Saints Row [Xbox]
As massive fans of the Saints Row series over the years, a reboot of the franchise was welcome news. There’s been a severe lack of zaniness in the genre over the last few years - a gap that not even series spin-off Agents of Mayhem could fill. So with a brand new Saints Row game on the scene - developed by Volition - our expectations were high.
After a quick party cutscene that was surprisingly low on the wacky-meter (where are the flying dildos!?), you’ll zip back in time by a few months to where it all began. You meet your Squad, each from different backgrounds. Eli, the innocent nerdy one of the group; Neenah, a member of the Los Panteros; and Kevin, the waffle-loving DJ of the Idols gang. You are a Marshall, a member of a very non-PC security firm in Santo Ileso, though this career turns out to be short-lived. After various issues in each of the groups personal lives, the quad decide to build their own criminal empire, taking control of a nearby church to call home. This, is the origin of the Third Street Saints.
Building up the reputation of the Saints requires you to complete missions that result in you networking with - and helping out - other characters such as Jim Rob, to get access to his Garage; and drawing attention to gain new recruits by taking part in a highly dangerous live-streamed battle royale. Who said running your own criminal empire would be easy? Similar to previous titles, you’ve got access to a mobile phone that acts as your hub for missions as well as various Perks and upgrades. The Perks you unlock can be very useful, such as increasing the radius for automatically collecting Loot and Ammo from downed enemies, reducing the speed at which you’ll gain Notoriety, or even replenishing health from kills. The most coveted of the Perks will take a while to unlock, which is the only downside, since you’ll possibly have gone way deeper into the game by the point you get them, when they would have been appreciated earlier!
There are various tasks that can be completed outside of the main missions, such as Photo Hunt tasks, Bounties and more. Funnily enough, exploring the world ended up being one of my favourite things to do - with such a vast landscape and loads of weird and wonderful things to do and see: people setting off random fireworks, giant art installations and shooting galleries, as well as plenty of references throughout the world to give you a chuckle; I actually preferred this to following the story. The main story missions themselves are pretty linear and end up feeling quite repetitive as you progress, with most following the same basic format. It actually feels like the imaginative questlines have taken a step back from previous titles, which is a shame as the wacky world of the Third Street Saints was always fun and exciting to be a part of, and had you eagerly working your way through the over the top story instead of just going through the motions. Unforgettable Saints Row personalities such as Johnny Gat, Zimos and Professor Genki are absent here - and the ones we’ve got instead just don’t quite feel as wild and memorable as they probably should - even the NPCs in the world feel less alive, with gang members in previous games having more of a visual impact on districts.
The visuals are a bit of a mixed bag, with the world itself looking fantastic but a lot of graphical glitches and texture issues being present. Most of the customisation options for your character are on par with the previous titles which is a missed opportunity, as I was really hoping for some new variety to be added here - but instead it feels somewhat lacking. The soundtrack however is fantastic, with a great selection of tracks to suit fans of a wide variety of genres. Obviously, we are now a few months post-launch, and we’ve gotten what we hoped for: various quality of life updates and patches to be issued to deal with the variety of bugs, but it does feel a little too late at this point, as most people have already either moved on from Saints, or skipped it altogether due to the initial faults.
Overall, Saints Row does offer a fun time but it just doesn’t feel like it has advanced a hell of a lot since the last game. Priced at £59.99 for the base game on Xbox, it still feels pretty expensive for what it is, so I’d recommend waiting to pick it up on sale - or you could pick up a physical copy for slightly less: £54.99 from GAME for the Criminal Customs Edition (and you get a bandana, while stocks last) but even this isn’t much of a saving. Maybe if you can get it pre-owned? Either way, it’s still worth giving a bash - even sans dildoes - if you can get it at a reduced price.
In the end, we decided to give Saints Row the Collecting Asylum rating of 7/10.
Are you interested in Saints Row? What do you think of it?
Let us know in the comments below!
- V x
Thank you to Koch Media for the Saints Row Xbox review code!
