ruggedtoast wrote: I think those were supposed to be shit. Although the one with the cats was enjoyable. |
No More Heroes: Desperate Struggle • Page 2
-
Sharks 5,089 posts
Seen 7 years ago
Registered 12 years ago -
Kay 21,321 posts
Seen 11 hours ago
Registered 18 years agoBut... that little dance he did whilst filling the tanks was priceless, no? Besides, like ecu said, you only needed to do them the once.
In fact, all the things listed in the OP are things I probably wouldn't want in the sequel, that would ruin what was the whole point of the game in the first place.
Edit: Don't quite make sense there, but meh. -
Sharks 5,089 posts
Seen 7 years ago
Registered 12 years agoA few whacky vehicular segments would be nice though. -
Tonka 31,980 posts
Seen 18 hours ago
Registered 18 years agoo/
Loved it. Loved the presentation, loved the collectables, loved the minigames. Although I do NOT buy into the "ZOMG post modern" bullshit that some reviewers wrote.
It's not some meta story where the real world is "our world with the daily grind" and the dungeons represent "gamers escape from reality into the gaming universe".
Any news on Fatal Frame Wii btw? -
I guess, but theres no reason for it to look like a PS1 game again is there? -
Tonka 31,980 posts
Seen 18 hours ago
Registered 18 years agoIt was made on a shoestring budget afaik. -
Tonka 31,980 posts
Seen 18 hours ago
Registered 18 years agoOn the same topic.
Read the comments after the latest Heavy Rain trailer. They quickly turned into "lowpolymodelslol" and "bad voice acting" rather than "Will this new game play that he is talking about really work?" or "Will it branch enough for it too feel as if I'm in control rather than just selecting different scenes from a DVD" -
Oh-Bollox 6,513 posts
Seen 2 years ago
Registered 14 years agoTonka wrote:
It's not some meta story where the real world is "our world with the daily grind" and the dungeons represent "gamers escape from reality into the gaming universe".
But it is. It's pretty obvious that's how it's supposed to be viewed. I wouldn't go so far as to call it a 'meta story', but it's pretty clear that the minigames are the 'shit bits' of Travis' life, when he's not playing the game.
It's not exactly a phenomenally clever concept. The fact that some reviewers pointed this out in awed terms is just a measure of how fucking retarded this industry is in terms of artistic creativity.
Fair enough if you think it's a load of cobblers, I do too, but it shouldn't be necessary for the artist to come out and tell everyone what he intended in order for us to grasp it.
Any news on Fatal Frame Wii btw?
I think we're probably not getting it. There's been no news AFAIK. -
Kay 21,321 posts
Seen 11 hours ago
Registered 18 years agoAgree with all of what ecu said, but for me maybe it was something to do with perceived value. I only bought the game after finding it for under a tenner brand new, and wasn't particularly interested in it, but thought it would be worth a try anyway. And so for that reason the shitty graphics, frame-rate or other technical issues (most of which I already knew about after reading impressions upon the game's release) didn't bother me. At first it was enjoyable in a "this is so shit, it's actually good" way, but the more I played, the more I realised... "although yes, this is still shit, it's also rather flippin' marvellous". If that makes any sense.
But if it was a game that I had looked forward to for ages, pre-ordered and paid full price for... then I'm not sure I would have enjoyed it as much. The ironic thing about that is the sequel probably won't be half as enjoyable for me because of the hype I will have built up in my head by the time I play it. There might be something in the whole post-modern thing after all..gif)
-
Sean.Aaron 2,531 posts
Seen 11 years ago
Registered 13 years agoWell, I'm inclined to pick up the original if I find it cheap next time I've got some extra cash laying about (ha!) based on the love being expressed and the pure oddity of it. The sequel seems to have a lot of appeal, but will apparently be a bit different.
Groovy. -
xandaca 433 posts
Seen 11 hours ago
Registered 13 years agoI disagree strongly with Tonka. Like Killer7 before it, NMH is a game of huge narrative depth that encompasses all sorts of interpretations and ideas. The widely accepted reason for the minigames being a contrast between the excitement of the gaming world and the mundanity of the real world is a perfectly valid 'reading' (in the academic sense - trust me, I'm doing a degree in this sort of thing!), but only scratches the surface of the sorts of ideas Suda is playing around with.
One of my personal theories, that I haven't seen anywhere else, is that the game represents the battle between different forms of national pop culture, just as Killer7 ostensibly dealt with the often interchanging battles between political and spiritual power, with Japan and America used as the representative pawns. Suda said that where K7 dealt with political issues, NMH deals with social issues - Travis, with his love of anime and all things otaku, represents the growing influence of Asia as a cultural and political power on the previously steadfast American imperial stage. As Travis slaughters his way through the various assassins, it represents a crisis of American culture as Asia gains strength and rises to the top. The open ending and deliberately convoluted plot twists show how these battles take place on so many levels the difference between each side becomes so blurred that determining a 'winner', with so many things changing at once, becomes completely impossible. But of course, it's also taking the piss of ridiculously overwrought gaming plot devices...
