Saints Row IV

I started playing Saints Row IV a few days ago. I bought during on sale through the Humble Store, which granted me a Steam key. Part of the reason I bought the game so late was because I'd been hoping to find an overseas copy, unaltered by our out-of-touch government.

Of course, my Steam account identifies me as a fragile Australian, and I'd already read that the gifting-from-an-overseas-account exploit that was so popular during the Left 4 Dead 2 era didn't work for SR4. The sale was too tempting, though, and I resigned myself to an incomplete game. Much to my surprise, however, I found that the game I played contained all the content but for one weapon.

I didn't realise this until I actually reached the content that was supposed to be cut, roughly halfway through the game. I have no idea why I was this lucky; nothing I've read explains it. Though the content itself wasn't all that stand-out, I don't have to describe the satisfaction that comes with discovering something you were certain you'd lost. It was like finding a $50 note in my back pocket.

Obviously this very much a post release review, and that’s probably a pattern you’ll see a lot of. Unfortunately, I don’t do this professionally, and can afford neither the money or time required to do a review “the week of.” Hopefully the delays won’t bother many people, and my thoughts will still hold a modicum of value.

I’ve played every instalment of the Saints Row series, and have experienced the... somewhat inconsistent tone between games. If I was to plot the “seriousness” of the series over time on a line graph, it would probably look like the heart monitor of someone going into cardiac arrest. Saints Row IV is probably the most tonally stable game of the series, but the level of insanity is through the roof. You might be thinking that SR3 would be hard to top in that respect, but trust me; they go full batshit in this one.

The opening of the game sets the tone quite well. It starts with you (now the President of the United States of America) personally foiling a terrorist plot about 30 minutes before aliens invade Earth. You patriotically start blowing the shit out of UFOs on the White House Lawn with a flak cannon that takes fashion advice from Uncle Sam, before being overwhelmed and dumped into a Matrix-style simulation which grants you superpowers. (I’ve deliberately left some stuff out here; it’s not a spoiler, but it’s pretty fucking great.)

The superpowers are the main selling point of the game, and distinguish it from the rest of series. Though a completely new addition, they’re a core part of the gameplay, and they add a liberal amount of Crackdown to the feel of the game. So central are the new superpowers that many classic elements of the game are relegated to secondary focus. For example, though the world is just as populated with traffic as it always was, you’ll rarely find yourself driving, as you gain to ability to run faster than even the best cars within the first hour of the game.

Obviously one of the main draws of the game is it’s relentless humour, which mostly takes the form of jabs at pop-culture. In the Zero Punctuation episode for Saints Row IV, Yahtzee states that the game confuses satire and reference. I don’t know if “confuses” is the right word, but the game certainly spends most of its time in the latter camp. There are a few moments where actual satire is attempted, but like most things in the game it’s extremely obvious and over-the-top, almost exclusively employing absurd extensions of the “satirised” material.

This is not a bad thing, and I found myself laughing more often than I expected. Saints Row IV speaks the language it understands, and that language is absurdity. Reaching for the absolute lowest hanging fruit is the most ostentatious way is the mode of operation here, and it’s done with a level of unashamed conviction that makes even the most juvenile humour infectiously endearing. SR4 serves as an example of how properly committing to an idea (in spite of its ridiculousness) can be far more effective than toning things down for the sake of decency or broad-market appeal.

It’s very much worth mentioning that the satire is never malicious; the developers are obviously enamoured with the topics they deride, and it’s clear that every cheap shot is delivered with a fist of love. Targets include The Matrix, the triple-A modern shooter, and a number of internet hot-topics from the period in which the game was developed (furries and dubstep in particular). Subtler references can be found in weapon modifications and clothing. My personal favourite was “the Captain” pistol skin, though I’m sure many people responded well to the “Special Investigator” clothing item (a Cumberbatchian coat).

"The Captain" heavy pistol

Mass Effect is channeled fairly consistently as well. Instead of safehouses, your home base is a spaceship populated by your crew, most of whom can be “romanced.” This again is satirical, as most are instigated by walking up to a crewmember and essentially saying “You wanna fuck?” at which point the romance ensues. (Jim Sterling of The Escapist mentions this in an interesting video on sex in games.)

The Mass Effect influence also gives us “loyalty missions,” which are some of the more interesting parts of the plot. These focus on the backstory of your crewmembers, and are surprising in that they present the history as being far more central to the experience than you’d expect. A number of the characters haven’t been seen since the original game, which might be alienating to players less familiar with the series.

(Spoilers for Saints Row 2 in this paragraph)

Perhaps the most bizarre examples of this are the references to events from SR2, by far the darkest game in the series. For those of you unfamiliar with the it, the plot includes positioning a man to unknowingly kill his own girlfriend, and mutilating a musician’s hand so he can no longer play. These actions are performed by the player character, and are done mainly out of spite. The severity of these events clash with the tone of SR4 so completely that, until they’re mentioned, one could quite reasonably believe they’d been retconned out of the series. These reminders aren’t just confined to dire moments in the story, either; characters bring them up out of nowhere as you’re walking around, doing something completely unrelated. Hearing people discuss your history of truly psychopathic violence is incredibly jarring when you’re driving around in a Mars rover that looks like a panda, or shooting down a UFO with a gun powered by dubstep.

This tonal dissonance is minor, though, and is easily ignored. The main disappointment of SR4 is that many things are virtually identical to the previous game. The most glaring example is the map, which is a slight rework of Steelport from SR3. The vehicles and customisation options are also largely unchanged. All told, though, these criticisms are hardly felt. The plethora of new features are more than enough to keep the game interesting, and the reuse of these elements can easily be thought of as intelligent use of resources (especially when recalling the whole THQ thing).

Thankfully, some major annoyances found in previous titles have been improved. Firstly, there are a number of new ways to manage your notoriety (wanted level). One is by catching a flying golden orb (get it?) which appears nearby when you’re wanted. Catching the orb drops your notoriety to zero, and chasing it down usually takes around 30-60 seconds. Alternatively, you can just keep hammering away at your enemies until the notoriety level maxes out. This summons a mini-boss, and when it’s defeated your notoriety is reset. Both these options are significantly less tedious than finding a Forgive and Forget (SR1 & SR2), and more meaningfully challenging than walking into one of the 400 stores you own (SR3).

Another welcome addition is the ability to “recover” from being ragdolled. Any of you familiar with the series know how hideously frustrating this was in the past. Though the recover ability doesn’t completely eliminate the problem, it ameliorates it significantly, and reduces the number of times you die or fail a mission “unfairly.”

All of this, though, is ultimately gravy. The core experience of Saints Row, “wacky, fun violence in an open world,” is more present than it’s ever been. It’s rare you find a game brimming with so much raw enthusiasm that it boils over the surface and threatens to melt your face. Though I’m aware that not every game has the word “dark” eleven times in the blurb, it’s always refreshing to play something that embraces its ridiculousness so wholeheartedly. Saints Row IV knows exactly what it wants to be, and it fucking delivers. I don’t know what kind of money the developers made, or what kind of money they spent, but the audience for this game is going to get exactly what it pays for.