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The Boss - An incredibly badass Sociopathic Hero who truly cares about their friends and would risk their lives for them, or a plain and cruel sociopath?
Are the Saints still true to the ideal of being a lesser evil compared to the gangs they pit themselves against, or are they no different? Julius claims the latter, based off his experience of running the Saints.
During Corporate Meltdown in the Corporate Warfare DLC, Dex tries to reason with the Boss by saying that Eric Gryphon's "not who you think he is". It's left ambiguous if Gryphon is actually more nefarious than he appears, or if Dex is simply trying to save his own skin.
Alt-Itis: The Boss can be customised in many ways, including appearance, clothing and voice. Dialogue and reactions can change for the same mission/activity, depending on what customisation options are chosen.
Anticlimax Boss: Most bosses are easier to defeat than to get to, except Veteran Child.
Awesome Music: There are ten radio stations (two of them are purchased by Ultor part-way through the game), all with different genres.
Crosses the Line Twice: The Boss, and occasionally Gat. They may do some cruel things to people, but like the rest of the game, they're so over the top one can't help but laugh/cheer.
Designated Hero: The Boss (and Saints overall), particularly regarding the handling of the Brotherhood. The first half of that arc was back-and-forth revenge rather than actual gang warfare.
The Tornado attack helicopter, due to their powerful homing missiles. Three of the five missions listed under That One Level are so designated because they involve being attacked by Tornadoes.
At higher notoriety levels, enemies in cars will try to run the player over, and carloads of them will attack the player. While driving, enemy cars will try to ram into/spin the player, particularly in activities such as Drug Trafficking and Snatch.
Even Better Sequel: Some people view the game as better than the first due to an improved story, more to do and much more customisation.
The Bear, an armored vehicle with mounted minigun, is easy to acquire early in the game. If modded it for extra durability and speed, is even more broken.
Completing the Red Light District Escort mission, rewards one with the ability to have any vehicle in the garage delivered for free (completing level 3 provides it, but for $1000 a pop). Works even during some activities like Drug Trafficking and Mayhem. On its own, useful. With an APC in the garage, it's practically cheating.
Completing the Hitman diversion gives infinite ammunition for assault rifles. For some reason, this also gives infinite ammo for a sniper rifle that can destroy any vehicle in the game with just one magazine of bullets.
Shogo Akuji may be a Smug Snake, but he just wanted to impress his father. Attacking Aisha's funeral is what undid him.
Maero was content to engage in petty thievery to fund supping up his monster trucks, getting tattooed by his guitarist best friend, and had a girlfriend he could rely on. Then he decided to make that 20-80 offer, which started the ultimately fatal war against the Saints.
Memetic Loser: Donnie just can't catch a break. First, he gets a gun in his face while mourning Lin. Then he's forced to sabotage his own gang's vehicles, almost getting him killed. Then he's cornered by the Boss again, being beaten to a pulp for information about Carlos.
This could occur in various missions for the Boss. Poisoning Maero's tattoo ink with toxic waste, getting Jessica killed inadvertently by her boyfriend Maero, and even using a bartender as cover for gunfire and blowing her corpse up to escape a Masako hit squad. The Boss also cripples Matt's hand with fireworks, ruining his livelihood as a tattooist and a musician, even though he isn't involved with the Brotherhood's business. He even explicitly says that Maero doesn't tell him anything because he doesn't want his best friend to get mixed up in gang violence. Announcing to Julius in the secret mission that it's 'my city', and that they don't care about cleaning up the streets before killing him can also count.
Shogo Akuji crosses it when he orders Jyunichi to kidnap Aisha, who winds up killing her when she tries to warn Johnny and the Boss. To make things worse, he betrays Jyunichi in a fit of pique and tries to personally kill the Boss and Gat at Aisha's funeral.
DJ Veteran Child didn't seem all that violent initially, even confused about how to go about punishing dissidents. However, he was more than willing to remorselessly abuse and kill his ex-girlfriend Shaundi as well as the Boss so he can save his own neck.
The Brotherhood when they tied Carlos to the back of a truck and dragged him through their turf.
Narm Charm: The Boss is over-the-top so often that they shouldn't be taken seriously, but they are also so unflinchingly brutal that they manage to be effective nonetheless.