As much as I want to, I won't ramble on (I do love discussing the themes of Suda's games - next week: Travis as Jesus!) but will refer y'all to an article I really enjoyed reading and while I don't agree with everything the writer says, it does show how many levels the game can be taken on:
http://schlaghund.wordpress.com/2008/03/11/no-more-heroes-is-not-punk/
Suda might not have intended all those meanings, but I firmly believe he deliberately left the game's narrative open to lots of different interpretations.
As you can probably guess, NMH is one of my favourite games of all time (both gameplay and story-wise) and the prospect of a sequel has me giggling with glee like a schoolgirl on magic mushrooms. I'd be happy if they just imported the gameplay straight over (dual wielding though... *giggles*), but if they make changes I hope they're driven by the story rather than just being arbitrary additions. Story-wise, I'm obviously hoping that Desperate Struggle has similar depths to its predecessor. It certainly sounds as though a satire of corporate power is potentially on the cards, fingers crossed Travis' role in the NMH 'philosophy' won't get sidelined. -
Tonka 31,980 posts
Seen 18 hours ago
Registered 18 years agoI will get back to you tomorrow -
SomaticSense 15,062 posts
Seen 3 years ago
Registered 16 years agoo/
Me too.
Best game on Wii by some distance now I look back on it. Even though I was saddled with the no gore Euro version and never made it past Bad Girl (fucking bitch, and the iffy camera didn't help...). Had it's problems, but the gameplay was just so much fun that they really didn't matter.
Best things? The music, the combat, the fantastic use of the wiimote as a phone, and the fact you have to take a dump to save the game! -
SirScratchalot 7,921 posts
Seen 1 year ago
Registered 16 years agoruggedtoast wrote:
Dude. Go play a PS1.
I guess, but theres no reason for it to look like a PS1 game again is there? -
Sharks 5,089 posts
Seen 7 years ago
Registered 12 years agoecosse_011172 wrote:
- new character: Nathan Copeland - ranked 50th, and a fan of Travis
Sounds awesome
And I never had any gripes with the frame rate, at all :S -
Tonka 31,980 posts
Seen 18 hours ago
Registered 18 years agoxandaca wrote:
I disagree strongly with Tonka. Like Killer7 before it, NMH is a game of huge narrative depth that encompasses all sorts of interpretations and ideas. The widely accepted reason for the minigames being a contrast between the excitement of the gaming world and the mundanity of the real world is a perfectly valid 'reading'
You are right of course. My problem is more when some people say that the minigames ...
My problem began with how some people would go on and on about how K7 was art. Some reviews I read even went as far as saying it was shit because it was too busy being art. When in fact it was more of a game than most. IF you think about it it's bursting with classic gaming staples. Team management, character levelling, stat levelling, resi style puzzles, boss battles, lightgun style gameplay. The way the navigation was made two directional in a 3D world made K7 play like a sidescrolling shmup with a lightgun.
But just because it didn't go for "realistic" graphics like HALO or MoH people got confused and pulled out the art stamp. I'm not saying K7 hasn't got a powerful arttistic presentation. I'm saying it wasn't arty for the sake of being arty. The graphics are mopre "polygon shaded" than "cell shaded". It made me think of early Star Fox or Interstate '76 rather than Mondrian or Malevich. Maybe the fact that one of the early screens for it had Harman outside Villa savoye threw people.
For me K7 is an homage to video gaming made by a person who is inspired by video games. Not an attempt to make an interactive movie or some such. I think the "This is art" reputation K7 got hurt it a bit sales wise which is a shame. A lot of people missed out on a very atmospheric an well made game just because it didn't fit right into the mould of what a video game "should" be.
Then there is the story which I admit went straight over my head. It makes a good job at being a nod to silly videogame stories past but it's still told in a way that made me realize there were more to it.
More on NMH later. -
xandaca 433 posts
Seen 11 hours ago
Registered 13 years agoTonka wrote:
xandaca wrote:
I disagree strongly with Tonka. Like Killer7 before it, NMH is a game of huge narrative depth that encompasses all sorts of interpretations and ideas. The widely accepted reason for the minigames being a contrast between the excitement of the gaming world and the mundanity of the real world is a perfectly valid 'reading'
You are right of course. My problem is more when some people say that the minigames ...
My problem began with how some people would go on and on about how K7 was art. Some reviews I read even went as far as saying it was shit because it was too busy being art. When in fact it was more of a game than most. IF you think about it it's bursting with classic gaming staples. Team management, character levelling, stat levelling, resi style puzzles, boss battles, lightgun style gameplay. The way the navigation was made two directional in a 3D world made K7 play like a sidescrolling shmup with a lightgun.
