Saints Row 4

Saints Row IV is a 2013 action-adventure game developed by Volition and published by Deep Silver. It is the sequel to 2011’s Saints Row: The Third, the fourth installment of the Saints Row series, and the final main installment in the original series that began with the original game. The game was released in August 2013 for Microsoft Windows, PlayStation 3, and Xbox 360, and was later ported to PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and Linux in 2015. The game’s open world nature allows players to freely explore a simulation of the fictional city of Steelport while completing main and side missions at their leisure.

Description

Similar to previous Saints Row games, Saints Row IV is an open world action game with third-person shooter elements wherein the player is free to explore the environment and, at their leisure, play story or side missions. As the leader of the Saints, a street gang that has become the world’s most “powerful and popular” organization, the player is elected President of the United States, receives superpowers, and fends off an alien invasion. Most often the player will engage in shooting and racing activities, though other activities vary from fighting crowds of zombies, shoot-outs in tanks, side-scrolling brawlers, fights against supersized, daikaiju energy drink cans, and using a dubstep gun to interrupt 1950s Americana.

The player-character receives elemental powers and superpowers that greatly increase their jump height and running speed, such that the player can hop over buildings and outrun vehicles. The elemental powers include abilities to shoot fire and ice projectiles, telekinetically toss things, and create shockwaves upon landing jumps. As the player progresses through the game, they can optionally upgrade their abilities and weapons skill tree by using collectible “data clusters” scattered around town. If the player becomes too rowdy, the alien race’s police analogue will intervene.

As in previous games, the player-character’s look and feel is entirely customizable via a robust character editor feature. The game is set in a nearly identical simulation of Steelport, the fictional city setting from Saints Row: The Third, though individual story missions have new, custom-designed levels. Saints Row IV’s story parodies science fiction video games, mostly Mass Effect 2, as well as films like The Matrix and Zero Dark Thirty, and other “nerd culture”. Some story missions are propelled by individual characters’ existential crises, as each Saint character is stuck in a personal simulation of their own hell, and must be rescued by the player. 

Other elements borrowed from video game culture include BioWare-style character romances and a Metal Gear-style mission with an unhelpful partner. City districts are “liberated” from alien occupation as the player completes side missions in occupied districts. Liberated districts increase the player’s hourly income, which can be spent on weapons, skills, and perks. Side missions include Insurance Fraud (where the player jumps into traffic to collect insurance money), demolition derby-style Mayhem, and superpowered foot races. Saints Row IV has a two-player cooperative mode.

A few months after the events of Saints Row: The Third, the 3rd Street Saints are called to assist MI6 agent Asha Odekar (Rebecca Riedy) and former Deckers leader Matt Miller (Yuri Lowenthal) in foiling a terrorist plot by former S.T.A.G. leader Cyrus Temple (Richard Epcar). The Boss (Troy Baker, Kenn Michael, Robin Atkin Downes, Laura Bailey, Diane Michelle, Sumalee Montano, or Nolan North) and the Saints’ top lieutenants, Shaundi (Danielle Nicolet) and Pierce Washington (Arif S. Kinchen), breach Cyrus’ base with Asha, killing him and preventing a nuclear missile from hitting Washington D.C.

Five years later, the Boss has been elected President of the United States for this heroism, receiving actor Keith David (himself) as Vice President, while assigning the Cabinet roles to fellow Saints, Asha, Matt and former Vice Kings leader Benjamin King (Terry Crews). Moments into a press conference, Earth is hit by an invasion from an alien empire known as the Zin, led by the ruthless Zinyak (JB Blanc), who destroyed the White House and abduct the Boss, Keith and most of the Cabinet.

After the Boss escapes from a computer simulation based on a 1950s sitcom environment with the help of the Saints’ hacker specialist Kinzie Kensington (Natalie Lander), it turns out that the Saints leader was brought into a virtual recreation of Steelport. Working to manipulate the environment with special powers, the Boss eventually reunites with Kinzie and Keith in a stolen Zin ship. When the group try to contact other Saints for help, Zinyak stops them by destroying the Earth. Enraged, the Boss re-enters the Steelport simulation to find the others that the Zin abducted, rescuing each from simulations based on their personal nightmares; which includes past harrowing experiences, and deceased foes.

Zinyak responds by having the Steelport simulation flooded with copies of gang members the Boss faced in the past, which causes Kinzie to suspect he is drawing them from the memories of someone else who has fought them. The Boss quickly deduces that the Zin abducted Johnny Gat (Daniel Dae Kim), who was supposedly killed years ago, but is the only other Saint who was in the gang longer than them. Despite concerns of their partners, the Boss rescues Gat from his own simulated nightmare; a recreation of Aisha’s murder. Reuniting with his friends, Gat explains that Zinyak captured him years ahead of Earth’s invasion, believing he could have thwarted it on his own. With this, Johnny officially rejoins the Saints.