#nmh3alternate

[orojuice]

Vanishing Point: Alternate Cut

A short comic I made with u/Sha-Yurigami featuring an alternate take on the Vanishing Point boss fight. The last of the NMH3: Alternate Struggles mini-series.

While I appreciated the exotic way that Kimmy Love/Howell played with the alien’s theme of “memory”, I was hoping for a more elaborate kill trip down memory lane. Nothing too extravagant. In fact, you could just play around with existing assets.

Just odd Arkham Knight-esque visual discrepancies that pop out without Travis noting them:

Like Jeane being a kitten again.

Shinobu wearing her school uniform while in her hospital bed.

Bad Girl not having her TSA crown and just drinking beer when you visit her.

Fu and Damon’s star-shaped tower and other alien structures being completely missing from Santa Destroy’s skybox.

It comes to a head when Travis visits the video store and mistakes Buzariashvili Bishop for his brother, the deceased Georgy. Apologizes. And then asks him tell his brother that he said hi.Sylvia manages to get him back on track with a phone call reminding him to go after “the Drifter”, who is now no longer on the top of a building, but is now hiding out in the baseball stadium of Santa Destroy.

When Travis goes there and confronts “the Drifter”, he sees Vanishing Point eating hotdogs and drinking beer instead. The sight of the alien snaps Travis out of his weird haze, and he berates the extraterrestrial for both messing with his memories and attacking his town.Vanishing Point scoffs at the latter, claiming that he’s pawed through the lavatory that is Travis’ brain, so he’s aware that Travis has been spilling blood all over Santa Destroy long before he, Fu, and the others made planetfall. He’s no protector. He’s just some crazed psycho killer with a beam katana. So naturally, a superhero’s got to put a stop to his rampage. Even if said superhero has to peel back his mind until he’s a drooling, witless husk. Then it’s only proper to give such a vacuous creature a quick mercy killing, right?

As Vanishing Point is saying this, a distorted version of Dr. Peace’s “The virgin child makes her wish without feeling anything” which builds in intensity and malice as the conversation between Travis and Vanishing Point becomes more hostile.

The big gimmick in the fight besides Vanishing Point’s blades, sartry kicks, phantoms of Gold Joe and Mr. Blackhole, and 80s grid projectile nonsense is that he “steals” Travis’ memories during each phase, rendering the assassin into his TSA, NMH2, and finally NMH1 skins that are typically available to the player after finishing NMH3.

Phase 2: Peels Travis back into his TSA self, while robbing him of every Death Glove Skill besides Death Force as that was one of the first Death Glove Chips he had access to in TSA.

Phase 3: Peels Travis back into his NMH2 self, robbing him of both his Death Glove Skills and his ability to jump. Jeane’s voice (as she only started talking in TSA) no longer provides battle commentary.

Phase 4: Peels Travis back into his NMH1 self, robbing him of his Tension meter and associated combos.

When Travis brings Vanishing Points HP down to zero, it has him stumble and get into a combat stance like the bosses did when you beat them in NMH1. A cutscene plays of Travis slicing off Vanishing Point’s left arm, and he’s about to land the killing blow to this weird half-horse, Mega Man-looking freakshow who he doesn’t remember having any beef with but who’s trying to kill him so whatever, when all of a sudden…this comic happens.

Besides the obvious allusions to Jeane’s boss fight in NMH1, I threw in a couple of remixed videogame and superhero comic references in. See if you can spot them all!

Or don’t.

You can just let this moment come and go.

[orojuice]

Paradox Bandit: Alternate Take

A comic by me and Sha-Y. Part of our NMH3: Alternate Struggles series.

Paradox Bandit was probably the alien “superhero” I was least interested in when FU’s crew was revealed way back in “The Return”.

Some noted his resemblance to He-Man, which I only recognized after it was pointed out. This comparison was strengthened during the Rankings comicbook intro that called him the “Master of Explosion”, a possible riff on “Masters of the Universe”.

Even with 2021 being an odd year for the Champion of Eternia, I wasn’t very inspired to do an “alternate take” comic with him like I did with Vanishing Point, Sniping Lee, or Black Night Direction.

