Saints Row returns – and as a reboot. We deliver all the info on gameplay, release and clarify the big questions.
Saints Row is a bit like the Fast & Furious of the gaming world. Starting out as a simple gangster-rollo fantasy for GTA fans, the series escalated part by part in sometimes completely abstruse directions. In the end, we conquered not only our block, our city, but the entire galaxy – and hell! Even Dom Toretto and his family would be impressed. But how should we continue after Saints Row 4?
The simple answer: not at all. The new Saints Row starts from the beginning in 2022. At the same time, of course, the new edition inherits more than just the name and the nasty publisher habit of simply giving reboots the franchise name without any additions, so that we have to write the year of release or reboot or something behind every Saints Row, Tomb Raider, Battlefront or Hitman so that someone knows what we’re talking about.
Okay, sorry, let’s move on: The reboot actually ticks off every Saints Row gameplay virtue. Once again, you travel to a US city, recruit your own gang of criminals, create your own character in the wonderfully colourful editor, take out enemy gangs with either down-to-earth or completely wacky guns, and generally cause chaos in the open world.
Torpedo enemy vehicles with Apache helicopters? Check. Organise a drug smuggling ring out of hot dog cars? Check. Being hurled 30 metres through the air by an explosion onto an oil truck, the detonation of which then transports us onto a skyscraper? Yesss …
But not all the ingredients are necessarily palatable to series fans. Saints Row 2022 throttles down the pee-pee humour noticeably, feels much more grounded overall than Part 4 – and clearly relies on the humour and aesthetics of Watch Dogs 2, with a dash of Fortnite.
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What’s the new Saints Row about?
Saints Row (2022) is set in Santo Ileso, a fictional city in the southwestern US, heavily inspired by more desert-heavy states like New Mexico. If you take a look at aerial shots of Phoenix, Arizona on YouTube, you’ll get a good picture.
So don’t expect rainy walks along the pier, but dusty races through the desert, sun-drenched downtown panoramas and the odd collision with a cactus. The developers don’t call Santo Ileso the biggest, but the most ambitious open world they have put together so far. You can get an overview for yourself in the trailer:
Your main character starts out similarly ambitious: together with three companions, you want to build a gangster empire and help the Saints gang achieve eternal greatness. If you take a look at the ensemble of characters, you will immediately understand who developer Volition wants to appeal to here: late-millenials including Generation Z.
Who are the new Saints?
The Saints are not like GTA’s CJ, Franklin or gangster legends like Don Corleone, Scarface and Co. from real criminal milieus, but are … well … the target group of the game. Young, educated people in their early-mid-20s. Creative director Jim Boone even cites this as an example: Imagine you can’t pay your tuition fees and so you build a criminal empire.
The three main Saints next to you:
- Driver Neenah works as a mechanic but is actually an art historian and anthropologist.
- Kevin not only forgoes upper body company on principle, but is actually a DJ who loves his friends as much as he loves chasing adrenaline.
- Eli has studied management and would like to start a business. So why not a criminal one?
Each team member comes from one of Santo Ileso’s three major enemy gangs, though they don’t represent classic gangster stereotypes either.
- The Idols love wild parties, wild punk and Daft Punk helmets.
- The Marshall Defense Industries are actually not a real gang, but criminal private militants.
- And the Los Panteros, as a gang of pumped-up mucki-pollos, are still most reminiscent of classic gangsters, but primarily embody fitness junkies.
Saints Row generally no longer sees itself as a biting caricature of the whole “Get Rich or Die Tryin'” hype of the 2000s and early 2010s. In principle, of course, this is a completely justified decision, but not every fan is likely to like what we get instead – especially since no really original ideas have caught our eye so far. Basically, you have to ask yourself: Did I like Watch Dogs 2’s humour and speech? That is, hip, young-guy talk that relies primarily on ironic sayings and situational comedy? Then you’ll also like Saints Row. If not …
What kind of game will Saints Row be?
Whatever stands to the new story: The gameplay looks fun. Enemy gangs control the city and you take part in numerous main as well as side activities to change that. There’s an extensive story campaign, plus co-op for two people and fan favourites like Insurance Fraud return. So destruction and mayhem remain the guiding principles of the Saints Row sandbox – very good.
The gameplay scenes shown were all about vehicular action. In trucks, sports cars, SUVs and off-road jeeps, you’ll race through the city and countryside, dismantling enemy vehicles with the bazooka. In addition, as already mentioned, an Apache helicopter could be seen, which tears up an entire car park with homing missiles. Many battles take place out in the desert, but there are also shootouts between the skyscrapers of the Commercial District. Alternatively, you can jump from a skyscraper with a wingsuit. In the game, too.
But you don’t just jump from buildings, you also own them. Real estate is supposed to play a big role: You can buy lots of land in Santo Ileso and then freely decide what to build there. Radioactive waste disposal? Easy. Clubs, bases, illegal enterprises – many facilities seem to be linked to side missions. In the gameplay we see our character transporting radioactive toxic waste through the city.
“Player expression” as well as “player customization” are important keywords for Saints Row: You can buy heaps of stuff for your character, as is typical for the series. Shoes, trousers, shirts, hats, glasses and, and, and. The new Saints Row may not present you with a self-contained gangster fantasy – but you’ll get plenty of tools to create your very own one.
When is release?
Saints Row won’t technically be a GTA 6 killer in 2022. How could it? GTA 6 is a) not out yet and b) Volition is obviously far from a Rockstar budget. But that doesn’t have to be a problem. What you get here is ideally a whimsical big city sandbox for both Last Gen and Current Gen – and there hasn’t been one for quite a while.
Maybe the story and style of the game will catch on over time – we can’t judge that yet. Either way, the presentation so far makes you want to shoot your way through Saints Row again with wacky guns. The reboot will be released on 25 February 2022 for all current platforms, current gen and last gen.
