Friday, January 1, 2021

Jack Red reviews Agents of Mayhem

 Happy New Years everyone, I apologize this would've been my last review of 2020. Now it is going to be my first review of 2021 instead. I am not going to hide I made out like a bandit this past Christmas. I gotten a huge Saints Row purchase which does include Agents of Mayhem with every dlc. I didn't play much of it through Game Pass but it was one of the last games I finished in 2020.

I do want to point out my views on Steam version to Xbox One version is vastly different. I couldn't even properly get the Steam version to work. I ended up refunding it being one of a handful of times I done so.

Agents of Mayhem is virtually an alternate universe version of Saints Row. Instead of a street gang that became a corporation to the very people running the United States. We have an organization called M. A. Y. H. E. M. which is short for Multinational AgencY Hunting Evil Masterminds. Usually in Saints Row series with the possible exception of Gat out of Hell, you play as just one character.

Here you get fifteen agents to play as. Which also means all of them have their own leveling process. A better way of saying it is sometimes being one person whose op can get boring. Why not give us a lot of op characters instead lol. Of course, you have to work at leveling up in this game to a degree. There is a weird addition where using these crystal shards after a character reached level 20.

You can use twenty crystal shards to level them up to level 40. But in the game itself it looks like 20 on one side with 20 on the other side of characters you fully leveled. As if they weren't allowed to call it level 40 for some reason. Just like later Saints Row games, it does get crazy & ridiculous in many ways. I should mention four of these agents so happen to be Saints Row characters.

The actual canon of this game is a bit of a weird case. It technically follows after Gat out of Hell but takes place in a very different place in another universe. There's so much you can do just like Saints Row series. It's hard to classified exactly what to call this game to Saints Row series when it's the only entry game.

Personally just going by a few select things like pop culture references, super hero theme and outrageous humor. I would say this game is more of a spiritual successor to Saints Row IV. You often face members of L. E. G. I. O. N. that's an evil organization bend on ruling the world as well as taking out the other organization.

I could argue in some ways they are worse than Zinyak but better than Satan is that makes any real sense. I loved some cut scenes are beautifully drawn. You actually can feel the craziness of this world through the characters. This game surprisingly creative in a few ways. Honestly, it is a surprise hit from Volition that more people needs to play.

I do need to mention, most agents are within teams of trios. Obviously Gat is my favorite Saints Row character. But since this is Agents of Mayhem, I need to pick a particular character who really got my attention. This may not come as a surprise to those who know me well. I have to go with Oni, he was a former Yakuza member.

He heavily works on taking threats out quickly as well putting fear into his enemies. He also gets some nice outfits as well including a Joker reference outfit. I do enjoy the map system, I just wish they done it slightly more in a few ways to Saints Row series. A great example of what I'm talking about is trying to find crystal shards.

They only show up on the map if you're within the radius of an location. So if I moved in any direction just enough, suddenly I don't see some of them while other crystal shards shows up instead. I do like you can unlock locations on the map as an alternate instead of just going to The A. R. K. building.

This game is very friendly when it comes to achievement hunting as well. There's a great soundtrack with some great voice acting. Some jokes are cornier than others but it's still a great time. This really does feel like a super hero team version of Saints Row I'm not kidding. I do need to talk about the boss fights.

I won't fully cover all of them since that would take too long. Some of them in some way you'll face again. They did make them notably different from each other. You do explore a lot of Legion lairs but most of them to me comes off being so similar that I felt like I kept redoing the same ones again. The secret room to a secret room is randomized in location.

I mention that for a few reasons. Why have another secret room connected to a secret room isn't one enough? Also, these lairs will take some time to explore. So a large amount of the time you won't even notice the first secret room unless you knew what you're looking for. This game is like a mix between an acid trip & getting piss drunk at times.

I wouldn't say that's necessary a bad thing either. They clearly put a lot of work into this. Agents of Mayhem is a solid experience if you're willing to give it a try. Especially you played the Saints Row games but always was curious about this. It is worth checking out honestly, it's a great game. This is just enough to be it's own game from those of Saints Row series.

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