Then Travis unveiled his skeletal “Full Green” armor mode and everything just sort of clicked, and a backstory for Paradox Bandit as fallen superhuman barbarian hero of a far-off planet/dimension whose Yuga-esque cyclic exploits are broadcasted on Earth ala Robert A. Heinlein’s “World as Myth” concept i.e. all “fiction” is “real” somewhere out there in the multiverse.

A quick two-punch, two-page comic script reminiscent of Travis’ confrontation with Electro Triple Star in TSA came to mind. One that satirizes the quick AND painful way writers try to shake up long-running fictional franchises, as well as the feuds that follow. We’ve seen it with He-Man, with Marvel’s Thor (whose washed-up Endgame iteration Paradox Bandit also resembles) with Star Wars, with The Greatest American Hero, the list goes on. In the stories these shifts typically occur in, the current is powerless to challenge the coming, the past is to be killed with no sincere purpose, but in the chaotic framework of No More Heroes, that needn’t be so as anything can happen.

Thus, the dismissed, diminished, and discarded demigod is given the chance to “fight back” in a raw and direct fashion that some of the archetype’s bereaved fans secretly wish they would, resulting in a metaphorical sequence rife with genuine pain, visceral delight, and undeniable horror. 

Choking Hazard: 3 years of age and under.

Rather than a straw supporter of the new guard or an upright acolyte taking a former idol to task, Travis would be an interesting opponent as he’s clearly not the ideal result of the pop culture strata Paradox Bandit is supposed to represent. Despite being a fan of heroic fiction as seen in the likes of Ultraman, Kamen Rider, and presumably 80s action cartoons (Travis was born during 1981 or 1982), he’s grown up into a thoroughly unpleasant and dysfunctional individual, calling into question just how effective the old way of doing things was in providing actable and legitimate inspirations for audiences. He is, in short, exactly what Paradox Bandit accuses him of being, the awkward contrarian who would like the Skeletor and Orko stand-ins over him.

That in mind, perhaps a change is needed. Although pre and post-fight, Travis tacitly argues for a method that ties in for his love of tokusatsu (see the names for the various Death Glove Chips), sequel stories that explore new themes, ideas, and characters but truly respect the virtues and spirit of the mythology’s bedrock rather than treading upon them to form a distinct platform: succession rather than supplanting (you can see that in how MotU progressed from simple toy comic tie-ins to all its much loved animated iterations, graphic novels, etc). Which is more diplomatic and preferable than Paradox Bandit’s wish to take the reins of his next cycle and lock it in a status quo where he will remain secure at the cost of stagnancy.

For his battle, Travis fights Paradox Bandit in his Full Green mode much like he does against Midori, more out of symbolism and to have at least one other Full Green boss fight on the roster. In contrast to Midori’s area control/denial battle style, Paradox Bandit fights in a much more aggressive and direct manner: causing tremors, stomping up boulders to kick towards Travis, calling down lightning, throwing his axe and calling it back, doing melee combos reminiscent of the Captain Treatments, summoning his version of Battle Cat that Travis needs to use missiles or his Tiger Attack to knock him off of, and of course, doling out EXPLOSIONS.

The fight ends with Paradox Bandit managing to badly damage the Full Green armor (to the point that it can only be used in short bursts, explaining why Travis didn’t pull it out during a crucial moment during the final boss sequence), but this gives Travis a chance to wrest his axe away from him. Screaming “By the Potence of ZweiNull! I have the Potence!” (which does nothing), he swings it down and critically wounds Paradox Bandit. As he lies dying, he expresses fear at what’s going to happen to him come his next incarnation, if one happens at all, and laments over his failures as both a hero and villain.

Travis assures him that despite how screwed up he himself is, he still lives by some of the lessons Paradox Bandit doled out as De-Max in his original show: He recycles, he looks both ways before he crosses the street, etc, which he’s passed on to his own kids. Paradox Bandit asks him if he’ll share MASTERS OF EXPLOSION with Hunter and Jeane, but Travis shrugs and says they’re not really into the kind of entertainment he likes, but if the new CG MoE show on Notflix is good, he’ll probably buy a couple of the toys if they’re of acceptable quality.

