It was bound to happen sooner or later. Saints Row for the 360 is the first "GTA clone" that is actually better than the last few GTA games in many ways. In case you don't know, "GTA clone" means a 3rd person shooter involving organized crime where the player is free to explore their surroundings in between missions. A "GTA clone" usually strives to be as controversial as possible through the use of partial nudity, swearing, and drug use. How is Saint's Row better than GTA: San Andreas? Let me count the ways...
1. Graphics
Duh. Saints Row for 360 in hi-def obviously blows the PS2 or PC San Andreas out of the water. But the more important thing is that Saints Row is that it's still impressive when compared to other 360 games. People actually look like real people in the game, and clothes look 3-D and feel real. Everything looks pretty realistic, and cars look particularly real. It's still not at the point where you'd mistake this game for a movie, but it's getting closer.
The only real problem graphics-wise is that there's a lot of ghosting. If your character gets into too tight of a spot, he disappears. Oh, and your character has a strange jogging animation.
2. Team Based Gameplay
Ok, Rainbow Six this is not, but the Row's "homie" system is one of the main reasons this game is enjoyable. Depending on which missions you've done and how far you've progressed in the game, you can either call up a friend or just recruit fellow gang members you see on the street. You can take them with you on just about any mission. I can't quite put my finger on it, but this is better in every way compared the similar system in San Andreas. For one, you can revive a dead homie if you act within 30 seconds. Also, your friends don't act as dumb as in San Andreas. It also just feels cool when someone takes a shot at you and your homies jump up to your defense. And unlike GTA, they don't empty entire clips missing their shots.
3. Side Missions
Wow, this is probably the main difference. Everyone talks about how you have so much freedom in GTA, but there's really not all that much to do except to wreak havoc and play story mission games. Who wants to do the taxi or fire truck missions?
Saints Row nails this part of the game. Insurance Fraud is so much fun; you drive out to a busy street and flop in front of cars, hoping to cause as much harm to your body as possible so you can get a nice fat insurance check. This is more fun than it sounds. Snatch is also a fun game where you can take a few friends with you in a sturdy car, and watch chaos ensue as you try to steal hookers from a pimp protected by a rival gang. Drug Trafficking is also fun; you defend drug dealers as they go about doing their business.
Some of these sidequests really aren't that fun, but they blow GTA side missions out of the water. Story missions are still the most fun to do, however. They predictably involve taking over the town from rival gangs, but are sometimes quite creative. For example, in one of them you dress up as members of another gang and cause chaos downtown as camera crews follow you around so you can get bad press for the rival gang.
4. We don't need no stinkin' auto-aim!
This is why I always preferred GTA games on PC. The PS2's auto-aim feature was clunky and didn't work that well, and manual aim never felt right. Saints Row has no auto-aim feature, and as a result their free-aim feels right, with good sensitivity.
5. The little things
It never paid to customize a car in San Andreas because if you drove it to a mission, it would often just disappear. In Saints Row, your car gets transported to your garage when you're required to drive something else in a mission. Nice.
You can actually customize the race and everything else about your character now, as I guess the 3rd Row Saints are equal opportunity employers. You can do so much more to customize actually, with loads of jewelry, piercings, etc. Though I couldn't make my guy all Miami Vice looking as I wanted...there's no white dress pants. And unlike in GTA, you don't buy "Green Hat Backwards". You buy a green hat, and you can wear it at any angle you choose. They even have belts!
Conclusion
Saints Row doesn't have a good plot like San Andreas did, and you don't really feel much connection to the characters. Your guy is even a play on Fido/Claude from GTA3; he never talks in the beginning of the game, and people say stuff like "Thanks for the advice, man" and "You're a good listener". Then, every once in a while, you speak, much to the surprise of you, and everyone around you.
But the game is better than GTA in so many ways. The gameplay has the perfect balance, and while there's the occasional frustrating mission, none of them are too bad. Whenever you go into a room filled with baddies, you never feel like it's going to be too easy, but you never feel like it's going to be impossible either.
In fact, my biggest gripes about the game is that it's too short (actually at around 30 hours, maybe I just didn't want it to end) and that the ending sucks. Really really sucks.
Worst. Ending. Ever.
Which shows that the game really was never about plot in the first place.
Saints Row could be the last in the genre actually with GTA IV's focus on realism. You'll have to actually break into cars and you'll never become king of the town in it. While that sounds intriguing, for the time being let's break out the bubbly, anoint Saints Row the pinnacle of "GTA style games" for the time being, and pat THQ on the back for a job well done.
p.s. I got this at Gamestop used for $30-something I think. You can get it for $30 brand new at Amazon. Wtf.
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