Saints Row 2022 Review
Legacy Review
Watch the review here or…
Read it here!
Title: Saints Row
Platform: PC Playstation 4/5 Xbox One/X/S
Reviewed on: PC w/Controller
Publisher: Deep Silver
Developer: Deep Silver Volition
Release: Aug 23, 2022
Time Played: 21 Hours
Genre: Action-Adventure
So you’re curious about the new Saints Row reboot. It’s been nearly ten years since their last itineration of Saints Row. Can a good Saint’s Row game still be made today? Are the characters as likable now and they were then? Well stick around and I will let you know. Oh, and just a heads up, this is a mature game, full of curse words, blood, and some nudity, so make sure the kiddos are out of the room if you play.
As with most Saint’s Row games, the main character is The Boss, totally customizable from head to toe. Gender, hair style, you can even adjust the bust or package to make the most preferred boss around. Not everything will be available at the start though. Spread throughout the city will be clothes shops and tattoo artists for more customization. Thankfully these adjustments can be made at anytime in the game, so you’re not stuck with the same look if you decided something didn’t quite fit right.
After The Boss is made the story starts on their first day of a new job. A rookie on a task force for the local security firm, Marshall, and their job is to take out a local crime lord. Right out of the gate gun fire and explosions are everywhere. Shoot your way through with some basic tutorial leading the way. It doesn’t take very long to see how bad ass The Boss is, for being a rookie and all. Good with a gun, hand to hand combat, they can even hold their own from on top of a hover-jet.
After their first day The Boss heads home to their best friends, Kevin, Neenah, and Eli, the new cast of Saints Row. All trying to make it the best they can, four friends barely able to pay for a tiny apartment. No strangers to crime though, they work well together to get by.
After couple hours of gameplay, getting comfortable with the controls and getting to know the new characters, the real game starts. The gang decide to start their own criminal empire. After setting up a home base it’s time to start taking over Santo Ileso, one small territory at a time.
Running a criminal empire isn’t cheap, so there must be a steady source of income for the Saints. Throughout the city will be empty real estate that the Saints can put their own shady business. Every business built comes with its own side missions The Boss has to complete so more money can come in every hour. My absolute favorite activity makes a return in this Saint’s Row, insurance fraud. In order to complete these side missions The Boss finds busy intersections around the city and just jumps in front of cars to start racking up fraudulent insurance charges. Its so much fun guiding a ragdoll through the air exploding cars and causing chaos everywhere.
Santa Ileso is home to three big gangs the Saints are going to have to compete against. The Los Panteros, a Spanish gang really into cars, their leader drives a monster truck. The Idols, an anarchist gang intent on bringing down the establishment. Very into neon. The last gang isn’t technically a gang, but they own territory that needs to be taken over.
The city is full of violent criminals, and the best way to take care of them when muscling in on their territory, would be guns. There are six different types of guns that can be equipped at one time. The pistol, SMG, Rifle, Shotgun, Heavy, and Special. The special being like a sniper rifle and the heavy is a rocket launcher. Every weapon in the game will come with a special ability that can be activated after a certain task is complete, like so many headshots or bullets shot.
And to move around the city there are a lot of vehicles to choose from. Everything on the street can be stolen to use. If the car is brought back to the base garage, it can be customized, upgraded and used whenever you want. These, too, come with special abilities that can be unlocked after beating a small challenge.
There’s a challenge for nearly every action in the game. From drifting to taking the right picture. Completing a challenge unlocks perks that can be equipped to better aid The Boss in their crazy shenanigans around town. Only so many of each level can be equipped at once though choose wisely.
There was so much to do in Saints Row, I completed the story after twenty-one hours of gameplay, and only finished forty three percent of the game. I really enjoyed this reboot. It was made for a new generation, but that just gave it some new flavors. Buuut, as much as I like the game, there were a few things that really got on my nerves.
First some minor quality of life things that were bearable, but still annoying. This was the first game I ever played that offered tobii eye tracker options. I tried it out, I’m not sure if the programming is quite there yet, but a few things didn’t work out. By default it was set to move the camera while aiming with just eye movement, but it moved so fast it turned into a never ending loop of movement until I looked at the cross hairs. After that fiasco I settled for a clean ui with everything faded unless I looked at it. Oh and I had to turn the tobii options back on every time I would start up the game.
There are a few radio stations that can play in a car while driving, at one point an app for the phone will be unlocked, allowing the player to listen to their favorite songs from a radio station. It was a neat idea, but every time the app would startup, it would start at the first song on the list, not where it left off. Totally not a big deal, but a pain none the less.
And I did find a few bad bugs in the game, the really bad ones started showing up the farther into the game I got. So we got in a fight and whenever a gun was selected, The Boss would act like their fists were still up, causing the guns to point down. Although it looked kind of funny, I had to restart the mission for things to get back to normal. But the worst bug I came across was a camera issue whenever I hopped into a helicopter. For some reason the game decided it needed to zoom the camera in fifty times. The chopper could still be flown, but I had no idea where it was going, and the camera would go right back to normal after I left the vehicle. That bug involved a complete restart to resolve. And then turn the tobii options back on again.
So, I really liked the story and the game play. It did feel like the old Saints Row games, but with new characters and a whole new city to explore. I had a very difficult time trying to decide where to put this game with the various bugs and issues I had. Ultimately, I felt this game still belongs on my top shelf. The game is still very young, still plenty of time for updates to fix the various bugs players find during game play. And hey, maybe a nice quality of life update to fix a couple things eh?