This gives Paradox Bandit some measure of peace, who says that he’s once again feeling very, very sleepy, as his body suddenly disintegrates. His axe then flies out of Travis hands and up into space, presumably to reboot MASTERS OF EXPLOSION.

I’ve actually watched the CG He-Man show. It’s actually pretty good. Radically different in lots of ways, but the essence and ideals of the Masters of the Universe remain. It also comes packaged with shockingly good humor, character dynamics, and action scenes. So check that out if you like.

Travis’ shirt is part of the logo of Forgotton Anne, a beautiful and fully-voiced indie puzzle platforming game that’s also about lost things…and lost people.

[orojuice]

Black Night Direction: Alternate Mix

Another comic by me and Sha-Y.

A pure Batman parody intermixed with a callback to Travis’ faux-pas against the CIA in Travis Strikes Again.

Luckily for Travis, while the CIA has updated its firmware so it can never be hacked again like it were in TSA, Black Night Direction hasn’t; something Juvenile’s AI makes clear to Travis’ captors before she hacks into Black Night Direction’s teleportation harness and transports him, Travis, and the Colonel way, way up in the sky.

Travis is able to break out of his bonds, grab his Beam Katana, and the Death Glove before latching onto BND before he recovers, which results in the both of them being teleported to safety. The Colonel isn’t so lucky and he winds up impaled on the top of the Thunderdome tower.

Once they’re back where they started, Black Night Direction tries to high road Travis, citing that his refusal to cooperate has probably set back diplomatic relations between the American Government and FU’s forces quite a ways. Travis retorts that FU executing the President of the USA on live television (and his Madame VP on FikFok) is going to be much harder for the aliens to walk back from. Sure, he didn’t vote for them, but that was still pretty rude to those that did.

Recovering Badman’s ashes is a secondary objective of Travis’. Which is rendered both tragic and absurd by how he’s pointedly unable to save any of the still alive civilians that Black Night Direction weaponizes.

Black Night Direction “dropping” people to death has been seen in superhero stuff before like X-Men: First Class, The Flying Man, and Brightburn. But I can’t recall it being a video game boss attack, so let’s put the Unreal 4 Engine to good and gruesome use! Litter the battlefield with collateral damage to distract and horrify assassin and player alike!

Native Dancer still plays a role in the actual boss fight, but it’s as a lead-up to the one you can actually replay in the Time Machine as he gives Travis new Death Glove Skills to counter a bunch of unfair tactics that Black Night Direction has at his disposal. These same principles can be used during his proper boss fight.

Death Force: Used to pull BND down while he’s hovering in the air and dropping “abducted” things on Travis.

Death Slow: Used to counter BND as he dashes around the battlefield with his trident, giving Travis an opportunity to lay the hurt on him.

Death Rain: Used to counter a numerous amounts of 1HP after-images that BND sends after Travis. Him getting hit by either Travis or the shower will call off the clone barrage completely.

The fight is meant to teach the player how to use the Death Glove Skills intelligently as they counter certain moved by BND, but there are always “outs” they can take (i.e. dodging and running away) if the proper skill isn’t charged. it’s just a less frustrating fight if you don’t recklessly spam these abilities.

Native Dancer’s boss fight can still be in the story as an unlockable secret boss fight if Travis follows a certain quest line (Syliva implies this post-fight whilst also chiding Travis for outdoing himself on collateral damage in battling Black Night Direction). Like Ryuichi but better programmed.

Travis’ shirt here is of Chicken Police, a fully-voiced and exquisitely acted noir fiction Visual Novel starring anthropomorphic animals in the style of Blacksad and Zootopia. Highly recommended.

The BND title cards are based on both Batman: The Animated Series and the character's various movies. I set the BND logo amidst a red leather backdrop to hint at BND's macabre combat tactics, echo his vaguely vampiric appearance, and to link him to Travis' own jacket in a kind of deconstructed version of the Batman v. Superman logo's compactness.

Incidentally, Joy Division's Shadowplay fits both Black Night Direction and Travis really well. Give that a listen if you have a couple of minutes to spare.

[orojuice]

Sniping Lee: Alternate Shot

A comic by me and Sha-Y. Part of our NMH#: Alternate Struggles series.

This comic is pure action and rather on-the-nose with what it's commenting on.

