Spoilers---------------------------------------------------------------------------
look, im a big saints row fan, i even love the 4th one that a lot of people have a problem with because of all the super power stuff (literally the best part imo). im a fan of the absurdity, im a fan of the story, all the characters and how they interact, im a fan of the gun play, the sandbox, the customization, etc etc.
so regardless of what everyone said, everything i've seen, i have always wanted to give this reboot a chance.. and although i am glad i did, theres just no way i can recommend this.
let me start with the positives; i like the customization, it feels like the most we've ever been able to customize the boss, and its so easy to change everything, its all a few clicks away on your phone, at any moment, no cost, change the boss completely and thats always fun. of course guns and vehicles too, speaking of vehicles theyre super fun too. full of customization and variety, you can change any car into a tow truck of sorts and thats surprisingly fun to drive around the city with basically a wrecking ball behind you causing havoc. the side sweep mechanic is also satisfying when you get the hang of it, the drifting as well. never was too big on the cars before in saints row games but i did like them here. another positive i can think of is just the city itself. i've always kinda thought dessert areas in open worlds were usually kinda boring but all things considered i thought they did a pretty good job here making it feel alive. the map is fuuuull of stuff to do and see. obviously a lot of care was put into all the areas to make them feel unique, the structures, statues, alley ways, islands, idk i just would constantly find myself stopping my car to go explore whatever would catch my interest and it would happen a lot, i would also be rewarded most of the time with collectables or little objectives like hidden treasures or cash. other than that though, the rest was pretty bad.
now the negatives; the writing. dear god, the story was such a ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ pain to go through. i played some of it with my girlfriend and the amount of times we would look at each other in disbelief from the worst dialogue known to man. these characters are so unbelievably uninteresting and annoying. i truly dont remember a single joke landing and i was constantly forced to try to care for them when that was never a problem in the older games, they were just written so much better, they were grounded even in this ridiculous world, i was excited to interact with them and cared for them. every single time this game started with a mission saying "go meet up with Kev" i wanted to rip my ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ hair out. he's one dimensional and has a quip for everything, same for everyone else in the main crew. It felt so misguided like they didn't really want to make an insane crime sandbox, full of hard sociopathic criminals. None of them feel like people that would ever engage with any of this ♥♥♥♥, we're murdering and robbing in cold blood and then go home and talk about waffles, rent and capitalism. only good character is JR. nothing ever feels even a little grounded. its very frustrating but everyone and their mother have already talked about the story so even though i can go on lets leave it at that. gameplay wise theres really not much to these missions either. 99% i guess its just shoot a bunch of people. they do change the environments up a bit to keep it interesting and i appreciate that. some highlights were when we were in the prison, the train heist and the last mission in that huge building. no other mission sticks out to me. speaking of, the campaign is so short. the game starts with the saints church having a party, and we are attacked and buried alive, then we go back in time before any of that. when we finally get to that part in the story and see who did it, i thought i was like half way through or something.... thats the last mission before the credits. underwhelming for sure, that ending is corny bro. but its a saints row game, which means all the fun is in the side activities right? yeaaah man idk, the side stuff is equally as boring. a lot of it is copy paste from old saints row games, but in all honesty they're just there so you can do a couple of them, then generate cash. the ventures you can create all have a couple missions, they all feel the same, then you make extra money passively. youre done. speaking of cash all the cash you make in the campaign is like 1% of what you'll make doing these boring ventures so you should prob just do them best you can. not really too much cool stuff to buy other then like some guns or clothes, but theres like 500 different clothes stores all different, a majority of them are just like little vendors that have like 10 bad items, its such a weird hassle. all in all it was just disappointing.
i got this game on sale i basically paid like a dollar or something, if you are able to find it at that price then yeah, otherwise probably not.
TL;DR its a sometimes pretty fun crime sandbox with a cool map, being overshadowed with a terrible story, terrible characters, and boring side content. 5/10
