Saints Row 2 Is Still The Best and The Most Complete Game In The Series 

I don't know what is a bigger tragedy, the fact that volition barely recognise the first 2 games, the ending mistake of saints row 1 or that when most people think of saints row they think of the wackyness of 3 and 4 rather than the grounded story of the first 2 games

Saints Row 2 will always hold a special place in my heart. I remember I'd play this game constantly at the age of 8.

I like how in the original Saints Row, Ben King tells the player, even if the they take out the Vice Kings it won’t be over, giving a bit of foreshadowing…

This game was completely underrated and arguably far deeper than GTA5. It is a good alternative to GTA4 and both of these games are peak imo of the open world gang games.

This game is truly lightning in a bottle. I've played dozens upon dozens of open world crime adventure games and this one still always comes out on top of them all for me. As much as I still love the Saints Rows that came after it (yes, even 4 and Gat Outta Hell) they just don't match this game's tone and storytelling. Really hope Saints Row 2 gets the remake it deserves someday.

I liken Saints Row to the Evil Dead franchise. The first SR is a crime game with elements of comedy; The Evil Dead is a horror movie with elements of comedy. Saints Row 2 carefully balances action, drama, and humor, like how Evil Dead 2 balances horror, comedy, and fantasy. Plus, this is where their leads found their footing and became the badasses we know and love. Saints Row 3/4 is the Army of Darkness of the franchise. It turns up the action and humor, though the decision to do so divided the fanbase. Some liked the aliens and dildo bats, others didn't.

When I was a kid my mom never let me play gta because of news outlets at the time. So because of this I had the opportunity to enjoy games such as true crime, and saints row. Saints Row 2 grew to be my most favourite game of the series due to the amount of weaponry you get and your character is an actual gangster, you have the choice to fight four different factions. Two of them being gang members, another being a Yakuza like gang and the fourth is corrupt ultor. It’s even more of a plot twist when you find you Julius is a traitor. The mini games were fun too like truck surfing, trying to see how long you balance on top of a moving truck.

Idk why but the court scene with Johnny gate has always been burned in my brain! " THERE IS NO STATUTE OF LIMITATIONS FOR MUDER!!" 😂 Iconic exchange.

I see Corporate Warfare as SR2's Epilouge with You being Friends with Vogel's Replacement Eric Griffon, leading to The Saints being Celebrities, or as Julius puts it "Vice Kings wearing Purple".

1&2 are two games that will hold a high place in my heart when it comes to games. Played the hell out of them. Remember the day I popped the 3rd into my 360 and stopped playing a hr & a half after and only touched once more after to make sure I wasn’t being too harsh on it.. have hated the series since

Saints Row 2 to this day is the greatest sandbox game out there, not to mention the story and gameplay being so amazing given the year it came out and how it carries despite it. I loved it and it deserves a remaster

Right there, when you said "While GTA was going more realistic and tame, the world wanted something more Bombastic and wild" That is the definition of Saints Row and SR2 is the pinnacle of that. This is what SR'22 should of been, a GTA V Clone, but just as wild and as crazy as SR2 was against GTA IV, coming in with the most bizzare and most crazy of things this decade of internet has a problem with. They could of went against Cancel Culture, how everything is filmed for views, how people rather tweet than oppose. Yeah they would of gotten the Anitas, and the Twitter crew blasting their game, but that is whats needed SR'22 could of been something special if they went back to SR-2 levels of storytelling

Despite being commendable in intent, Julius's plan is fundamentally flawed. He forgot the most important rule about power: it abhors a vacuum. Even if the Saints managed to take out all three gangs and then disband themselves, new gangs would arise to take control. We even see this in the second game: having been out of commission for five years, three new gangs moved in to take the Saints' place. The only way to ensure that more gangs won't arise is to keep the Saints active.

I don't think Loa Dust is a MJ derivative. When Shaundi introduces it to the player she uses a light bulb. The only thing you'd smoke out of a bulb is stuff you'd want to vaporize.

As much as I LOVE SR2 The graphics seems washed out especially during the daytime and threw me off cause the core gameplay and story was and still is engaging so yeah we definitely need a Remastered desperately🙏🙏🙏

Keep in mind Shogo got connections with Ultor and Dane Vogel, which his father then completely trashed, leading to Dane telling the Saints about the hotel the Ronin has control over, Shogo was actually running the Ronin fairly well, but when Kazuo stepped in it slowly started to fall apart

Fun fact, the protagonist is technically not silent in saints row 1. He has a few speaking lines during cutscenes, but otherwise is a mute.

