash doing minigames that are intentionally boring and repetitive just seems ridiculous. The fact that you said they are awesome, is that awesome because they are fun? Or awesome because they are 8 bit.

No release date that i can find for the uk, so i guess i have some time to make up my mind!

More than half of the minigames in NMH2 are genuinely fun and challenging and none have intentionally bad controls, where did you get that from? Also, the "entry fees" of the first game have been abolished, the money is now exclusively used to buy entirely optional upgrades (and clothing), and when I say entirely optional, I mean it.

Speaking of that, I thought the difficulty was right there. The game is challenging enough to not let you get away with simply mashing the attack button, but if you know what you're doing you should be able to defeat most bosses on your first try. The difficulty curve is a bit uneven though.

TL;DR version: NMH2 has been reduced to the "awesome" bits of the first game.

I got the "intentionally bad" controls from watching the giant bomb quicklook. Maybe i was reading more into it than needed. Everything else you just said makes me totally want this game now, which is a shame as i can't get it yet!

I've heard that they shaved all the jaggy bits off and made a game that follows more inline with mainstream games, sacrificing what made the first one more unique and quirky

They cut out most of the intentionally un-fun gameplay, but the characters and dialog are weird as ever. So yeah, it's less quirky than the first one, but it's still a pretty far cry from selling out to the God Of War crowd.

I remember when NMH1 came out, I was a bit disappointed that it wasn't as surreal as Killer7. I still think that's Suda's best game.

Haha, I just beat Killer 7 for the first time five minutes ago. Holy shit. I thought it would all make sense at the end, and in a way it kind of does, but I have way more questions than I did earlier.

Naomi. Naomi. Naomi. Naomi.

:crazy:

Just beat it, and I'd say I have to agree.
But it's still an absolute blast.


Also...you know in the manual for NMH1 it said Naomi had a dark secret?

Well GUESS WHAT?  :lol:

The controls in that particular game they played actually don't really suck at all.  Surely you've noticed that the Giant Bomb dudes sometimes are just bad at the games they play.

I dunno man. The kotaku review pretty much ripped a hole in the 8 bit games too, as well as the fact that the areas leading to bosses are according to them no fun. Obviously you gotta take reviews from sources like those with a pinch of salt, but it's definitely a point that i've seen in a few places now. The upside is you don't actually need to do the side games if you don't like them i guess.

I heard somewhere that Suda51 went on record saying that one of the things he really wants is to please his fans, but before NMH his games barely had a fanbase to begin with. Apparently NMH is the first game he made to gather enough attention to allow him to listen to fan suggestions.

Also, let me guess, Naomi drops a Bridget on us?

Naw. Pretty much the opposite, in fact, if that's possible.

Most of them only take like 10 minutes though (aside from the parking lot level, also mentioned in the review), also I thought slashing up generic goons is fun and satisfying, and already did in the first game. Generally, if you like classic beat 'em ups like Golden Axe or Turtles In Time, you should enjoy it too.

I'm currently stuck at the russian kosmonaut dude. He's rather easy and somewhat boring most of the time, but when he's down to his last 3 or so "squares" of health, he suddenly throws all his attacks at you at once and does something that forces you to move very far away from him and then run back dodging his numerous projectiles.  >:(

What? A game on a Nintendo platform involving homorerotics that's not Tingle's Rosy Rupee Land?

I need to play this one.

does anyboby know the australian/PAL region release date?

Nothing specific yet. I softmodded my Wii ages ago because of the shoddy PAL region support Nintendo platforms seem to have, with extreme release delays (I think it was something like 4 months for Animal Crossing DS for instance) and a lot of games not making it here at all.