Nov 14, 2011

Saints Row: The Third

Aah, morning. Such a lovely time of day, when the world feels new and possibilities are endless. I usually start the day by having some coffee and reading the news. That's how I start my day in real life, anyway. In Saints Row: The Third, I tend to start things with a little bit more… immediacy.

As I have already said, I think that Saints Row: The Third is a riot of a good time. I'll be doing a full review of the game later this week, but for now I wanted to share some videos to show you guys what this game is all about.

Many games contain what I've started thinking of as "encapsulating moments," in that they're a single moment, sequence, or level that pretty much sums up the game in its entirety. Hanging from a gargoyle in Arkham City? Encapsulating moment. The train sequence in Uncharted 2? Encapsulating moment. The feeling of relief when you take the Duke Nukem Forever disc out of your console? Encapsu... okay, you get the idea.

Saints Row: The Third is pretty much a game made of encapsulating moments. The one in this video is perhaps the most encapsulating of them all, in that it's how I start each day in Steelport. (I should note that there is a fair amount of screen tearing in the video, and while tearing definitely exists in Saints Row 3, it's not usually so noticeable. I suspect something is up with my video capture cable.)

Aah, smell that morning air! Take in that scenic view! Okay, let's base-jump into a sprinting old-guy suplex and then go destroy some things.

You can contact Kirk Hamilton, the author of this post, at kirk@kotaku.com. You can also find him on Twitter, Facebook, and lurking around our #tips page.

Nov 11, 2011

Saints Row: The Third review

Saints Row: The Third

You really know you’ve made it in the underworld when you find yourself partying in a penthouse with an army of pink ninja bodyguards. In Saints Row: The Third, I’d achieved this within two hours. That’s it, I’m on top of the world, ma. No-one’s gonna bring me down.

Then the minigun wielding ogre clones showed up. In this free roaming city sandbox, you can never predict the future.

It’s worth saying right now that this is the stupidest game I’ve ever played. I mean that in a good way. If you find yourself demanding reasonable answers to questions like: “Why does the tiger in my car calm down when I do power slides?” or: “Why am I being chased by carts pulled by gimps, and why did they just explode?” then you should steer clear of this ramshackle madness. If, however, everything described so far sounds like the best game ever made, then Saints Row: The Third was built exactly for you.

The world’s most media savvy crime syndicate – the titular Saints – are back. But they’ve fled their home town of Stilwater to find their fortune in the city of Steelport: a generic neon metropolis studded with warped versions of American architectural landmarks. The opening scene has you and returning Saints Row heroes Shaundi and Johnny Gat dressing up as bigheaded versions of yourselves in order to rob a bank. The Saints have come along way from the grimy back alley thugs they were in the first game. They’re international superstars now. Your hostages ask for autographs as your team politely fills the money bags.

Then the women in trench coats attack. The Saints aren’t the only gang in town. The pompous Syndicate are the head honchos, and they demand that the Saints give over two thirds of all their Steelport profits to continue operating in the town. Your pal Johnny Gat politely declines by ramming their leader’s head through a plane window. One free-fall later, you’re on the streets of Steelport, and the whole city is unlocked, ready to be conquered.

Your mobile phone is the hub by which you accept new missions, check your bank balance, set waypoint locations and buy new upgrades for you and your gang. Important gang members will appear in your mission list when they have a ludicrous new task for you to perform. Completing these will unlock new safehouses and put you in contact with new gang members based in different parts of the city, unlocking more missions and furthering your quest to win over Steelport. Three gangs make up the organised crime syndicate that stands in your way, the slick European gunrunners known as the Morning Star, a lime green gang of Mexican wrestlers, The Luchadores, and the cyberpunk hackers that call themselves The Deckers.

Missions can be separated into activities and story missions. Activities are short, sharp tasks, and vary in quality immensely. Tank Mayhem throws you into a tank and asks you to roam Steelport’s streets, doing hundreds of thousands of dollars of gleeful damage within five minutes. A less stimulating task has you dangling from a helicopter with a sniper rifle, shooting enemies off the tail of a fellow gang member half a mile away. Even if they’re wading through the corpses of their nearest and dearest, enemy gang members will be completely unaware that they’re being sniped, and the perfect accuracy of the rifle make this a dull turkey shoot. Not good.

But then there’s Insurance Fraud. You drive out to a given crossroad, and must charge into oncoming traffic. Left clicking at the right moment to have your character ragdoll face first into the oncoming car. The more damage you take, the more money you get. Take enough punishment and you enter adrenaline mode, which lets you steer your flailing corpse in midair, letting you swerve into the path of more cars, racking up more and more insurance money. Brilliant.

Completing each mission unlocks it as a repeatable challenge on the city map. You can drive back to each location to kick off ever harder versions of the original mission for extra money. For me, only a handful survived the novelty of the first play through. The mad, mascot-slaying gauntlet that is Professor Genki’s Super Ethical Reality Climax was one of the highlights. The minigame in which I had to cruise through a dull, undulating track on a Tron light cycle dodging firewalls wasn’t. Saints Row’s activities are wildly variable, but short enough to let you blast through the naff ones.