I honestly think Saints Row 2 is just straight up my favourite game of all time. It's my comfort game I've become lazy these days on starting new games and learning them so I always find myself just booting up Saints Row and playing all over again. Or just messing around. The most relaxing thing I can do is load up Saints Row 2 and just mindlessly have fun for hours.

Volition really did have the perfect formula with SR2. A big diverse city, grounded story, interesting characters and whackiness on the side. They could’ve built on that and made a fantastic sequel/game in general. Following Dex to a new city should’ve been the way forward. I fail to understand why the game developers seem so adamant on steering as far away as possible from it with each instalment. I think it would’ve been better to arrive in Santo Ileso for the new Marshall job, knowing no one and then build from there.

I remember when Zero Punctuation named this his Game of the Year for 2008. That's when I first really noticed Saints Row. Still haven't played it tho.

There are voiced lines for the Playa in part 1. There's only a few and they're short too.

The graphics weren't great but i still thought it was perfect. Fun gameplay, lots of sidequests and activities, one of the best character creators of any game i've played and an amazing soundtrack with so much depth in it. Story was funny, sad, terrifying and badass. I wish it could get a proper remaster.

SR2 Was one of the few games I played over, and over, and over, and over again and again when I was younger. I miss it lol.

It’s a shame how saints row 3 destroyed this fire, that the saints row series once had.

I replayed sr2 after a decade, and it actually lived up to my nostalgic memories. The frame rate is far worse than I remember, along with the controls and the AI but the driving is better than I remember, still crap though. Everything else just as cool as I remember. Aside from the unlocks maybe, 15% clothing discount? No barnstorm reward? The funniest part of the story is Pierce, he’s desperate to get in the action and murder people, ultimately he’s denied every chance for it and ends up as one of the few characters nothing bad happens to through the entire series, because nobody noticed him.

When I was young...In my mind - I always looked at this game as "San Andreas 2" in an alternate dimension where you get to play as the ballas lol. All time classic and its the peak of the Saints Row series. I only wished that the modding scene was bigger and that old volition team gave the community modding/debug tools. can you imagine the fan-made overhauls and expansions??sigh... if only

Thanks for the trip down memory lane! One of my favorite games as a kid- ahh, the good old days.

Saints Row from 2006 was my favorite! I was only 14 years old and I loved it!

the reboot : exists Saints row 2 : you're a cheap fucking knockoff

is nobody gonna talk about that character created that looks like a mix of all the wolverines mashed with most of the 90s WWE wrestlers 😂

Played SR 2 through 4 (haven’t played 1 and completely finished 3) and 2 is definitely my favorite from the franchise!

This game truly is one of the game of time, for sure. Really great video on a really great game

I love SR2. One of my favorite games of all time. But to say it has some of the best third person shooter mechanics in all of gaming is actual insanity.

The first game was a chore. Yes, it had great ideas and parts were seriously cool, i.e. the world building where there were characters all throughout the city, being able to break into stores at night, and the story was pretty good. But my GOD, was it an unforgiving game. The city wasn’t easily traversable, meaning certain side missions were absolutely a chore; the mayhem and car chases weren’t enjoyable because of the easy deaths, which also transferred into numerous story missions. I only managed to finish the game twice and couldn’t play any more for my own sake. The soundtrack wasn’t great either Then 2 knocked it out of the water. Had the same world building, but with much crazier mission designs, and again, real continuity between story and gameplay. The fact that you and Gat could raise a bit of carnage outside the story was cool for me, and I especially loved how much tighter the side-activities were. They were no longer a chore, and I almost forgot about the main story at times because I wanted to go beyond the infinite respect and just unlock shit to blow every gang member to the smithereens. What also made the game more enjoyable, was being able to actually sit back, enjoy each moment without the fear of having to restart an entire mission again (some in SR1 took a good 15 to 25 minutes to complete). What they had also done with 2 was take the stuff from 1 and ramp up the speed. Everything was faster, from the car chases to the gunfights, and far more explosive (again without the fear of having to tediously rethread everything). The absolute carnage that could occur in a car chase or shoot out was beyond anything I’d seen in a GTA game, with rag doll bodies flying in multitudes alongside bits of cars, glass from a shop window, or bits of suburbia getting absolutely annihilated mid-chase. Bear in mind, this came out a few months after GTA 4, and while I really loved 4, SR2 was the first time I had ever found a GTA-clone to be actually ON PAR or an EQUAL to the actual GTA, to the point that just MAYBE a few extra additions and it would have been better, (what sells GTA for me is setting and backdrop too) but in the end, SR2 is a game I honestly have absolutely no criticisms about. The soundtrack was much better this time around too.

