No More Heroes 2: Desperate Struggle
is a 2010 action-adventure game developed by Grasshopper Manufacture for the Wii. The sequel to No More Heroes, it was released by Marvelous Entertainment in Japan, Ubisoft in North America, and Rising Star Games in PAL territories in 2010. The game continues the story of professional assassin Travis Touchdown; upon discovering that a corporation's CEO placed a hit on his best friend, Travis rejoins the ranks to fight his way through an even greater number of assassins to confront his best friend's killer and attain revenge.
Desperate Struggle was the only game in the series without Goichi Suda as lead director; he was relegated to executive director, with Nobutaka Ichiki replacing him. The game received critical acclaim, with critics considering it to be superior to its predecessor. A port of the game developed by Engine Software was released for the Nintendo Switch in 2020, and for Amazon Luna and Microsoft Windows in 2021. It was followed by two sequels: Travis Strikes Again: No More Heroes and No More Heroes III.
Plot
The story of No More Heroes 2 is told through cutscenes following Travis' journey, interspersed with scenes of a woman at a peep show dictating the story's events to a silent, unknown observer.Three years have passed since Travis Touchdown became the top assassin in the United Assassins Association and walked away. He has returned to Santa Destroy and fights Skelter Helter, who seeks revenge on Travis for killing his older brother Helter Skelter prior to the first game. After winning the battle, he meets Sylvia Christel, who informs him he taken Helter's as the 51st best assassin, and offers him a "five-course meal" in exchange for reclimbing the UAA ranks and reclaiming his former glory at Rank 1. The nearly-dead Skelter Helter interrupts them and warns Travis that he and his co-conspirators will still have their revenge.
The same night, a group of criminals kill Travis's best friend, Bishop, and throw his head through Travis's window in a paper bag. Travis, seeking revenge, asks Sylvia to help him find the one responsible, but Sylvia tells him that the one who ordered the killing was Jasper Batt Jr., the CEO of Pizza Bat and first-ranked assassin. In the first game, Travis stopped three different attempts by Pizza Bat to expand into Santa Destroy by assassinating the CEOs. In the three years since, with Travis out of the picture, Pizza Bat successfully opened a headquarters in Santa Destroy and bought out practically every business in town. Travis resolves to climb to the ranks to get a chance for revenge on Jasper.
Travis fights and defeats Rank 50 rap star and religious fanatic Nathan Copeland. Afterwards he meets Rank 25 football star Charlie MacDonald and his cheerleaders, who transform into a giant mech called the Santa Death Parade. Travis defeats them in his own mech, the Glastonbury, built by Dr. Naomi and based on a mech from his favorite anime. He feels remorse for the cheerleaders, explaining that they were harmless, but backpedals after Sylvia offers to nullify his victory. He also spares the optional challenger Kimmy Howell, commenting that he "can't kill a co-ed". Travis also begins fighting the supernatural: facing Rank 24, the child ghost and fire starter Matt Helms, followed by Rank 23, the poisonous siren Cloe Walsh.
Sylvia organizes a battle royale with twelve assassins, including Travis. After arriving at the arena, Travis witnesses all the other contestants killed off by Rank 10 Dr. Letz Shake. Letz Shake reveals to him that he has frozen Henry in carbonite as revenge before facing Travis. After he destroys Letz Shake and rescues Henry, he meets up with Shinobu, who now idolizes him and calls him "Master". At Sylvia's request, she fought and defeated Rank 9 wealthy gunslinger Million Gunman and Rank 8 cybernetic twins New Destroy Man for Travis. Shinobu advances on Travis, but he turns her away because he feels "like the pervy teacher in a porno". Rejected, she takes her leave.
Travis fights a grueling battle against Rank 7, the silent but honorable Ryuji. Travis crows triumphantly after Ryuji concedes, but Sylvia kills him in cold blood, criticizing Travis for showing mercy. Henry, suffering from hibernation sickness, fights Mimmy in a nightmare before awakening. He reconciles with Travis and kills the next three assassins for him. Travis fights Rank 4 Margaret Moonlight, a gothic Lolita, and Rank 3 Captain Vladimir, a missing cosmonaut, and convinces Sylvia not to destroy the latter's body after finally finding peace. After defeating Rank 2 ascetic Alice Twilight, the penultimate assassin, he decides he is fed up with the ranked battles and the UAA. He berates Sylvia, insisting that assassins are human and that they should not have to die for entertainment like its some kind of video game. He promises to tear down the UAA after defeating Jasper. Sylvia arrives at Travis's motel room and sleeps with him for the second time, giving him the "Five course meal" damaging the motel in the process.
