I beat No More Heroes a couple days ago and here are the impressions I gathered about it.

A quick premise: I played the european blood-less/slightly different version of the game. Also, possible *spoilers* ahead.

No More Heroes is a good game, it features a great character design, imaginative levels, generally smooth controls, solid combat system, impressive bosses, great cutscenes, quality voice acting, a lot of black humor and a good deal of extras. It is not free from its good share of flaws though, even major ones.

The plot is as simple as these things can get: otaku killer Travis Touchdown (yeah...) lives in the city of Santa Destroy (...yeah...), where he starts an escalade of the assassins ranking, aiming to become the number one killer in america. On his way he'll have to fight the other killers forming the top-ten. The duels are set up by a mysterious girl, who irresistibly attracts our dumb 'hero' Travis.

The game is divided in three main sections: driving, working (right, you have to work in games too...) and fighting. In the driving section you basically ride your ginormous motorbike around to reach the next battle or mission. This section was compared by many to Grand Theft Auto, but I can't see many similarities apart from the fact that you drive a vehicle, run the the rare pedestrians over and trample streetlamps and trees (yes, you can break trees, I think it's the first time I see this in a 'sandbox' game). The whole driving thing can be fun, you can call your bike wherever you are and it'll be brought to you, you can speed boost and jump by waving the Wiimote and there are several cameras available, but the collision detection just plain stinks: the vehicle will often irreparably get stuck in corners, cars and benches, meaning you won't be able to unstuck it and will have to walk away on foot and call it, which is annoying. Furthermore, the collision box around objects is way too big and this will result in awkward situations.

The working section consists in a series of minigames, ranging from collecting coconuts to killing scorpions, retrieving lost cats and so on. The minigames are sometimes pretty fun, but most of the time they're just tedious chores needed to unlock fighting missions essential to earn money. This brings us to the fighting section, where the game gives its best: dozens of enemies will attack you in groups of one to six at the time. You hold the Wiimote high or low to change stance and tap the A button to swing your weapon -a weird lightsaber (the game is filled with Star Wars references)- chain combos and then wave the Wiimote to perform finishing moves. It all works fine and it's really enjoyable to play. My only complaint is that stronger enemies tend to block too much, but that's no big deal.

The enemies are weird: funny guys with paperbags on their heads, baseball players, bus drivers... each level has his set of lunatics, but the bosses are the strangest, I leave it to you to find out who they are, because discovering the next boss is the best part of the game. Sometimes they are too hard and take too long to beat, having way too much life, but it just takes some perseverance. The settings you'll fight in are also imaginative, again, I'll leave it up to you to find out.

The graphics give me mixed feelings: the characters look grand, but the generic environments (city, most levels...) are bland beyond belief, with blocky buildings and objects (the cars are horrible) and blurry textures. The characters are cel-shaded (a render mode I personally like), but the environments are not, and this can leave you wondering why. I heard some people saying the game stutters when there are many enemies around, but I never noticed any slowdown at all.

The sound is competent, but what really shines is the voice acting; Travis sounds great and so do all the bosses, while the mystery girl's french accent is annoying (listening to her telephone rants fom the Wiimote speaker turns the great idea of using the controller as a mobile phone into a nuisance). The shop ownwers also sound ridiculous, I think they made it on purpose.

My complaint about the game is that you need money to proceed: you need it (a lot of it) to unlock the next boss fight, you need it to buy new (essential) weapon upgrades, you need it to go to the gym and boost your stats, you need it for everything! You can also buy (expensive) clothes to change Travis'outfit. To earn cash you can play the tedious minigames or play the fighting missions over and over again, which grows old pretty fast. Thankfully you'll later on unlock some easy ones that are also very rewarding.

In conclusion, No More Heroes is an entertaining game that allows you to engage in furios and visceral battles and have a good laugh with the black humor and absurd situations. It can be a bit of a grind when going fo money and the driving feels like an afterthought, but it's a solid game and a good addition to the Wii software library.