All the Saints that died, including Carlos, are always put on the Boss, even if they couldn't stop it.
A meta example: It is almost impossible to discuss the Boss without bringing up their more infamous actions, such as having Jessica kidnapped and crushed to death. The Boss was made more Affably Evil in future games, and other characters poke fun at the Boss' previous nature in hindsight
Aisha's murder during the Ronin arc, especially if one played the first game. Carlos's death and Veteran Child taking Shaundi hostage during the Samedi arc as well.
Killing Julius in the hidden mission, for some players. The dialogue of the closing cutscene will probably make some players feel a bit of Heel Realization.
Sacred Cow: Widely considered the best game of the series, being a Surprisingly Improved Sequel to the original and differentiating itself from GTA by being Denser and Wackier, while still remaining reasonably grounded and serious at times, unlike the following games, who earned more mixed reviews. Aside from the disastrous PC version, criticism.
99.0 The Underground is a pirate radio station, so it has a limited range. Unfortunately, said range is incredibly tiny, with a clear signal only covering about a quarter of the map, making it impossible to listen to it on a consistent basis. Luckily, Scratch That sells the songs that play on the station, allowing one to listen to the station's songs anywhere.
NPCs telling the player that they smell bad if they wear the same outfit for too long.
Activities having six stages in them can be tedious, especially for the more difficult ones such as Mayhem and Trail Blazing. The sequels did away with it by breaking up activities into two separate versions with an easy, medium and hard version each, making it much more convenient.
Sequel Displacement: The first game was given average reviews and is only available on one console, but this game was released on more platforms and was improved on the first game.
A random female pedestrian admits to shipping Shaundi/Aisha and saying "They're going to be together forever!"
The Boss sometimes makes comments implying they ship Pierce and Shaundi.
Signature Scene: The ending cutscenes of the Brotherhood mission Red Asphalt and the Ronin mission Rest in Peace are often used as examples for the first two games’ tone compared to later entries in the series, with the former being a massivePlayer Punch and Tear Jerker, and the latter being both cathartic and horrifying.
Special Effect Failure: The nurse's shirt in the opening cutscenes of Jailbreak doesn't stay consistent between the cutscenes played before and after the Boss is customised.
Strawman Has a Point: Julius was right when he told Troy he was not going to be able to convince Playa to drop their flags. In Revelation, he tried to reason with the Boss, but the latter killed him as revenge for planting that bomb 5 years ago.
Surprisingly Improved Sequel: The first game was given decent reviews, but was criticised for being a GTA ripoff. In contrast, the second game was much more highly praised for being unique and having a lot more to do, and even seen by many as a worthy rival to GTA.
Suspiciously Similar Song: The theme of the FUZZ show that the eponymous activity is based off sounds a lot like Bad Boys.
Assault on Precinct 31. Between the ridiculously uncooperative helicopter controls and the police copters spamming homing rockets, have fun.
Bank Error In Your Favor. Is not necessarily the hardest mission, it's just that there are so many ways to botch it. The player has to drive to a bank, take Jessica hostage, drag her slooooooooowly to the top floor to have her deactivate the bank alarm, drag her slooooooooowly to the street (all the while shooting security guards and SWAT strike teams and making sure they don't flank the player), tuck her inside her car, then drive the car to the stadium about 15 blocks away. Now, did she get killed accidentally by the cops or Saints in the crossfire? Restart at the bank door. Was she accidentally thrown her or executed because the wrong button was pressed? Restart at the bank door. Did the car get totalled during the chase? Restart at the bank door. That's right, the one mission that absolutely needs a checkpoint in a game otherwise filled with them doesn't have any. Oh, there's also a rare and juicy assasination target that has an habit of showing up during the chase, and stopping the car to take him down will get it totalled.
One Man's Junk..., where one is forced to fight the timer for the entire mission to get to a junk at the marina where a sword-fight is occurring. Despite the fact the Boss can drive over there quickly enough from the start, they are forced to go to a nearby dock and drive a jet ski over there, which cues the respawning attack helicopter with depth charges thrown at the player. At the marina, the Boss has to run through a maze of Ronin and flaming boats to reach the boss fight (again on a time limit), and if the player fall off the boats, restart from the checkpoint because there's no way to easily get back on the boats. Finally, once the Boss gets to the fight, the sword-fight is a lot more annoying than the one against Jyunichi since there is a lot less space, and there is fire around the place, though it can be used to damage the enemy.
