Reviewed: October 15, 2008
Reviewed by: Mark Smith
Publisher
THQ
Developer
Volition
Released: October 14, 2008
Genre: Action
Players: 1
Online: 2-12
9
8
9
8
9.0
Supported Features:
Screenshots (Click Image for Gallery)
In the world of sandbox crime adventures you have two major next-gen contenders; Grand Theft Auto and Saints Row, although this is the first year where you’ve actually had a choice between the two franchises on both of the next-gen consoles. When the original Saints Row debuted THQ had the luxury of being the only game in town for nearly two years. This time, Rockstar managed to beat THQ to the punch and is enjoying a loyal following of next-gen GTA fans, but the time between the two releases is significant enough that those looking to escape the Russian mob and the trappings of a fictionalized New York City might be ready for something fresh and new.
Saints Row 2 might not be entirely fresh or new, but it is a fantastic example of sandbox gameplay mixed with a healthy dose of gang violence, seedy criminal organizations, corporate corruption, and one of the largest living, breathing cities ever designed for a video game. If you thought GTA was huge and complex, you ain’t seen nothing yet.
Fortunately for Volition, rather than trying to emulate the design features or capitalize on the omissions of GTA, they struck out to make their own unique vision of an open-world game and in doing so have created a game that is totally original, and even though there are a few similarities between the action and activities of Stilwater and Liberty City, the games are hardly in a position to be compared. They each offer their own assortment of fun and dangerous activities and will certainly captivate gamers for months to come.
Saints Row 2 amps the fun factor right out of the box with a fantastic solo experience that you can dive into alone, or bring along a friend for some amazing cooperative gameplay where you tackle the same city, the same story, and the same missions, but you do it with a tightly integrated cooperative element and even a few co-op specific challenges. Nothing beats doing an ATV race with one person driving and the other tossing grenades.
But bigger than co-op and perhaps bigger than the solo adventure is the amazing multiplayer options for up to 12 wannabe gangsters who can all join inp for some totally addictive carnage in the Strong Arm mode. This is basically an open-world full of challenges, many taken from the main game and others specific to online or system link gameplay where you can battle it out in free for all or even form teams and fight for cash to buy back your turf.
Whether you are playing alone, co-op, or in exhilarating 6-on-6 matches, the first thing you have to do is create a character and the character creation process has never been bigger or better than what you’ll find in Saints Row 2. Hell, it’s more robust than most RPG character toolkits. Choose your sex, choose your wardrobe (which doesn’t necessarily have to match the sex), or perhaps you might go sans cloths if you want to partake in the streaking challenges. Don’t worry parents; the naughty bits have been blurred out. We wouldn’t want junior to accidentally see a nipple while he’s cutting a van full of sex perverts in half with a chainsaw.
Beyond the person and the clothes you can also specify the way your character walks and talks. I would have preferred some more options in this department as I didn’t really like most of my choices and opted for a British accent. At least I sound classy while I protect my turf and recruit me some ho’s. If you ever get bored with your decisions, just visit one of the in-game plastic surgeons to make any cosmetic changes or visit a store for some new threads. What this all means is a much more personalized experience that puts you in the game.
In addition to creating a totally unique playable character, you will also have the opportunity to customize your crib using a variety of themes or if you prefer, pick and choose your furnishings one by one. This opens up the chance to purchase a home entertainment center so you can play video games, or at least one video game called “Zombie Uprising”. Surprisingly enough, this isn’t a cheap knockoff diversionary mini-game, but rather a full 3D zombie survival game that puts you in the same Stilwater-quality city fighting off waves of zombie hoards.
It’s been five years since the cliffhanger events of the first game. You awake from your coma to find Stilwater is now under corporate control and rival gangs have invaded your turf. The city is divided into sections (or turfs) that you must capture and hold, much like the first game. The world is full of activities so there is always something fun and original to do when you need a break from the story. Thankfully, the story is original enough and set far enough into the future that those who never played the original and are not familiar with the events or locations of the first game won't feel lost or confused.
