The January sale on the PlayStation Store is over on Wednesday and today’s mention goes to Saints Row: The Third which was €29.99 and is now €14.99 (€13.49 for PlayStation Plus Subscribers) until 30/1/13. This was originally developed by Volition, Inc. and published back in November 2011 by THQ. The next entry to the series is likely to be by Koche Media, who bought the franchise when THQ was divided and sold this year.
I have never played an entry in the series before this and haven’t spent much time with Grand Theft Auto games since the days of the original PlayStation so I won’t really be able to comment on how it compares to them, other than the fact that they are both sand box games that have you take control of a criminal in a city. In Saints Row you’re not working your way up the ladder from the start, you begin as the leader of a crime gang trying to take control of a new city from the gangs already there while dealing with the police at the same time. The most obvious difference is that Saints Row: The Third is out and out off the wall comedy the whole way through. In every mission effort has been put into making it outrageous and bizarre, and it’s awesome. Missions can range from driving around town with a tiger in the front seat to insurance fraud, which has you running into traffic to see how much money’s worth of damage you can do to yourself in a set time.
As you begin you can make your own character and the choice is massive. Players can end up looking like themselves or I found it was possible to make one look convincingly like Captain Planet with blue skin and green hair. The option to be male or female is there and there are 8 voices to choose from. Voice acting here is really top notch, you can be an overweight woman with a man’s voice or you can have the character speak in zombie growls for the whole game. Throughout the city there are various shops to buy new clothes for your character and you can customise the colours of these too. If you’re getting bored of how you look then there is even a shop which performs ‘plastic surgery’, allowing you to edit how you look or what gender you are again in the middle of the game. Customisation doesn’t stop here; all the vehicles are open to this too, allowing changes to the paintwork, wheels and other features. There are RPG elements to Saints Row as you have the option to upgrade your health and add members to your gang which becomes larger as your progress. Vehicles and weapons are also upgradeable, so you can make your car’s defence stronger or change from a grenade to a fart in a jar. This whole game is about just letting you enjoy yourself; tanks, helicopters, boats and jets are all available for you to play with. Destructive weapons like RPGs are there for you along with ridiculous weapons like a giant purple dildo.
All of the outrageous scenes you go through are well written, the characters are likeable and even though they’re all clearly mad, how they react to each other is great to see. What did bother me though was how characters act towards you and how your character reacts to them. I chose a female character but found at points that what she was saying and how she acted seemed much more aimed towards a man’s actions. I understand that the story was probably written and the option to play as a woman was just added to that but it was strongly noticeable at certain points in the game. From what I’ve read about Saints Row, the boss was a male in the first entry to this series and due to an accident got reconstructive surgery in the second entry where the option to customise your character became available. Perhaps being able to look and sound like a woman but act like a man stems from this.
The graphics for the game aren’t bad but they wouldn’t stand close to games like Metal Gear Solid 4 or Uncharted. Certain sections are full of life and colour but other parts feel bland and empty. There is a nice selection of music you can play on car radios, it doesn’t compare to the amazing collection in Grand Theft Auto but is still enjoyable.
Playing online is an option so players can join your game or you can join theirs. The whole main campaign can be played this way and having players drop in and out is very simple. It adds more hours to the game since even if you’re finished the story, you can join in on someone else’s with all your weapons and upgrades. A lot of DLC is available to purchase too if you find yourself wanting more from the city of Steelport.
Saints Row: The Third is full of tasteless jokes but it doesn’t take itself seriously. The whole game makes every effort to ensure you’re having fun and enjoying yourself whether you’re following the humour filled story or just messing around in the city. I didn’t really ‘get’ the game for the first hour but after that I found it to be one of the funniest games I played last year. Here is a game that can put you in a good mood playing it.