Saints Row 2 for the PC has countless technical issues and bugs but fortunately they won't stop you from playing this cruel, detailed and incredibly fun game. You get to create a character but you can't name them. You choose the usual stuff, gender, race (African American, Caucasian and Asian), hair, make-up, facial hair and the face shape customization is incredibly detailed but unfortunately (if you want your character to look unique) you'll have to spend at least 30 minutes at making your character's face.
You start off in a jail because you were blown up on a boat and you survived but you were put in a coma for five years (at the beginning, the story will make no sense to you at all if you didn't play the first game but later on you'll start to understand the plot). You belonged to a gang called "The Third Street Saints" which pretty much ruled the streets of Stilwater but after you were "blown up", the gang fell apart. You wake up in the prison's medical centre and a guy called Carlos Mendoza (who's one of the prisoners) claims that his brother belonged to the Saints and he wants to bust you out of there. After the short and quite easy Jailbreak, you arrive to the city and find out that everything has changed after you were put in a coma and that a clothing company called Ultor rules the city. From here, the real game starts and you will have to complete 45 missions to get your gang back together and rule the city.
The main story itself is quite long and it will take much time to complete it if you won't use cheats but there are also lots of other side missions called activities and diversions. Thanks to these, you will nearly never find yourself doing nothing in SR2. The graphics can be beautiful for a game of this type but if you want to play normally (because of the high frame rate) you will have to lower the settings to nearly nothing and then the game looks quite bad. The controls are good enough, though sometimes they can get annoying and the shooting can be impossible when your game lags. One of the best things in SR2 is the customization. First off, you get to create a character, when you get busted out of jail, you can change clothes, get tattoos, change hairstyles and when you see a car that you really like... you steal it, drive to a nearest garage and totally customize it and look like a millionaire when driving it.
Overall, Saints Row 2 can be really fun if you've got some patience, a good PC and you are not offended by swearing, criminal themes, blood, violence and gore.
OVERALL RATING – 7.5/10 (Good)
NEW GS RATING – 7/10