Saints Row's Open World Is Chaotically Messy, And I Dig It
A lot has changed in the open-world genre since the Saints Row series came to its ridiculous conclusion amid an alien invasion almost 10 years ago. And with the reboot of the franchise, Deep Silver Volition seems to be looking back to that time, before open-world games were flooded with RPG elements and crafting systems. The new Saints Row feels a lot like a game from a different era, but with a bunch of additions that make it more than just a nostalgic return to the past.
I played about four hours of Saints Row at a recent preview event, which encompassed the beginning of the game. As with the original Saints Row, the new game is all about creating your own criminal empire--but you have a long way to go before that happens. It's set in the new city of Santo Ileso, a fictional location in the United States' Southwest that mixes an urban center, suburbs, and desert locations, and has the vibe of places such as Las Vegas or Albuquerque without being quite like either.
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Now Playing: Saints Row Hands-on Preview
From the outset, Saints Row takes a different tone than the last game in the franchise, Saints Row IV, which had gone into some pretty absurd territory. Volition has said that it means the rebooted Saints Row to be more grounded than where the series previously wound up, and while that's true, this is by no means a serious game. It has the feel of an action-comedy akin to something like the Bad Boys movies or a '90s Schwarzennegger romp. You're still a kick-ass hero who's great at fighting, you're just not
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