Consider it or not, it has been 9 complete years since Saints Row IV, and to be sincere, not a lot has modified (minus the superpowers and alien invaders, clearly). The merely titled Saints Row is a reboot of the sequence, sporting a wholly new setting, new characters, and a recent story — however the gameplay construction that the property has been peddling since day one stays. At its core, it is a mission-based, third-person shooter with a sandbox setting — however this can be a sandbox that feels prefer it’s flew straight in from the PS3 period of open world design.
The map turns into more and more coated in exercise icons as you progress by way of the principle narrative, to the purpose the place the map display really stops displaying sure varieties of markers, and strikes them to their very own separate tab. Right here in 2022, it comes throughout as overkill — the form of bloat that will make even a Ubisoft title blush. However by way of its persistently over-the-top gameplay and penchant for stupidity, Saints Row nearly manages to get away with its brazen content material padding.
Saints Row continues to be at its greatest when utter chaos is unfolding. Whether or not it is throughout a very explosive principal mission, otherwise you’re simply attempting to outlive in opposition to a dozen SWAT groups, there’s nothing fairly prefer it when it comes to tone. It is dumb jokes and ultraviolence from begin to end, like a cartoon model of Grand Theft Auto.
All of it kicks off with the sport’s strong character creator. You are free to make any form of murderous antihero you need, and also you’re additionally free to regulate their look at any time throughout gameplay. Whoever or no matter you determine to be, your creation is the star of the present. In typical franchise style, your ‘Boss’ is bigged as much as be a born killer — a comically violent power of nature who blasts their approach by way of the prison underworld to ascertain their very own gang, the Saints, throughout the opening hours.
You are joined by three greatest buddies in your conquest of Santo Ileso: numbers man Eli, harmful driver Neenah, and shirtless muscle Kevin. So far as Saints Row characters go, they’re comparatively grounded, and, it may very well be argued, a bit boring. Their extra critical streaks do not actually gel with the rampant homicide and unapologetically daft plotlines, however they do permit your Boss, in all of their potential absurdity, to face out.
The story’s acquired some genuinely nice moments, but it surely appears like every thing strikes a contact too quick. The primary missions themselves make up roughly a 3rd of the sport’s 25-ish hour marketing campaign, and consequently, it struggles to correctly doc the Saints’ rise to energy. Most key plot factors drop with out a lot warning, and also you’re shortly ushered from one narrative beat to the subsequent by way of snappy cutscenes. In the end it does work — we have been left feeling pretty happy because the credit rolled — however there was positively room for a extra elaborate rags to riches storyline right here.
However our starvation for extra story missions is indicative of the sport’s wavering high quality relating to facet actions. That is essentially the most feature-rich Saints Row but — paired with the sequence’ largest map by far — however plenty of the actions simply really feel like busywork, plain and easy. Returning excursions like Insurance coverage Fraud, the place you hurl your self into oncoming visitors to make large bucks, are nonetheless nice enjoyable — however they utterly overshadow jobs the place you are tasked with driving poisonous waste-bearing vehicles very slowly throughout the map, or ‘Choplifter’ missions wherein you ferry containers between places. Wowzer.
It would not be so dangerous if there have been just some of those duties dotted concerning the metropolis, however as we wrote earlier, the map is lined in icons. Granted, you do not have to do them, however Prison Ventures, as the sport calls them, are by far your largest supply of earnings — and also you want that cash to construct extra companies and subsequently unlock the subsequent story missions. And to be clear, do not go into Saints Row anticipating in-depth enterprise administration. You get to determine what fronts go the place, however that is about it.
Fortunately, the busywork is made (principally) bearable by way of the title’s punchy gun-based fight and arcade-y driving mechanics. It simply feels good to play; a DOOM-esque system, the place you regain well being by performing brutal takedown assaults, provides every battle an gratifying movement, and as you stage up, you achieve entry to numerous particular talents that may flip the tide of a difficult encounter. A welcome evolution of the Saints Row gameplay method in nearly each approach.
It is value mentioning that there are a great deal of accessibility choices, too, which exist alongside your normal issue settings. You may tweak incoming injury, the severity of cut-off dates, autoaim, and extra to fit your wants, whereas controller inputs could be remapped fully.
And you already know what’s additionally value a point out? Co-op, as a result of it is particularly effectively carried out right here. You may workforce up with one other participant on-line and play by way of the entire recreation collectively if you would like, principal missions and all. As you’d anticipate, having one other human to clown round with provides Saints Row a further comedic edge, regardless of bouts of co-op-specific bugginess. Any progress that you simply make with a buddy carries again to your single-player marketing campaign, and vice versa, which will help alleviate the grind of ticking off tedious facet jobs.
In the meantime, on the visuals entrance, Saints Row is distinctly last-gen. By no means ugly, however definitely not a looker both. Character fashions are fairly fundamental — generic NPCs are particularly bland — and the sport’s graphics choices go away rather a lot to be desired. Favouring efficiency on PS5, you possibly can select between a locked 60 frames-per-second at a brilliant muddy 1080p, or you possibly can go for 1440p with a body price that targets 60, however does have a foul behavior of dipping. At 30fps you possibly can pump the decision proper as much as 4K, however for a title that may be so action-heavy, the halved body price is a flip off. However hey, these desert sunsets look beautiful — dramatic lighting is unquestionably one of many recreation’s graphical strengths.
Conclusion
Saints Row is a largely profitable reboot, even when it typically feels dangerously outdated when it comes to open world design. Its story and characters could be hit or miss, however the expertise is carried by enjoyable gameplay and an endearingly dumb sense of humour. Regardless of the brand new faces, Saints Row is unquestionably nonetheless Saints Row — simply greater and most likely higher.