But just because it didn't go for "realistic" graphics like HALO or MoH people got confused and pulled out the art stamp. I'm not saying K7 hasn't got a powerful arttistic presentation. I'm saying it wasn't arty for the sake of being arty. The graphics are mopre "polygon shaded" than "cell shaded". It made me think of early Star Fox or Interstate '76 rather than Mondrian or Malevich. Maybe the fact that one of the early screens for it had Harman outside Villa savoye threw people.
For me K7 is an homage to video gaming made by a person who is inspired by video games. Not an attempt to make an interactive movie or some such. I think the "This is art" reputation K7 got hurt it a bit sales wise which is a shame. A lot of people missed out on a very atmospheric an well made game just because it didn't fit right into the mould of what a video game "should" be.
Then there is the story which I admit went straight over my head. It makes a good job at being a nod to silly videogame stories past but it's still told in a way that made me realize there were more to it.
More on NMH later.
I agree with you about people who throw out the claim that a game is 'art' simply for being graphically distinctive. Okami and Viewtiful Joe were also given the 'art' marker, even though (lovely and enjoyable as both games are) they had featured fairly standard gameplay beneath the beautiful visuals and didn't seem to be trying to make a statement or evoke any response from their players. In that respect, K7 is arguably closer to what might be considered a common definition of 'art' than most other, similarly afflicted games: its graphical style was evidently put in place to evoke a certain response from its players, and the story is abstract and raises big questions. But then it all depends on one's personal definition of 'art'. When people tend to apply these labels to gaming, it seems to me to be out of desperation for acceptance than genuine belief. I personally think it's close to impossible for any form of entertainment (film included) to be considered 'art' because the 'artists' will have to deal with so many different inputs and challenges and restrictions to his/her vision on their way to the final product, and I'd say true art has to be the work of a singular artistic voice. But again, that's just me.
And I wouldn't worry about not 'getting' K7's story: I only started to properly piece it together after playing through it several times and even then much of the plot remains something of a blur! If you're into this sort of thing, there's a brilliantly conceived plot analysis at GameFAQs (no, really!) that's worth a look if you're after something truly brain-melting:
http://www.gamefaqs.com/console/gamecube/file/562551/38193 -
JinTypeNoir 4,368 posts
Seen 7 years ago
Registered 16 years agoxandaca wrote: Okami and Viewtiful Joe were also given the 'art' marker, even though (lovely and enjoyable as both games are) they had featured fairly standard gameplay beneath the beautiful visuals and didn't seem to be trying to make a statement or evoke any response from their players.
Eh? I wouldn't call the gameplay in Okami or Viewtiful Joe fairly standard by any stretch, they're both rather non-standard, Okami for its brush, main character mechanics and restore-color-to-world quests, and Viewtiful Joe for its time manipulation puzzles working hand-in-hand with enemy combat. I've also never heard Viewtiful Joe being called art before, but I can understand Okami because what the creators wanted to express is obvious throughout the game and some people will think so.
My issue is similar to Tonka's, I don't think it's out of the question there are definitely issues at work in Suda 51's games, but I do think the line is often taken overboard -- I'm not sure if it's not a case of overanalyzation of his games and he only meant some of what people are applying.
But then that's a problem of the scope of analyzation in the first place. I mean, for centuries now they're have been arguments back and forth about whether you can only take meaning from what you can suppose the author wanted to say or whether if you've got backed up sufficiently anything is possible to analyze.
For my part, what I see in No More Heroes is a story about a guy who doesn't find much magic in normal life and seeks out in fantasy life, the typical story of a person who gets wrapped up more in the fantasy world than the real world. Like those erotic stories about housewives and such!
But other than that, I don't think it runs all THAT deep.
I really don't think the minigames and Santa Destroy were purposely made un-fun (mostly because I enjoyed them).
I also think people should be careful when it comes to critiquing the visuals in his games, just as much of it is due to the fact that he needs to run a tight ship to keep his company intact and that he's basically not obsessed with whiz-bang presentation as his peers are, so he's very willing to let some presentation fly that a large development house wouldn't.
But above all, you have to remember that Suda 51 is very playful and some stuff IS just for kicks.
I also think it's a shame that some people think that what makes Grasshopper games is their stories and not necessarily the gameplay. I personally haven't played an original Suda 51 game yet that I didn't think had interesting gameplay, Killer 7, Moonlight games, The Silver Case and Flower, Sun and Rain included. -
xandaca 433 posts
Seen 11 hours ago
Registered 13 years agoOkami is essentially Zelda with a brush mechanic and different fighting system, while Viewtiful Joe is a scrolling fighter with 'camera effects' instead of special moves. They don't rewrite the rules of their genres, defy classification or create new genres. That's what I meant when I said their gameplay was standard: I enjoy both very much, but it's play based on an established template.
