You can tell I been busy reliving one of my personal favorite game franchises. I would even put it up high with Tekken, Soulcalibur, Resident Evil and Dead Rising respectively. So you know for me it's a huge deal. I also gotten an 100% completion in the new Saints Row game. Now I got all of that off my shoulders let's go right into the review.
Saints Row like the original Saints Row game is a new beginning. Let's be honest, Saints Row IV was meant to be the end. Including Gat Out of Hell into it, Saints Row IV was really ridiculous. It made sense they had to hold back on the humor. I wouldn't say there wasn't jokes that didn't fly because a lot of them did.
Also like the original Saints Row game, both the Saints gangs were founded in churches. Yes some might be disappointed it's just The Saints this time around. At the same time that also worked to their advantage too. I will say this I do wish they added more to the title. Simply calling it Saints Row brings confusion especially looking up streams on websites like Twitch.
This might suddenly turn into a controversial review because a lot of the complaints I heard. Either people stayed turned off by the trailers while playing the game, some stuff wasn't entirely true or simply became a target. A target of people who wants something to complain about even for no real reason. Majority that spoke about the game considered it among the worst of 2022.
Which I strongly felt isn't what it deserves at all. The reboot direction especially after another possibility from Agents of Mayhem failed was a good decision. You might not like the character but for me all of them grew on me in some way. Let's be honest, who actually plays this style of video games for the story? Not enough to make it a major issue.
I am sure most of them are more into the actual game play, which is very critical. There's plenty of changes from the original game series. Such as owning a business has more involve this time around. They even made places like Let's Pretend stand out more too. Most of them comes with their own missions.
You also get missions from other people as well. Obviously the campaign itself is present. I do like the concept three of four original members of The Saints were previously members of the enemy groups. Your main character was temporary working for Marshall. No not the clothing store but that would've been funny.
Marshall Defense Industries also acts as a form of law enforcement. Which is also strangely interesting because the game in a few ways treated them as an gang. I will go into that just a little bit. Neenah was a member of the gang Los Panteros. This gang is strikingly similar to another gang from Saints Row 2 named Brotherhood.
I'll quickly break it down too. Both had similar leaders that drives their customized monster trucks. Kevin or Kev for short used to be a member of the gang The Idols. This gang is filled with people obsessed with causing chaos to community. Which would fit in perfectly if this were a Batman game. They often throw parties around the city.
You wanna know the weirdest thing about The Idols? Somehow they broke the long standing record for the most leaders in an gang or organization. The previous record was held by The Syndicate. Three leaders of each gang that formed that crime organization. Well let's double that, The Idols has six leaders called The Collective.
Now they should give you an idea how massive this gang truly is on it's own. You actually get a great idea of that as you go for an 100% completion I'm not kidding. Believe it or not, you can take out all six leaders in the actual game. Some may compare them to The Deckers, I'll be honest I did a few times myself.
Both had intelligent leaders with their respective gangs having a punk inspired style clothing. Also some of their actions were stuff most of their enemies wouldn't considered doing. I meant in terms of both gangs have wits over everything else. Beyond that everything else is notably different. The Deckers were more of an order gang while The Idols being more a chaotic one in comparison.
All the enemy leaders including the main antagonist dies. It is structure similar to Saints Row: The Third, you take out some leaders during the campaign in a particular order. Now I know a lot of people prefer the first two Saints Row games. When it comes to their respective campaign structures. Where you actually can choose which gangs to take out in any order you want.
Those are your three main enemy groups. Of course, you also deal with the police as well. It is nice to have a variety of enemy groups again. Going back to Marshall, they brought back the gang notoriety feature. Marshall with the two enemy gangs shows up on the top notoriety meter. The police gets the bottom notoriety meter by themselves.
This is weird because neither STAG or Ultor got their own notoriety symbols. Instead both got treated as the police on that feature. There is a lot of collectibles too. Either collecting drug packages or finding collectibles hidden around the map. A good number of them will require your cell phone to take pictures of to claim.
Yes there are loyalty missions as well. Which ends up being some of the better missions in the game. I didn't experience that much technical issues. Then again I did get the game earlier this month. A major issue I kept running into is boundaries. If you go too far off the map. Instead of getting blocked or simply turned around.