New for Saints Row 2 is untethered co-op play where a friend can drop in during your solo story adventure and help out or even participate in some co-op specific activities. One such activity is the Heli-Assault mission that allows one player to fly a chopper while the other sits in the gunner seat. Yes, Saints Row 2 lets you take the battle to the skies for a completely new style of drive-by shooting and a fantastic reveal of the new super-charged engine that drives this game and allows the seamless presentation of a massive city that is 150% larger than the Stilwater of five years ago.
One particularly nice feature of the co-op mode is that there are no range restrictions imposed either by the game or the story. You are free to split-up and venture to opposite sides of the city if you wish, although this defeats the tactical intent of working as a team. We’ve seen campaign co-op play before in games like Gears of War and Kane and Lynch, but you’ve never had this much freedom.
Combat has been tweaked and there is a new ammo system in place that allows for more engaging and frequent shootouts. You can now zoom down to a shoulder cam that allows for slower movement and more reliable aiming, and you can even grab pedestrians and use them as meat shields.
While all of these new improvements and features certainly make for a great solo experience, the new multiplayer modes are easily the biggest draw for Saints Row 2, and nothing could be bigger and more inventive than the Strong Arm versus mode. Strong Arm is basically an umbrella mode that encompasses a vast array of mini-game events and challenges ranging from demolition derby and street racing to package delivery and VIP assassination. All the while you can also stake your claim to your own territory by tagging key locations for your gang (team).
The overall challenge is to win enough cash to buy back your turf. Winning events will score huge sums of money while tagging and enemy kills will also reward you with smaller amounts of cash. Some events have bonus cash opportunities like the money pick-ups during race challenges. There is also incredible freedom in how you are able to contribute to your team. Let’s say you suck at driving, and a race event is about to start. Rather than embarrass yourself behind the wheel, you can scout ahead on the racecourse and take up a position with an RPG and start blowing up the competition as they pass by.
Insurance Fraud is back and in multiplayer you can actually benefit by having some of your team driving the cars that you are throwing yourself in front of. This scores bonus cash. Strong Arm is incredibly fun and will keep you playing long after you have finished the story mode and had your fill of the more traditional DM and Team DM games.
There is just so much to do in Saints Row 2. I must have logged at least 12-15 hours before I realized I had only done two story missions and I still hadn’t even earned my first achievement. You get caught up in doing all these crazy activities and when you find one you like you can’t help but do all the sub-levels within that challenge. I must have played Fuzz for two hours straight my first day of gaming. This is a version of Cops where you pose as a police officer and ride along with a cameraman while exercising extreme prejudice during your patrol stops – and by extreme I mean using chainsaws and flamethrowers to dispatch unruly mobs. By the time I got back on track with the story I had so much cash and respect it was crazy.
And then you can get caught up in the discovery challenges, especially at night when the sun goes down and all the hot spot locations reveal themselves with their neon-like glow. Nothing beats an agile chopper for skimming over the city looking for spinning CD’s and tag locations. I've gotten pretty good at tagging then flying away when rival gangs or the cops show up to complain. It’s also a lot of fun to go shopping for new cribs. You can even buy a place on the prison island where you start.
Unlike the first game where you had numerous gangs, you now only have to deal with three rivals, The Sons of Samedi, The Brotherhood, and The Ronin, and when they are put in their place you can finally tackle the Ultor Corporation who has literally taken over the city with corporate dictatorship. Volition has done a great job of creating a compelling story, and once you can peel yourself from the activities long enough to get hooked, you’ll find some truly emotional and cinematic elements at work here.
There was only one minor glitch I found in the gameplay and that was with the save system. The game will periodically checkpoint itself and save your location to the hard drive but this auto-save only keeps track of mission and activity progress. If you don’t do a manual save in one of the regular save game slots you will not record things like CD discovery and tag completions. I lost about five hours of discovery items one night after I failed to save before exiting.
Visually, Saints Row 2 is much better than the first game but still pales when compared to the overall realism found in GTA4. But what the game lacks in textures and refined polygon models it more than makes up for in style, scale, and diversity. I challenge anyone who climbs into a Learjet, biplane, or helicopter to not fly around the city for less than 30 minutes. Once you see just how big Stilwater is, and how it is all intricately interconnected, you’ll agree this city is an amazing feat of engineering.
