Saints Row has always been a series that pushes the boundaries on what an open world can be since debuting on the Xbox 360 in 2006. What started as a player driven gangster’s dream has slowly turned into a caricature of most open world games. Since being liquidated, publisher THQ has sold off many of its properties including Saints Row. Developer Volition now releases the series under publisher Deep Silver, but is facing a lot of controversy, criticism, and bugs; the good news is that Saints Row 4 is the best addition to the series yet, but I think it’s important to keep in mind that Saints Row 4 was originally DLC for The Third.
Remember this year's Saints Row(opens in new tab)? Volition would probably prefer that you didn't, which might go some way to explaining why the studio recently decided to upgrade everyone's copy of Saints Row 4(opens in new tab) to its full-fat Re-elected Edition, containing all the game's story and cosmetic DLC and even introducing cross-play between Steam, Epic, and GOG versions of the game.
Unfortunately, that upgrade seems to have backfired, and players now report a myriad of bugs with their new version of SR4. Both the Saints Row Steam forums(opens in new tab) and subreddit(opens in new tab) are filled with players complaining of broken saves, crashes, and mods failing to function. It's also received a few hundred negative Steam reviews(opens in new tab) since the update. If it's succeeded in washing the taste of Saints Row (2022) out of players' mouths, it's only because it tastes even worse.
I wonder if Volition's getting reorged under Gearbox impacted the quality of their release.
When it comes ranking the Saints Row games, there are a couple of weird ones you have to consider, though this is Saints Row after all.
Juan at SwitchWatchTV got his hands on Saints Row 4 Re-elected for Nintendo Switch. Check out his review here and see what he thinks.