Salting the Earth...Again, where the player drives a car to a dock to pick up a boat to drive it to a yacht. Once the player get in the little speedboat, Ultor sends an attack helicopter with homing missiles. Sometimes, the copter will send the missiles early to taunt the player. If the player is Smoked anywhere before they get to the yacht, they are sent to the start, at the Saints' hideout. Even if the player shoots down the chopper before they get on the boat, Ultor will shortly sent another, requiring some luck anyway to get to the yacht.
The final mission ...And a Better Life. Specifically, the part where the player has to get in an attack helicopter and blast four small targets on the side of a building while avoiding getting blown out a sky by the other attack helicopters, which have guided missiles that can take out a helicopter in two hits. And naturally, as a nice kick in the gut, dying at any point during this segment of the mission will send the player right back to the beginning of said segment.
Crowd Control's laters levels, with groups of 3-4 aggressive fans at once spawning in quick succession. Towards the end of levels 5-6, they may even have handguns or rifles, which nearly instantly raise the harassment level to the maximum level, causing a fail. The big money makers e.g., garbage trucks and throwing fans off the balcony, are time consuming and allow many fans to swarm the celebrity. The player is also not initially armed, and usually can only acquire a baseball bat.
Drug Trafficking's later levels can be a little difficult, but level 6 of each, particularly the Brotherhood one, can take several attempts. The Brotherhood's Compensator trucks take amazing punishment, while dishing it out on the player.
Escort, where avoiding the press and other privacy-invaders can be very difficult. Clients will request targets to kill, request different stunts to be done with the car, and even request the player to drive halfway across the city to a location, all the while avoiding getting filmed. Shooting a gun also decreases the pleasure bar, though to avoid it, simply set the weapons HUD to unarmed.
Heli Assault Level 6 has the player flying a helicopter to defend a van through tightly packed skyscrapers and/or mazes of highways. It's very easy to bump into skyscrapers and other tall objects, and the rival gangs also have attack choppers. On the last stop, the game spawns a car right next to Shaundi with a rocket launcher, meaning that the van can get blown up seconds before the mission ends. Oh, and Shaundi and Pierce bitch whenever they take damage, even if was avoidable and even if they hit an obstacle themselves.
Mayhem levels 4-6 are impossible unless the player is a freak at blowing things up quickly while avoiding the cops and gangs.
Trail Blazing from level 5 onwards. RNG regarding the number of people and vehicles often determines the result.
The Tow Truck Diversion, for the truck's poor handling (with vehicle attached), lack of progress saving and low time limit. The Three Kings prologue mission gives a taste of it.
They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot: The Corporate Warfare DLC ends up with the Boss vowing to track down Dex and eliminate him for his treachery, but it was never followed up on. Saints Row: Money Shot would have had Dex being assassinated, but it was never released. Killing Dex's husk at least seven times as a challenge in Gat out of Hell was seen as anti-climatic.
Tough Act to Follow: The acclaim this game received was always going to be tough to achieve again, but the changes made for future games were seen as inferior.
Unintentional Period Piece: Despite the game taking place in 2011 (five years after Saints Row), the setting is very reminiscent of 2007-2008, especially with the fashion, music and cultural references. This is due to the game actually being released only two years later than the first.
All Maero had to do was be a little more polite and argue his case a little better, and an entire third of the game could have been avoided, including some truly ugly deaths. And, the funny thing is, if the other two gangs are defeated first, the Saints are actually larger than his gang. Its like a lizard making a deal with a crocodile to catch a chicken, and offering a wing in return.
Speaking of deals, there is Shogo giving Jyunichi's position away to the Saints, arguably his gang's most capable man. I get it, he wanted to prove he could lead the gang/show his father he was a man. He attempts to pull a Uriah Gambit that ends up failing spectacularly and cripples the Ronin past the point of no return, or at least gives them a big push in that direction. Way to go Shogo, you idiot.
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