A lot of the game involves driving and there are numerous cars, trucks, motorcycles, and other vehicles at your disposal. Unlike GTA, the vehicles are intelligently located within the city so you have rusty heaps in the ghetto and luxurious rides in the fancier parts of the city. The actual city construction is unbelievable in its variety and uniqueness. It’s difficult if not impossible to spot a repeating structure or texture within view of another. With so many original locations and landmarks it becomes quite easy to learn your way around town much like any other real city.
With all this detail and scale comes a few technical issues including draw distance,pop-up, and specific to the PS3, some washed out colors and contrast issues. Most of the time the pop-up isn’t an issue, at least on the streets. When you take to the skies you’ll enjoy some of the best wispy cloud effects I’ve ever seen, but you’ll also have to fly pretty low to see the city pop into various levels of detail including the traffic. On the water things get even worse. I was riding my Jet Ski from the prison island and I kept seeing these white plumes of water on the horizon and then suddenly a yacht or fishing boat would materialize right in front of me and I would have to quickly divert. But these issues are rare and mostly confined to air and sea adventures and certainly don’t impact the enjoyment of this game.
The character models, animation, and facial expressions are excellent for both your character and all the other stars of the game. Even the random pedestrian, homeless person, or chubby hooker offers a level of diversity to the population of Stilwater. I really enjoyed how the game uses your current character model including any accessories and clothes when generating the real-time cutscenes.
Saints Row 2 packs in the Hollywood talent for a fantastic ensemble cast that delivers a high quality cinematic experience for cutscenes and even during the gameplay. There is so much random dialogue assigned to the pedestrians that you’ll find yourself trailing some guy on the street just to overhear his cell phone conversation or listen to the random murmurings of a hooker, pimp, or some other colorful street character. Nothing beats the dialogue you’ll hear coming from the backseat while you’re driving a hooker and her customer around town while trying to avoid the press.
The sound effects are awesome with unique engine noises for the various vehicles, horns, sirens, and a nice assortment of weapon noises and explosions. The carnage sounds as good as it looks and it all comes at you in a stunning 3D Dolby Digital mix that puts you in the middle of a living breathing city.
The Saints Row 2 soundtrack is all over the place with 11 radio stations that covers all genres like rap, metal, 80’s and even classical. While there isn’t as much talk radio as GTA, there are plenty of humorous commercials and ranting DJ’s. As much as I loved the talk radio shows in GTA, I did find myself sitting in my car just to listen to them, so I’m glad Saints Row 2 left them out. You can also increase the size of your available music library by collecting the various CD's hidden around the level and visiting the record store.
Saints Row 2 is one of those rare games with virtually no end in sight. Sure, you can finish off the story mode in 20-30 hours, but you probably won’t have done everything there is to do in the game, and finishing the story alone is a lot different than teaming up with a friend. And once you have mastered all those fun activities, head online for some intense multiplayer action in Strong Arm as well as the more traditional online modes for teams and individuals.
I was impressed that Saints Row 2 played as well as it did on the PS Network. While I did experience a bit of lag in some larger games, it wasn't nearly as bad as most other PS3 online games. I did find chatting with the bluetooth headset a bit problematic with lots of static and dropout. Overall, the 360 offers a much more polished online experience, while system link and LAN play are identical across both systems. The PS3 version doesn't support Trophies with could potentially hurt the longevity of the title for those obsessed with notority.
I loved the first Saints Row. At the time, it was the only next-gen game of its kind, but despite that there was something about the gameplay and the overall design that made it more attractive than any of the GTA games that had come before it. And now, even with direct competition, I find myself wanting to play Saints Row 2 more than GTA4. This game really packs in the action and does a great job of integrating the activities and respect system in order to unlock story missions. And the multiplayer for Saints Row 2 is far more engaging and addictive than Liberty City.
The only place where Saints Row 2 falls short is in the graphics, with washed out colors and the occasional glitch or pop-in. But for a game of this magnitude and overall complexity, it would be hard not to have one or two hiccups, and nothing that did sneak through will hurt your overall enjoyment of the game. Saints Row 2 is a game you will quickly become addicted to and one that you won’t be putting back on the shelf anytime soon. It rises to the top of its genre and will easily satiate the violent urges of even the most twisted of gamers.