Saints Row hands-on preview and interview – ‘we’re definitely more grounded’

metro.co.uk:

GameCentral gets to play the opening hours, and speak to the principal designer, of the controversial new Saints Row reboot.

It’s seven years since the last Saints Row game was released and it’s hard to say how much the world has missed it. Previous games have been very successful but 2017 spin-off Agents Of Mayhem was a dud, both critically and commercially, and so the upcoming reboot is vitally important to developer Volition and the future of the franchise.

Things have not been off to a great start, with fans upset that the new game does not feature any of the characters from the previous titles. There’s also been differing responses to its tone and art style, which has been described as both too realistic and too cartoony.

We recently got to play the first few hours of a near finished version of the game, and it’s not hard to understand some of the concerns about the new characters. The gameplay is certainly what you’d expect of a modern Saints Row game, but the question is whether that’s enough now, given how open world games have evolved in its absence.

The new Saints Row is based around the creation of a new criminal gang, with you playing as an entirely customisable character referred to only as The Boss, who conspires with three roommates who represent the existing three gangs in the city of Santo Ileso. The game starts off with you beginning a new job at a private military company called Marshall, which acts as the most high-tech of the three initial gangs.

This works as a tutorial for the third person combat, which on paper is fairly standard but in practice a lot more fluid and enjoyable than equivalent systems in Grand Theft Auto. There’s no cover system though, which is slightly surprising (although you are