You will get a quick loading screen followed by you reappear within the map. Also some missions isn't clear what the boundaries you have to stay for the missions. Which does apply to the extra stuff you can do as well. They should change the map boundary. If we had to stay within a certain amount of area. Why couldn't you give us some idea how much ground we actually have?
Rather than all of a sudden time limit. It is a very short time limit to get back into boundaries too. We are talking a few seconds, yes one of those strict time limits. I never noticed this in the other Saints Row games before. Why all of a sudden they do this here? Also customizing wise needs a little more interesting variety.
It is still weird you no longer simply have the option to choose your sex. Yeah you have to choice one of the pre-created models first then customize them. Some are male while others are female. They didn't include Trans which may upset some people. Radio wise, it's still technically better than Gat Out of Hell simply because this has a radio!!!
The music selection however isn't that great. Usually they have some great songs on the radio. Yes you can even select your favorites to be in it's own custom radio channel while in vehicles or walking around. Yes not a lot of people knows if you access music on your cell phone, you can explore outside vehicles.
You still learn to your favorite songs to keep you going. A feature previously done in Saints Row IV, not a lot of people noticed there either. Money collecting wise, it does start rather small as well as slow. If you do everything that increases the amount as well as the rate your money increases. It actually turns out to be the very best in the series by far.
Your money does add up real time but your true maximum you can withdraw is $10 million dollars!!! In most Saints Row games, there's a few clothing stores you may realize. I do like how they went about the weapons too. Some newer weapons are among my favorites to date. Like there's a boxing glove gun that can be dual wielded or this small rocket.
This rocket can cause any target to fly upwards then explode. You also get a device that allows you to shoot through walls including people inside an tank. Thus, you actually can quickly destroy tanks without any explosives is pretty insane. Speaking of insanity, two particular activities do return in this game.
Insurance Fraud & Mayhem, I would say one is roughly in the middle while the other ended up being my favorite. Insurance Fraud changed how the meter works. After it's filled among hitting vehicles, they may explode. If you do all of them then go see the lady. You get a very unexpected reward, Insurance Fraud Anywhere.
All you do is simply call her up then you will instantly start Insurance Fraud where you called her from. I absolutely love Insurance Fraud for years, so I was over joyed with this particular reward. Mayhem is mind blowing greatness. They made it fully arcade style with the scoring. It's also like the first two Saints Row games because rival groups comes after during these.
They even done one Tank Mayhem as well as one plane variation. You will get a tank automatically in your garages from doing these. You also can do LARPing in the game too. It's short for live action role playing, a lot of people do this in real life. You get to own your own castle for this. Some additional stuff becomes available from it too.
I got to talk about Wanted, it's an app where people hunt down other people. Hitman, Assassination and Security Deletion are all about hunting down particular targets. Wanted does a few things differently. Each target has their own story lines. The person that gives you those targets gives you instructions how each target gets taken out.
Let's say they got a little more creative here this time. Some may prefer simply showing up or doing something to cause the target to appear more. Personally, I liked what they done here with the concept. The usual car place is replaced by Jim Rob's Garage. A man you previously worked with while back in Marshall.
A short story after helping him get his new business started, you become his business partner. I kinda liked the idea of that rather than buying or hacking in IV's case those car businesses. Thus, you actually have more reason to care about the business. Some businesses, I liked your character is teaching these people to get better at their jobs too.
This boss does things the previous one never got to do. Like driving trucks with toxic waste barrels to a particular location, help prevent the clean crew from getting into trouble & take part in heists. Yes I had played GTA V, I absolutely didn't like how that went about heists. I liked in Saints Row, you go to each location to take pictures.
Which gets sent to a member of the team to help come up with better strategies. Yes mostly doing that, holding off the police or Marshall in the last heist & escaping. To me, those were both more interesting as well as fun to play. Some of these missions are virtually doing the same thing repeatedly a set number of times.
Some of them offers some variety like the technology business. I highly recommend doing all of it's missions for some rather cool surprises. Such as the hover board, yes as in Back to the Future movies concept. You also get previously mentioned rocket that attached to people as well as that device. Which also reminds me of a particular rifle in Perfect Dark.
Yes you can take out operations around the city but some are different than expected. A good number of them is simply wipe all of them out. You also got find & destroy police vans. There's also destroying drones from Marshall or defend the stash from enemy groups for a time limit. Some of these do have boss characters mostly mini ones.
