The extended Metal Gear Solid parody would also fall flat on those not familiar with the series.Īside from the gaming industry in-jokes, it's clear that the very premise of Saints Row IV may turn off fans of the genre. The 'romance' option where you can seduce a crewmate at the press of a button is meant to parody the storylines in Bioware games like Mass Effect and Dragon Age, but while I found it hilarious, I'm sure others who aren't as familiar with those games as I am may see it as misogynistic.

However, your casual gamer wouldn't know who he is, and would feel like they're missing out on an in-joke. I got a good laugh when I saw I could choose Nolan North as the voice of my character, since I recognized him as one of the most prolific voices in the industry. Going from copying Grand Theft Auto to parodying space opera-style stories like Mass Effect may gain you fans, but also lose others in the process. While I loved SRIV, I couldn't help but realize that I am very different from the kind of person who enjoyed the first game in the series. Naturally, Saints Row IV went even further and placed the entire world in a simulation, where the main character gained superpowers and fought aliens. Saints Row the Third was unafraid of offending anyone, and its degree of absurdity finally elevated the series to a new level of success. It wasn't until Saints Row the Third where the series truly caught my eye. While SR2 leaned on the wacky side, it was still heavily inspired by GTA. The third game in the series took the wackiness to a whole new level, featuring missions that defied the laws of physics, missions where the player jacks into a version of The Matrix, and above everything else, a giant dildo that could be to beat people to death. In order to differentiate itself from its more popular cousin, Saints Row 2 started the series' trend toward wacky humor, with increasingly bizarre missions, some of which involved spraying feces across the road. Like GTA, the story revolved around gangs, and the gameplay was open-world, allowing the player to complete missions at their leisure and using the game world as a sandbox to play in.

For those who don't know, the first game in the series was a typical Grand Theft Auto knockoff. However, as I played through the game, I got the sense that I didn't quite know who the game was designed to appeal to. The game suffers from numerous glitches and a few design flaws, but overall it was definitely one of the funniest games of 2013.

While I got the game too late to include it in my Top 10 Games of 2013, it's safe to say that SRIV would probably occupy my #11 slot. Last night I finished playing Saints Row IV, the most recent game in the series that started in 2006.

Saints row 2 eye for an eye