For every few you complete, you’ll get access to a hefty story mission in which the Saints fend off a major attack from one of the three rival gangs of Steelport, or strike out to take some territory for themselves. These missions contain some of The Third’s finest moments. Diving out of a helicopter into a penthouse swimming pool in the middle of a rival gang party, and then wading out with a rocket launcher to the sound of Power by Kanye West was one. Taking cover behind an angry, naked Russian ogre man to do battle with an army of clones was another.

Story missions also put you in touch with Saints Row’s surprisingly funny cast of characters. Some are just jerks. Fine, they’re all jerks – but you’ll separate the ones you can’t stand and the ones you’ll choose to drive around with you based on how much of their schtick you can handle. The pimp who speaks entirely in autotune is amusing for the first two missions, then I endeavoured never to meet him again. On a more socially acceptable level, the vengeful Shaundi makes a welcome return from the second game, and the seven foot tall, turtle neck wearing Oleg is a lovable addition.

The humour blends a shock and awe assault of nudity and narcotics jokes with some knowing, clever oneliners: “When will the rescue chopper arrive?” “Oh, in about two waves of SWAT guys”. I teetered on the brink of genuine offence throughout, but stayed on the happy side of disgusted. True, it’s a game that lets you hit an innocent pedestrian fatally in the face with a huge purple dildo, but you can’t hire a hooker, drive her into the middle of nowhere and shoot her. And there are no women-slapping quick time events, or any of the other moments of nastiness that GTA slips under the radar in the name of parody.

The ridiculous, funny, disgusting balance that Saints Row strikes with its characters, and the all-in attitude to mission objectives, forms the glue that holds the whole thing together. Considered in isolation, its mechanics are solid at best. The driving is easy and fast, even if the cars feel a little weightless. Choppers are powerful but sluggish and the shooting is almost laughably easy at points. My most powerful weapon for the first third of the game was the pistol. You’ll be able to wipe out a room by chaining together headshots: these enemies like to cluster together and all seem to be exactly the same height. It gets around this later by throwing huge hordes of stupid but determined opponents your way. They come skidding up in decked out cars, mounted in trucks, sniping from helicopters, sliding around on rollerskates, and as you progress you gain access to ever more powerful weaponry, like UAV drones and a gloriously destructive shock hammer. The combat in The Third is rarely challenging, but it does get pretty spectacular.

This over the top combat forms the basis of Saints Row: The Third’s co-op survival Whored Mode (aping the Gears of Wars Horde Mode). It’s a good way to get into a fast fight, but it’s been made redundant by the fact that a friend can jump into your campaign at any time to play. The addition of co-op only adds to the playground feel of the city. You can start huge, escalating fights with any of the three gangs by wading into their territory and shooting them. If you’re not concerned with the story you can buy the local establishments in each territory, boosting your hourly salary and earning you discounts in shops. Unlocked safehouses can be expanded and customised, there’s a brain melting array of costume options available, and you can even buy upgrades for you and your gang’s vehicles.

It’s mad. In fact, it barely makes any sense at all. But for all its wonky bits, there’s an odd charm to Volition’s decision to leave nothing on the drawing board. It’s not the largest sandbox, but it is packed full of brilliant toys. Saints Row: The Third’s commitment to unrestricted, ridiculous fun is unflinching, and the product is a city full of glorious slapstick debauchery.

Nov 11, 2011

Intimidation Played No Part in These Saints Row: The Third Review Scores

Saints Row: The Third

Here comes Saints Row the Third, walking down the street without a care in the world, waving its giant purple schlong about for the whole wide world to see. Why is it in such a good mood? Perhaps the assembled game reviewers have the answer.

Okay folks, it's getting old now. As Kotaku's resident Frankenreview crafter, I'm responsible for building all of these charts, making sure they're eye-catching without being too garish, and that they maintain a certain design symmetry. All of these perfect 100 scores are ruining that. Batman: Arkham City, Battlefield 3, Super Mario 3D Land, Skyrim, Uncharted 3, Skyward Sword; it's a cavalcade of perfection, and it's getting on my nerves. I figured I was safe with Saints Row: The Third. We suggested you buy it, sure, but it's a game marketed with sex toys. Surely it won't get a perfect score anywhere.

*eyes the chart and sighs* Oh just go read your damn Frankenreview.

Intimidation Played No Part in These Saints Row: The Third Review Scores

Destructoid
Saints Row 2 is one of my favorite games of this generation. Taking the silly violence of "Grand Theft Auto III trilogy" and ramping it up to near-farcical degrees, Volition created a game that was like nothing else out there, despite resembling every other sandbox game on the surface.

