Developer Volition and publisher Deep Silver have been ramping up the rollout of new information on the upcoming Saints Row reboot ahead of its August launch, but it seems that leaks have beaten them to the punch. A new report was recently published by prominent insider Tom Henderson on WhatIfGaming, diving deep into several aspects of the open world title’s gameplay, including its combat, customization, and more.
Where combat is concerned, the leak focuses primarily on the game’s abilities, which are tied to a system called Flow. Flow will allegedly be tied to action in combat, with killing enemies, destroying vehicles, and the like awarding Flow Points. These, in turn, are spent to use Abilities, which range from shoving a grenade down an enemy’s pants (classic Saints Row) and then shoving them into a larger group of enemies, to using a smoke grenade to conceal your position, to hitting an enemy with an uppercut and sending them flying.
In addition to abilities, players will also have access to perks. As per the report, of the five total perk slots that players will have, the first one will be unlocked after completing the game’s first mission, with the other four being unlocked by spending in-game cash. Perks themselves will supposedly be unlocked by exploring, completing missions, side missions, challenges, and more. Meanwhile, they’ll be divided into three categories- Basic, Advanced, and Ultimate.
Another new mechanic described in the report is executions. Allegedly, healing in Saints Row will be tied to executions, for both your character and your vehicle, so killing an enemy or destroying an enemy’s car will reward you or your vehicle with additional health.
Various other aspects of the game have also been touched on in the report. Saints Row’s much-touted customization mechanics, for instance, will also allegedly include cosmetics based on other Volition-developed games such as Red Faction, Agents of Mayhem, and Summoner. Fast Travel, meanwhile, will task players with clicking photographs of landmarks in the open world, which players can then instantly travel to at any time. Meanwhile, the open world will also have a number of dumpsters, and dumpster diving here will yield vehicle parts, cosmetics, cash, and more, while collectibles will come in the form of drug piles.
Criminal Ventures is something else that the report described (Volition has also spoken about this feature in the past), and will include a wide variety of activities, such as dumping toxic waste, robbing bank vaults, repoing vehicles, stealing food trucks, committing insurance fraud, and more. One particular type of Criminal Venture will apparently also task players with beating up corpses or destroying their vehicles in specific ways to stage fake crime scenes.
The game will also feature a variety of accessibility options, as per Henderson’s report, including toggles for QTEs, eye commands, customizable button prompts, difficulty options, and more. Finally, Henderson also mentions in his reports that as per several sources (including some who have played the game), Volition is likely to introduce a multiplayer component to the game following its release- though that is not yet concrete, and hasn’t yet been officially confirmed.
These are all unconfirmed details for now, of course, but with Saints Row not far out from its launch, it’s likely that Volition and Deep Silver will be officially pulling back the curtain on these details and beyond in the near future. With Summer Game Fest coming up in June, it’s possible that we hear more about the game there.
Saints Row is out on August 23 for PS5, Xbox Series X/S, PS4, Xbox One, and PC.