wait, Suda didn't direct NMH2?
honestly, I was planning on buying this game before I got ME2 and it enchanted me. As of now I'm not super hyped to play it and I might hold out to see if they announce a 360 version.
or actually wait until the Wii game is cheaper. or man up and get gamefly.
Well since I'm not really far enough to give a recommendation or not, demi and the others who finished it could hopefully answer this better.
But I would say it's worth playing if you are:
-A fan of NMH
-Someone who didn't like NMH
If you are a fan, you should still play it because it's more of what you enjoyed. You might be disappointed (like how sequels often are), but it's still worth playing.
If you are someone who didn't like NMH, you should try it because the changes were made FOR YOU so that you will like this game.
It's kind of like (the first half of) MGS4 or any of the dozens of games that dumbed down/streamlined their game to conform to what reviewers want. And like what happens every time, in doing so the games lose a bit of what made them great in the first place, but they review better and more people like them. NMH2 is taking what was a niche game trying to be a mainstream action game and is instead making a mainstream action game that's trying to look niche. It's a subtle difference, but I feel the stuff in NMH2 is doing it for the audience "Oooh look mechs! And anime! and BLING!" whereas the stuff in NMH1 was done because Suda wanted to do it (shmup throwback, driving around a baseball field in a motorcycle, etc...). I still like it, but as demi said in the other thread, NMH didn't really need a sequel. Grasshopper had never done a sequel before, since like Treasure Suda is all about original ideas and doing different things. And in the end a sequel is just more of the same. There's definitely some originality in the new stuff, but a lot of it was already done in the first game.
As for the staff, from what I've gathered from gaf, Suda51 went from NMH to the EA game (which he's directing w/mikami producing & yamaoka composing). During this time he also wrote the scenario and acted as executive producer on NMH2 with a mostly new team (according to gaf the only returning name in the opening credits is the sound effects guy). I'm not even sure who did the soundtrack. Apparently Masafumi Takada who has scored all Suda's games until now isn't credited but he may have done some?none?all? of the music and Akira Yamaoka composed a few of the boss fight tracks.