I did find a member of The Collective too during one of these. You can also build a tower, the last major property you can own. Yes you may not own as many businesses as the other games. Don't worry in many ways the game greatly makes up for that. I also enjoyed Pony Express, you have to rush to the drop off locations while avoiding the police.
For any groups that spotted you, after you reached the drop off location. You have to take all of them out to complete the mission. Not to piss the companies responsible for the actual game off. I felt the best of writing went into the extra stuff more than the actual main campaign. I think it's time to talk about the game's main antagonist himself. He is named The Nahualli, he has his own enemy group.
Although they or himself doesn't affect either notoriety meters in the game, weird I know. His group shows up in a handful of missions. You indirectly got him arrested while receiving a permission. After not protecting a particular object, the boss himself fires you. Later on, you got The Nahualli to help in the train robbing mission.
Then right before your party, he betrays you. Most of the Saints got killed with your three close friends kidnapped. Of course, you know what exactly followed all of that. You ended up killing all of his men plus the man himself. The reason why he betrays you is a little weird to say. I felt the campaign itself was a good length.
I also gotta mention in a weird sense Professor Genki's events got a spiritual successor. In the form of Boot Hill, it's a live streamed kill event. Like in those events, you are awarded with better weapons. The goal is kill most enemies then survive. I should mention, a good amount of these missions have a lot of enemies.
You now can customize your character on the fly through your cell phone, I loved this idea. First Strike Dojo missions is a spiritual successor to both Fight Club & Super Power Fight Club. You take out members of a rival dojo including their sensei with several melee weapons. I grew up playing beat em up games so I felt right at home with these missions.
Another cool feature you can unlock involves the flight suit. The flight suit is your gliding mechanic in the game. You can jump off tall buildings or aircraft high up in the sky or even jump off vehicles on the road to glide. Some particular stuff do require getting better at using the flight suit. You have to disrupt frequencies for most enemy groups to unlock the ability to prevent them from calling in more enemies.
This game actually shows you how truly creative & scary The Saints can truly be. I would say it's a good reboot of a franchise that simply got the worst reception. Honestly, another notable problem is you can tell by several things including the main story. The team really tried to pull off both major styles of the franchise but doesn't work well.
Personally I would've done something that would've required time as well as more people to pull it off. You could even say this is incredibly ambitious concept. What I would've done is give the players a choice of how the game would be played. Either the classic Saints Row style with the respect system or the later style of the later games.
Another factor is they could've simply came up with a new style more fitting of the game itself. This is a game that's notably better than what majority claimed of it. I did notice a lot of people quickly jumped on "bullet sponge" enemies. Yes some enemies are tougher than others are usually the bosses including the mini bosses.
The way most of them talked about a regular enemy takes forever to kill simply isn't true. I will explain exactly why too. Yes there is a leveling system with the max level being 20. Which is virtually the same as Gat Out of Hell but it should've been a little higher. Both The Third & IV's max level was 50. But I'll take that over Dead Rising making the max level being 100.
I would even say DR4 truly deserves all of it's criticism. It is much worst than this game in every possible way imaginable. Another issue I had is two particular dlcs are what should've been in the game but surprisingly wasn't. Usually when you take down a rival gang, you'll get their vehicles. For some odd reason, they chose to change it to owning those dlcs instead.
On one hand, you would get those much sooner than you would've gotten them. But on the other, you just felt a bit cheated too. I do enjoy looking at the artwork of this game. The only Saints Row game bigger in size than Saints Row: The Third Remastered. I am hoping they decide to do dlc mission packs.
Which they been doing since Saints Row 2. Gat Out of Hell was directly following the events of IV doesn't count. Ever since How the Saints Saved Christmas, the standards went up notably. By the way SR2's dlc missions aren't present in the PC port. Although you can still play them through modding the game.
Going back to the leveling system, each level gained gives you a new perk. Doing the challenges also gives you perks too. There's two perk set ups that affects several things. There's no longer having to buy in your upgrades. But you still gotta buy some slots in one of those which are notably more expansive. I can't even say this would be better than the original Saints Row.
Another notable issue I had is Collectible Finders doesn't do much to help you find the collectibles. Instead, you will be given a hint with shadowy figures of what that collectible is. Honestly, why couldn't you guys kept it like The Third & IV's? Which was much easier in comparison to use. Regardless, I do truly enjoy this game a lot with an passion.
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