I just thought it would be good to really utilize the potential of Call of Battle’s setting to have NMH address the latest trend in gunplay action games.

Sniping Lee’s “rescue” of plane passengers was put in as I was disappointed that after Vanishing Point, we didn’t get to see FU’s cohorts rampage across the Earth in major ways. I wanted to create a sequence that showed just how dangerous and skilled a “Galactic Sniping Champion” would be with an unhealthy dose of absurd ultraviolence. This would also facilitate obstacles that would organically impede Travis from just leaping down onto the beach rather than a typical invisible barrier (as seen in the Call of Battle's orange burning airplane icons). Ideally, it's an intriguing spin on the usual "evil/incompetent superhero destroys an airplane and kills its passengers" cliche.

The mechanics of his “boss fight” are a mishmash of Speed Buster’s and Margaret Moonlight’s combined with the typical “Battle Royale” shrinking arena gimmick; a boss is constantly trying to shoot you albeit with a tri-barrel sniper rifle. In Travis’ way are a mixture of the usual alien enemies, armed civilian NPCs, and copies of the character models used for Damon’s board meeting wielding weapons. The human enemies would have very simple move sets, low health, and are always aggressive.

Avoiding them is an option, but they can be used to distract Lee by attacking them to pass on his target reticule or running by them so that the his laser dot beam stops on them instead. Some cutscenes would play that would differentiate his “red” attacks (which can be blocked by buildings and other obstacles) and his “green” attacks (which can shoot through the above), necessitating confrontations with Travis’ fellow contestants. Getting a Full Green on a Slash Reel also gives Travis a secret “cheat” akin to the one in Sonic Juice’s RPG sequence to skip most of the lead-up as he can use the Tiger Attack on Lee’s location to charge right at the blockhouse he is camping at.

The contestant count starts from 51 (of course), and is gradually whittled down regardless of whether Travis has killed any enemies until is stops at 4 (Travis, Sniping Lee, Notorious, and Destroyman True Face) when confronting Lee; although you can end the chase earlier by whittling that number down faster yourself. Then a mostly identical version to his countdown screeching from NMH3 will play out before he’s taken out by Notorious and Travis is forced to fight the Destroymen instead, making for a more unique bait-and-switch than those of previous boss fights.

However, I still think this scenario could still work while keeping everything else in the story intact. While Travis has a similarly contentious argument about video game genres/types with Sonic Juice, he’s marginally more nice when fighting the #3 ranked alien, and it’s pertaining to a semi-old style of play rather than the hot fad thing that Lee is trying to latch himself and his opponent on. Also, Travis getting to fight Destroyman again is rendered ironic given his acerbic reaction to the new style of play forced upon him; in a perversion of his desire not to do that, he has to fight a decidedly old enemy in place of Lee.

To be honest, I’m not sure if Travis would show disdain towards the likes of PUBG and Fornite. His video game tastes are hard to gauge. We know he likes AVNs, wrestling games, Mario titles, Zelda entires, Hotline Miami, Deathman, vector graphic retro installments, arcade classics, Unreal Tournament, and top-down shoot ‘em ups. Other than that, it’s hard to say. I thought that his indie game shirts in Travis Strikes Again would offer some clues, but stuff like Children of Zodiarcs and YIIK are in that catalogue; and Travis expresses disdain for turn-based RPGs in NMH3. So, I can’t say. It might transpire that he likes them. What I am certain of, is that he’d probably be just the little bit appalled that Fortnite has Ryu carry around a gun ala those GI Joe toys from the 90s.

Not to mention other OOC affronts to a guest star’s dignity.

If Suda somehow sees this and is appalled because in his notes, Travis does like these kinds of Battle Royale games, I deeply and sincerely and preemptively apologize.

But I must confess, I just really wanted Travis to say "aim-assist shitlick".

Special thanks to the artist, Sha-Y for a particularly genius creative decision. While it was my idea to create the Let it Snipe survival board and the use an edited Call of Battle map for a Fortnite spoof, it was their idea to link Lee and Travis’ word balloons to their location/placement icons.

Travis’ shirt is the logo from West of Dead. 2020’s OTHER red-hued action-adventure roguelike set in the underworld. Ron Perlman voices the flaming skull cowboy!