Die in No More Heroes 3 and you get to spin a roulette wheel to potentially get a buff on your next try. With each successive death, the wheel spins more slowly, meaning that if you lose enough times in a row you effectively get to select your powerup, and, therefore, since one of the choices is an instant revive, beat every fight for free. Funnily, this feels more patronizing than empowering, and getting handed a pity victory is honestly more effective as a sort of psychological punishment than, say, the King of all Cosmos berating you for failing a level in Katamari. Though, it feels like it’s missing something- if a mechanic like this was in No More Heroes 1, it’s easy to imagine that, like nearly everything in that game, it would be contextualized as something less abstract. My favorite example of this is increasing your attack power: while Travis lifts weights, you play a buttonmashing minigame that’s almost reminiscent of MGS’s torture sequence. As you progress, this gets to the point where it’s physically painful to level up, which sort of makes you think... couldn’t I actually be working out and improving myself right now instead of playing this stupid game? Whether you find this kind of thing humorous like I do or just annoying, I think we can agree that this is the No More Heroes identity. It’s remembered as the action game where you have to do literal chores in between fights, because, if it didn’t have this kind of stuff, it’d just be a subpar hack-n-slash.

No More Heroes 3 is this hypothetical game. Chores are still here, but you’re always given enough money from mandatory designated fights so there’s never any reason to do them. There’s two types of currency so you don’t have to choose between paying for the entrance fee and upgrading your stats. Besides the retry roulette, the only two unique additions to this game are a completely flavorless crafting system and some new abilities for Trav. This has by far the best combat out of any No More Heroes, which is a low bar, and means it only really rises to the level of “serviceable”- there’s not enough options or customizability to stop things from getting stale, like, c’mon, even the first game had alternate katanas. But I don’t like the original No More Heroes because I find it particularly good, I like it because it’s interesting. I think Suda fans will agree regarding his other games, but the disconnect for me with something like Killer7 (and most other story-focused classics slash masterpieces) is that I don’t think I have the ability to connect with a game’s narrative themes when they don’t seem to be reflected in its interactivity. In other words, I tend to zone out during cutscenes, but I’m wide awake while trying to figure out why an action game might force you to partake in lawnmowing and garbage collection to get by. This is what’s so disappointing about other No More Heroes games, but here, it seems extra intentional. The small details- naming one of the locations “Perfect World,” Travis no longer running out of breath after sprinting for two seconds, and even being able to teleport your bike to your location instead of needing Bishop to drive it up for you. Truly, this is a world that aims to cater to you at every opportunity, and, coming from a director who seems to delight in designing experimental, often anti-player mechanics, feels like a letter of resignation.

Strangely, same issue I had with Mario Wonder earlier this year: can’t say I was ever really bored or annoyed while playing it, but I kind of wish that I was, because then I might’ve walked away with something beyond admiration for the pretty colors. It’s aesthetically great (obviously), I laughed at a good chunk of the cutscenes and dialogue (favorite bit, by far, was Travis constantly trying to recommend animes to a grieving Badgirl) and I found the combat passable. But mostly I’m just thankful this was on Gamepass so I didn’t have to spend any of my precious Utopicoins on it.