Saints Row

Is there a game series wackier than Saints Row? Each new entry (before the 2022 reboot) is more over the top than the last. The first in the series, however, offers few hints about what the series would become. It’s a by-the-numbers Grand Theft Auto III clone through and through.

As you would expect of an open-world crime-em-up, Saints Row provides a sizeable metropolis to cruise around. Spanning three islands, Stillwater has no shortage of places to explore. Saints Row district is a dump; the suburbs are loaded with yuppies and expensive cars; Chinatown has a garden area with a distinct Asian flair. It feels like a typical Midwestern city that’s been shrunk and stripped down to its bare essentials. It’s not the most exciting city but it gets the job done.

Whatever sense of character the city lacks, however, is more than compensated for by the game’s cast of NPCs. The 3rd Street Saints lieutenants all have memorable personalities. Lin is a stone-cold operator, Dex talks like he’s smarter than he is, and Gat just loves to wreak havoc. Because the player character is nearly mute, the lieutenants take charge of doing the story’s heavy lifting. Most of the story is told through cutscenes, but sometimes characters will chat while riding along in your car as well. While the plot itself is nothing to write home about, the characters and their banter always keep me feeling engaged.

In terms of gameplay, Saints Row definitely shows its age. The on-foot controls generally feel responsive; the driving controls less so. There are three in-vehicle control presets to choose from but none of them feel quite right. If you’re a regular human like me, you simply won’t have enough fingers to steer, aim, accelerate, and fire a gun at the same time. Fortunately, I think the developers realized this, as the game never requires you to shoot precisely while driving. A related gripe is that there aren’t separate settings for driver and passenger controls. When one of my 3rd Street buddies asks me to get in the passenger’s seat and shoot bad guys, I usually open the menu and change my controller preset from Setting B, which is better suited to driving, to Setting A, which is more focused on aiming and shooting.

As you’d expect of an open-world game, there are plenty of side activities – drug dealing, street racing, insurance fraud, carjacking, and so on. You’ll need to complete a certain number of these to boost your respect, which is required to take on story missions. Despite the wide variety of side activities available, they generally felt like busy work, and I always did just the bare minimum needed to unlock more story missions. Then again, Saints Row isn’t a particularly long game, so I can see why the developers don’t let players blitz straight through the critical path. If nothing else, the mandatory side content helps the story’s pacing feel more natural.

Truth be told, the most interesting thing about Saints Row is that it’s the precursor to Saints Row 2, which I regard as an accidental (or maybe not so accidental) masterpiece. But this review is about the first game, not the sequel, and I want to save the compare and contrast session for my review of part two. So, to sum up, if you’re looking for a game that lets you play gangster alongside a colorful cast of characters, Saints Row the first fits the bill. But if you’re looking for something more than a GTA clone, you may be disappointed.

Now how about we take a break and stop for burgers at Freckle Bitches?