THE SILVER CASE: What Is Uehara Kamui?

Screenshot from No More Heroes III. Newtype Kamui says, "Trav! It's me!"

(All No More Heroes III screenshots come courtesy of GhenryPerez.)

To return to the actual Kamui, continuing the narrative of Travis Strikes Again (sort of), the next year’s No More Heroes III also features Uehara. The Kamui of “Travis Strikes Back” is recognizable as Uehara from The 25th Ward but stylized to the same extent as the surrounding characters. In No More Heroes III, though, Asano Inio (of Goodnight Punpun fame) has oddly redesigned Uehara from a stocky government agent into an unrecognizable pretty boy. His left eye remains silver. It is no wonder that Travis calls him “a child at heart”—Uehara has literally become a child. But he is apparently the same character. Though the credits identify him as “Newtype Kamui,” he calls himself “Kamui Uehara” and Travis’s dialogue confirms he is the Kamui from Travis Strikes Again.

Newtype Kamui appears in the Midori Midorikawa level, where he is revealed as her boyfriend. In a humorous scene, Midori first uses him as insurance against the alien conqueror FU, who would otherwise probably kill her for missing their lunch meeting. FU realizes Kamui has been trailing him but is left fuming after his power cannot eliminate the boy: “FU you cant kill my boyfriend so dont waste your energy K?” The scene occurs in a diner, referencing the two diners at which Travis meets Kamui in the previous title.

Screenshot from No More Heroes III. In an American diner, FU, a muscular, shirtless, blue-skinned humanoid covered in white stripes, with a thick mane of poofy white hair and a V-shaped crown sticking from his forehead like horns, sits on a stool by the counter. He looks at his smartphone, whose screen is displayed to the viewer on the left. In the background, at another stool, sits Newtype Kamui. The text messages FU has received read, "FU? OMG im SOOOOO sorry! i was up all night and slept in gonna have to cancel ill get my job done laterz!!! oh yeah youre probably pissed huh? youre gonna try to kill me now rite? my boyfriend is already onto you."

After the boss battle against Midori, a cutscene has Uehara appear using powers very like Kurumizawa’s. Through their friendship, he successfully pleads with a confused Travis to spare Midori. Under a supernatural spotlight, Kamui then pauses the game to deliver the player a somewhat try-hard esoteric speech about “truth” much more characteristic of The Silver Case than No More Heroes. Even the VA Max Mittelman sounds somewhat unsure reading the lines: “This boss fight… It had become quite the confusing mess. But somewhere inside that confusing mess hid the truth. What is real, what is not? These are indeed questions for the ages. There is only one thing that is real. I am here in front of your very eyes.” He finishes with his old catch phrase, divested of substance: “The true end is killing the past. I’ll see you again, in the past.” GhenryPerez interprets the monologue as a plea to play The Silver Case and The 25th Ward. He takes “I’ll see you again, in the past,” for instance, as meaning Kamui will see the player in the older video games they will play after this more popular one.