YMMV / No One Lives Forever

• Anti-Climax Boss: The last part of the second game, sadly. Not only is there Volkov in the wheelchair, but the very last enemy you have to confront is just a Giant Mook, maybe a little more resistant than the others, but he doesn't even get an energy bar. Even Isako may qualify; the second and last encounter with this boss is almost boring, compared to the battle inside the tornado in Ohio.
• Awesome Bosses: First fight with Isako in the second game. It is a tense close quarters fight with the master ninja in a small trailer park house, while it is floating in the middle of a tornado. Over the course of the fight portions of the house are ripped away. While the fight may not be exceptional in regards to the tactics and skill required, the sheer insanity of the situation is memorable.
• Awesome Music: The main theme of the first game. The theme of the second game, while good, is not at the same level, but you can hear the first theme during the ending credits.
• Genius Bonus: In one level of the first game, you can overhear a conversation between guards discussing shows like The Man from U.N.C.L.E.. Specifically mentioned are that The Fugitive aired its last episode a month before and that The Prisoner will start airing "next Friday" - both of which match up with the setting of the game in late September 1967.
• Germans Love David Hasselhoff: The first game was quite successful in Germany, thanks to many positive reviews in the German gaming press, and probably also to its taking place in several German locations. So much that, while the first edition had only translated subtitles, the local publisher took the effort to also dub the game for the GOTY rerelease.
• Good Bad Bugs: The Good Old Fisticuffs duel against Armstrong in the first game has an exploit which makes the fight a breeze: When he stomps down on the ground, his hitbox is briefly lowered enough that you can jump on top of him. None of his attacks can hit you there, and since the AI considers the player being within reach, he doesn't move while you can keep karate-chopping Armstrong from above.
• Hilarious in Hindsight: Bruno (John Patrick Lowrie) and the mimes (Gary Schwartz) are voiced by the same people who, among other Valve roles, play Team Fortress 2's Sniper (Lowrie) and Heavy/Demoman (Schwartz). The art style and humor could have easily inspired Team Fortress 2, and the two games are even set in the same time period.
• Ho Yay: "Tom Goodman" aka Melvin Blitzney and Agent Smith in the first game. They apparently met in a bar in Miami.
• Misaimed "Realism": The tutorial for the first game makes it clear that Cate can't haul dead bodies around to move them out of sight due to her slight frame and relatively low upper-body strength, and so introduces you to the alternative of a body-dissolving powder to simply remove them from the field, which is all well and good except that it doesn't at all line up with her genre-standard ability to carry a dozen weapons and hundreds of bullets for them; the second game would fix this by letting her actually carry bodies around, with the powder repurposed as a much faster but noticeably limited method of hiding them.
• Nightmare Fuel: The "man-handler", which turns henchmen into human crates, is less funny than it sounds. Especially when you see the eyes of the poor sap the first time the machine is seen in action. Also the entire level in the Antarctic Base, where the occasional malfunctions of the keychain light turn from slightly annoying to unsettling.
• Sequelitis: Contract J.A.C.K. was done by Monolith as a side project to give the artists and level designers something to do while the programming team was working on building the LithTech Jupiter EX engine that would later be used as the basis for First Encounter Assault Recon and Condemned: Criminal Origins. The lack of concentrated effort was reflected in the quality, and the franchise got canned because of it.
• Spiritual Adaptation: As an Affectionate Parody of '60s Spy Fiction that simultaneously revels in the glamour of the setting and genre and lampoons its more dated tropes (especially the sexism), it's probably the closest we'll get to an Austin Powers game. Although it should be noted that lead designer Craig Hubbard personally disagrees with the idea that NOLF is a parody in the same vein as Austin Powers: "while the game is campy and silly, the underlying premise borders on apocalyptic. That dichotomy in tone results in a very different style of humor from a parody, where everything is in good fun and nobody, including the characters, takes anything very seriously." In the same interview, he reveals that 60s spy films and TV Series such as Our Man Flint, The Avengers, and The Spy Who Came in From the Cold were far greater inspirations for NOLF, while Austin Powers primarily lampooned Sean Connery's and Roger Moore's tenures on James Bond.
• Tear Jerker: An unexpected one at the end of the second game. "Abigail..."
• Villain Decay:
  • Volkov in the second game. In the first he's the main Big Bad, even if he is taking orders from The Man Behind the Man; in the second he's stuck in a wheelchair (albeit a cool one) and the battle with him is an Anticlimax Boss (compared to verging on That One Boss in the original thanks to being very accurate on higher difficulties).
  • Curiously, at first there seems to be a Retcon, since you assume Volkov's condition is due to his fall in the icy pit near the end of the first game, apparently ignoring the very last scene of the same game with him in perfect shape, meeting the Director. You also might end up assuming that his first meeting with King Pierre as well as a letter you can find towards the end of the second game, where he claims he got injured in a skiing accident while on vacation, is a justification he gives to cover his failure. Then, at the end of Contract J.A.C.K. you find out that it's all true.

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