As for Suda and particularly NMH, I agree that many analyses people come up with probably won't have even crossed his mind while he was making the game. The nature of the game's story makes me think there's definitely a lot of subtext in there (plus that quote about the game tackling 'social issues') but since he's never gone on record specifying what his exact thoughts are regarding this or K7, we'll never know for sure. What I'm completely certain of is that he wants his games to be analysed and read in different ways. There are so many different and seemingly disparate and unresolved elements and story threads at play in both K7 and NMH that I find it impossible to believe that he wanted its players to simply take what they were seeing at face value. NMH is great fun whether you want to 'read' it or not, but is obviously designed to raise questions for those wishing to examine a little deeper. Whether Suda meant for those particular interpretations to surface is essentially a moot point. What is important is that the game's content has inspired debate and caught imaginations, which is the sign of an outstanding and ingenious writer, and I believe he is the first, and currently only, truly great writer for the videogames medium.
PS: If anyone even thinks about mentioning that grievously unsubtle Rand ripoff BioShock at this point, I may have to destroy you.
PPS: And I absolutely adore the gameplay in both K7 and NMH. I'm firmly of the belief that a game can easily survive without a good story, but can't survive without good gameplay, and neither game would be among my all-time favourites if they didn't play as brilliantly as they do. However, those two games are also some of the very rare occasions when the gameplay and the story are deeply intertwined and complement each other perfectly. I could talk forever about how clever the implementation of the fighting system in NMH is or why, despite the unfair criticism, K7's controls and on-rails style was absolutely perfect for the type of game it was. But on this occasion, it just so happened that the story became the first topic of conversation. -
Tonka 31,980 posts
Seen 18 hours ago
Registered 18 years agoI feel guilty for not having the time to reply. I will get back to this eventually. I have read that gamefaq story explanation for K7 and I did melt my brain. I really enjoyed it though.
Basically I agree with all of you. But in my own way. What I don't agree with is the destructoid interpretation of NMH. Then again, I happen to think they are a bunch of drooling cabbages so I guess I might be overly critical of anything they say. -
Der_tolle_Emil 7,308 posts
Seen 12 hours ago
Registered 16 years agoDestructoid (if you are talking about the website) is shit. They haven't written a single useful article yet. -
Tonka 31,980 posts
Seen 18 hours ago
Registered 18 years agoYes, it was Destructoid the site I was talking about. Thay have this "NMH is about us gamers" article that made my skin crawl.
I think NMH is a game. Simple as that. Where K7 is an homage to the early videogames up until PS1 era NMH is an homage/parody to/of GTA games. The "boring" mini games are intentionally boring. Not to show how "gamers struggle with every day life boredom" but because picking up litter is boring. It's a poke in the ribs on GTA where you can drive a bus/taxi and collect money. No one wrote that "GTAs bus driving shows us gamers struggle with everyday life. Yes, you can earn enough money to buy every safe house but isn't it better to blast your way through a heist" or some such.
People took GTA at face value. Yes, NMH does invite more open interpretations. But a game that even breaks the fourth wall to tells us that it is a game IS a game.
It's a game about playing videogames, being a nerd, watching wrestling, doing ordinary jobs and fighting killers. Like K7 before it the inspiration comes from videogames but I don't like the idea that he sort of shuns every day life.
But I love that GHM creates games that are worth discússing. -
Tonka wrote:
It's a game about playing videogames, being a nerd, watching wrestling, doing ordinary jobs and fighting killers. Like K7 before it the inspiration comes from videogames but I don't like the idea that he sort of shuns every day life.
The last chapter of the game clearly shows that it is about Travis' insatiable need to kill, which you have helped him satisfy all through the game. The reason that he does this killing is very, very stupid. When he fights the last boss he realises it is all he is - nothing else in his life means anything.
As the mirrored reflection of this existential truth, the ordinary jobs being bullshit makes sense. As does the ghost-town he drives around in, only paying attention to money and sharp clothes. He literally is not interested in anything but killing, and one question is whether you as the player are repulsed or unaffected by that - even though he has shown some twisted kind of compassion by not attempting to kill female assassins. (But that might only be because he's messed up from incest). -
Ech0ez 20 posts
Seen 12 years ago
Registered 12 years agoThe game is looking good thus far, dual-wielding energy kantanas looks epic.
Although do we know why Travis is down to ranked 51st assassin now? Apart from be an obvious homeage to Suda 51, if there any other details on the story? -
Trailer is out guys; http://uk.wii.ign.com/dor/objects/14288376/no-more-heroes-2/videos/nomoreheroes2_052809.html
Looks bloody awesome
.gif)
But other than that, I don't think it runs all THAT deep.Sometimes posts may contain links to online retail stores. If you click on one and make a purchase we may receive a small commission. For more information, go here.
