A Gamers Voice

Well, Gamespot released it’s Game Of Year awards.  I particularly enjoy the Wii so that’s what I looked into first.  The game of the year this time around (stop me if you don’t wanna know) was No More Heroes!  For anybody who doesn’t know what NMH is, allow me to explain.  Travis Touchdown is a cel-shaded badass beating the shit out of people in an attempt to climb his way up the world of illegal assassins and, essentially, just be a total badass.  The fighting gameplay is ridiculously fun, funny, and hilariously gory.  However, there is two other modes of gameplay, House and City.  In the house you can play with your adorable kitty with a bell, change clothes, call people, and use the bathroom/save your game.  In the City, you get to unleash random bouts of havoc Grand Theft Auto style by driving your house sized motorcycle around town assaulting citizens and lamp-posts in either random fun, or in a mission or in transit to a mission.  You can take odd jobs like picking coconuts, taking out trash, finding cats, etc.  Or you can take hitman jobs where you kill people in garages for money.  That’s the setup.  Once you get out into the game though, the real fun begins because it flows incredibly seamlessly and is intensely fun!  It’s easy to see why it was Game Of Year for Wii.  What’s notable is that it beat out Super Smash Bros. and Mario Kart!  Now, I’ve been a massive fan of SSB for years and Mario Kart is one of the best party games around, so while I agree with the fact that NMH is a fantastic game, I can’t help but wonder; “was it better than SSBB?”  I mean, the introduction of Snake and Sonic into Brawl was one thing, then level editor, online support, the vast amount of levels, and the sheer fun of the game alone make it quite a heavy contender!  But still, I think there’s more than just the gameplay at work as far as the choice for NMH to be game of year.  I think it’s the significance that a third party developer made a fantastic game that puts NMH so high up.  So, let me ask you; do you think that if No More Heroes had been made by Nintendo instead of Capcom, that Gamespot would have ranked it lower?  Not to rag on the game!  I love it, it’s one of my favourites.  But I think that the intense deprivation the Wii has seen of third party games maybe makes people favor the ones that do come along.

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