Saints Row: The Third
Extreme - and then some
Review You shouldn't laugh at Saints Row: The Third. I mean, what's funny about bludgeoning an old lady to death with a three-foot-long purple dildo? Or kidnapping a gimp-wearing BDSM fetishist and forcing him to to pull your chariot in gladiatorial Pony Play?
Hand over the Carats
That's the crux of the Saints Row series. By seasoning its smorgasbord of indefensible crimes with infantile and often outlandish satire - not to mention outlandish attire - developer Volition makes vulgarity palatable.
It's a cheap trick learned from Grand Theft Auto, of course, but while its debt to the master of underworld gaming is profound and very obvious, Rockstar's divergence towards a more serious tone in GTA IV has left the sociopathic sandbox market wide open. It's a void that Saints Row: The Third steps into with anarchic alacrity.
Punch and shooty
The story – what little there is – once again revolves around the Third Street Saints. Now risen from simple street gang to household names, they've become the ultimate franchise business, exploiting their new found celebrity status to endorse merchandising from movies and toys to sportswear and energy drinks.
Having outgrown Stillwater, the Saints' plan for global domination takes them to the sprawling metropolis of Steelport and into direct conflict with two new adversaries: The Syndicate, a powerful criminal cartel comprising three factions, and STAG, a ruthless government taskforce intent on eradicating criminal gangs.
Shocks in store
In substance, Saints Row: The Third works exactly like every other open-world game. You tear around Steelport attempting to capture and control 'hoods by playing a variety of missions, buying up businesses and defeating the entrenched triumvirate of gangs, all the while avoiding the attentions of the police.
Next page: Player's a player
COMMENTS
Dear el Reg.
Thank you for teaching me the phrase "Cock Sock".
yours
phuzz
Poor Voda
Don't you know a 'fun' game when you play it... that's if you have played it. SR2 was more fun than GTAIV. This is more fun than what's out at the moment.
Even though I am ploughing hours into BF3 multiplayer with my comrades, it's SR3 that I keep thinking about, and what I want to play when I get home from work - and after the missus has gone to bed ;)
Cock socket is preferred as it is more descriptive and handily shortens to 'socket' in polite company.
I'm playing this game at the moment, it's very good fun but I think I marginally preferred Saint's Row 2. SR3 has spread out each of the side missions, so instead of just finishing one level and continuing with the next, you have to drive to another location in the city to continue. In one sense it prevents repetitiveness but in another it just breaks up the gameplay mid-flow.
SR3 also seems to be missing some of the better side-missions from SR3, like the bodyguard missions where you had protect a celebrity from their rabid fans by throwing the fans in front of trains, into lumberjacks with chainsaws, into the blades of a helicopter, etc. Also missing so far are the sewage spraying truck and the police brutality side-missions.
Still, lots of the good stuff is still there. Cars can be very heavily customised, the custom character creator is fantastic, there's loads of silly costumes to wear and so far I've still not run out of things to do. Driving a tiger around in a car is a favourite new addition to the game.
My only really serious gripe is that it's crashed on me quite a few times now, to the point where I'm having to remember to manually save after every missions. I'm not sure if that's because my 360 is on its last legs or because the game was rushed onto the shelves. Halo Anniversary hasn't crashed on me so I'm more inclined to blame the game at the moment. Hopefully there will be a patch at some point.