Only game I’ve seen where they throw aspects of an online open world game into the campaign, (ex: buying personnel properties with customization options, choose the style of your gang/ vehicles, custom radio station and etc.)

I've played through this whole entire game so many times and I still love watching videos about it

This game was more fun than gta 4 it wasn’t just a gta clone and even it was so what it’s doing a great job at being unique game

Volition has a chance to improve the reboot if they were to follow the footprints of saints row 2 if they even make a SR2

I played Saints Row 2 as my first Saints Row game when it was randomly made free on Steam in a sale like 7 years ago. I was still new to gaming and hadn't ever played a game like that before and I loved it. I loved the open world and the character customisation and the humour in the game. I've tried Saints Row 3 but I couldn't get into it. I don't fully connect with the lore cause I never played the first game but for me it's still the only one I need to play, and stands pretty well on its own.

Two things you forgot to mention: - This is the same Ultor from Red Faction. - This game has two DLCs, one of which stars a porn actress.

My XBOX360 finally died on me about a year ago and this was one of a handful of games I was playing until the very end Fight Night champion Saint's Row 2 and godfather 2 to this day are some of my favorite games ever I'd probably buy another 360 just to play them again

I have both on gamecube an both are great. Love the channel! You cover alot of things I've been revisiting lately.

This was a trip down memory lane. Can't tell you how many times I played through this game. Truly one of the best open world, crime games. This was my first Saint's Row game and got me into the series

this is my favorite by far. I actually played it well last the original release but man am I glad I started with it

Saints row and saints row 2 story in both was the best written story in a gangster game I’ve experienced. Whoever wrote the story in both games and had the ideas definitely did a great job and needs to be recognized. These two games made the series. I remember playing saints row 3 being really disappointed how Johnny was “dead” and how they change shaundi. The game wasn’t bad like saints row 4 but it wasn’t the step in the right direction just the wrong one. The only thing I liked about saints row 3 was stag I thought they had fun and crazy missions and had a big boss feel compare to morning star.

I have a feeling SR2 is about to get a lot more players coming back bc of the new reboot disaster…

great video, keep it coming. thnx for uploading

I started with saints row 2, and it was an amazing game and experience. None of the others compare.

Ive been re playing saints row 2 before the new game comes out tomorrow. SR2 is easily the best in the series, so many side quests and exploring the map!

You explained perfectly Why SR2 is the best game

For some reason the intro had me dying. Bro sponsored himself

Great vid, you should do one on Roadkill.

Dude I’m replaying now and having the time of my life

I’m replaying it right now such a fun game can’t believe i was 9 years old when this game came out

Oh to be in middle school again, playing 1 and 2 via the double pack

they need to remaster this game!

steelport doesnt touch Stilwater. it's in the name, stagnant rotten water breeding filth as a theme from the beginning

One thing is sure, the should have retconned the new one, pick up after 3 because 4 was just "ok we're done here have fun"

Me after playing SR 2022: Look, how they massacred my boy. JUST MY OPINION. SR2 is undoubtedly the best SR ever 10/10. SR3 was fun, not even close to 2, but fun, more like 8/10. SR4 was very weird, but overall, okayish, 6.5/10. SR 2022 is just bad, simply bad, those idiotic woke devs ruined the series, -10/10

I like how SR2 lets you play as the bad guy. The bosses take no shit I'm the best attitude is so fun to come back to.