Travis fights his way through the Pizza Bat headquarters to meet Jasper in his office. Jasper reveals that he was seeking revenge for his father and two brothers, the previous Pizza Bat CEOs Travis killed in the first game. Henry enters and helps Travis defeat him. After defeating his second form, Jasper becomes a giant parade balloon, which Henry refuses to fight and destroys the roof with one swipe. This final form is destroyed after Travis leaps out the office and slices it in half. Sylvia, riding Travis's motorcycle, catches him and drops him off at his motel.
A scene after the credits reveals that the woman at the peep show is Sylvia, who took the job after the UAA's collapse, and that Travis himself has been listening to Sylvia's story about his exploits. The two have a tearful reunion as Travis informs her that they need to return to Santa Destroy for an unknown purpose.
Gameplay
The combat is similar to that of No More Heroes, with mechanics such as wrestling moves and deathblows returning. There are four beam katanas, which Travis can freely switch between in the middle of battle, each with different properties. For example, the Peony is a large and heavy sword with a wide range, and the Rose Nasty consists of two beam katanas which Travis dual-wields. There are two sections in which Shinobu and Henry are playable, both of whom have different capabilities from Travis. Shinobu can jump, and her section contains some platforming elements, while Henry has the ability of making a quick dash in all directions by using the B button on the Wii-remote.The overworld from the first game is gone, and Travis no longer has to pay an entry fee to enter ranked battles, allowing the player to progress through the game more quickly. The minigames that Travis can do to gain money and become stronger are 8-bit style games, in genres including action, puzzle, and racing. Another feature is a "Deathmatch" mode, allowing the player to replay any of the bosses once the game has been completed.
Development
Desperate Struggle was announced on October 8, 2008, where a teaser trailer for the game was shown at the Tokyo Game Show in Chiba, Japan. The trailer provides little insight to the premise of the game, other than that the player will once again take control of Travis Touchdown. Following No More Heroes suit of pitting Travis against unique adversaries, the trailer sees Travis preparing to battle a woman fitted with a six-limbed jet pack. Travis would be fighting for revenge, and that he had also become more serious about fighting than he was in the first title. Also, similar to the first game's numerous references to popular culture, in the trailer Travis says the Terminator series' catch phrase "I'll be back!" before initiating a sequence with music similar to that of the Terminator series' scores.Plans for a No More Heroes sequel were revealed shortly after the release of the first game, in a March 15, 2008, interview with Computer and Video Games, where Suda revealed he would be interested in producing a No More Heroes 2 for the Wii, on the condition that the game sold well enough to convince its publishers. With No More Heroes positive reception in North America, and Martin Defries, manager of Rising Star Games who were responsible for publishing No More Heroes in Europe, raving about the sales of the first game, not only was it unlikely that Suda's intention to direct a follow-up would go unsupported, but this meant it was likely that the sequel would not be published exclusively in Japan. It was announced at TGS 2008 that Xseed Games would publish the game in North America, taking over from Ubisoft which had published the North American release of No More Heroes, while Rising Star Games would again handle the European release. Ubisoft, however, announced at E3 2009 that they would be publishing the game in North America.
Suda has stated that the game incorporates a strong theme of revenge. While he suggested the game would be more serious, he still wanted to maintain the game's sense of humor. He has also acknowledged the criticism that was made that the open world in the first game was less than satisfying, and hopes to add more detail this time around.
A port of Desperate Struggle along with the original No More Heroes was published by XSEED Games for the Nintendo Switch and released worldwide on October 28, 2020. XSEED also published ports of both games for Windows, released on June 9, 2021. An 8 minute prequel motion comic titled No More Heroes 1.5 was dubbed for the first time and released on Grasshopper Manufacturer's YouTube channel on September 26, 2021.