One of its most compelling aspects was the playable role of an irredeemable villain whose sociopathic treatment of others made for a truly vile character. A real scumbag, yet one that we couldn't help rooting for due to the sheer magnificence of his or her bloodthirsty antics. It was a game about being evil, and not in the pussyfooted way that other games present playable villainy. It was pure, malevolent, all-encompassing turpitude, and it was spitefully good fun.

Saints Row: The Third aims to top the outrageous behavior of the last game, and it certainly manages that in several ways. In a few others, however, it seems to have taken a drastic step back.

GameTrailers
The Third Street Saints are sitting on top of the world, with lucrative licensing deals, major motion pictures, and a very active finger in the crime pie in the city of Stilwater. Since there's little conflict in being number one, a shadowy syndicate moves in and kicks the Saints down the social, economic, and criminal ladder. That's the gist, and it follows an outline not unlike earlier games in the series, getting exponentially more absurd by way of hulking clones, Belgian bankers, and rival gangs that are also populated by walking stereotypes. The story doesn't pretend to aspire toward realism, with humor trumping structure, lessening the effectiveness of plot curveballs.

BSDM clubs that give way to auto-tuned pimps in pony suits set the level of narrative and trots on out from there. Offensive jokes, flashes of skin, and pretty much anything crude and rude run the show. Its cheap jokes get cheap laughs, and while there's nothing wrong with Saints Row not taking itself seriously, the game is also constantly stroking its own ego, combining pride and profanity, resulting in an obnoxious bit of mediocrity.

GamePro
It all begins with the character creation tool. I don't think it should be understated how awesomely democratic this feature is; you can be anyone, and I mean anyone, you want to be. The fact that your character talks and engages in cut-scenes makes each player's experience unique, and almost gives you the impression that you're taking part in the game's design. That's a pretty cool concept that was satisfying to see in action, especially as the story continued on. It was for me, at least.

The evolution of the character you play as — "The Protagonist," as he or she is referred to — doesn't end there. Saints Row: The Third is practically a role-playing game with all the ways you can enhance your character through personal upgrades, not to mention the system for upgrading your weapons and cars. As much as the open world contributes to the variety you'll experience in the gameplay, the customization options are another layer that enriches the entire experience.

Game Informer
When you're not taking part in one of the ambitious story missions, the series' trademark activities are scattered all over town. New distractions involve keeping a tiger satisfied while it sits in your passenger seat, riding a cyber bike through a computerized world, sniping enemies while rappelling down the side of a building, and participating in a televised deathmatch that feels like a cross between The Running Man and a Japanese game show. While most of the distractions are fun, some tedious activities like Trafficking, Snatch, and Escort make their return instead of more entertaining alternatives from Saints Row 2. That game's Fuzz, Septic Avenger, Fight Club, Demolition Derby, and Crowd Control activities seem like a natural fit for this sequel, but they're surprisingly absent.

Regardless of a few omitted favorites, Saints Row: The Third features no shortage of activities, side-quests, collectibles, and humorous distractions. Between them, the wealth of new upgrade options, co-op play, Whored mode (a Horde mode clone), and the explosive story missions, there's no shortage of content. It's also good to see Volition continue to make the series less buggy with each installment. Occasional glitches will rear their head as you cruise around the new city, but they're rarely more than cosmetic. Taking over Steelport as the 3rd Street Saints feels like a more focused effort than its predecessors' campaigns, and it'll keep you laughing throughout.

The Gamer's Temple
As you play the game you'll have to face more than your share of gun battles with police, rival gangs, and even the military. The gun battles are fun, not just because of the variety of weapons and explosives at your disposal, but also because the controls don't get in your way. The controls are tight and responsive, and you'll be able to take on hordes of enemies without taking on the controls as well. If a battle has you overmatched, you can call for backup from either random flunkies from The Saints' rank and file or from some of the NPCs you've forged alliances with. The NPCs each have their own special skill, so calling in the right person to back you up in a pinch can make your job easier for you. The AI of your allies is pretty good and they're there for more than show, doing their fair share of the work in taking out the enemies. The enemy AI isn't quite as good - their attacks tend to fall into patterns that you quickly learn to recognize and it's pretty easy to flank and take out an enemy hiding behind cover. Most of the challenge you'll face will come from the sheer number of enemies the game can throw at you at once. This can sometimes be frustrating as a near endless stream of enemy reinforcements can come streaming at you until you're overwhelmed. Luckily, death just means a trip to the hospital and some medical fees conveniently deducted from your bank account.

Games Radar
Saints Row has always been seen as something of an also-ran, but The Third finally says, in no uncertain terms, that it's just as big and even more fun than its more serious competition. Some might be tempted to dismiss the game because of its extreme wackiness, but know that at its core, the game is incredibly well crafted and ceaselessly fun. While the comedies typically lose out to the dramas come awards time, none of it changes the fact that Saints Row: The Third is one of the best games of the year, and given this year's competition, that's no small compliment.

Did the gang just jump from Third Street to Main Street?

You can contact Michael Fahey, the author of this post, at fahey@kotaku.com. You can also find him on Twitter, Facebook, and lurking around our #tips page.