Based on that, everyone thought Volition was done, that Deep Silver (their publisher) lost faith in them after that collapse and we'd never see another Saints Row game. I was incredibly pleased to find out that I was wrong about that. Just dubbed Saints Row, Volition said that this was a reboot; which to be fair kind of had to happen what with Zinyak having blown up the Earth in Saints Row 4 so it couldn't be a sequel. However, being a reboot means that all of the characters we had come to love: our boss, Johnny Gat, Shaundi, Pierce, Kinzie, and more are all gone which is absolute tragedy. Which leads into what I'm going to talk about first, which is things I don't like about the game thus far.
I just find it odd that with it existing during the time period Volition themselves said, between 2 & 3, where the 3rd Street Saints had just taken down the massive Ultor Corporation in Stillwater and became incredibly powerful and well known. Leading into them essentially being rock star criminals by Saints Row 3, that some other random gang in the desert across the country decides to call themselves the 3rd Street Saints. I could understand if
#2) MY CREW'S LACK OF BACKGROUND TOGETHER
I know that a lot of people are disappointed with this new crew and while I am not overly impressed (especially with Eli) they are okay, sure they lack the character and personality of Johnny Gat or Shaundi but they have their own unique things (except Eli). My big problem is that there is no backstory to the crew, how the met, how they joined up together or became friends, interesting looks into the lives of Kevin, Neenah, or even Eli. Basically, we get our job at Marshall and show up to the apartment after the first mission and it's like, "Hey honeys I'm home *insert studio laugh track*" It's a personal gripe that's all, it doesn't detract for me from the overall game, but I preferred learning things about my crew like in EVERY OTHER Saints Row game.
#3) THE ABSOLUTELY AWFUL SOUNDTRACK
The one thing about all of the Saints Row games thus far, even Saints Row 1, was that they all had ABSOLUTELY BANGER soundtracks. Nothing but great songs and even had the ability to construct your own playlists and use it as like a custom radio station. Saints Row 3 and 4 even ramped it up a notch and had moments where songs became a part of the game. I will never forget when your boss and Pierce chill in a car during a mission singing What I Got by Sublime in SR3 and in SR4 they do the same only get cut off by Zinyak who starts singing too. The beginning of SR4 where your boss is climbing on a nuke to Aerosmith's - Don't Wanna Miss A Thing and they save the world and become President. It's moments like that combined with other great songs that make those games amazing. So far, Sound of the Police came on when I was escaping them in SR 2022, but the radio was on before that so it didn't seem to have that same impact. That's it. As I flipped through all the stations while driving, the only song that caught my attention was Party Up by DMX, everything else was bleh. There was no way to create my own radio station, then once I finished a mission with Kevin I was given the "Playlist App" for my phone, awesome okay let's set up a playlist with DMX and find out what other cool music I may have missed.......there was none, it was all bleh. To top it all off, it's a playlist app and doesn't act like a radio station so you have to turn off the car radio and turn the playlist app on in the car and turn it off when on foot, it's all inconvenient. I'd say this is one of my biggest gripes in the game thus far.
#4) THE CHALLENGES TO UNLOCK ASPECTS OF WEAPONS & VEHICLES
The thing is that in every other Saints Row, particularly 3 & 4, when you wanted a better version of the weapon you just kept upgrading it at Friendly Fire for cash and upon the final upgrade it unlocked an ability. In this new Saints Row, you can pay for upgrades still to boost the guns stats, but there will be no special abilities unless you meet an arbitrary challenge. An example of an easy one is I had to get 30 kills of the Idols gang with a Sawed-Off Shotgun to unlock Dragonsbreath Shells for it, not bad because finding enemies is easy. Then for some reason there's ones like get X number of Double Kills and they don't tell you what counts as a Double Kill. The worst one I had to do so far was with my K7-Krukov which was "get 10 kills with your last clip", not telling you what that means in a gun that has 2 magazines taped together and 24 bullets total you would assume that it means as long as it's within the last 12; not even, you have to lose ALL YOUR AMMO until you have 24 bullets left and get kills with that. Then they added challenges to vehicles too in order to complicate things too.
Still as smooth as ever, the game play in Saints Row is fantastic, though it can be quirky until you turn down your dead zones on the controller or if you happen to be on a mouse that would be fine. Just simple quality of life things, but still solid game play, enjoyable shooting, fun driving, and now the perks and skills change things up and it's a fun play.
#2) THE CHANGE IN CUSTOMIZATION
As usual one of the best things of Saints Row is still here and that is the mad amount of customization options available to you when you are creating your boss and then when you go around to buy new clothes and accessories. It's a staple of Saints Row to have mad customization which has been around since 2, perfected in 3, and just great since. This time around though something changed to make it even better. Now you don't even have to head back to your base, apartment, or wherever you used to have to change clothes or have to go to A New You for a new custom look there's a "Style App" on your phone that lets you change everything about yourself whenever you want.
#3) CO-OP IS STILL GOOD
While I didn't play it for a super long time, my friend and I tried out co-op together and I have to say that it is still well put together and enjoyable to play. The nice thing is that whoever is the host is the one whose story progresses so if your friend is further into the game, like mine was for me, then him coming into my world helped me go through mine. It's not a toss up as to who shows up in cut-scenes, it's your game and you do, likewise your buddy does as well. One addition that I liked to this new Saints co-op is called Pranks, not that the host has to have it on or anything but if you do and you meet the requirements of whatever it says, at some point you will be able to prank your co-op partner. The first time we did it to each other we ended up dancing, that was for the achievement so we knew it was coming so not as hilarious; then my buddy didn't tell me he had a prank and during a serious mission he activated it and I kept doing 180 degree turns so my feet and head reversed it was hilarious. I got him back by turning him into a vending machine shortly after.......granted he was a vending machine that could still shoot and beat people up.
While it might not be what everyone expected it's still an enjoyable game to play and I'm going to enjoy playing the rest of it. Enjoying what the rest of Santo Ileso has to offer.