Saints Row 2
GTA sans story is still fun.
Tags: Saints Row 2 Categories: PS3 Reviews, Reviews, Xbox 360 Reviews
Posted by Mike "Two Tone" McConnell on Dec 18th, 2008
| Title | Players | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| Saints Row 2 (title page) | 1 | ||
| Developer | Publisher | Genre | Online |
| Action | No | ||
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Saints Row 2 leaves me of two minds. What can be said about a title that takes the formula of Grand Theft Auto, strips out all of the grand storytelling, morphs smarmy satire into obvious parody, and goes straight for the prurient interest? This is the type of game that you wouldn’t play with your mom in the room, and no thoughtful protest can defend its existence – but that’s what makes this so much… well… fun.
If Grand Theft Auto is Punk Rock, Saints Row 2 is Green Day. It lacks the authenticity of purity, but at the same time you find yourself tapping your feet. Saints Row 2 may lack the substance of its predecessor, but it still manages to find a foothold in your mind.
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Now that I have lost over half of you that have bothered to read this review, let’s get on to the game. Like the first title, Saints Row 2 is all about customization – beginning with the creation of the player’s choice of destructive avatar. Although much of the culture here is based around gangster rap stereotypes, you can still have some fun if you don’t feel like reenacting Boyz in the Hood. I went with two choices, on the 360 a Asian Punk Rocker with a Scottish accent and a hulking Al Jorgensen look-a-like that sounds like Suge Night on painkillers. This level of freedom, and the fact a friend can join you in the mayhem, gives you a much different kind of experience than Grand Theft Auto has been able to deliver.
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So because that Sandbox nature is essentially the only redeeming quality, let’s look at this like a crime spree arcade game. The story of a kingpin returning from prison to retake the city one block at a time isn’t that engaging, and the voice acting is rather lackluster. I had more fun with this game when I just drove around looking for various activities to do. Here is my top three, the first is where your character is hired for the TV show, Fuzz. There are actually two but the intent is the same, you get to take a film crew on a ride around to stop various crimes around the city. There are six levels to each run through, upping the ante of destruction required to satisfy the bloodthirsty producers. I mean it may seem excessive to disperse skateboarders with satchel charges, but using a minigun to break up a steroid ring is just ridiculous amounts of fun. Next up is another mission where your singular goal is to complete a course on a four-wheeler, but the catch is that you’re on fire. To increase the time between checkpoints you must light pedestrians on fire and ram passing cars causing them to explode. After causing quite an alarm at my mental health, I will leave you with a tame one. Your character is recruited to be a bodyguard for an adult film studio, and this is six levels of drunk tossing. It’s quite stupid, but also quite fun.
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So that’s Saints Row 2 in a nutshell, a long torrid trip in the sandbox, If you have twang of guilt when mowing down pedestrians in GTA, this will send you to the confessional. So this is going to be a guilty pleasure at best, and I doubt the staying power, and advise developers that maybe shelling out a bit more for the scriptwriters.
| What Works | Score |
|---|---|
|
+ Sandbox is quite fun to play in + Customization + Co-Op adds a new level of fun |
8.5 |
| What Doesn't | |
| - The story is pretty much a disposable part of the game | |
| Under the Shrink-wrap | |
| The power of freedom beats out substance. Not for everyone, but still worth a look. | |
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Tags: Saints Row 2
Posted by Mike "Two Tone" McConnell on Dec 18th, 2008 and is filed under PS3 Reviews, Reviews, Xbox 360 Reviews. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can post a comment, or trackback from your own site.
