Saints Row started life as one of many Grand Theft Auto clones over 15 years ago, but thanks to Volition’s team doubling down on its more wacky tendencies and over-the-top cartoon character, it quickly grew into a much-loved franchise.
Now, nearly a decade since the series’ last outing, Volition is back with a new vision for the franchise: a complete reboot for the next generation. While fans weren’t necessarily asking for a new set of characters or a new vision, this year’s reboot was an opportunity to bring the series back in a big way and offer something new in a gaming space now overrun with AAA. -experiences.
Unfortunately, the latest entry misses the mark, renewing old ground and proving that certain gaming trends really don’t stand the test of time.
While there is some fun to be had in Saints RowAfter all, it’s a pretty bland and at times dull slog, bringing nothing new to the table and failing even some of the most basic things that other games managed over a decade ago. It is also marred by bugs and offers a short story that ends almost suddenly.
Deep Silver / Volition
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As you’d expect from a reboot, none of the original characters return, replaced by a cast of young characters looking to pay off their student debt by any means necessary.
There’s the DJ who has a thing for waffles, the business geek who likes motivational podcasts, and the hard-core who likes fast cars. Tired of having skin color, they join you, ‘The Boss’, as you create your own criminal empire.
While we have nothing against the characters, the style and jokes they go for feel like something we’ve seen before in Ubisoft’s Watchdogs 2only on a more superficial and poorly executed level, and it was a struggle to care for one of the cast.
Gameplay-wise, there’s nothing special to talk about here – for better or for worse, it’s a very arcade-like experience.
Driving is light and fast, with a slam mechanism that lets you deal with enemies overtaking you. There’s a lot to unlock and collect as you go, with a range of cars you can customize to your heart’s content and special abilities like ejection seats that take you straight from driving to using your wingsuit.
Deep Silver / Volition
The same can be said for your weapons and character abilities, with special moves like ‘Pineapple Express’ – where you grab an enemy, throw a grenade in their pants and toss them into oncoming enemies – or ‘Transfusion’, which can give you health from damage to target.
The problem is, these offer little more than short suspense and don’t distract from the surprisingly hollow firefight, which lacks any real crunch and with awkward aiming at a controller.
And no matter how the mission starts, you’ll always end up shooting waves of enemies until the game decides you’ve done enough to move forward – which quickly gets boring.
To be fair, there are some fun moments to be had, such as a character’s quest to become king of The Dustmoot in a LARPing event across the city.
As you collide with rival houses in this story, inspired by Dune and Game of Thrones, enemies fall on your foam darts and pretend to die in the most dramatic ways possible. There are some fun twists and turns on this quest and it’s an entertaining diversion, but we wish there were more missions like this.
Deep Silver / Volition
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Aside from the story missions that tell the story of The Saints growing in infamy, the rest of your time is spent actually building your empire – installing businesses on lots and executing missions to maximize their earning potential. You can dump toxic waste at cleanup sites or remove cars from crime scenes.
“Insurance fraud” is making a comeback as one of your viable businesses, allowing you to launch yourself into traffic and wander around making as much money as possible. Despite being one of the funnier highlights of the game, it is let down by bugs as we often found ourselves on the road with traffic simply refusing to load while the timer was running out.
Such bugs are not uncommon. Some can be funny to experience, but a lot of the ones we found just broke the mission you were on. We had instances where important vehicles or characters didn’t show up and loaded enemies so far away that you couldn’t walk up to them without failing the mission to leave the area. We were even forced to restart the game from scratch after falling through the floor due to a malfunction.
Saints Row is ultimately a disappointing missed opportunity. It’s a shame because this was an opportunity to do something big, bold and different – show us where the franchise could go in the coming years.
But instead, the end product is a simple and rather tedious experience stuck in an era of gaming long gone. There are a handful of fun moments, but these are fleeting and it’s hard to imagine anyone picking up the game.
Platform rated on: Xbox Series X
Saints Row is out now on PC, PlayStation 4 and 5, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X.
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