I just love how Stillwater is based on Detroit

2 was the perfect mix of slightly quirked up and serious

Amazing review, but not enough mention of Charles Shaughnessy (Mr. Sheffield in The Nanny) voicing the cockney British voice option. Definitely one of the reasons why 2 is the peak of the series! 😏

The soundstrack of SR2 is top notch

Demolition Derby unlocked some core memories of the 64 game LOL

The true spirit of series died with Gat in 3 intro

I First Learnt About SR this year. I saw through a part by part playthrough by A RU-vidr of OG SR and i immediately fell in love with it. I watched the Playthrough from the same person of SR 2 too. It was great. Yesterday just finished playing SR 3 1st time and it was terrible compared to the Older ones. They completely Went Over the Top with the game the Ending left Me questioning my willingness to spend my time playing the game and the story and characters are forgettable at best. Such a Shame that they went from Vice Kings , Sons Of Samedi to The Deckers. The Syndicate weren't even an issue if you had a good story. Literally like Two Story based missions in and you're already taking out Loren. How can taking out a whole gang operation be This easy. There's no build up to the demise of the Morningstar leaders and an overall waste of an Antagonist with potential. I completed almost all the activities besides Hitman And Car Jacking but really felt empty inside like i was expecting something that wasn't there. It didn't really the same like SR and SR2. Although the activities were enjoyable , fun over the top ngl

The thing I love about saints row 2 is that the story wasn't over the top nor did it try to make it super funny or whacky, it did have it's moments when it's dark, funny or had some lore to it but when saints row 3 and 4 came along the series wasn't the same.

I will always appreciate saints row (The first one) and saints row 2.

Saints row 1 protect the pimpin was the shit to 💯

Hear me out: saints row 2 is one of the best games ever made but the best 3rd person gunplay is max Payne 3

For sure my favorite Saints Row game. I had the disk for xbox 360 and it broke. I saw it was free on xbox like a week ago so i down loaded it and started to play it again

Good video I disagree with something’s about it like how the aiming is top notch and all the missions being great but over all I liked the video.

This is why the reboot is so upsetting. They hyped it up by saying they were going back to a more serious tone like sr2 and instead we got Just Twitter 5.

I like the reboot more than 3 and 4 by far, but 2 still takes the cake for me. Wish the reboot had multiple purchasable Cribs and just more of those little things, but oh well

Maybe my favorite game of all time. When they killed off Johnny Gat I knew Saints Row 3 wouldn't be the same and it just wasn't.

Big W! You earned a sub my guy!

The console version of SR2 is the best in the series. I wish the PC port functioned properly.

I'm finally going to get my physical 360 disc so I can play this awesome game on my Xbox 1.

Always liked carlos was always upset he had to die

These games look/feel 6 years behind the industry… we’re in 2022 and it’s still the same shit with SR

My only complaint about the first 2 games were needing respect for the next main quest. Sure it was easy to get but still had to do a small grind in between to keep going. I like how the third introduced you to each side mission but didn't force to do a few levels.

I completely agree with the title, I played the game yesterday (Aug. 26th) and compared to one; the activities are so much more fun than the rest of the series. I didn't even do missions until I had finished a good handful of activities. From the rest of the series I didn't like much, other than insurance fraud and Genki's Murder Time or something like that. P.S Of course I love the story of 2, Liked 1, mildly indifferent to 3, and okay with 4.

You should cool this video "Saint Row 2 Story summary"

Saints Row 2 is probably in my top 15 games. I liked 3 too, but never finished 4 and the reboot leaves something to be desired.

i think in the long run I will always enjoy saints row 3 and 4. those type of games are usually in my alley and I enjoyed plugging in hours in 4. i think if i had gotten the first two sr games for the 360 i would have a more better fondness for the series. I did recently try saints row 2 on ps plus and after 30 mins i dont know if i liked it at all. but watching this video made me enjoy what the og sr games did to bring a better balanced fun sr

Give me a amazingly remastered SR2 I’ll buy the super deluxe edition!! Lol

Looks like it’s remaining that way.

Loved this game honestly none of them compared to the emotional depth that this one did. Maybe it's just rose tinted glasses but this one had an impact on me which kept me playing the 3rd and 4th... yet to pick up the reboot.

There will never be another SR2 👏🏼

saints row 2 really got my into gaming sad teh series hasn't been nearly the same since

I only played a little bit of saints row one and loved it. Then years later played three or maybe it was four but I remember hating the wacky superpower nonsense an just thinking what the hell happened.

SR2 was so good that's makes me feel guilty for getting it free

I have only 1 problem with this video, you said "almost half a decade you've been out of it" I thought it was only 2 years?

My geniune fav saints row game

If battlefield and socom and call of duty can coexist saints row and grand theft auto as serious crime games can too. Everyone forgets Sleeping Dogs was like Grand Theft Auto and came out close to it.

I always thought SR2 was the best of the series myself

Ultor was funding the Ronin not the Brotherhood.

$3 was pretty good loved the constant action in it

The day they remake this they will finally set the world right again