Mega Derived

Another day, another GTA inspired title. Here we go again, then. In Saints Row you play the new recruit into a gang of thugs determined to take out the other three gangs and rule your city. Or your ‘turf’. Whatever. Your character doesn’t speak and doesn’t have a name. There’s a customisation thing, here. And it’s good, too. When you’re not engaging in overtly misogynistic acts of beating up hookers, shooting other dudes in the face and snorting a line of blow off a toilet seat, you can fulfil your dreams of spending hours playing dress-up. There’s something for everyone. Only you can’t actually snort coke. Shame.

Basically, the city – named Stilwater – is a shithole. It’s no wonder it’s in such total disarray, though, the economy of the city has gone to hell: the cheapest burger at the local “Freckle Bitch’s” fast food resturant is twenty dollars. In comparison, you can buy a gun for a hundred bucks. Let’s work it out: for five burgers you can buy a handgun. In England you can barely afford a bullet for the price of five burgers (and, obviously, I’m talking from experience here). It’s no wonder I just shot everyone eating at the burger bar and stole their burgers, it just makes better financial sense. It gets even more ludicrous: for the price of five deluxe burgers, which look roughly equivalent to a Big Mac, I can afford to have a police car – that I stole by shooting a cop a few times and making off with his wheels – re-spawn in my garage. A strong economy is the backbone of a society, people, and that’s why this place is such a dump.

That, and everybody speaks with such venom. This is a rude little state, and rather unlovable. There’s not much redeeming about Stilwater at all, really. That said, I’m quite a fan of Saints Row. It’s obviously a rather neanderthal attempt at remaking Grand Theft Auto, but i’m okay with that. There’s plenty of driving, and plenty of shooting, and the combination works. I couldn’t give a damn about the storyline, however. The voice acting is almost entirely without charm, and the script just isn’t up to much.

Technically, it’s all a bit average. There’s a system of “respect” in Saints’ Row: you do enough stuff to impress your gang, you get a bar of respect. You have to spend one bar of respect to play a storyline mission. Therefore, you need to work away at various mini-games scattered around the land to complete the game. It can create a rather stunted experience, sometimes, as you reach a cliffhanger moment in the narrative and you’re forced to do some drug running for half an hour before you have enough points to continue. The menu is good, and the map is friendly, and there’s lots of nice little touches here and there. But nothing amazing.

This is probably how THQ seems gang culture, though. Think about it. We, the players, can view a world of urban crime presented to us by a load of middle-class white designers. If there was ever a game that epitomized “wigger“, this is it. Still, not bad. Not particularly great, either. If you see it going for cheap, consider it.